Pour Some Sugar On Me

I am the worst hypoglycemniac (is that a word?) that I know of. If I go for too long without eating I will get the world’s worst headache that won’t go away. Just before the headache though, comes a period where I sort of enter “the quiet zone” and my personality flat lines. I can literally hear myself talking like a robot. It hit me last night as I was trying to finish my holiday pre-shopping scan of every item in every store. Unfortunately I had just entered a store and had just started my scan when I flat lined and an extremely perky salesman approached. I felt my force field go up immediately. That’s a barrier no salesperson can penetrate.

He wanted to know what I was looking for, in what size and what color. I let out a stream of monotone “I’m just looking” and with each non-emphasized word, he got more excited. It was a challenge; I had dropped the gauntlet and he was picking it up. Oh my word, couldn’t he tell I was running low on sugar and thus out of “sweetness”? I was a hungry sourpuss, a Grinch who was Christmas shopping. All of his excitement and sales-witchery bounced off my low glycemic brain like water off of a Rain-X’d windshield. I just didn’t have the time or energy to explain that I was pre-shopping scanning, or what that was, or why I MUST do it that way. I needed silence to ensure my scanning downloaded properly. Silence was not part of his game plan.

Salesman (SM): …but if you did know what you were looking for , what sizes would you need?

Me: (flatly) I have it written down on a list in the car.
SM: What are the favorite colors of the people you are shopping for?

Me: It depends on what it is.

SM: (Sensing that he was getting nowhere, he switched to his “How to deal with a difficult shopper” sales routine) Could you help me with something? I am not trying to sell you anything; I have some things picked out for myself and would like to get your opinion on them. (I zombied over to him) See these suits? I am trying to decide about tie and sock choices.

I looked and he had two gray suits laid out with three ties and three pair of socks. Each tie was nice and had a few spots of bright color . In the first, it was silver for the most part with a few little dots of lime green. The socks were bright lime green. The next was a tie, dark gray, with some bright blue spots in it. The socks were bright electric blue. The third was in the purple category. Somehow in the midst of all this, I hit the “I’m over it” stage and was really ready to just go home.

SM: I love these tie/sock combinations with these suits; my boss thinks I am crazy. What do you think?

Me: (Without taking a breath and looking him right in the eyes) I think your boss is really smart.

He stood there frozen and silent (I finally got silence). I heard a loud gasp to my right. I turned and to my right was the cashier. Her jaw had dropped to her chest while she took in lots of air really quickly. I looked back and the salesman and he said, “Ouch”.

I felt so bad. Where was my Southern hospitality? Where was my smoothing this over and not hurting his feelings? I know better; I was raised better. Apparently my sweetness is directly linked to my glycemic levels. I made a robotic effort to tell him that the ties matched the socks and looked good together but that I would have to wear them without the suit…..what? I realized how odd that sounded but as it seemed to give me an exit note, I took it.

SM: Now watch how I turn this around and sell you something.

Me: Watch the door.

I exited center stage. I knew it was time for me to go home. I knew I needed to eat something ; my batteries we just about dead. Did I go home? No. I remembered that I needed to get a kid’s gift and ran into Old Navy. While there, I decided to do my least favorite thing in the world…try on jeans.  Why? I have no answer for that other than I wasn’t thinking clearly at this point. I tried on every style in two sizes and none of them made me look the way I think I should look. I sat down my stack of reject jeans by the first stack of rejects and the tired dressing room attendant said,”So, did any of these work out for you?” She had no idea that she was dealing with a drone at this point who was suffering from IBS (irritable boy syndrome) . I was really hitting the point of no return and I answered, “No, none of them worked. They are all either irregular or I have a fat ___.”  (Sorry ladies, pardon my French) I’ll let you fill in the blank. Every now and then, when the blood sugar is low and the timing is right, I speak French. The dressing room attendant just looked at me and said, “We don’t carry irregulars.” Bazinga! It was time for me and my glutes to exit stage left.

 I am going to have to start stocking my car with Power Bars or something so that I can enjoy the Christmas spirit when I am in the midst of the hustle and bustle of it all. You know something is wrong when you are expecting peace and quiet in the middle of the holiday shopping frenzy. You also know something is wrong when you are not patient/kind with people who have to put up with the crazed crowd of deal hunting shoppers. Let’s face it, they are stuck in a big over scented/overstocked box, listening to the same songs over and over again…all day long. It’s holiday waterboarding for those poor sales people. I am going to have to go out and spread some cheer today to make up for last night. If you are looking for me, just follow the trail of Power Bar wrappers and you’ll find me.

 

 

Holiday Stuffing

I am not a “have a pizza delivered” kind of guy. I don’t know why but it is just something I have actually never done. I’ll bet I can count on one hand the number of times I have gone out and gotten a pizza and brought it back home. The only time I actually ever eat it is when I go out with people to a pizza place (or Marina’s on the square). For some reason, Sunday night, I had a hankering for pizza.
We had just had a two hour car ride from our relatives get-together ( a good time was had by all) and I had partaken in everything that was served. I told myself that I really didn’t need anything for dinner as I was about to explode but somehow, around 7ish, my man/bear/pig appetite kicked in. I was out an d about and decided that since there was really noting at home to cook that I would just go to my favorite Chinese restaurant “Most Happy Panda”…or something like that. Yes, before you ask, that is the one that I am pretty sure served me dead baby koi for the Shlimp Spayshell but I think we have mended that fence. On the way to MHP , I started thinking that I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to wait for them to cook it and that maybe I should just run to Subway, get a pretend healthy sandwich and call it a night.

I pulled in to the parking lot and suddenly remembered that there was a new pizza place across the street. My stomach and inner bear growled and my pig squealed to I drove passed the glass door of MHP and in my state of paranoia I am pretty sure the owner was looking out the door and saw me slow down and then drive off. This feud needs to stop. Anyway, the thought of pizza had more appeal than the thought of steamed “chickey brahkrees” and I went to the new pizza place.
The only kind of pizza I eat is veggie , with the occasional chicken pizza. I rationalized all this in my mind as no being so bad since it had to be somewhat healthy and that maybe I just needed to think of this as some kind of “cheat day”. So I walked in the door to order just a small veggie pizza. In my temporary state of perceived starvation, I ordered the medium bacon pizza. Bacon? I don’t eat bacon...except for Christmas morning (it’s a religious thing…something about a manger, a giant star that shined like bacon in the night, etc). Anyway , they told me it would be about ten minutes. Apparently this is the kind of place that people normally just “call in” because I was the only one there waiting…the entire time.

I have no idea why, but after a while I found myself reading information about “fat burning exercises” on the internet. I don’t normally read that stuff, especially not on my phone but for some unknown reason I felt compelled to learn more about this subject matter. The site was filled with  info and several videos on how to perform the exercises. I can’t remember which site I was on  but there were tons of mindless videos to help me not sit there and think about how hungry I was. After a while “seatitis” set in and I had lost all track of time. It just seemed like I had been there a really long time.
I heard a guy in the kitchen say, “Who is that guy sitting out in the lobby? He has been out there forever.” I looked up to see everyone staring at me and I slowly mouthed back the word “FOREVER”. Two men came up front and opened up some kind of storage hot box and said “Oh here it is; are you Perry?” I told them I was and asked what had happed. All I got was a “thank you and have a good night”. I asked if they thought it was now going to taste like a cardboard box but I got the same reply, “thank you and have a good night. So I left and looked at my ticket. I had been there 40 minutes. Mentally, I was dying of starvation.

I got home and checked the DVR and sat there and ate a few pieced of pizza while watching some show that was just too important to miss but that I can now no longer remember. Mmmmmm bacon pizza…with a little pineapple (you’ve got to get in a serving of fruit…if you are health conscious) and a hot spicy crust. If I had to guess, I would say they brushed the outer ring of crust with jalapeno juice. It was good but it set my tongue on fire. I could feel the burn….feel the burn….I remember reading something about that on the fat burning website. I WAS feeling the burn; it had to count for something. The more I ate the more I burned.

The reason I went for the medium was so I could actually have the rest for lunch the next day. As I sat there I remembered I was going to a company party the next day for lunch and wouldn’t need it. “Bacon pizza, that should be good for breakfast,” I told myself. So that was the plan until I started thinking about the fact that every day of this week was going to be some kind of “cheat day” and that just because I had overstocked on pizza it didn’t mean that I had to eat. Then that “starving kids in Africa” saying sounded off in my head….so many voices in my head, it ‘s just hard to always know which one to listen to. I decided to not save any for the next day. All I can tell you is that the last piece was just as good as the first.

So yesterday, I finally remembered that I was out of all my vitamins and went to go restock. A very energetic, salesman, who was, from what I could tell, a doctor of supplementation, gave me a free sample . As he was putting this miracle drug in my bag, he said, “This is going to give you a really/super/hard/intense workout. I informed him that I don’t actually do really/super/hard/intense workouts but that if it gave me a little energy, I would be happy. He replied, “No, you don’t understand, if you take this, you WILL have a really/super/hard/intense workout.  I just said, “I don’t see that happening but I will give it a shot.” He replied, “Oh, it’s going to happen…by the way, you may get body tingles for a minute, that’s normal; it’s fine. It’s supposed to happen.”

I drove to the gym wondering why this guy thought I needed to workout harder by just looking at me. So with that in mind and a fond/loathing memory of a bacon pizza (RIP bacon pizza, you were loved), I looked at the ingredients to this early stocking stuffer that had been put into my bag. It looked like vitamins, amino acids and caffeine…a  thing of two I couldn’t pronounce but sounded like native plants from third world countries, so it sounded relatively safe. I mixed it with water and went in to do my  “slothfit” routine. In just a matter of minutes my face started to tingle. It was weird. It was just my face, somewhere between a tingle and a burn. It eventually went away. I think it did give me a little more energy, kind of like tons of coffee (with the added splash of Icy Hot as facial lotion feel). My heart wasn’t racing or anything. I know, I know, I shouldn’t do these things but the 20 year old supplement doctor said it was safe.

This morning I woke up and looked like a teenager. Wow! By “looked like a teenager” I mean my face had broken out, not that I didn’t have any wrinkles. Apparently I woke up the acne demon from my teen years. It had to be the face tingle. I don’t think I am going to put this product on my Santa list. So today I am back to my whole grain rice/barley/spinach trifecta and I will be once again trying to Frankenstein the low fat/sugar free/ mocha frappaccino…with a shot of protein…maybe. More Christmas events coming up and visions of sugar plum demons dance in my head. I know: pacing, portion control…it only happens once a year…life’s too short…you only go around once…yadayadayada. I will enjoy it, don’t worry, every last bit of it...bite of it. Oh, oh, oh, Merry Christmas.

Stop and Go Buster

 
Dear Man that pulled his car out in front of mine while I was travelling 50 mph down the road,

               Thanks for teaching me my car’s 50-0 breaking distance. Thank you, also,  for teaching me that my bladder can jump up and smack the backside of my Adam’s apple. I had no idea. There is just no way to thank you for re-shuffling my files that were sitting on my car seat. It’s different pages from different files …that’ll teach me to not ALWAYS keep them in my manbag/briefcase. Tomorrow I will find out if green tea causes a permanent stain in car carpet.  Thank you for rearranging my trunk. I was convinced that it was completely full….apparently not. I have plenty of room now, right at the front of the truck. Thanks for showing me how quickly I can get my heart rate up to its maximum. I will re-live this moment over and over again and I should be hitting my fat burning zone much more quickly now. Thanks for taking away the “buyer’s remorse” on my new overpriced, Otter shock absorbing rubbery phone case…no regrets. Thank you for having my bucket list flash across my windshield like something off the Matrix and letting me see that the list is full and that I need to get started. Really, all in all, I learned a lot today, all because of you. Thanks for the memories.

 

Dear Arthritis,

               Thanks for coming back to visit during the holiday season and for being a little bit early this year. Thanks for reminding me to be thankful for what I have. Thank you for giving me the inside scoop on impending weather conditions. Please ignore the massive bottles of Osteo-flex sitting on my kitchen counter. There’s your welcome, now don’t wear it out.

 

Dear Guy in Class,

               Thank you for crushing the myth that “there are no stupid questions.” Seriously…..dude.  When you raised your hand I had no idea that I was about to encounter a myth buster. Thank you for slowly articulating your overmedicated rant while still keeping one eye open. It was a question I would never have anticipated, “Why do the police pull you over just because you took a sleeping pill an hour before you hopped on the interstate to go home, when your doctor told you to take it an hour before you go to bed but didn’t tell you that you couldn’t drive after taking it?” Huh…what…oh. I apologize if I stood there for a while with my mouth hanging open not knowing how to answer. I also apologize for the wisdom of the weathered lady with the husky voice sitting on the front row that chimed in sounding/looking very much like Willy Nelson, “It’s kinda common sense…hello!” Thank you Myth Buster and thank you Wilma Nelson.

50 Shades of Faith (a serious note)

I am sure there are more than fifty shades of faith. As for me, I have always seen two kinds. It seems there are those who just have it, like an artistic gift. Just who naturally had a beautiful voice or the ability to draw or paint whatever they see, some people seem to have faith naturally. They all can polish and hone their skills and perfect their abilities but nothing is going to take it away from them. They will always have it.

 For others, like myself, faith is like a plant. It has to been nurtured, fed,  watered and given light. It requires constant attention. If left alone, it won’t grow, produce or even survive. It will simply dry up, wither away and die.
 
I don't think that one kind is better than the other; one is just more difficult than the other. I’ve always longed for the “gift” but I just didn’t get it. I can, however, like a struggling musician, practice. I can practice over and over again for years and years and in the end, hope that what I can produce and create can be just as good as someone who just “has it” naturally. Not everything in life is easy. Maybe it’s those things that we have to work the hardest for are what, in the end, we will cherish and appreciate the most.

Nanas and Tatas

I asked a hair stylist today about a new product  for my hair and they assured me that it would feel completely natural once it dried. I just used it and maybe it’s because I put it over a pre-existing layer of hair gel, but I am currently a helmet head. I think those two products have merged into a hybrid concrete of sorts. Anystiff, the product also has an extremely strong scent. I am not sure what this scent is called but if I had to guess, I would say that it is probably called, “Nana’s hand cream.” Seriously, it’s hard core senior-scented. I hope it doesn’t turn my hair blue. I don’t think I’ll be able to use this in the summer without getting swarmed by bees…or without feeling like I need a shawl.

 
Tonight I was at Cheddars and there was a two year old boy at a table by me and that kid screamed at the top of his lungs nonstop for about ten minutes. The parents were in their early twenties and you could tell they were at a loss as to what to do. I kept thinking the kid would eventually wear out but he didn’t. Finally the mom got up and took him outside for a few minutes. When they came back and the kid sat back down, he started the same screaming nonstop. I started to think that maybe there was something wrong with the kid. He screamed on and on, louder and louder, stopping only to take a deep breath for better vocal support.  Those poor parents looked so helpless. At the table was also the grandmother. At some point Nana couldn’t take it anymore and I heard her say, “Let me give it a try.” Nana disappeared with the kid for a few minutes and then came back to the table with him. Now, I don’t know what Nana did or said, but all I can tell you is that kid didn’t make one single sound for the rest of the meal. Sometimes, going “old school” is a good thing. You go Nana.

 
When I got home tonight I saw that I had gotten a letter from Dow Corning. It was from their Settlement Facility Claims Processing Department. It seems that I am part of a multimillion dollar class action lawsuit. I have an ID number and everything. All I have to do is send them the paperwork showing when I had my Dow Corning breast implants put in and when I had them removed. If I still have them, I can get them replaced and or repaired, plus compensation. Seriously?  Really?  I have an ID number! What the…..? Have they been reading my notes? Is this about me being paranoid that someone has been slipping me Yaz in my flavored water at the gym? How do these things happen to me? Please tell me that everyone in the state of Tennessee got one of these letters. I may just go ahead and send in some kind of before and after pictures; you never know…stranger things have happened. If I suddenly disappear from Facebook and you get a friend request from someone named “Marsha Perry” that looks a lot like me with pigtails, take the friend request;  dinner’s on her.

 

There is a picture that was painted back in the mid 1800s that I just love. I call it Sunday In The Park, or something close to that(A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte ,to be exact). It’s a beautiful painting that shows people dressed in their period clothes, enjoying a sunny day in the park. There is lush green grass, a lake, children, dogs, everything you would expect to see on a perfect day in the park. What makes this painting unique is that it isn’t painted in brush strokes; it is painted in hundreds, if not thousands, of dots. It reminds me of what you would get if you took a modern day computer picture print out and blew it up over and over again. After a while you would see that it is nothing more than a series of dots. It’s hard to believe that someone had that perspective, that way of seeing things back in the 1800s.

 
I remember seeing scene in a movie in which the camera had zoomed in on one tiny area of this picture. It was on a shadow. Thus, all you saw on the screen were a few little black dots, maybe a gray or two. On the entire movie screen it was just those few dots. Soon the camera started to zoom back and a few more dots started to appear. Some red, blue and green dots appeared and the camera continued to zoom out and more colors of yellow, purple and every shade of the color spectrum all looking like nothing more than dots on the screen. The camera continued to zoom out further and further until boom, there you had it; a big beautiful picture of Sunday in the Park. It was such a great scene and such a great moment.

 
I thought about that scene for a long time. It hit me that there were so many lessons to be pulled from it. It seemed to me that it could be like a picture of our lives. If we were able to have a huge picture of our lives, from beginning to end, A-Z, it could look like this. Of course, for most of us, much of this painting has yet to be created. But if we were to have this painting of our lives, it would be as if every day of our lives was a dot. Every person that we met, every experience that we had, every moment that we had on this earth would be a dot, all different colors and all different shades.

 
We have so many moments in our lives that seem so random, so meaningless. If we could step back and see the bigger picture we would realize that it all goes together; it’s what makes up our own unique, colorful life. Some dots would be bright and colorful while others would be dark and dull. If we, like the camera in the movie, only zoomed in on the dark areas, the shadows, and all we did was to stay focused on those clusters of black dots, we would interpret it all as a very dark and bleak picture, one that we would not like. If we went from random dark spot to random dark spot and that is all we looked at, we would be missing the bigger picture. Life is full of highs and lows. We need it all to appreciate the good, the bad, the unimportant and the precious moments. We love the sunny days but when the sun shines it is going to cast a shadow. You have got to have rain to have a rainbow. We don’t like the bad moments that happen in this life but they do make us appreciate the good and remind us to hold tight to the things that we love. They give us perspective.

 
We have to step back. We have to step back and look at the bigger picture. Sometimes we just don’t have enough pieces of the puzzle to figure it all out and it might even take years for all the random dots to take form. All we know for sure is that each moment, good or bad, light or dark, help to make up a much bigger picture, a big beautiful picture that is our life. Not learning from our mistakes, making poor choices, poor twists of fate, all these things can create many more dark areas in our lives than we wanted but that doesn’t mean a beautiful picture is not going to be created from this. We just can’t waste our time focusing on the bad or worrying about the meaning of random events, all we can do is to try to focus on creating as many bright and colorful moments as possible and to appreciate the fullness and the richness of the picture that we are creating.

 

 

Starbuck's Wars

 
Ok, so a few days ago, I made my very first pot of coffee in my life. I was trying to copy  Starbuck’s Mocha Frappuccino Light. I know there are probably a million recipes out there but I decided to wing it. Coffee, ice, chocolate syrup, how hard could it be? Fortunately the coffee can had directions on how to make coffee so I just doubled it to make espresso. By the end, I was having the equivalent of six cups of coffee…with ice and chocolate syrup.  My ice didn’t blend as well as Starbuck’s ( I may have needed milk) but it was still not horrible for a first try.



I slurped it down on the way to the gym and pretended that it wasn’t bitter and that the ice wasn’t chunky. Mmmm, a frozen drink on a hot summerish day. It was almost like being on vacation. I think it was the first time I have ever been  sweating while walking into the gym. Who am I kidding? It would be even be odd for me to be sweating after a “work out”. When I got there I looked in the mirror and my face was red, my ears were glowing and I was starting to glisten. Oh yeah, I was feeling the burn and I hadn’t even started.  I was pretty much soaking wet when I was done. Now I am no brain scientist but I am pretty sure that I made an important discovery today. Move over Amsterdam scientists, I have discovered the cause of global warming: humans consuming fancy coffee. Yes, it became quite evident to me after consuming my mocha crappuccino that the areas around me got warmer. Everywhere I went was hotter, noticeably hotter…because of me. Combine my internal combustion and the warm fuzzy of something yummy and I am pretty sure that my core temperature had gone from 98.6 to at least 99.6, maybe even 100. That one to two degrees of difference can make all the difference in the world. This was huge…potentially more huger.



Then it really hit me, Starbuck’s have been popping up all over the country , especially after Y2K. This is also about the time that scientists from other countries started noticing polar bears having to jump off of icebergs into the frigid, icy but not frozen water. Oh yes, I had figured it out. Drinking fancy coffee causes the air around us to heat up because we are little walking portable heaters whose temperatures have just gone up…thus, we heat up and destroy the earth. I was pretty sure I was on to something and then I saw this:

 

It was an unmarked cup but I can tell; I can tell. What a discovery I have made. I thought more about it and remembered that I had double brewed my coffee to make espresso. Coffee…doubled…Co x2 …could it be…..holy cow/sweet baby Moses floating down the river Nile/ Samson with a high and tight…I had hit it, hit it big. All I know right now is that I have got to get the word out. I am going to need some press, and maybe a haircut. Maybe I can get someone to make a movie or a video about it and put it on Youtube.



 I know is that it’s been hot everywhere I have been this afternoon. The effect seems to be pretty long lasting too. I went on the square tonight and walked around and before I knew it, it was raining off and on. Freaky, that is the only way to describe it. The climate was changing from wet to dry to wet to dry all because I had consumed some fancy coffee. This is “end of the world” kind of stuff.



Wow, so Starbuck’s is enabling us to destroy the world and we are too addicted to our frou frou caffeine and the warm fuzzy feeling it gives us to notice it or to care. I know I can’t stop, nor do I really, really want to.  I’ll be buzzing tomorrow and until they come up with a decent alternative, I’ll just have to create a little heat. Sorry polar bears but you will just have to hang out on ice bergs, swim in freezing water and eat raw fish, or even be forced to consume the unthinkable, baby seals. So polar bears, until someone can create a non-dangerous frou frou coffee or until they can get you to a zoo in Florida and give you chicken tenders and vitamin pellets you are going to have to “make do” for a while.



Starbuck’s are here to stay, I am afraid; they are everywhere and just too big to fail. We rely on them to get us to work and back home again. I don’t see any easy way out of this. I have no intention of giving up my frozen coffee but I still feel the urge to save the world. There just is no answer…unless we could somehow offset the impact of Starbuck’s by taxing it. Maybe that would slow down the consumption and we could use that money to research alternatives…but not too quickly , just in case this tax thing generates a lot of money, plus, I need my frappaccino to keep me going to and from work.



Really, I don’t mind being the face of the person that saved the world and I don’t mind telling everybody about my discovery and our possible course of actions. As a matter of fact, put me in the pyramid for the tax collection and I’ll just go ahead and say “yes” to being the spokesperson for the cause. I mean, I wouldn’t want to open this Pandora ’s Box for nothing. It would be a great cause, saving the earth and all, but if I am going to stick my neck out and go up against the big coffee companies and save the world and make fancy coffee become even more expensive, I don’t think I should do it all for free.  I am going to need a little something to offset the costs; it’s the least I could ask for.



Well, I am off to find scientists to prove my theory. I also think we should start by stopping the farming of coffee beans here in America. It’s the least we can do to show everyone that we are serious about this discovery. That would a good start. The best coffee beans come from Colombia anyway  and I have a feeling I could work out a pretty sweet contract that would give me that ocean front retirement property I’ve always wanted in South America. Wow, I need to start contacting people. Maybe I'm more smarter than I think I am. Maybe I should have been a rocket surgeon or brain scientist.  All I know is that I’m going to need to get to work; this is going to require caffeine and wifi…

Occupying Grounds

 
I didn’t know that I pride myself in not being clueless but after tonight, I realized it. I have a new client that is a talker. He can talk two hours straight without coming up for air. Tonight we decided to meet at a coffee shop to write up an offer. It was…intense. Looooooots of talking. Anyway, we had our heads buried in papers and explanations and I noticed that we suddenly had a large 20 something crowd come in and that they were pulling chairs around and over for themselves. We just stayed  focused and talked…and talked and signed and talked.

At the end of our last scribble I sat up straight for the first time in over an hour and looked around. All the tables and chairs had been pulled to the other side of the room and everyone in the room was either sitting at the tables or standing behind the tables. The odd thing is that everyone was facing me. There was a large gap between my table and the rest of the tables. It was odd and very Stephen King. I looked to my right, only about two to three feet away max, and there stood a musician, a row of microphones, three other musician/singers to his right, and large speakers sitting up on large stands.



What had just happened? The nearest musician was standing there holding his guitar and looking at me. Then we had this conversation:

Me: Is there about to be live music in here or something?

Musician: Uh…yeah. The coffee shop closed over thirty minutes ago. Me: So, am I sitting on your stage?

Musician:Uh…yes. We need this whole area. We are about to have a music thing…a private music thing. You kinda need to ...yeah

 

I looked at the crowd that was looking at me, the arrangement of the room, the band, and I suddenly felt so clueless. I was “that guy” . My client had had his back to everyone and had an excuse. He jumped up and grabbed all the paperwork and started apologizing for the both of us. All I could do was stand there and turn red.. I have no idea how long the crowd had been focusing on us and wondering what was wrong with “the old guys” but they had a look of growing restless and it all seemed to be focused on me. That's a lot of bad juju; I could feel it.



I still can’t believe I was that “out to lunch”, completely clueless. I had noticed the place had a whole new crowd that came in and I knew that people were moving chairs and I saw a few speakers come through the doors but I just didn’t pay THAT much attention to it all and didn’t put all the puzzle pieces together.  I don’t think I can go back there for a while. I am so glad the band didn’t start up before I moved. I am a bit surprised that nobody came up and told us but I guess they thought it was obvious and that I was trying to do some kind of “occupy” thing.  My client and I stood outside for another thirty minutes where he explained the difference between aluminum tow bars and ….something,  but after a while, all that water and iced herbal tea called nature who in turn sent me a text. I told my client that I was sorry but I had to go…literally. I power-walked back into the coffee shop since “time was of the essence” and decided to go into the side door from which I had made my quick but tardy exit. I was afraid the front door might have been locked or that I would once again draw too much focus. I quickly made my way  across the parking lot and burst through the side door. I looked up and I was on stage…on stage…nice. All I needed was a microphone. That’ll put the brakes on the old bladder. I can’t imagine what the crowd, or band, was thinking when they saw me re-enter the coffee shop…on stage. I heard one of the stagehand/ sound guys say, “ok…well…” but I had to stay focused, head down, pace quick. The band kept on playing; they were real professional amateurs. I on the other hand, possibly from doing too many plays in college, looked up at the crowd, smiled and waved . It was one of those “hello, please keep your seats” kind of waves. I did have a fear that someone was going to stop me or tackle me or something but they just all sort of moved out of the way.



I left out of the front door and my client was still standing outside wanting to talk some more. I couldn’t . I was so embarrassed and horrified…I was, once again, embarrified. Being clueless is not something I am comfortable with. I may always be clueless but I am not normally aware of it. What a day; what a way to end a day. Looking back, maybe it was all that herbal tea. I am not used to it. I don’t  know what those hippie baristas might have put in there. I could have been high as a kite and not even known it.

Bar Hopping and Al Roker

 
Somehow today I ended up running behind to go teach class. It hit me as I was getting ready that I had not eaten lunch and that I wasn’t going to have time to fix anything. I knew there was a Subway on route so I just decided I would make a quick stop on the way. My brother had given me a coupon for a $3 dollar sub so I thought this was the perfect moment to cash it in. I may have been running behind but everything was still falling into place just right. By the time I got to the Subway I knew that I only had five spare minutes to get a sub and be back in my car and then make my five minute drive to class.

 

When I started to get out of my car I realized that I had forgotten my lifeline…my check card. I remember leaving it right on the corner of my dresser. I started to panic as I was running late and was getting really hungry and then I remembered that I had gone to the bank and had money sitting right there in one of those white envelopes they give you at the drive through. I opened it up only to find that they had cashed a check in hundreds….seriously? Do I look like a pimp/drug dealer?  Do I look like I want to LOOK like a pimp/drug dealer? After digging through my arm rest and coming up with $1.67, I realized that I was just going to have to pimp it out and walk into Subway with my head held high and not worry about what other people might think. It was my only option, so I marched into Subway at 12:50 with a $3 coupon in one hand and a hundred dollar bill in the other.  I was starving...and pushing the clock.

 

I ordered my six inch sub and could feel my heart racing as my sandwich architect just didn’t share my sense of urgency. I could also feel my inner man/beast growling and I am pretty sure I salivated on the sneeze guard (overshare?). As I handed the cashier my coupon and my hundred dollars I noticed a sign on the cash register that read, “We do not accept bills over $20.” I prayed the girl working there hadn’t read the Subway handbook. She looked at me and said that she couldn’t take it. I told her it was all  that I had but she insisted, in her second language, “Eat’s ouwah pole a/c” . I stood there with the coupon and Benjamin back in my hands and tried to convince her that I was starving and that the bill was real and that they had already had their lunch rush and surely had plenty of change but this girl wouldn’t budge. I looked at her, then at my sandwich that I couldn’t buy, then back at her, and for a split second, I had a criminal mind. I had a flash of pushing her backwards , grabbing my sandwich and running out the door. “I can take her” ran through my head for about a half a second. But in this  “survival of the fittest” scenario I knew she would be able to catch me and the other customers would more than likely slam me to the ground or at least ID my get-away-tank.  I snapped back to reality only to hear her repeat the company policy.

 

I got back into my car sandwichless, now with only five minutes to spare. I floored it and set a new land yacht speed record. That drive from interstate exit to interstate exit was the longest four minutes of my life. I knew there was no way I could stand up in front of that class for two hours with sugar-free blood. My mind raced and I thought about the fact that there was a huge gas station right off the interstate exit that is all of 60 seconds from class. “Interstate gas stations have tons of money,” I told myself. I pulled into that gas station like a cheetah going after its prey. I did a quick scan of the aisles and bam, there were the protein bars all side by side. There were so many to choose from at this interstate gas station/rest stop. I reached for the one I recognized and then noticed there was a chocolate one on sale and another. I went from bar to bar; I bar hopped and  nabbed the one on sale. Then I went right up to the cashier, whipped out my hundred dollar bill and the cashier didn’t bat an eye. I was out the door in under 60 seconds-ish. I’ve never eaten a protein bar in three bites before, but that I only had one minute until class time and I didn’t want to be late. I know walking into the room at the exact moment I was supposed to start talking wasn’t exactly what you would call “early” but I knew I didn’t want to be “late”.

I looked at the wrapper from my protein bar, right before I got out of the car because to be honest, from what I briefly tasted of it, it was delicious.  Across one corner of the wrapper were three little words, “Now with fiber!” “Hmmmm, my lower GI tract was still holding a grudge since last week’s “Fiberoo 2013” when I grazed on a handful of Fiber One bars throughout the day. I couldn’t decide if I should be concerned or not but since I was already walking into the building and into a classroom full of people and the clock was hitting 1:00 on the dot, I had no time to think things through.

 

I could tell I was on high alert throughout the first hour but all went well. For some reason, after I gave everyone a five minute break and class started back up, I felt a twinge….a rumble…a dissention among the ranks. I hadn’t been talking two minutes when I felt my colon raise its hand and ask, "May I be excused?" Oh no…not again. My brain quickly split into right brain/ left brain. The right side kept me talking and the story going. The left side of my brain started strategic maneuvers to align a complete system lock down, secure the boarder and sent out strict orders for all systems to “cease and desist”.  I’ve never concentrated so hard in my entire life. I was sweating.  

 

By the end of class people were crying all over the place. I must have been a bit intense, what with all the concentrating. I think it is the first time I have spoken while not smiling. I am going to say that they could probably see the pain in my face and I probably looked really serious. Looking back, I feel sorry for the people sitting in class but there wasn’t a part of my brain left to handle reminding me to relax my face and smile. Sorry, but I wasn’t about to stand up there and “Al Roker” myself right in front of the class. Apparently my recent  “lower GI training” had paid off and the crises had gone from high alert to low alert. 

 

On the way back home I thought about what had been averted. I went through the whole “worst case scenario” (Al Rokering) and I think that if that had played out, I would have just walked straight out the door, faked my own death and moved to a third world country under the name of Marcos Antonio. I might have sent a card home to let everyone know that I was ok…but I am not sure about that. A fake death feels more appropriate.

 

I got off at the next exit and pulled into that same Subway. I walked in with my $3 coupon in one hand and a ten dollar bill in the other. The girl didn’t even recognize me. I was dying to know who ate my sandwich from earlier but I didn’t ask. I got to the cashier and she didn’t recognize me from my pimp/drug dealer days either. I wanted to make a point or let them know that they had almost been responsible for a fake death and my permanent disappearance but I had another appointment and time was still of the essence. It was so hard for me to say “thank you” and not let them know what they had almost put me through…Al Roker…I mean, that is serious. The grilled chicken was cold …after all that, the grilled chicken was cold. One thing is for sure, when you eat their grilled chicken cold, you learn something…that’s not grilled chicken.

 

No more bar hopping for me, ever. It’s Powerbar or nothing.  I don’t trust anything else.  I will also never leave home without my check card and I also need to have a talk with my bank teller. It’s actually rare that I ever go to the bank and cash a check. It took a lot of random acts of nature for my Saturday to turn out so exciting. Obviously, if I am writing about this, I have no life. Isn’t this more of a nursing home story? I can’t imagine what I will be talking about when I am in my 90’s. It might be a good thing for me to go ahead and assign a power of attorney to make sure that I don’t have a Facebook page when I get that age. I can’t imagine what I would write about if my “self-edit” button was worn out. It’s bad enough as it is. Sorry mom, I know you raised me more better.

We Are Soldiers (a serious note) continued...part two

Once a year we all come out of the trenches for a moment and we join together; we march, we walk. In over 600 towns across this country, we gather in groups and walk to show our support for all the work that is being done to fight this horrible disease. We march in memory of loved ones, in honor of those who are being cared for and in celebration of the efforts put together to raise awareness and funds to help us with this battle. It’s a day of reminding ourselves that we are not alone and that we are making a difference. If you would like to help and join forces in time, support or even with finances, you can go to www.alz.org and look for the Walk To End Alzheimer’s in your area. There are many teams from healthcare organizations, caregivers and families. For my mom, Ann Perry, we are www.thememoryjoggers.com .

Don’t be discouraged if you don’t have the funds to help out financially.  There are other organizations that require nothing more than a click . One great organization that is working hard to get the government to increase the funding for Alzheimer’s research is http://www.usagainstalzheimers.org  .This is a powerful group that is really starting to make things happen by making our government understand the epidemic situation we are facing and the economic impact it will have on our future. Another that I love is the grassroots campaign to get a postage stamp (much like the one for breast cancer) for Alzheimer’s. These type stamps have raised millions in the past. That site is https://www.facebook.com/HelpStampOutAlzheimers  .Whatever you can do, do it. Do it for those you love and do it for future generations so that years from now, the Walk to End Alzheimer’s will be nothing more than a distant memory.

We Are Soldiers (a serious note)

For those of you who have had an experience with someone with Alzheimer’s, you are fully aware of the toll it can take on you. I recently saw pictures of soldiers that had been in Afghanistan; they were before and after pictures. It was obvious that the constant worry and stress of their situations as well as the loneliness of missing their loved ones back home, had taken its toll on them. It reminded me a bit of what I see in the mirror every day. I know I haven’t had to go through the horrors of what our soldiers have gone through and I haven’t had the stress of literally fearing for my own life on a daily basis, but in the mirror, I can see what a long drawn out battle has done to me and the toll it has taken.

I can see it in the faces of people who are taking care of their parents and their spouses.  We are at war; we are in a battle. We are fighting something bigger than ourselves that we cannot defeat. Our days are long and drawn out and we are forced to do things we never thought we could do mentally or physically. We are fighting a disease that knows no enemies and has never been defeated. We fight to keep our loved ones safe from harming themselves, wandering off, or simply from falling down. We fight to keep them involved while fighting to protect their dignity. We fight our frustrations in them not knowing who we are. We fight the urge to argue when they want to go home even though they are already in their own home. We fight to convince them to do the basics of daily life like changing their clothes when they have been wearing the same clothes day after day. We fight to keep it together when they tell us the same thing every five minutes. We fight to not break down each time they go into the hospital to battle some other illness that could end their lives. We fight to not give up when we are at our wits end and the day has just begun.

We struggle daily with the guilt of our bad decisions and letting someone else help to take care of our loved ones. We worry when we leave them alone with caretakers that they will be watched after and cared for and that no one will show them their own anger and frustration. At night we lie awake and worry about the day we just had and how we will handle the next one. We worry that we are not doing the right thing, or doing enough, or that we might just snap under the pressure. But each day, we gear up and face the battle. We do it to protect our loved ones. We do it because we have to and we want to and we are scared to death not to. The toll it takes on us is great. We can see it in the mirror. We can feel it on the inside. We know we are isolated from many of the people we love as our lives are immersed and focused on making the best of fighting a losing battle. As hard as we try, our minds never really wander away from our task at hand.

 

Just like a soldier that comes back from war, when our loved ones have passed away, we need time. We need time to re-adjust when it is all over. We need time to heal, time to learn how to let go of our experience and time to enter back into the normal thoughts of a day. We are soldiers who have fought the good fight, to defend what we love and believe in. We are battered, shell-shocked and tired, but in time, we will pick up the pieces and find the good to remember and take pride in knowing that we made a difference; we did our best, and even though probably never expressed, it was appreciated. No one can really understand unless they have been through it. We can’t expect them too. What we must do is continue to pursue a happy life that we know our loved ones would so desperately want us to have. We  continue to fight this disease so that future generations do not have to fight this same war for us all over again. We are soldiers, and we have our battle scars both inside and out.

Don't You Hate it When: Smartphone

Don’t you hate it when you interject  yourself into someone else’s conversation only to find that you are in way over your head and that you have no idea what anyone is talking about but you try to keep up anyway and while you are rambling out of control like a train wreck  you start having flashbacks from your childhood when you went down a hill on your bike that went from a steep slope to a ninety degree angle and you were no longer riding your bike but hanging on for dear life which then reminds you of the time that you hopped on the wrong ski slope and you were going so fast that you had no idea how you were ever going to stop and that the most you could hope for was to  fall and not break anything or get run over by the experts but you didn’t want to go ahead and fall and cut your losses because you were  too scared to do it because you knew it was going to be ugly and as you remember all these things you realize that your mouth is still running and that the left side of your  brain has no idea what the ride side of your  brain is talking about and suddenly you hear someone say “Let me see your phone and I can probably figure it out” and as you hand it to them you snap an instant replay tape into your head and recall that everyone was talking about the glitches in their smartphones and that you were also trying to complain but couldn’t answer what you thought the problem was because you didn’t understand any of the lingo so you tried to “wing it” and before you knew it you were heading down that steep hill/ski slope/runaway train and your brain was spinning out of control until everything came to a quick, sudden stop because the person who was holding your cheap phone announced “This isn’t a smartphone” and everyone is silent and you can hear the clock  ticking on the wall and it hits you that you actually have no idea what makes a smartphone a smartpone and that yours isn’t actually smart at all and may only be average at best,  and that phrase you have heard a million times about “It is better to remain silent and have everyone think  you are an idiot than to open your mouth and confirm it” ,or something like that, starts running through your head and it bothers you that you can never remember  exactly how that phrase goes  which probably is a reflection on how badly you should not ever try to use that phrase as you are only acting out the words as you speak them offering up yourself as a  personal example for the phrase and all you want to do is find a computer so that you can Google “what makes a smartphone a smartphone”  and you try to end the conversation by shaking your phone to make it work better and all you can think about is that it would be a perfect time for somebody to break out into a flash mob to “All You Single Ladies” but it is not happening so you just shake your phone harder while the people you were talking to watch  and that tingling part of your brain is thinking all by itself wondering how you could make everyone within earshot forget the last five minutes or why there isn’t something like “rapture on demand” or how cool it would be if Harry Potter’s cloaking device was real and the next thing you know you realize that your mouth is still running while your brain is having its own internal audit…? Yeah, I hate it when that happens.

 

Cutting Back

Cutting back

 

 

I had to go to the doctor yesterday just for a routine check up and he informed me that it was that magic time of my life when I needed to get a physical. Yeah, I don’t see that happening any time soon.  Anyway, at the end of the appointment he said those six little words that I have never heard from a doctor before, “You need to lose 20 lbs”……………how could he tell? I had on my “hide-a-fat” clothes the whole time and he never grabbed my love handles….oh yeah, the scales…those darn scales! He went on to add, “Do you remember where you were 10-15 years ago?  You were 35lbs lighter. Let’s start with 20lbs.”  I felt  horrified and insulted...I was horrisulted.

 

I couldn’t believe it. It seems that pretending I am in shape while overeating isn’t doing the trick. So last night, while watching TV,  I was thinking about all this and what I was going to have to do . I heard the timer go off in the kitchen so I sat down my bowl of chocolate peanut butter ice cream (with an extra spoonful of peanut butter for flavor) and went into the kitchen to check on my blackberry/blueberry/raspberry cobbler (it needed ten more minutes) and gave my crockzilla full of cabbage/bean/Italian sausage soup a stir and then went back into the den, sat back down and picked up my bowl of ice cream. I thought about it all and realized that it was time, time to make a change. I consider myself to be health conscious and it was time to make a difficult yet important decision about cutting unnecessary things out of my life. It was time to find a new doctor…Bon appétit !

 

Dear People: Getting the boot, getting the pill

Dear Personal Trainer Guy (who is not on my payroll),

Thank you for pointing out to me…and your client…and everyone else standing around that my brand new, favorite exercise that I do at least twice a week is called the “fat man’s pull-up”…nice. A little side note here, I didn’t ask you what it was called. You came up and asked if you and your client could work in with me while I was doing the FMPU. Your client got a kick out of it, grrrr, you almost got a kick out of it, right in the seat of your high tech, water wicking sweat pants.

Now I am perrynoid. What else am I doing? My workouts are pretty much a morphed version of some kind of exercise that are a cross between what I CAN do and what I am WILLING to do. My fear is that there are names for my other marxercises. Am I doing the “lazy leg press”, “chubby chest press”, “girlie glutes”, “crack head crunches” , “the pansy pushup”…the list goes on and on in my head. I may just have to make up my own names and announce them while I am doing them. I can hear me know, “Wow, this Def Con Dip I am doing it going to hurt tomorrow, especially after that set of Power Ranger Pull-ups.” Wait a minute…I think Power Ranger Pull-ups are a brand of training diapers for little boys….never mind…that’s not so impressive. Hmmm, I may end up doing more harm than good. Maybe I might just recommend to “said trainer” that such negative names for exercises are not the best choice for him to use in his chosen profession, especially since he works with a lot of overweight people. I also need to start stretching so that I can get my foot up higher just in case I might need to kick “said trainer” in the seat of his high tech pants.

Dear Yaz Telemarketer,

No, I have not been using Yaz, the female birth control pill. Thanks for calling me for the second time and letting me know about the harmful side effects of this pill designed for young girls 14 and up ( but not recommended for anyone over the age of 35), that treats acne and also allows them to sleep around responsibly. But no, I have different plumbing and have no use for this product and do not need to be part of the pending class action lawsuit. On the other hand, if I do start to notice headaches, swelling, dizziness, blood clots, chest pain or if I have a heart attack or a stroke, I will keep your number and have someone call for me. I could have been drugged and not known it; you never know. Is that how you got my name and cell phone number? Really…how did you get my name and number? Did someone turn me in? Has someone Yaz-roofied me and then confessed? Should I be perrynoid? I’ll bet it was someone at the gym. Somebody saw me doing my 10lb dumb bell curls and my overhead press that looks more like a cheerleader move and slipped me a Yaz-roofie in my strawberry flavored water (darn you Dasani and your delicious fruity flavored water)….I never tasted a thing…except strawberry. This explains everything. My inability to gain muscle, my 14 year old girl arms….it’s all coming together now. While I have been at the gym surrounded my juicing, testosterone reeking gym rat comrades, I have been “unjuicing” with and strawberry flavored estrogen cocktail. OMG…I’ve been Yazzercising!

Hmmmm, maybe I should CSI this and come to the conclusion that this is all that trainer’s fault…that’s got to be it. I’m going to start stretching today. I’ve got some very high, seemingly rock hard glutes to kick; I may need some boots. If any of you see me walk in to the gym in the near future wearing combat boots, you will know what is about to go down.

The Evolution of Art

A new scientific breakthrough has happened and it has left  the art world spinning. The Sistine Chapel has long been cursed with water and dampness issues. Parts were rebuilt and redesigned early on, as water runoff became a big problem in this structure. Mold was also a problem that they had to deal with, in what is one of the most beautiful interior buildings in the world. Recently, while looking to clean areas around the artwork on the ceiling, scientists were brought in to figure out some unusual looking areas on the paintings. What they discovered is that what we currently know about those famous paintings may be completely wrong. The discoveries were of several types of mold but there are three that have opened up and whole new Pandora's box in the scientific and art communities.

The first, for reader's sake, we will call the "red mold". You can see here that it is a true red and is considered to be in the "slime mold" family. It loves damp, wet areas.

 

. The next mold we will call the "yellow mold". Yellow mold can also be one of the slime molds. Yellow mold,  like the red mold, also loves places that stay damp and moist.

 

 The third type of mold is the blue mold. The blue mold is called a "mildew mold" and just like the other molds, thrives in damp areas.

 These threes molds were all found in the ceiling and other areas of the Sistine Chapel and were growing on the plaster as well as the stone. So what does all of this mean? Why is this important? This is why: these are the three primary colors. At several points in the investigation , scientists noted an overlap of the molds thus creating every color in the color spectrum. Some areas resembled sunsets while other areas looked like green fields and flowers, much like the works of Monet. Upon further investigation of the ingredients in the plaster, scientists have come to the conclusion that what we have considered for so long to be the  work of artist Michelangelo, is  a lie. One cornerstone of the structure was studied and an embedded fossil was found that dated 500,000 years old. It seems the structure must have been started many years ago by prehistoric man. Wood tested in the beams was found to be over 1,000 years old. It is now believed that the Sistine Chapel may have been the inspiration for Solomon's Temple built about 2,500 years ago. We have no exact date on the building of the Sistine Chapel other than it was built in stages . It seems the written history of this building has been handed down and reinterpreted to fit the story of the church congregation that moved into it. Even though the occurrences post 1470's are probably true, the creation of the building, the real history of who built it and the origins of the art on the ceiling are up for new interpretations.

 

What is important about all of this is that Scientists have been able to conclude that the molds, over hundreds of years, slowly blended and grew and morphed into what we see on the ceilings of the Sistine Chapel. What we have generally thought to be the works of the artist Michelangelo, are simply the creations of mold over hundreds of years. Part of what we see is our brain making sense of it all and "filling in the blanks" of the visual field.

 

Michelangelo was a sculptor and we know did some plaster work there in that old building. We know he was an artist. It is now thought that once he saw the molds he took claim of them as his own paintings. It is a bit staggering to realize that all those beautiful scenes up on the ceiling are merely the accidental mixing of different types of mold, but science has proved it. There are also naturally occurring pigments that have come in through rain, evaporation, heat,pollens, etc. Some theorist believe that Michelangelo may have added some pigments to help brighten or shape some of the pictures that had already been created.

 

The art world is stunned and many are fighting this discovery to the bitter end. Some artists, even educated ones, are refusing to believe what science can prove. Many say that these two dimensional pieces of art are just too complex to be accidental mold configurations. Lobbyist for the scientific community are currently working hard , before it even hits the press, to get the creators of textbooks in our public schools changed. Leaders in the education unions are behind this, claiming we can no longer stand by and give Michelangelo credit for something that just happened by accident. Years from now, after the history books have been rewritten and the younger generations are taught the truth about the Sistine Chapel and the origins of its colorful ceilings, I have a feeling the older generations and some religious factions will still be holding on to what they were taught when they grew up. No amount of scientific evidence or proof will make them budge. I am not sure why they will be like this, but I predict it. Let's face it, you can't argue with science, its findings, or how it is interpreted. It might be a bit hard to believe that those works of art "just happened" but it could happen and it did happen. They are just colors on plaster.

 

Millions of dollars of funding has been provided from the United States for research to see if possibly these molds do have some level of intelligence which could open up and whole new world of research. This new approach to looking at art could change everything we know about art today. To some, the works on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel will never look the same. For some, those images will bring about even more wonder and amazement and to others they will have lost their appeal because the "art" has gone from being created by a skilled artist to just being patches of mold that were allowed to roam free and collide.

I'm Chipper

I know better than to have any kind of “snacky” food in the house. I obsess over it like it is something that needs to be checked off of some kind of “to do” list. My recent obsession was a box of Frosted Mini Wheats. I’ve had a long running relationship with these little critters. They actually never make it to a bowl of any kind; I just eat them like popcorn…highly frosted, packed in calorie popcorn. I eventually vowed to break off this relationship as it was causing more harm than good.

So yesterday I had a giant box of Frosted Mini Wheats sitting in the passenger seat, wearing a seatbelt (don’t judge). I am still a bit paranoid after the road kill incident from the other night. Heaven forbid I should have to hit the brakes and lose an entire box of candied wheat (I have a strict “no eating off the floor mat” policy).

I am not sure if I was telling myself that I would just have one or two every now and then when I got the munchies or not. I know better. I knew that box was going to be empty by the end of the day. I am also not sure why they were there. It’s not like I was on some kind of road trip and might have to go for miles without seeing a gas station or something (do those areas even exist anymore) but I had my survivalist box of Frosted Mini Wheats there by my side…just in case.

Once that box was opened, it was all over. I was riding down the road running through those tasty squares and happy as the city wood chipper the week after Christmas. At the end of the day, there was Frosted Mini Wheat shrapnel all over the car. When I got out of the car in the gym parking lot last night, after a fifteen minute sugar coma nap, I noticed that I had a mini wheat up on my dashboard. I have no idea how it got up there. I opened the back door to get out my gym bag and there on the back seat was another mini wheat. Seriously? How in the world did it get back there? Did I, at some point, just start throwing them at my face? Oh my word; I hope I am not on someone’s Facebook page today in a video titled “ The human woodchipper”. It’s a good thing I don’t have any kids. They would hate me. Their bags of Cheerios and Fruitloops would never make it through a church service…as a matter of fact, they would probably arrive at church with empty bags.

I was worn out when I got to the gym. I was blaming it on the fact that I had just taken in month’s worth of sugar in a matter of hours but it could have been all that chewing. I was exhausted. New rule: no more desert cereals allowed. I wish Kroger had a way of cutting a person off. You know, like a way you could go online and set up an account and put a list of things on there that it won’t let you buy. I think that might work. It would be like, if I tried to buy something on the hit list, it would sound an “alarm of shame” and not let me scan the item. I know it sounds extreme but maybe it’s time large corporations took a little personal responsibility for their customers. Maybe it’s time for Kellogg to also step up to the plate and show some personal responsibility and not put Frosted Mini Wheats in such big boxes. Who knows, I might even sue. I am concerned that the increased sugar and subsequent weight gain might be detrimental to my health. Maybe this would be a wakeup call to big business. Personal responsibility, it seems to be a thing of the past and such a hard thing to teach. All I know is that I have got to go to the $5 car wash today with the unlimited time slot vacuum. I have work to do; there is wheat to harvest.

Sometimes You Feel Like A Nut Sometimes You Don't

I don’t know exactly what happened tonight. I have been doing so well. I’ve been watching portion control, sugar, calories, everything. Tonight I went into Kroger with the idea that I was going to do a little “reward session” and make a sugar free, low fat, apple cobbler. There we apples in my cart; I do remember that but the rest is a blur. Something took over, something powerful. The only thing I can think of was, yes, you guessed it, my inner manbearpig. It had come out of hibernation and what with the pending snow storm, decided to prepare for a re-hibernation.

All I can tell you is that when I left Kroger, I had the ingredients to make an Almond Joy cobbler. “How do you make an Almond Joy cobbler” you might ask? I have no idea but I am assuming that my inner manbearpig does. I checked on it a few minutes ago and realized that I had made the basic cobbler recipe wrong. If you have ever made a “quick cobbler” then you know that rule number one is that the butter/oil does not get mixed into the batter. It goes in the bottom of the dish and the batter goes over the top. If you mix it all together is too thin. Well, in my “haste to make waist”, I mixed it all together. I think I remember making this mistake once before, years ago and it took about two days to get done. I am pretty sure that it makes it turn rubbery or something. I also noticed that I forgot the almonds…the almonds! How do you make an Almond Joy cobbler with no almonds? Let’s face it; it is no longer an Almond Joy cobbler. It is a Mounds Bar cobbler. Basically, I took the “joy” out of the cobbler. Still, my love handles are quivering in anticipation.

This had better be good. I haven’t had the real thing in a long time and these calories had better be worth it. If not, the neighbor’s dog is in for a treat. That dog should like me by now but it just growls when it sees me…hmmmm, now that I have put that in writing I think I just figured out why it hates me so much. It’s probably blaming me for all its stomach aches. I know they feed it people food but my cooking mistakes can be pretty epic. My recent crockpot “rice/broccoli loaf” and subsequent rice/broccoli patties probably topped the charts for culinary tragedies. It’s much easier to throw away a “grain wreck” than it is a desert-gone-bad. No matter how rubbery or joyless this desert turns out to be, I have a feeling that it won’t be anything that a little microwaving and scoop of ice cream can’t fix.
#yumgrrroink

Pictures Don't Lie, Unless You Pay For It.

I’ll be the first to admit it…wait, that’s a lie, let me start over. I’d really never admit this but one good thing about glasses is that they offer a bit of haze between the crow’s feet and the general public. Plus, they also give some shape to tired drooping eyes. I don’t go out in public without my glasses any more. Today was picture day for our church directory; no one is overdue an updated picture more than myself. I have known for a long time that I need a new one and that profile Facebook picture made me look five years younger five years ago.

I forgot, imagine that, that this was picture day until my phone reminded me. I didn’t have time to go home first but luckily I wasn’t running around in my sweats. I was however, dressed a bit like Johnny Cash with my solid black shirt. I hoped that I wasn’t going to stand out as someone from “the dark side” in the church directory.

I went into the room to have my picture taken and the lights were really low in there. It was a good sign. We did several in the “thinking man” pose and then switched up to a different shade of sponge painted backdrop and took a few shots from my other good side. The photographer decided to take a few pictures “sans glasses” . I took off my glasses and she took a few quick pictures, looked at her camera, looked up at me, and then said, “Oh honey no, no you need your glasses…uhuh, no, …” She looked at her camera pics again and continued, “No that’s not going to work….you need those glasses to kind of , you know, give your face some shape or something…yeah, that’s not going to work at all; just go ahead and put your glasses back on.” I was horrified at my hideousness; it was hard to go on and put on my happy face for the camera.

After the session I had to go look at them on the computer. That was tough. When we got to the “glasses free” ones, I almost screamed. Yikes! I swear I had “crazy eye” in all of them. She was a good salesman and had me whipping out my credit card in no time. She was clever. She said, “As much as none of us like to admit it, we are not as young as we used to be. Let me show you something”. She put two pictures out in front of me. The first was just a good, normal picture of herself and the second had been “Airtouched” . She pointed out, “You seen how, in the Airtouched picture, the teeth are a little whiter, the lines on the face are a little softer and the eyes appear a bit brighter?” I saw it; I saw it all. I looked at it and then turned to my big 8x10 mug on her computer in High Definition and said , “Yes please”. She smiled at me, said “Excellent choice” and swiped my credit card…all in one move.

Dear Baby Jesus,

Please forgive me for being so vain that I spent extra money (that could have gone to that country where the kids get mad when you don’t clean your plate) on generic Photoshopping for a picture that will go in a church directory to be viewed by people that I see every Sunday in broad daylight. Is that a big sin? I know it might be false advertising. I promise to be more frugal in the future and will use this as my business card photo and Facebook profile picture for the next ten years. In my defense, I thought the photographer/saleswomen must have been an angel in disguise when she showed me the photo upgrade option…sorry…that was a lie…that thought never entered my mind. Yeah, let’s just stick to my first request and I’ll stop talking before I rack up a list of things that need to be addressed.

Rituals (a serious note)

I haven’t written an update on my mom in a while. Really there is nothing new other than the knowledge of what people have to go through when a loved one is in the final stages of Alzheimer’s. Mom is basically asleep. Part of this is due to her condition and part of it is due to pain medication. We are not sure if she is any pain or not, as she has no way of letting us know, but it doesn’t seem possible that she could be comfortable in the position in which her body has atrophied.

 

There is no more communication or responses. We can wake her up and she will open her eyes but it is hard to tell if she is looking at us or just through us. I believe recognition was gone a long time ago. Yet, we still go. We go through the rituals that we have carved out and continue to follow them. We go see her and talk to her and hold her hand but we know that it is very probable that she isn’t aware of us at all.

 

Sometimes Dad and I sort of take turns talking to her. We still try to get her attention and get into her line of vision but it is different now. I guess it is the hope. The hope of seeing that expression on her face or light in her eyes that let us know that she knew we were there. Of course, with that, was always the hope that she knew who we were. Now, I think we know the answer but we still go through the same rituals of talking to her and asking questions and telling her who we are and of course, that we love her. Hope is so necessary in life but it also requires faith and a hint of possibility. That is gone; we don’t discuss it really but we know it.

 

I’ve never really been that much of a fan of rituals. It makes me think of religions filled with manmade rites, that standing alone, don’t really have any kind of connection or meaning to me. I’ve never seen their purpose. Maybe it is my Protestant upbringing that makes me think like this. Maybe it is my lack of studying what these acts stand for and represent that makes me doubt them. My attitude toward them though, is changing.

 

I am learning and growing to understand that rituals can keep us grounded. They make us feel safe, remind us of what we are supposed to be doing, keep us focused and are a physical representation of memory and thought and maybe even give us a little bit of comfort. I tell myself that I have no artificial religious rituals but when I think it through, I have many. It’s really on Sunday that they begin. I get up at a set time reserved only for Sundays. I go through my normal, morning everyday rituals of two pieces of toast (an additional bowl of cereal during times that I have “a lot on my plate”). I turn on the iron before I eat and then after breakfast I am ready to iron my “church clothes”and get dressed. I drive to church and park on the same side of the building that I always park on and then go inside, get a bulletin and go to find a seat on the left, back side of the auditorium.

 

I watch the song leader and sing the songs displayed up on the wall. We pray and sing some more. I watch and listen to a sermon that is usually about the same length in time each week, then we sing and pray and take communion. When church is over I drive straight to where my father has been waiting every Sunday for several years and we go eat lunch and then go visit my mom. There we talk to mom and each other and we enter the ritual visit that keeps us grounded and lets us know mom is OK. It is where we used to look for a glimpse of mom recognizing us, a response, or a smile. Now we go there knowing we are only checking on her and getting to spend a little time with her. It is time; time that we will not have for much longer. It’s a ritual, a habit, an obligation, a desire; it’s a rut that we have carved out and traveled for several years now and are happy that we still get a chance to make that journey, though the destination is a shadow of what it used to be…but our love for the destination has never changed.

 

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

I know I have mentioned it to the point of overkill, but I truly hate the cold. Tonight, as I sat outside the gym, I had the hardest time getting up the umph to get out of the car. I just sat there in the car with the heat and radio on trying to justify getting out, getting cold, and going into a crowded place to pick up heavy things. Now that I am not doing the Crossfit classes and am getting to enjoy watching my ET body morph back into its original form, I have had a hard time pushing myself without a team around me. I know that all I have to do is miss a day and then I will have permission to miss another and the snowball starts and I will end up being shaped like a snowman. No, I had to make myself go. I got inside and went to the locker room , got undressed, opened my gym bag and realized that I had forgotten my clothes. Now that’s a defining moment. I may or may not have let out a “wordy dird” when I realized that I had forgotten my clothes and a stranger (Satan) standing beside me asked, “What’s wrong?” I told him that I had forgotten my clothes and that I guess I was just going to have to skip working out today. He responded, “I’ve done that before, good thing Goodwill is just a few doors down…I mean, if you really want to work out.” Great, there went my excuse. I knew that if I went home to get clothes that I would never leave the house again. So, I decided to slide down a couple of doors and find my bargain workout gear (and give back to the community).

Armed with a twenty dollar bill, I started with the pants as I could tell that they had a lot more t-shirts than sweat pants (I mean, they had to match, right?) The pants were mixed in with the dress pants so finding the appropriate size was not the easiest thing I have ever done. I found lots of MC Hammer sweats that were shiny and had elastic at the bottom. After going down ever single aisle of pants, I realized there was only one pair that was my size and not from the 80’s. They were navy blue with bright yellow stripes down the side. The t-shirt was easy as I found one the exact same color with yellow words on it. I looked at the time on my phone and realized that an hour had passed since I had first pulled into the parking lot at the gym. I had gotten completely lost in my retail therapy while scanning the aisles for the perfect workout clothes that someone had deemed not even worthy to have in their house or even in their garage in a box.  Yes, an hour had passed because I had gotten caught up in the hunt…I was Goodwill hunting.

I got  back to the locker room and put on my recycled sweat gear (wow when you say it like that….) and those pants…..they were Old Navy pants made from that material that doesn’t stretch and looks waterproof. I have never in my life seen pants with legs so wide! I didn’t notice it until I put them on. I can literally fit my entire body into one leg. I just looked like a square…I was Sponge Bob Square Pants. I put on my “matching“ t-shirt and  noticed a little fur on it. I know these clothes are supposed to be washed but this one may have Hoodini’d its way through the system. As I slid the shirt over my head, I noticed a light Febreeze scent mixed with a little…what was that….I had smelled that before….Hello Kitty that was cat pee! Oh yeah, no doubt about it. I guess there are reasons other than “this doesn’t fit any more” for people to dump their clothes off at a bin in a parking lot. It didn’t matter, at this point I was committed…the scent was faint…and I’ve smelled much worse at the gym.

I saw a couple of people that I knew while I was there but I stayed at arm’s length just in case I was not the only bloodhound in the crowd. I had this fear that if I got hot and sweaty (who am I kidding) that like a scented candle when it is lit, I too would become more aromatic. As the workout slowly progressed (no drops of sweat occurred) my Perrynoia got the best of me. I also couldn’t stop looking in the mirror at my wide pants. 

I decided to get on the rowing machine before going home as I could hear the dinner bell ringing and this Febreeze scented cat was getting hungry. I did a full seven minutes and that is all it took to heat up and unleash the essential oils locked deep inside the fibers of my discounted fitness attire.

I got back to my car and fired up the heater on high for the rest of the ride home. You know those cedar tree air fresheners that people used to dangle from their rearview mirrors? Well , if they made one that looked like a litter box, that is what should have been dangling from my mirror. Oh my word, “Febreeze-kitty” is not pleasant. I had a flashback of my Prius that I bought up in Ashville, North Carolina in about five degree temperature. I remember telling them to save me some money and not detail the car as I would do that myself. When I got there it was late at night and the wind chill was about twenty below. The salesman mentioned to me that he had ten cats at home that he needed to get to back to so we would only take a short test drive.  I noticed his jacket looked like a cat bed. When we got into the Prius and drove around, I started getting a slight whiff of something; I assumed it was his fur lined jacket. After getting the car home and taking out the paper floor mats, I noticed there was a dark red/brown stain in the passenger floorboard. I also noticed that there was some kind of red/brown liquid that had dried between the upper and lower passenger seat. As the summer heated things up, it got to the point that if I left my car out in the heat for a long time, I had to roll the windows down for a while just to handle the smell…the dead body smell. I can’t prove it but the red/brown, the great deal, the smell that could absolutely take a person’s breath away, the fact that the person who owned the car last only had it for three months and put 30,000 miles on it…oh yeah, something was up in that car’s history that Carfax and that salesman was afraid to tell. I spent a lot of money on gallons of solutions to neutralize my hybrid hearse but nothing could kill that smell….poor choice of words.

So now I have clothes that I will never wear again. Just like my former Prius owner, I will put these clothes right back into the system for someone else to enjoy. Now that I have had time to think about it, my little shopping spree made no sense at all. I could have gone home and back by the time it took me to track down my Sponge Bob/litter box ensemble but for some reason I was thinking that I was saving money. I didn’t save money; I threw $8 away. What was I thinking? Oh yeah, Satan…Satan in the locker room giving me bad ideas and pushing me to make poor choices….sneaky little devil. Tomorrow I will give back to my community by donating some workout clothes to a bin in a parking lot. Yes, I give back…I will give back a gift that keeps on giving.