Out of Pocket

Don't you hate that term?

Sorry it's been so long gentle readers. I have been travelling for work for a bit, living at a Radisson Suites in lovely Rancho Bernardo, California. Never hear of it? Yeah, there's a reason for that.

I was away for a week learning how to train people in my company to become "Self Leaders", to use their "I Need" statements, to "Partner for Success" and to "Sell their Solutions". Despite the touchy-feely vernacular, it was actually a really amazing experience and probably one of the highlights of my career. I finally realized that I'm pretty good at training people and I just *might* help people.

Anyway, while I was away, my gramma took a bit of a turn for the worse. I don't talk about my gramma very much on this site, because it makes me very emotional. But my grandmother is one of my favorite people and I love her very very much. She's not your typical cranky gramma, she's always been so loving and funny and lucid and just so wonderful to be around.

After living with and being cared for by my parents for the last five years, we all faced facts that she needs more help than what my parents can give her. We made the decision, with her agreement, that it was time for her to move to an assisted living facility.

I am visiting my parents right now, trying to spend some time with my gramma as she gets used to living at her new home. I will be honest when I say that it's the hardest thing I have ever done, to witness her deteteriorating in front of my eyes and to see confusion cloud her eyes from time to time. She has never looked so old or frail before and it's heart-breaking.

Getting old is the most undignified process I think anyone could go through. For my grandmother to have to ask for help to brush her teeth or cut her food is just no way for her to live after raising children and grandchildren and being an active and valued member of her community at church and work and volunteerism.

It's horrible.

Jumped the Shark

Lost. You have let me down.

I don't want to give anything away to my readers who have not caught up on TIVO, but in last night's episode, there was a sweat lodge, a spirit guide.....and a very MacGyver-ish incident involving a torch, a can of hairspray and a polar bear.

I am starting to get really disappointed in this season. Do you think they are going to keep everyone separated all season? I like having the Big Fat Unhappy Family all together at the beach fighting it out over the guns and medicine supply. I'm not into Jack hanging out by himself in the shark tank while Sayeed, Sun and Jin are wandering around the rain forest somewhere. Sigh.

The only reason I keep watching......I have to know why Jack has all the crazy tattoos.

40 out of 1000?

I love lists. And thank god there is listology.com to satisfy my obsessive need to check things off.

Here’s a list of 1000 books to read before you die.

It’s a pretty good list, I have to say. Of the measly 40 books on this list that I have read, they are probably 40 of my favorite books of all time. (I took a moral stance and did not include books that I couldn’t finish or movies that I saw instead of reading the book, or my list would have been closer to 100).

Incidentally, my FAVORITE book on this list and easily one of my Top Five Favorite Books Ever? Alias Grace, by Margaret Atwood. Get thee to a bookstore….at once….. and buy it.

How many have you read? And more importantly, what’s your favorite book on here…..b/c I can’t find a THING to read right now.

100 degrees of hotness

Recently Gawker took a look at the phemonemon known as "Anderson Cooper" and just what makes him so downright fabulous.

Personally, I would rate his blue eyes MUCH higher than his blue blood, but that is just because I am so incredibly......deep.

Monday Fun

I'm reading this right now and howling in my cube.

Shameful

While I’m planning my own legally-recognized wedding, I’m painfully aware that many of my gay friends have been happily married, own homes together and paid exorbitant amounts of money to have children with their own DNA……and yet the 1st District court continues to uphold the ban on gay marriages in California.

I don’t know what to say, there's nothing to say, for it makes no goddamned sense.

I can only say I'M SORRY to Timm, David, Michael, Michael, Kenneth and Rusty…..who have all, for many years, been better and more loving partners than a lot of the straight people I know…..including myself.

Downright adorable

Our mayor, who I voted for, FINALLY lets his hair down. He should have done this LONG ago. It's too bad my friend, future Senator Kuckelman, just got married.....because they could have beautiful, politically active children together.

(just kidding, KK, I love Anthony.)

Is it me?

Or does anyone else just want to get loaded whenever you watch Sideways? Because I do. But it's only 2:18 in the afternoon. Sigh.

"I'm not drinking any FUCKING merlot!"

I can’t sleep.

I am a bad sleeper. In the past year or so, it’s gotten really bad. I wake up 4-5 times a night. I get night sweats. I have nightmares. My mind races. I worry about not getting enough sleep in order to function at work. And I cry in bed and wake Fiance up.

It doesn’t help that our apartment has the walls the consistency of tissue paper and I can hear our upstairs neighbor breathe (very heavily). It also doesn’t help that Fiance has a deviated septum and tends to snore. It also doesn’t help that we have pipes in our walls that bang for 30 minutes at 4:20 a.m. every morning when the heat goes on.

I’m tired. And I’m not fun right now. And I’m on the verge of tears a lot of the time. And I fear that I’m not being a good partner to Fiance when I’m like this.

So I want to officially apologize to Fiance and my friends and family who read this blog because I realize I’m not myself right now.

But I'm trying to figure it out.

Reading: Fall on Your Knees

I’m breaking all my self-imposed rules right and left these days.

1. I started eating cheese. About 20 years ago, I decided, for reasons that elude me, that I don’t like cheese. Turns out….I like cheese a lot and have been eating it non-stop.

2. I’m planning a wedding. I’ve been pretty much adamant that I want to elope for a long time……and guess what? I’m not. Planning a big ol’ wedding and I’m wearing a big ol’ white dress.

3. I keep reading Oprah-sanctioned books.

I Just finished Fall on your Knees, by Ann-Marie McDonald, a book that Oprah apparently “couldn’t put down” in 2002. Not that I care what Oprah thinks…..but I thought I would throw that out there if you care.

Ok. I’ll give Oprah a little credit because this book was a page-turner. Seriously. In 400 something pages, we’ve got murder, racism, depression, drownings, promiscuity, incest, homosexuality, unwed mothers…..not to mention a couple world wars. I think within 7 pages, three major characters died by murder, suicide and childbirth.

It’s really hard to describe this book. It’s one of those stories where you really aren’t sure what is going on, but you know that you’ll figure it out if you keep reading and you WANT to keep reading because you HAVE to know what is going on. The final plot twist is revealed on the last page. I won’t tell you what it is.

The story revolves around the Piper family, headed by James and Materia and their daughters who live in a remote corner of Nova Scotia called Cape Breton. The book resolves around the daughters, primarily. Kathleen is a prima opera singer and the apple of her father’s eye. Mercedes is the reliable one of whom no one really notices. Frances is a major trouble maker and Lily is the baby of the family who survived polio.

And besides that, I can’t really tell you much else because it would take way too long. But I really liked this book. It was disturbing and I can’t say that I really liked any of the characters, but it was completely well-written and very, very intense.

Thumbs up.