Christmas

Note: I began writing this a couple days after Christmas and didn't publish it. I've decided to go ahead and post it anyway.

Despite my general bah-humbugging, Christmas turned out to be pretty nice. I'm going through a rough time right now, regretting some decisions I've made regarding my career and education, trading financial security in my twenties for some long-term goals I've pushed back. Now that I'm trapped in a career with no way out without risking everything I have, I find myself kicking my own ass for putting myself here.

This, coupled with the losses Chris and I have been dealt this year in losing both of our Grandmas has left me feeling like there's something missing from Christmas that we'll never get back.

Due to the holidays being such miserable bitch-fests between my broken family while I was growing up, it's hard enough for me to enjoy them. My family hadn't spent Christmas with Gram for a number of years before she passed away, despite having grown up going to her house for every holiday, but this year she's gone and that fact solidifies that those days, that joy and union of family, the celebration of together-ness, is gone.  What's left is a December I have to juggle between warring factions, watching what I say in front of whichever party is present at whichever dinner I'm attending.

Maybe I'm just depressed because I took a job way beyond my physical, mental, and emotional abilities and skills. I can't go into too much detail, but I was starting to get hopeful when a professional was called in. They were subsequently dashed by the pickiness and eccentricities of both parties involved and now it's back to square one. I've also discovered I have no more hope of getting affordable health care through this job than I did the last.

Anyway, I started this post explaining how this Christmas was nice and ended up dumping my depressive thoughts all over it. Let me start again.

First, I have the best husband in the world. I can't express enough how supportive he is, even when he doesn't really understand my poor articulation of my own feelings. He's just there for me no matter what.

My family, though broken, split and scattered from the Bay Area to the foothills, have managed to come together for sharing the best of us together. My stepmom made Chris and me a quilt, her very first one. That we were her first project says so much about the repair and building of the relationship between me and her. This wouldn't have always been the case.

My mom worked her ass off at her Christmas to have a dinner and gift exchange for no less than seventeen people. I don't know how she does it, but it went off without a hitch. Her and my stepdad bought us a forty-inch television for Christmas, which we never would have been able to afford on our own.

Christmas day we had a quiet and lovely  gift exchange and lamb dinner at my In-Laws' place.  I was quite comfortable until Chris reminded me I had to work the next day. We stopped by our friend's apartment on the way home and I finally felt like I could get into the Christmas spirit. My friends are expecting a baby and it is so great to see them so happy.

Despite my  change in attitude, the next day I breathed a sigh of relief that Christmas was finally one day in the past. I don't think that's perfectly abnormal, even for those who love Christmas. Anyway, it is what it is and it's over now. On to the New Year.  

Updates and Rants, 10-22-11

October has been as busy as September. We have had something planned every weekend since early September now and we are looking at not having a free weekend well into November. I have forgotten what it's like to wake up on a Saturday and not get showered and dressed until 1pm. Since September we've gone to Monterey, Daly City, Placerville, had people over, seen a couple of our best friends get married, had some great times. I'm not complaining, but it will be nice one of these days to just not go anywhere.

I took my ASL midterm last week and scored a 49 out of 50 points. I was seriously nervous, too! I thought for sure I had at most a C. I could have sworn my teacher looked confused half of the time, but my nerves were just playing tricks on me.

There are people in class that are just helluv rude. They talk out loud on purpose and giggle about it. Not only is it disrespectful to our Deaf teacher, but it's also distracting while we're trying to get instruction from him. One douche-ass stood in front of the class during an exercise where we were describing relationships and made something up about having a girlfriend. That's fine, but when he sat down he said so everyone could hear, "I'm actually single," just to get a laugh. They will all lose the last laugh when their grades come in. My friends and I are telling the teacher who and when the speaking is going on. Yup, I'm a snitch and I don't care.

It's one thing when people whisper to each other to help each other out, but it's another entirely to speak just because the professor can't hear. You would think that in the second level ASL class these students would have a little bit of respect for Deaf people and for the language, but no. I'm sure you've heard this rant before, but it's something that really bothers me. Anyway, that's all the rant I have for tonight.

Mom's up this weekend. We've been hanging out, going to the jazz festival downtown. We went to Davis Common to the Main stage at first. After awhile we realized there was another stage across the street. We went over and listened for awhile. We painted on their art wall in front of the Natsoulas Gallery and then went in and showed mom the staircase of art and the roof. She loved it.

Mom took Chris and I to Ali Baba's for dinner tonight and it was wonderful as ever. It's been a great day. Next weekend, Halloween party!! Weekend after that, Eid!! I'm making cake pops, chili and mulled cider. I was thinking about making a pumpkin pie, but I will probably just buy one, with all the cooking I'll already be doing. Here's to the holiday season!!!

Sunday Comes Afterwaaaaards

Yesterday was free calorie day, according to Mom and Chris. I was not allowed to count up all the ingredients in the crepes and pizza that we had and mom insisted I have a Pepperidge Farms Milano cookie. We went on a long bike ride on my new hybrid, 21-speed Marin, and I tried to keep my portions small, so I'm hoping that not much damage was done, but sometimes you just have to live and my mom coming to hang out would have been dampened by my obsessing over food and diet. So I gave in.

Today I'm going to start running again. I was fitted at Fleet Feet and they suggested some motion control shoes by Mizuno. They weren't as cushioned as the other ones they had me try on, but they felt a lot more stable. I'm going to keep doing the two-minute run, three-minute walk because I still have shin splints, which,according to Fleet Feet, is more of a results of being out of shape than the condition of my shoes. I have to keep working and the pain will go away as I get stronger. However, I can't help but remember the girl on my softball team last year that had permanent damage and scarring from shin splints. Of course, I don't know the full story and don't have all the facts of that case, so I'm just going to stay alert to what my body is telling me.

Everyone is still asleep, but it's time for breakfast so I'm going to wake these sleepyheads up! Time to get moving!

Wedding Things

I'm trying to keep my wedding simple. I really don't have the budget for anything grand. I'm not even having an official wedding party because I don't want to put a financial strain on my friends who also happen to be getting married (Seriously, we're one of three couples in my tightest circle of friends who got engaged in 2010). I've also spent nothing so far on a dress, but we'll see how that works out.

Chris's mom has a vintage, lace wedding dress that is so me I can hardly believe it. I know that I wouldn't look right in a silky, rumply, long-train stylish mod wedding dress that you find at all the bridal shops. Then again, I haven't tried any on.

The one time I tried to look at wedding dresses, I went to Renfro's on Main St in Placerville and they were snooty, snobby bitches whose first words to me and my friend as we were trying to look at their selection were, "Excuse me, what are you girls doing?" I said, "Looking for a wedding dress..." They asked, "Are you getting married?" Really? You really think I'm looking for a wedding dress to wear to the bar or something? They asked if I'd like to make an appointment to which I gave an emphatic, "No, thank you," and walked out the door. So that's the equivalent of my gown shopping so far.

I have only lost ten pounds and felt comfortable enough with that to let the cold weather and short days be a perfect excuse to stop exercising. Boo, right? But starting the ASL class has got me at least out of the house two days a week and I walk a lot at work to take the clients to the mall or the bowling alley or wherever we might go. I've also committed to eating fruit every day. If it doesn't mean less weight, it has at least made me feel better. So we'll see in the months to come if I can find the motivation and will to stand up and go (ugh) running. Maybe we'll have warm, longer days soon enough that I'll be able to go on the bike rides I enjoyed.

Since I began writing this blog post, I've set up time to play with makeup and hair with my big sister, Talia and to go to a bridal show with my Mom at Cal Expo next month. Talia also knows a tailor that is really good at letting out fabric. Her husband does some carpentry work for him and their kids play together, so I know I can trust him. I've also had a call from someone in my class who wants to meet a half hour before each class and on the weekends. My life is full and wonderful and I have more support than I could ever ask for.

The Sheepherder's Bread

"Pass the mint jelly, please," Chris asked around the table on Christmas Eve at his parents' house. I gladly obliged, having already spread my share on the incredibly delicious lamb on my plate. We were enjoying our dinner with swiss beans, baked potato and a pear and lime jello mold that is Chris's favorite.

"We have Sheepherder's Bread for desert," Robin said, as her and Garry both started laughing. Chris and I looked at each other with eyebrows raised. "Sheepherder's Bread?" I asked.

"Well," Robin began to explain, "It's not really Sheepherder's Bread, but I've got to tell you the story."

"Your father and I were at Railey's yesterday picking up a few things and we saw this item in the bakery that looked like a red velvet cake with some kind of frosting on top. It said, "Sheepherder's Bread" on the label and was only two-forty-nine. I had never heard of it before so we went up to the bakery and asked what it was. The girl behind the counter was very busy and quickly explained as she glanced at the label distractedly, 'Oh yes, Sheepherder's Bread. It's a red velvet cake with a cream cheese frosting. It's delicious. It has a slight cocoa flavor to it. It's really good, I can give you a smple if you'd like.'

"So Garry and I tried it and it was delicious! We brought it up to the register and the cashier looked at us with this puzzled look on her face and said, 'Well, if that's the price they put on it, that's the price I'll give it to you.' At that point, she turned to the bagger and said, 'Look at this.' The bagger looked surprised and asked, 'You think there's any more in the back?' The cashier answered, 'You'd better go check, and if there are, save me some!'

Garry and I were so perplexed at the exchange, so we had to ask as we were paying, just what is up with this Sheepherder's Bread? Just then an announcement came over the loudspeaker, 'Attention Railey's shoppers, we have Red Velvet Cake for justtwelve-ninety-nine in the bakery.' The cashier then explained that the item was mis-marked. It was a red velvet cake we were buying. Sheepherder's Bread is like a baguette with spices on top. We got a twelve-dollar cake for under three! We were laughing all the way out of there as we saw the bagger run to the back to see if there were any more mis-marked cakes to buy up for himself!"

And so, the Grahams and I shared our Red Velvet cake for desert. It was absolutely delicious, and probably the cheapest cake in the world.

Thanksgiving Updates and the Best New Game Ever (Not GT5)

The work week was only three days long, and so went by rather quickly, despite Wednesday being the hardest I'd ever had. Due to the nature of my job, I can't go into detail, but I can say I left work feeling completely inept and stressed. I ended up in traffic on the way home and running out of gas. It was brilliant.

I went to bed pretty early Wednesday and woke up only for Chris to ask me if he could go buy Gran Tourismo 5, which had just come out. One less 60+ dollar game I didn't have to buy him for Christmas, I said, "Sure, go ahead."

The next day, we drove to Placerville for dinner with Chris's folks. Chris and his dad, Garry, went to take the dog for a walk while I shared with Chris's mom, Robin, my relief at finding a venue where I could have the ceremony and the reception in one place so that no one would be mad at me for either not being able to go to the ceremony or having to leave some family members at the reception hall or whatever. Robin thought that was excellent. I think Chris and Garry liked it even more because it meant they don't have to clean up the yard anymore.

When Chris and Garry and Baxter (the toy poodle) got back from their walk Garry asked Robin about Gran Tourismo 5 and whether or not it had been on Chris's Christmas list. Oops. The ensuing comedy (or tragedy?) of Robin booting up her computer and searching her email for the Christmas list on which Chris insisted he had never put Gran Tourismo 5 resulted in Chris being promised a bag of coal under the tree this year. Chris swears he doesn't remember sending that email, the poor guy, but there it was from his address. After all was settled, we had wonderful snacks and a lovely dinner.

The next day we went to Tracy for my mom's Thanksgiving. It was splendid! The turkey was super moist. I don't know how my mom does it. I ate seconds for the sake of seconds, as I was no longer hungry, but what the hell-it's the holidays. I did exercise this week for at least a half hour at a time, so I'm not completely in the red.

Afterward, we played the traditional Apples to Apples game, of course, followed by a new game that requires nothing but pens, paper and an imagination. It's called "Toilet Paper Roll." The idea is that everyone writes a sentence on the top of a piece of paper and then folds the paper forward so that the sentence is facing up. The paper is then passed to the left. Players read the sentence and then draw a picture depicting it and fold the paper forward again so that the person they pass it to next can't see the original sentence, only the picture. That person then must right a sentence explaining what they see in the picture. At one point, seeing my picture of an army of bunnies saluting Hitler near the bottom of the paper, Chris said, "Oh god. I see where this came from my original sentence." The game is a blast.

Michelle, my little sister, brought her Holland Lop rabbit, Waffle with her. She said she just felt like taking him, but she knows I'm trying to wear Chris down into giving me a rabbit for Christmas, so I think it was also a good tool to get Chris to look at the bunny, pet the bunny, know the bunny and maybe want a bunny himself. We'll see. I'm still working on him.

The weekend has been pretty lazy. I'm enjoying my time off. Work is going to be hard to go back to on Monday, which is pretty much normal after these long holidays, but I'm ready. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Only In My Family

An engagement party for two dear friends of ours Friday and errands at Chris's parent's house on Saturday led to Chris and I staying Friday night at my Dad and Stepmom's home in Placerville. We woke up to a light dusting of snow, the likes of which I had thought I escaped when I moved to Davis, and to bear claws and coffee for breakfast. (I love going home).

I woke up and began the loads of laundry I would be washing in my dad's free machines (any opportunity to do laundry at a parent's house when you live in an apartment should always be taken to the full advantage), and helped my dad navigate his notifications on facebook. Apparently, he's had the thing for over a year and didn't know what the little red boxes with the white numbers were.

I sat down with my bear claw and coffee and soon heard from the computer room, "Hey Kate!" I kept my fingers crossed that it wasn't some question about Farmville, as my dad has thus far avoided signing up for the stupid facebook game and bringing shame upon the family.

"Did Dennis [my uncle on my mother's side] have a heart attack?" he asked. "What?" I replied, thinking that if my Uncle had had a heart attack I surely would have heard about it by now and there wouldn't be any way that Dad could have found out only through facebook.

"Dustin posted that his dad had a heart attack last night," he explained as he scrolled around trying to find the original post. I instructed him on how to use the "search" option to go to my cousin's page and sure enough, his status said that my Uncle had a heart attack. There was only one thing to do: call my mother. If anyone knew it was her. My uncle and my mom are closer than any of their other siblings and my mom is very close to her mother. Being that my uncle lives on my grandmother's property in El Dorado Hills, I came to the reasonable conclusion that my mom surely had already found out and was waiting to call me until she thought I was awake (on a Saturday, that's usually any time between 9am and 12pm).

I was surprised to hear my mom answer the phone groggily, as if she had only just been sleeping when I called. Her response was, "What? No, no one called me! Hang on, let me call Dennis's house." She proceeded to use her cell phone as I waited on her landline.

"Dennis?" I heard her say, thinking she was talking to my uncle and this was all some big mistake, but then she said, "Oh, Dustin! What's going on?"

It was then that we got the story of how my uncle had had a heart attack a week ago and didn't know it until last night and that no one had bothered to call anyone else in the family. It hit me and my mom at the same time that we had to find out through facebook that my Uncle had suffered a heart attack. At the same time I was thinking, "My uncle had a heart attack and nobody called me?" I heard my mother ask Dustin, "My brother had a heart attack and nobody told me?

I told my mom to call me when she had more information so I could go see my Uncle Dennis if he was having visitors and hung up the phone. I am greatly relieved that my Uncle is alright. He's one of my faves, always ready with a witty, smart-ass remark and a smile. At this point, however, I was mentally facepalming the fact that only in my family could we find out through facebook that something serious had happened.

There was nothing for me to do but call my two sisters because I didn't want them finding out through similar methods I had. Talia was sleeping and Michelle was at work, so it took a few calls to get them on the phone.

I decided to start the phone call with, "Uncle Dennis is fine, but..." thinking that it would soften the blow and be less devastating than starting with, "Uncle Dennis had a heart attack." Unfortunately, when I called Michelle, I was finishing up a piece of bear claw and she heard me as saying, "Uncle Dennis is fighting, but he had a heart attack." Her strong reaction surprised me. "He's ok!" I insisted. "Oh, well, I can't understand you through your chewing!" I looked down at my delicious bear claw and laughed. "Sorry! Didn't mean to scare you!"

Two things happened here that I think are pretty unique to my family. One is that my uncle walked around for a week with a heart attack and complained about blurred vision and lethargy before finally and reluctantly going to the doctor under the advice of my cousin and my grandmother. The other is that the incident was only found out through facebook. I'm really glad my uncle is ok and I hope I can see him today but I will be wondering from now on what big news I'll receive next time I'm on facebook.