Would someone just post already?

I'm just coming off a seven-plus day bout of working, and found out that I get to work tomorrow afternoon and evening, too, so the blogging going on around here is going to be darned limited.

On the plus side, I'll get to take some time off if Guy Crouchback comes to visit.

Don't, don't, don't let's start

One of the residents has had some problems with shouting outbursts, and whenever she gets going her roommate will gesture me aside and say in an urgent whisper, "Don't start!" Frequently she wags her finger at me, too. (The injunction is meant to her roommate, not to me.) Sometimes she'll do this for a while even after her roommate has calmed down, so to break up the tension I'll sing the They Might Be Giants song back to her. The best that I can say of this is that a good time is had by me.

I told Mrs. Bear this, and she said it was awesome. I think the dance that goes with it surpasses awesome, but I can't see it (being as I'm doing it).

Introvert vs. Extrovert

Mrs. Bear's recent post, and a conversation on being introverted with a friend in which she told me that I "hide it well" because I seem to enjoy talking with people, have prompted this small clarification:

Introversion is NOT a pathological state (that crazy Jung—always yukking it up).

Furthermore, the distinction between extroverts and introverts is not "loves people" and "hates people." Rather, it is that extroverts are energized from contact with people, especially large numbers of people, and introverts are energized by time alone, especially with large numbers of books.

And, if you want to get into the four ego functions* (and if you have any sense, you'll be into them like a dachshund and a rat hole), extroverts show the world the function that they use most (making them easy to get to know), while introverts show the function they use second most.

Coming up...the title of a good book on the four classical temperaments.

* Disclaimer: this was the best summary I could find (read: the only), but I'd just like to go on the record as saying that I do not believe that hallucinations are simply alternate psychic experiences. Good grief.

Baby Got Back

One of the residents had a birthday a week ago, and her father gave her the DVD Black Beauty. Everyone was excited and the DVD came up frequently in conversation. However, pronunciation being what it is, the first vowel of "beauty" sounded like "oo" rather than "you." I continually found myself on the brink of telling people that Sir Mix-A-Lot hails from my hometown.

No More Meetings!

In about forty minutes I get to go to the third meeting in as many days. This meeting is an improvement on the other two, as it doesn't fall on my days off. (We all have to put up with meetings on our day off now and then, but I been having a pity party on the scale of a five-alarm frat bash because there were meetings on both my days off.) Further, I managed to avoid sleeping for all but one hour last night, so I'd had my heart set on a little slumber, a little folding of the hands in sleep after the morning's duties, but my boss informed me that this makes the devil's work and that I need to come to this meeting or else look forward to a purgatory full of book groups.

The book group in this life has slowed down to two pages a week ("It's so rich!"), so it will take us three years to get through the 300-page book. I can only surmise that the purgatory book group would start at two pages, but gradually cover a portion of the book that is less than any given amount. Then when you finally gave up your own desire to have a sense of the whole in addition to a sense of the details, Grace would come, jump you to the limit (or asymptote), and you would find yourself in heaven and free to read something else.

So how does your intrepid heroine plan to face the day? First, no more caffeine. I've cut down on it to the extent that I've become super-sensitive, and the combination of caffeine (at any point during the day) and a bad-health night sometimes adds up to a grievous sleep deficit which is all my fault. Second, I intend to read more of Freddy the Politician before the book group commences.

God is Good

I just went to the dentist for the first time in five years, and had X-rays taken for the first time in six years. The dread with which I had approached the dentist's chair had nothing to do with a fear of pain. No, it was that terrible grown-up fear of the bill which lurks, green-eyed and slavering, waiting for the psychological moment to bite in the place where it will be felt most. I have a fair amount of dental pain, and had visions of having to sell organs on the Chinese black market in order to cover the fees.

This dentist actually does the cleanings himself—he says he feels like he gets a better understanding of a person's teeth that way. He's not quite as thorough as the hygienists that have cleaned my teeth in the past, but he charges $45 rather than $150, so I'm not complaining.

But the best news of all is this: I don't have a single cavity! The dental pain is simply due to migraines, and I'm not even grinding my teeth from them!

As we say in this house:
God is good!
All the time
All the time
God is good!

Miscellaneous

This week I registered at a new parish, and was puzzled by a blank marked "family salutation." I wrote down "Salve" but something tells me that wasn't what they meant.

I finished the Harry Potter book and very much enjoyed it. In fact, it reversed the one thing that had most upset me about the earlier books. I'm just going to be pleased and not discuss the legitimacy of this reversal—let's just take joy where we find it.

And speaking of finding it, I'm off to the library to find more children's fantasy books. I think it's just about Prydain-o'clock. If my erstwhile readers have any other suggestions, I would love to hear them. I'll probably check out The Dark Is Rising Sequence (although that has always seemed a bit dark to me).

On Bandaids et al

I was asked recently how I had mended my V-necked shirt with a bandaid, which tells me that my writing is not quite a crystal clear prism of brilliant thought. The bandaid was in fact an unrelated accessory, the result of an attack in the bath by a razor wielding maniac a day or two prior. Now that the hot weather is upon us, and even lukewarm showers are not enough to make balance and coordination simultaneously possible, these attacks are becoming both more common and more grievous. In fact, I am becoming piqued at their frequency, though I've been assured in no uncertain terms that I am not only alluring but sultry when plastered with bandages. (Of course, I do lose a significant amount of weight—albeit from only one spot—with each incident.)

However, razors have also brought happiness to these quarters. I consider the following to be a definitive refutation of those who believe that literature cannot teach:

A Willa Cather character sat down after a long day hiking across southwestern deserts to hack at his callouses with a penknife.

Hercule Poirot, in need of a small, very sharp knife to slice open a knapsack which he suspected of containing smuggled heroin, went to his bathroom for a callous knife.

After reading these passages, I went straight to the drugstore, found that callous knives still exist (though they are more razors than knives), purchased one, and successfully removed the callouses from the sides of my feet. However, something that looked very similar came back as soon as I got to my current residence and the semi-public shower, as noted in a previous post. Now I wish I'd never brought the topic up, as the treatment was not successful, perhaps due to my fabulous disappearing immune system.

A New Hope

Only today I was wondering what The Royal Tenenbaums being my favorite movie said about my subconscious. And now I see that Wes Anderson is poised to release a new movie! The dread question is: will it, like another film we could mention, be all wet?

Today I Bought Into Mass Hysteria

And I feel Fine.



But I have to read it hidden in my room as my coworker will burn both it and me if she finds out!

The Gloved Left Hand

Is Facebook.com the gloved left hand of the man (as Mrs. Bear insists), or is it a fun and harmless way to keep in touch with friends who have heartlessly abandoned the blogging world?

Also, is it as prone to being broken into as myspace?

In other words, if I sign up, am I asking to be found the next day with a dagger in my back and an expression of unspeakable horror on my face?

A Picture of Now

From Mrs. Bear

A picture of now, between past and future.

1. a. Describe your outfit. I am wearing a heather-wine-red T-shirt, jean capri pants, and a Band-Aid. I bought the shirt for the color, and didn't notice that it had a V-neck until I got home from the store, so I have to do a lot of re-adjusting so that the world doesn't see more Flannery-flesh than is strictly good for it.
b. What associations does the main color evoke? The main color is one I've rarely worn, and the "heather" texture makes it pretty new in my world (and therefore non-evocative). When I first came across this question, I was wearing a bright turquoise shirt that was the color of joy.
c. Is there a memory associated with that outfit (or part of it)? Unfortunately, this outfit is new enough to justify a judgment of "soulless." I bought both the pants and shirt in May as part of a campaign to dress appropriately to my station in life (which I interpret to mean more than three pairs of weather-appropriate pants). The Band-Aid is new as of this morning. My primary memory in future will probably be twitching the neckline up.

2. a. Are you listening to music? No, it's hotting up around here, so that means no more migraine-making music. However, I was just listening to the song I linked to in question 5.
b. Was this intentional? Yup. But when I first came across this question, I was listening to the Cranberries' first album, which is replete with memories of 1996-1997, the year I first lived away from home, moved four different times in 12 months, and in general experienced an alternative-rock version of Dostoevsky's universe.
c. What does the music make you remember? Exhaustion, getting home at midnight and watching the last of Late Night with David Letterman with my older brother on our functional TV which sat atop our non-functional one, darkness of late night and early morning and the darkness of a bank account with nothing in it.

3. a. Describe the objects within arm's reach. My appointment book (from Barnes and Noble. It is the only day-planner which has ever worked for me, and now my life falls apart without it.) An almost finished baby blanket (which is a surprise for a couple that doesn't ever read the blog), my craft tote-bag and scissors, a packet of fountain pen cartridges (I haven't gotten a needle and syringe, so I can't refill the old cartridges myself), two decorative boxes (still in the bag, just purchased from the clearance table), a bag with a couple of makeup sponges, a P.G. Wodehouse book, I Believe in Love, my watch, a glass of water, a few other books and a journal, and my cell phone.
b. Choose one object and tell where you acquired it. I bought I Believe in Love at a small Catholic bookstore in Plano, Texas. A friend had read the first chapter out loud to me, and I'd been wanting to read more on St. Thérèse of Lisieux's spirituality, since I love her dearly. If I were marooned on a desert island and could only have five books, this would be one of them.
c. On the whole, are the objects new (memory blanks) or old (memory filled)? I don't think any of the items are more than a year old, and some of them were just purchased tonight, while the baby blanket is still coming into being. The day-planner is old in the sense that it shares in the two or three prior ones which were the same in kind but different in number—and they are all very much memory filled.

4. a. What room are you in? My tiny bedroom, chosen over a larger room because this one has two windows and only one mirrored closet (rather than two).
b. To what extent is it yours? It's mine in the sense that if I find anyone sleeping in the bed, I can dump them out of it, and people have to knock before coming in. But I don't own it and didn't even sign a lease for it. It's just part of the job.
c. What kind of memories will you have in the future of this room?I'm not sure. The fact of the matter is that anywhere that I have lived is capable of generating bittersweet nostalgic memories such as featured here. (Actually, there's one exception, but that was pretty exceptional.) I don't know if it's simply that these things in the past are part of me, and thus have a hold on me, or if there is enough good in pretty much anything for it to be a wrench to let it go.

5. What were you doing before starting this post, and what would you like to do next? I was shopping (escaping from the house), then took a break to talk to a friend and crochet, and hope to talk to Mrs. Bear shortly.

I tag Hélène, Sapientiae Amator (i.e. The Slacker Who Uses Classes as Lame Excuses—he probably tells his professors that he'd love to write his papers but can't because his blog keeps him so busy), and Guy Crouchback (Mr. I Just Gave My Sister the Surprise of Her Life by Posting Twice in One Day after 1.5 Million Years without a Post).

A Succesful Ad Campaign

Yesterday I went to Walmart and plopped down $12.84 (+ tax) of my hard-earned cash, bubbling over with excitement. This is what happens when I watch TV (two nights ago, approximately one hour).

I pride myself on being impervious to advertisements, but random samplings of evidence (i.e. what I happen to remember at the moment) suggest that I am actually highly suggestible. I have not found myself wondering how my life would be improved by a vacuum-seal food storage device, but have wondered if it would be "fun" to sign up on eHarmony, and—when very tired—have even thought that the CD compilations (Dance Hits of the 80s, Country Western Songs that Tell Stories) might be a helpful supplement to my overall happiness.

But the fatal commercial this time was a lavender-and-white concoction featuring beautiful feet. A voice-over inquired whether I was troubled with stubborn callouses on the sides of my feet as an invisible pen marked Xs along the exact mountainous regions which have obstreperously refused to be pumiced away. (Apparently this can be a rare—read unique and exquisite—form of athlete's foot). In one moment I had been shown the evil that lurked at the bottom of my soles, and in the same instant shown the remedy. Little wonder, then, that I was found, within 24 hours, solemnizing the union with a WalMart checker officiating.

Now that I have the darn thing, I would like to say that the lotion is kind of messy and annoying to apply twice a day for the next two weeks. A spray would have been preferable. And I hope that the cream does not entirely transform my feet into those of the commercial, as it would be awkward to have cartoon feet on a purple background.

Fruit vs. Vegetable

Mrs. Bear brought up the "vegetable or fruit" controversy in a recent post, which reminded me of a theory I've been wanting to get feedback on.

People always talk about how tomatoes aren't really vegetables, but fruits—when in fact, about half of what we normally call vegetables are technically fruits. Cucumbers, all squashes, all peppers, and eggplants all contain the seeds of the plants. But I've never heard anyone talk about how pumpkins are really fruits. True vegetables would be leafy greens (lettuce, rhubarb) and roots (jicama, onions).

I think that in common usage, the difference between a fruit and a vegetable actually depends on the sugar content. Tomatoes are very sweet, which might be part of why they grab all the attention here. Of course, bell peppers and carrots are also pretty sweet, but they have some sharper flavors as well which may mask the perception of sweetness.

What do you think?

Sing On, Sweet Soother of Souls

The last few days have been difficult. I had to work seven days straight, then today (my first of two precious days off) had to work two hours in the evening, and it so happened that these were the two hours marked off for talking with a dear friend whose son goes to bed at the beginning of them and who goes to bed herself at the end of them. One of the residents has a pimple in a place not ordinarily seen which she earnestly desires to show me, another is upset at living with "low-functioning" people who cannot cook for themselves (and is also upset at not being allowed to cook here), and a third is jealous over the second's accomplishments. We assistants seem to interact on a similar level.

But today's mail brought a used copy of The World of Mr. Mulliner, and it has already soothed my soul.

The man in the corner took a sip of stout-and-mild, and proceeded to point the moral of the story which he had just told us.
"Yes, gentlemen," he said, "Shakespeare was right. There's a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will."
We nodded. He had been speaking of a favourite dog of his which, entered recently by some error in a local cat show, had taken first prize in the class for short-haired tortoiseshells; and we all thought the quotation well-chosen and apposite.

I may or may not have laughed in a manner ill-suited to a house where others slumber.

Five Things

Courtesy of Mrs. Bear and writer's block (my favorite duo).

Five things in my closet:
1) library tote
2) craft totes and projects
3) appropriately trendy clothing
4) suitcases
5) drying rack

Five things in my fridge (N.B. It's not really my fridge, and I do little of the grocery shopping, so I can't be blamed for many of the items.):
1) fat-free American cheese (no comment)
2) cantaloupe
3) grape jelly (YECH! I always thought parents bought this to plague their children, but it turns out that it is preferred by some.)
4) free-range eggs
5) juice watered down to half-strength (almost enough to make a right-thinking person declare holy war)

Five things in my car (N.B. See above):
1) Drew's Famous Party Music CD (you would not believe how much dancing can be done while seat-belted into a 14-passenger van!)
2) wipies
3) step-stool
4) bench seats
5) steering wheel (Okay, it's pretty barren--or tidy, depending on your point of view.)

Five things in my purse:
1) a small notebook for brilliant (ahem) thoughts (a total of one [1] pages used--it turns out that brilliant thoughts have to be written on napkins, backs of envelopes, etc.)
2) wallet stuffed with old receipts that I need to enter in my check register
3) digital camera
4) small day-by-day calendar/appointment book (with lots of brilliant thoughts scribbled on random pages)
5) Cucumber-Melon disinfecting hand gel

Five Good Things about Today (because there ought to be five entries in a "five things" meme).
1) guiding a blind developmentally-disabled man around a carnival
2) riding in bumper cars with this man as the driver
3) making it to the bathrooms on several occasions without Disaster striking a member of my group, despite the dream-like slowness of our progress
4) watching The Great Mupppet Caper
5) going to sleep in a couple of minutes

I tag Helene, Sapientiae Amator, and Guy Crouchback. (Hey, impossible things are happening every day!)

Won't you come out to play?

Most of the cool kids have disappeared. It's okay, I don't need you. I'll just stalk Mrs. Bear's friends list (it's almost like having friends of my own!)

Envision a Black Border

Somewhere a book entitled (I think) My Life as a Burmese Princess exists. This book was brought to my attention by the admirable catalog, A Common Reader, which was to books as J. Peterman is to clothes (but more so). The J. Peterman Company went out of business while I was in college, which was much lamented as it provided a beloved dance entertainment, read by Mrs. Bear and acted out by young men who may or may not have had a beer or two to prep for the role. In looking for something to link to, I just discovered that the catalog has renewed its fountains of strangely inspired prose, which is good for the world but bad for my proportion.

A Common Reader also entered my life while at college, and in the same way, in the form of a catalog addressed to a former student, abandoned in the mail room. (I sometimes wonder what bulk mail addressed to me is spicing up the life of the current students.) Almost every book in it was wonderful. It had, among other things, the full Bagthorpe saga. However, it sold books at list price (plus shipping), and although the worthy publishers of the catalog deserved every penny of that exorbitant amount, I still got the books from the library or amazon.com. Which is probably why the catalog no longer exists.

I've also noticed a dramatic falling-off in used bookstores since amazon.com hit its stride about five or six years ago. My adolescent favorite was in the basement of the Magic Lantern Theatre, a short walk from the downtown bus station--now a mere memory. Remaining used bookstores tend to have ridiculous prices, and generally send an outraged me back to my computer. So although I regret some of its effects, I can't say that I regret amazon.com's existence--the most I can say is that I sometimes feel guilty over it.

The book in question is actually Twilight over Burma: My Life as a Shan Princess. (Information and link courtesy of amazon.com).

I have totally wasted my life...

...For this never occurred to me.

File under coincidence *Updated*

Watch the PA System get hit by lightning (repeatedly) as Rudy Giuliani tries to explain why his position on abortion is not like Pontias Pilate's position on crucifying Christ. (A short summary of his explanation is: "Well, yes, but I feel that an elected official has no other choice.")