Yawn....

Maybe it's the blues, maybe it's the weather, maybe it's my internal wiring....but I have no energy.  I feel about as energetic as a throw pillow and as useful as a worn out afghan in a blizzard with no heat and no fireplace...in total...pretty non energetic and fairly useless.

I wonder why I feel so worn out, as I gaze at the sleeping Siamese curled up in my lap twitching as he dreams, I feel myself drift just a little.  Could my little buddy be sucking out my energy?  Is he using it to fuel his shiny ball chasing craze?  Perhaps he's using it to power some cat time portal or some cat space probe.  I trust him completely but there are times he seems deeper than a mere kitty sleeping on a lap.

I love fall and winter, honestly I do.  I forget every year how season changes affect me.  This is my second year rewired and I don't know what to expect on that front.  Exhaustion seems to just "pop up" out of nowhere with this.  I guess it really isn't totally out of nowhere.  I can usually trace it to something, lack of sleep, weather, too much typing, too much of anything, medication, nightmares.

The mental fog is pretty substantial too.  Both of them are hitting at the same time.  The exhaustion and mental fog.  The futility of raising a teenager is also mentally draining and for some reason mental stress makes my body feel worse.  Odd or normal?  I think it's normal that stress causes some fatigue.  I think it's odd that I have no idea how to deal with this.  I am assuming I'll figure it out eventually.

Yeah, ok this post is a bit whiney.  This is one of those days I just want my Grandma, the multi colored afghan I used to peak through, the old green plaid sofa,  the pheasant pillow, a cup of Campbell's Chicken noodle soup and Fantasy Island.  If I could turn back time for just one day, I think it might be a day I didn't feel so great and my Grandma took care of me.  I'd love to feel that care again.  I know they guys care, but it's not the same.  I'm responsible now and I'm not supposed to need to be taken care of.  I'm supposed to take care OF things.  On top of all the mental fog, physical exhaustion and general oddness I beat myself up emotionally on a daily basis because I just don't feel like I'm in charge of anything.  I feel completely out of control.  This can't be good for me.  Somewhere, somehow, something has to give.....I'm pretty sure all of us go through this feeling drained thing. I think I'll perk up when the weather has settled, my kitty isn't sneezing so much and we start to decorate for Halloween.  Mmmm Halloween, stolen candy from my son :)  I can almost taste the tootsie rolls now!

Gee isn't this a gloomy post!?  Aren't you glad you read it?  At least it had Tootsie Rolls and Campbell's soup....but not together, that would just be gross.

Genre Favorites Blogfest

List your favorite genre of:

Movie

Music

Books

And a guilty pleasure genre from any of the three categories!

Starting from the bottom guilty pleasure so of course my favorite category 

Books!!

Thrillers.  I adore a good thriller.  Robin Cook, Michael Palmer, Iris Johansen, James Patterson, Dan Brown, Clive Cussler, John Grisham.  I suppose technically some of them would fall under mystery, thriller and or suspense.  I had to pick one (i think) and the thriller label seemed just generic enough.  I do read many genres, currently I am addicted to my son's Fantasy and Sci/Fi series Artemis Fowl (yes, it really is a great series)  I've needed an excellent diversion.  The creation of entire species and imagining a new world has been a great escape and wonderful guilty pleasure.  I was lost after Hogwarts was no longer accepting my application for admission due to the close of the series.  I escaped many nights into those dark passages never knowing what secret room I would discover or talking painting I would chat the night away with.  Now, thanks to Robin Cook and Michael Palmer, I will be attempting to master home surgery for the novice.  If anyone would like a practice appendectomy let me know. I can provide vodka as a sedative but no medication as I am not licenced for anything except for that breast feeding class I took in 98 and of course driving. 

Music

Rock!  I can listen to most anything and do, but my favorite genre is rock.  I love punk, alternative, some country, folk..even opera at times, and some classical.  But rock runs in my veins. If I played an instrument the first song I would want to play well would be Summer of 69, or Born in the USA, or I Love Rock and Roll, or Heartbreaker, or....oh so many songs so little time.  Music is almost a religion for a southerner, but I can sing to myself.  I can't write a great  book to take me away.

Link for the song blog I do with a friend  An Experimental Situation

Movies

Chillers, thrillers, horror.  I'm not sure what good horror is called, not just the blood and guts stuff.  I like a good plot, well rounded characters and chills that make you ponder for days.  The good movies, that leave you with a feeling of uncertainty afterwards. Movies that make you think and reach inside to the places you don't go, because you're never sure what you might find if you do.

I hope I did this right!!

Being a kid today must be horrible

I remember Saturday mornings.  Oh how I loved Saturday mornings as a child!  I would jump out of bed with the grace and beauty of a drunken rhino and charge down the hallway all disheveled at full tilt to the living room.  I would zoom to the television like the misconcepted lemming to a cliff.  I would then dial my channel (one of four!!!) and turn on the tv.  Oh the feel of the knob in my chubby little hand! The wonder! The glory! The rapture!  It was.....cartoon time!!!!!!

I would alternately, sit, stand or lie on the sofa singing along with such catchy  theme songs as, "Marshall, Will and Holly on a routine expedition....(yada yada)....to laaand of the loooost".  Who could forget that fuzzy kid?  He always reminded me, for whatever misfit synapse, of what a glass of ginger ale might look like should it come to life.  The sleestaks scared me.  At night on the potty I would look at the shadow my feet cast hanging there; then being a morbid little cuss, I'd move my toes a certain way so the shadow reminded me vaguely of sleestak feet.  I would then swear the sleestaks were coming and I'd run back to bed.

There was the Shazam/Isis hour...all I remember of that song is 'Shazam!, Isis'  I think Isis turned around when her name was stage whispered.  I know I would feel like I'd failed the week, if I didn't turn around at the right time.  It was either that show or Wonder Woman.  I really think it was Isis though.....i digress.

I would have a bowl of C'apn Crunch, while watching "Honeycomb's big yeah, yeah, yeah! It's not small no, no,no.  Honeycomb's got a...."blah blah bite, crunch taste.  I didn't eat it.  I just wanted to go to the hide out!  At one point there wasca cowboy for Corn Pops, of course the stoned bear for Sugar Crisp (later Super Golden Crisp)..."Hey Kool-Aid, Oh Yeah!", "Let's get Mikey! Yeah he won't eat anything! Hey, Mikey?! He likes it"

Then that new cartoon The Smurfs...it had narration in the first series.  The narrator said "long, long ago. Deep in a forest.......(yada yada)..... And if you're good, you may just catch a glimpse of the smurfs"
There was "Hong Kong Phooey, number one super guy....."  He wasn't so super, the poor cat did all the work! I loved 'opahraytah Rosemary'
"Flintstone's, meet the Flintstone's! They're the modern stone-age family....."
"Meet George Jetson! His boy Elroy! Daughter Judy! Jane his wife!....(catchy chopsticks song bit)...Jane! Get me off this crazy thing!"    I still want a flying car! And a robot house cleaner!
Baggypants and the nitwits, savior faire is everywhere, yogi bear, i've forgotten so many and I keep remembering more as I write!
Then American Bandstand!  Finally, The Soooouuuuul Train"
Then boredom set in....the day dragged on, until....
The Love Boat, soon will be making another run.....
and,     Boss, de plane, de plane!.....
I am Mr. Roarke, your host.....welcome to Fantasy Island!
Geez I miss Saturday!!

Kids today have cartoons on demand.  They should have to wait for them.....just like the good ole days.

Southern Lives 2

Mama sang bass....

Johnny Cash recorded a song, Daddy sang bass, Mama sang tenor, me and little brother'd join right in there. 
Wonderful song!

Southern people, generally speaking, all go to church and sing loudly.  They also sing while doing housework...etc.  I adored certain songs in church, "When the Roll is Called up Yonder", "Come and Dine", especially funny because I was a fat child.  "Lily of the Valley", "Amazing Grace", "Sunlight"....there were more..in Catholic school "Shepherd me o God"  I still get chills and it makes me cry.  I selected it for my Mother-in-Law's funeral.  I felt she wanted it.  "Arise my Love"  The lyrics to all those songs touch me in some way, the music is haunting and touches my soul. Mama would have loved some of these new songs too.

Southern people (again generally speaking) enjoy singing.  Music, singing, dancing, it's in our blood.  I am still moved to tears by certain songs.  I feel a religion in even very secular songs because the singer/songwriter (you can usually tell when they do both) puts so much of themselves in there, it will just move right through me.  I feel a deep stirring, then I find myself singing almost in a worshipful haze no matter the genre.

Mama was stirred by most songs...I remember trying to encourage her to sing more softly in church.  It was met with the "make a joyful noise" comment.  I tried encouraging her to possibly sing on key or listen to the way the music moved when she was singing "Sexy Eyes" while dancing through the kitchen with a dishtowel. I was distraught when she discovered "Sexual Healing" and the dishtowel went whirling.  Every single song I liked she sung to...loudly!  It wasn't off key soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto...it was almost like bass!

When I was a teenager....she sung in front of my friends!  I would NEVER have done such a thing.  I vowed then and there to never sing in front of my children (I wanted 4 just like Mama) if it embarrassed them, or sing in front of their friends.  So, as all "intentions fall to the floor"~ Live, Lightning Crashes  One day after driving my son and his friends home the preteen voice whines at me "Mom, can you not sing in front of my friends?  It's embarrassing"  I froze!  I was becoming Mama!!  I was singing in front of my son's friends.  I try not to now, unless it's an all car sing along and allowed.  Everyone has to sing along to "Mommy's misheard Lil' Wayne Lyrics"  it's that song with Nicki Minaj "What's Wrong With Them"  Totally misheard them as ' baby what the fu¢k bomb?  bomb with them!'  I told my son and his friend what I thought she was saying so those became the all car sing along lyrics. "hey it's the fbomb song my mom likes!"

It has come full circle...I have become Mama...but I don't sing bass..its some sort of nails on a chalkboard sop-alto..or altrano sound.   I do however sing lots of songs to embarrass my child, he just isn't around.  :)

I'm sure if you're Southern or know a Southerner you know all about sing alongs, clapping of hands while singing, and loudly belting out lyrics be they right or wrong.  I think it must be something rooted deep inside us all, like a homing device if we stray too far from our grits and catfish.  The music will bring us home in our hearts.  I haven't met a southerner who wasn't in some way moved by music, if they aren't they must be a yankee pretending to be a southerner.  I was born a yankee but of southern heritage...actually Appalachian heritage.  Maybe the music is deeper there, the ballads, a good ballad gets me every time! ...I digress....   And I leave you with Johnny!

The Great Towel Shortage of 2012

Children; long praised for their boundless desire to help and the great fondness they hold for the doing of chores, can sometimes go overboard when they help. The poor hard working dears delve so fully into helping, seeking extra chores, shunning payment no matter how hard they work, that they often tire themselves out and make mistakes.
Our very own chore seeking child toiled the entire summer. It was a pity to watch him washing, drying, ironing, folding, hanging clothes, towels, bedding...etc.; then the dear simply insisted on putting everything away himself. We would often stand helplessly by and watch him work to weed the yard, plant a garden, do laundry, and make dinner. The sweet hard working teenager would be so frazzled that many an evening we would find him asleep under a cabinet where he had been oiling woodwork. When we noticed the usual perfection in work, slipped to high standards, we sought to have him take a day of rest. Perhaps playing a video game, watching television or simply spending time with friends would help to relieve the tension he was under. He would hear nothing of it! He continued with his rigorous schedule, often working himself into a lather;
Rising before dawn for calisthenics and a short 3 mile run, followed by a 3 mile jog.
Taking a shower, then scrubbing his bathroom top to bottom every day.
Melon and yogurt for breakfast.
Unloading the dishwasher, cleaning the litterbox, washing clothes, windows, walls, mopping the floors, vaccuuming, drying clothes, weeding, landscaping, tending the garden, sneaking to a neighbor's yard to weed and water plants.
Washing up, light lunch of tuna and wheatgrass juice.
Putting dinner on.
Ironing the laundry then folding or hanging it. Putting it away.
Cleaning grout, dusting, oiling woodwork, and wind down chores.
Dinner, followed by another shower.
As is clearly demonstrated, he works so much we have nothing to do ourselves! We noticed, as I mentioned earlier, things were slipping from perfect to high in standards. We observed little things. A glass left on the counter, a few books out of alphabetical order, a wrinkle in a sheet....but most telling, a sharp decline in the number of towels in our linen closet.

Tonight...the night of every young person's dreams, (the eve of back to school) I felt like I should help him make his bed. Imagine my utter shock when I saw over half our family towels creatively stuffed in his linen closet!! I of course immediately tucked him into bed, took his temperature, (it was normal) then applied cool compresses to his brow. While he was distracted darning socks, I quickly whisked some towels to our own linen closet. I desired to spare him the sight of 'fixing a chore'. He caught me and sobbed copious amounts, working himself into a dither. He screamed " why, why, why?" I gently explained that we had no towels and only wanted a few. Poor child had worked himself too hard to notice he had filled his linen closet to bursting with towels!
I put his trembling form gently back in bed. Sleep dear one....for tomorrow is another day....