The Limit

I have finally discovered the limit of my tolerance and patience.  No, not with politics, child-rearing or academia.  I have discovered the limit of my ability to understand and empathize with mental illness.  Not all mental illness, mind you, just one permutation.

What is the occasion of this journey of self-discovery and shame, you ask?

Hoarders, on A&E.

Just–Oh My God.  Usually when I watch these shows about addiction or depression or schizophrenia, I may be baffled by the people on the screen, but I can muster empathy for them because they are obviously suffering from a debilitating illness.  But there is something about the hoarding–even though you can obviously argue that it is a debilitating condition–that completely shuts down my empathy valve and has me yelling at the screen, “For God’s sake, stick her in a padded cell and CLEAN THE FREAKING HOUSE!!!!”

Maybe it’s due to the fact that I grew up in a house where my dad’s idea of a fun way to kick off Saturday morning was by vacuuming at 8 a.m.,  followed by raking the shag carpeting.  (Yes, I am a child of the 70’s.  Deal with it.  We had lovely, fluffy shag carpeting, too.  It never got matted or ratty looking.)  My parents, due to their Depression-era raising, were super-scrupulous about taking care of stuff and keeping it clean.  They were too poor to hoard, so they went the other way–you want poster people for “reduce, reuse, recycle,” look no further than my parents.

Or maybe it’s due to the show itself, which does an admirable job of illustrating the kind of denial hoarders live in, without being an hour-long “fix-it” show.  No one suddenly sees the light at the end of the show, no sassy british ladies show up with baking soda and feather dusters to make inappropriate sexual jokes and scour away soap scum–it’s just the same person, insisting that they aren’t hoarding, they’re going to get around to selling the stuff/repairing the stuff/giving the stuff as presents/reorganizing the stuff for an ENTIRE HOUR, while simultaneously refusing to actually get rid of/organize/fix or sell ANYTHING, even when an entire army of mental health professionals and a Haz-Mat team have shown up to help out.

News flash:  Here’s how these stories are probably going to end.  The hoarders are going to lose all their friends and family, die covered in cockroach crap when a pile of ancient newspapers falls over and crushes them, and then the four dozen cats they “rescued” are going to EAT THEM.  But they don’t get it, or they don’t care. 

And instead of empathy, it produces blind, frustrated rage in me when I watch.  Gah.

Is it compelling television?  Definitely.  I just don’t think I’ll be able to watch it anymore, because of its effect on my mental health.

Your Friday Dose of WTF

Well, we’re officially ensconced in the new house, so that’s a load off my mind–and with a scant 5 weeks to spare before the Blessed Event.  Anyone know of some reputable painters who can get the interior whipped into shape in a few days?

Blogging will hopefully be more regular now, at least until the onset of Newborn Syndrome, at which time it will devolve into random smatterings of nonsensical ideas that seemed rational at the time…

But enough of that.  I titled this post the way I did for a reason.

So this morning I had to sign a permission slip for The Boy to be allowed to view the president’s little “stay in school” speech at his school.  Yes, we have arrived at rock bottom in terms of both the level of political discourse in this country and in the level of mistrust of our elected officials on both sides of the aisle.  And while I’m all about some healthy scepticism, particularly when the political class tells you to relax and let them help you because they know what they’re doing and you should just trust them, I’m mostly flabbergasted by all of this hoo-raw.  Although on the other hand, there’s never really been a p.r. nightmare that the NEA couldn’t make much worse, so maybe I shouldn’t be that surprised…

But of course all of this pales in comparison to the REAL burning issue of the day:  Is Lady Ga-Ga an hermaphrodite?  Best related headline:  “Has Lady Ga-Ga got a Poker?”

Silly season, indeed.

Chancellor Wish List

So, as many of you know, we have embarked on a search for a new Chancellor.  In the interest of transparency, the university has decided to actually get opinions from faculty, staff and students about what they would like to see in this position.  Based on preliminary feedback, here’s what we’re looking for:

• Someone who can separate religion and education.
• Someone who will defend religious groups on campus.
• Someone who is undergraduate focused, instead of research-focused.
• Someone who will continue to give research the support it deserves.
• Someone who is committed to diversity.
• Someone who won’t give in to the relentless pressure to be P.C. when doing so would make the university act in a ridiculous manner.
• Someone young.
• Someone with the benefit of years of experience, who’s been around the block.
• Someone who listens to everyone’s concerns before acting.
• Someone who knows that leadership means shouldering the burden of decision-making.
• Someone who isn’t completely bound to the whims of donors.
• Someone who is a fundraising genius.

So to sum up, it appears that our new chancellor needs to be a religious atheist multi-racial bisexual hermaphrodite who is under 50, has at least 15 years experience in the classroom and 15 years in the lab, and who is a maverick renegade visionary leader who builds perfect consensus and who can get money from people s/he will then tell to mind their own business.

It’s going to be an interesting year.

Packing Tips

Everyone knows that the best (as in “free,” and “already sectioned into neat cubbyholes for glassware”) boxes for packing kitchenware in are the ones that you can get at the local liquor store.

Unfortunately, since everyone knows this, competition is fierce for the boxes….

Unless you are located at a university, where the stacks of empty liquor boxes actually obstruct the entrance to the local liquor store.

Bless you, legions of drunken college students!  You are saving me a tidy sum on packing!

Facing Adversity is Challenging

When you don’t actually know what the adversity is, numbers-wise.

The good news is that I am no longer alone in my freaking out, having dragged a loan agent, her entire management staff, 2 realtors, my extended family, and the sellers of the home we’d like to buy into the morass of freaking out along with me.  So I’ve got that going on, which actually kind of cheers me up.  I’ve always been a “share the pain” type, and not in that altruistic, Obama-care kind of way.  For me, sharing the pain involves more of the “oh, Hell no–if I’m suffering you’re coming with me” Ghenghis Khan-type sentiment.  But if you’ve been reading this blog you probably already know that…

Speaking of Khan and all things sort-of Barbarian, I finally saw the movie Conan the Barbarian last night on G4.  Wow, that movie was horrible.  And I’m not talking about the cheesy dialogue, Arnold’s complete lack of acting skills OR James Earl Jones’ wig.  I’m talking about the fight choreography!  Pretty much the only reason I was watching Conan was to see burly barbarians whacking the crap out of each other, but the whacking, it was sorely lacking. Frankly, the fight scenes on Deadliest Warrior are way more compelling.  It was like they couldn’t afford slow motion cinematography, so they just made the actors slow down instead.  Likewise, they couldn’t afford decent props (the giant, obviously painted styrofoam war hammer winning the BAW cheapest prop of the night award), or stuntmen, or script writers, or…

How did this movie not show up on MST3K?

YEARGH.

Let me just kick the dust bunnies and cobwebs out of the way, and apologize for my hiatus.  Things here have been…stressful…of late.

It seems this year that for every piece of good news we get, we also get a complimentary kick in the teeth.  Latest example?  Well, the Gestating Girl is apparently gestating along just fine.  She’s already upside down and in the lotus position, practicing her swallowing and gaining weight in preparation for her October debut.  We’re at 3 lbs, 10 oz. right now, which is awesome.  I tend to have nice, petite babies, which makes me happy.  So things are doing  just fine on that front right now.

Which means that of course SOMETHING needs to go horribly awry with the house moving.  Apparently a local builder–who had several homes he couldn’t sell and a debt load he couldn’t therefore sustain–undersold all the homes on the market in the neighborhood where we’re buying just in time to completely screw up the appraisals process.  So, even though the home we’re purchasing appraises well above what we’re paying for it, the aforesaid builder skewed everything downward far enough that the mortgage insurance company my loan agent is using won’t cover the mortgage, hyper-excellent credit rating, sizeable down-payment and fabulous debt-to-income ratio be damned.  Commence mad scrambling from my loan agent, realtor, etc., to find someone else to cover it or figure out a way to make this work.  We’re two weeks from closing, by the way.

So.  I am shortly to be 8 months pregnant and homeless.  You do NOT want to be around me when this happens, and I calmly informed my loan agent and realtor that perhaps they should pass this data along to the mortgage insurance people as well, so that they won’t be alarmed when a large, enraged pregnant woman shows up at their office and commences to give birth on their doorstep.

At least when my newborn daughter shakes her tiny, angry fist at them, I will feel somewhat better.  Maybe if I’m really lucky, she’ll poop on them as well.

Attack of the Ukranian Man-Boobs

All right, I’ve had it. If you are a world leader, please, for the love of all things holy, KEEP YOUR SHIRT ON! Please. I am begging you. Because no matter how successful you are, or how well (or poorly) your country is faring, no one wants to see your boobs.

I PROMISE.

Let’s face it, fellas.  Most of you are upwards of middle aged, the time in life when things start to sag and drag, no matter how many chest presses you do.  Why you would think that showing some saggy pecs to the world would impress anyone with your virility is frankly beyond me.

I mean, think about it.  Would Golda Meir or Benazir Bhutto have done photo ops on a topless beach to prove to the masses that they possessed enough feminine mystique to rule a country? No. Just, no. 

So if they wouldn’t have done it, and you’re a man who may actually wear a larger bra size than either of those women, do us all a favor and Keep. It. Covered. Take a page from the book of decorum, is all I’m asking.

The eyes of web surfers everywhere will thank you, starting with mine.

Conversations with my Mother: Losing my mind edition

Me: “Hi mom. Still interested in helping with the pre-move stuff? Because Hublet goes back to work a week before school starts, and that week would be a good time for you to come – I’m planning on letting you pack the china, because I suck at it.”

Mom: (Looks at calendar). “Sure! I can come after the luncheon on that Tuesday, and stay until Saturday!”

Me: “Oh my God – you think it’s going to take 4 days to pack the kitchen stuff? We’re never going to make it!”

Mom: “Um, sweetie? Hublet will be back at work that week, right?”

Me: “Yeah, so there shouldn’t be anyone in your way…”

Mom: “Yes, but The Boy doesn’t start school until that next Monday.”

Me: “So?”

Mom: “Well, part of the reason I’m coming is so that your not-quite-eight-year-old won’t be left home alone for an entire week.”

Me: “Oh. You know, I totally forgot about The Boy.”

Mom: “I noticed.”

Me: “He’s so low-maintenance I keep losing him in the shuffle. Hope I remember to feed him.”

Mom: “Me, too. You seem a little stressed, dear. I could come earlier if you’d like.”

Me: “No, it’ll be fine. Hublet will remind me if I forget something Boy-related.”

Mom: “Ookay. I’ll just call to check in later, then.”

Sometimes, Trendy Just Doesn’t Work out Properly

Take for example the latest trend dominating our roadways – the curlique’d faux monogram stickers that I’m seeing more and more often attached to the rear window of family-mobiles. The letters are all curvy and stylized, and the monograms are usually done in pink or green. It’s all very preppy, and gives me PTSD flashbacks to 7th grade, when I lived in button-downs and had one of those Papagallo purses where you could buy the different covers for it in order to coordinate with your outfit. I KNOW. Toss in a hairdo that copied Pam Dawber’s Mindy and a pair of penny loafers, and you have my 7th grade fashion statement, a.k.a. the stuff of nightmares.

Anyway, so I’m seeing these little mongrams everywhere nowadays, and usually I just roll my eyes and move on. If traffic is slow, I amuse myself by making up horrible names for these letters, like Rotunda Phonebone Smithee, or whatever, and then see if the person behind the wheel matches the name I’ve created.

And while I will argue that monogramming your car is asinine, it doesn’t evoke the same sort of rage in me that bumper stickers do. After all, the only thing I have to confront about the driver of the mongrammed car is the fact of her initials – I’m not also being invited to take a stand for or against any of a myriad of the latest political or religious issues of the day.

That said, however, I do have words of caution for the mongramming wannabes among you. Please remember that monograms put your MIDDLE initial first, followed by your first initial and last initial. So do us all a favor and think about what that might spell, in order to avoid the following scenario:

The Boy: (riding merrily along in the car) “ASS!”
Me: (manages not to swerve into the guardrail, oncoming traffic, or a ditch) “WHAT?!”
The Boy: “That car says ASS on it! See? A – S – S!”
Me: (scouring the bumper of the minivan in front of us for obscene bumper stickers and finding nothing) “Where?”
The Boy: “Up on the window, see those pink letters? Except they capitalized the wrong one.”

Sure enough, emblazoned upon the back window of the Ford Expedition, was a curly pink monogram that read: aSs.

I pondered this for a moment, informed the curious Boy that the word referred to the driver of the car in front of us (I know, bad mommy, no cookie), and left it at that, though I was tempted to preface the word in question with “dumb.”

I also ran the initials of every family member (including the one that’s still baking) through my head to make sure that in the event of a mongrammed gift, no one in the Big Arm family would have to walk (or drive) around with an embarrassing word embroidered (or stuck) to their person or belongings.

Apologies for the Radio Silence

We finally got an offer on our house. So now we need to buy another one and move, hopefully within the next 4 weeks. No problem, right?

On the bright side, my mother is beside herself with anticipatory glee. I feel as though I should put all the local furniture stores on alert…