and i know you know about cebu. they’re the masterminds of this piece of art:

i am in awe of these guys. and naturally, they are/ were big fans of michael jackson. now, say what you will about mikey, but he was talented before he was a loopy dude that lived in neverland. i’m not slapping this up to discuss michael jackson. he was the schiznit when i was in third grade, and he had that crazy 3-D video thinger in disneyland back in the day. and eventually, we’ll remember his talent over his laundry list of weird.

anyway. cebu has a final jackson dance for us:

thanks for stopping by.

here’s the thing. i love living in the portland area. there is so much lunacy to be had. there are drag queens, yarn shops, and strange eateries scattered all about the area code.

but, what we don’t have? erik’s deli.

during my high school years, i lived in santa cruz, california. a lovely pocket of nuttiness, where i’m still convinced all the hippies go to die. i’m not being mean, i’m just saying. it’s a very mellow area, and it’s a beautiful pocket of landscape. also, they have these signs at the city limits that say “santa cruz is a nuclear-free zone”.

i wish i had pictures to prove it.

one of the great things about santa cruz – i mean, besides living so close to the ocean that i could hear the waves crashing at night in my bedroom – were the delis. there were a fair few awesome delis. we had togo’s, dharma’s cafe (which used to be called mcdharma’s, but they changed it because of that other mc-place giving them the serious side eye), and that little place around the corner from our house, to name a few. as an aside, the place around the corner from our house? really good food. but one of the guys in the back? gave me the straight-up creeps. he always wore his apron. even while waiting for the bus. and he would stare you down. i’m sure he was a nice guy who treated his pets really well, but he freaked my teenage self out.

anyway.

erik’s is awesome. they have amazing food. their menu items have amazing names (seriously, you can order a knuckle sandwich there. it’s cream cheese, salami and sprouts on dark russian rye. sooooo good). it was all healthy. they had the best brownies in the universe. and if you ate there, your drink came in a mason jar. i don’t think erik’s could have happened anywhere else. although, technically, their first place was in scott’s valley. but that’s right up the freeway from santa cruz, and it totally counts.

i bring this up because tonight i was at my yoga class. and the instructor and i were talking about favorite sandwiches. she mentioned this amazing-sounding concoction she’d sweet-talked a bar cook into making her. there was bacon, cheese, avocado and tomato in a pita pocket. it sounded so good. and it made me think of my favorite sandwich at erik’s, the natural high. when i told her about this sandwich, she asked, where do they make that? it sounds fabulous. i sighed and said, at erik’s. in santa cruz. i’d love a natural high, with a berry calistoga to drink.

portland has failed me. and through no fault of its own. there’s nothing that comes close to that here, at least in my opinion. i was even looking around on their website. thinking, please let them have a deli in yreka (pronounced why-reek-a). that’s just across the oregon-california border. i can go there on friday. sadly, they haven’t left the bay area.

my point is this. if you live in the vicinity of an erik’s… dude, you’re so lucky. if you have no idea what i’m talking about… dude, you’re missing out. if you’re looking for a franchise to start in oregon… dude, give erik a call. he’ll hook you up.

basically, i’m just hungry. thanks for stopping by.

so, i’m typing from southern california.

hi!

my day started out just awful. i got to the check in counter one minute past their baggage check deadline, and they refused to check my bag (seriously? i was 50 minutes early. i hate you, united airlines). so, i have to carry on my bag. because i wasn’t expecting to carry my bag onto the plane with me, i had soap and lotion and all the little assorted things you take with you when you leave your room. not only do most of my toiletries get confiscated (i should have just burned a $50 bill), but i get searched. like, bodily searched. like, with the little hand wand and a full pat-down.

also? when we landed at LAX, we were 15 minutes early. that annoyed me to no end. i could have checked my damn bag if we were so ahead of schedule.

anyway. worst flight experience in quite awhile for me.

but, ye gods bless moi. she not only took me to a lovely yarn store, but we swung by giant robot. which is honestly one of the coolest shops in the history of the ever ever if you’re a geeky dork. such as we are. anyway, we each made silly purchases. but, we had an honest-to-goodness snort over this:

sure he's happy.

yeah, it looks like a random alien toy. but check the closeup:

insert your own dorky joke here.

in lieu of a wang, the alien has this. an on/ off switch. which – let’s face it – is standard in human males also. and don’t ask me what it did when the switch was… er… toggled. this one didn’t have batteries, so we don’t know.

we saw a little anger:

he wants to eat my intestines.

and… well, i’m speechless.

bananas gone wild! yeah, those are nanners in stockings.

the japanese are an unusual people. i must join them immediately.

i just won’t fly united to get to them. united asshats, if you ask me.

thanks for stopping by.

so, it’s fair to say i’ve been a little emotional the last week and change. i’ve started half a dozen blog posts in my head, only to have my internal editor veto them before i got to a computer. and then, i end up reading a book and forgetting about the blog altogether.

instead of talking about this cat-shaped hole i now have in my life, i’ll talk about my neck. at least that story has a happy ending.

as you may recall, i had an MRI of my neck that told me what most of my friends and colleagues already know – that i’m damaged goods but pretty much within normal limits. a few saturdays ago, i was in the shower washing my hair, and i experienced what i thought was a pulled shoulder muscle. great, i thought. i’m the only person i know who can get injured while performing personal hygiene.  i continue about my day, which included going to see the watchmen and doing a few little errands. as an aside, i’m still not sure if i recommend the watchmen to non-geeks. you may love it, you may hate it. or, you may just go to see if dr manhattan really is totally naked (yes, and apparently uncircumcised. just saying). it was fun to watch, but i don’t know if i absolutely loved it. i guess if i still don’t know, then i probably didn’t love it. still, worth watching.

anyway.

as my day goes on, my neck starts to hurt more and more. what started as a mild pain in my left shoulder became really intense pain working its way up my neck; by the time i was heading home, the pain was on both sides of my neck, shooting into both shoulders. i couldn’t turn my head to check traffic, or my blind spot. which made my drive home one elongated prayer to the universe. please don’t let me hit anyone, please don’t let anyone hit me, let me make it home safely, please please please…

as another aside, i don’t really believe in god. i blame my catholic upbringing. i can’t get behind the idea of an invisible man, up in the sky, watching every move i make and deeming it good or bad. also? that’s just plain creepy. but, i can get behind the idea that energy in the universe can be positive or negative. and if you ask nicely, these good and bad energies can sometimes work together to get you what you need to get where you’re going.

so, i get home in one piece. i go to bed, because i can’t really hold my head up. this is the week before ophelia died, and she was all over me, and very much on board with going for a lie-down. i lay down, put on a DVD, and proceed to try and not move.

i know i’ve said this before, and i’m pretty sure i’ll be saying it again, but you really don’t appreciate beign able to do something until you experience not being able to do this same something. the act of moving from a horizontal position to a sitting position takes no time or thought on most days. it took me over 15 minutes. seriously.

so, i’m in a lot of pain and moving sucks. i take waaaay too much aspirin, and roll out of bed monday morning (yeah, i spent my weekend snoozing with the cat and trying not to move. i’m such a rock star). i go to work – yeah, i’m having trouble moving, but i work at a hospital. surely, someone there can help me. what i get is a stern talking-to about taking waaaay too much aspirin, a prescription for muscle relaxers, and a referral for chiropractic services. the pills help, but it’s the chiro dude that makes the pain go away. i was so impressed when, 10 or so minutes into my first appointment, i could move my neck. i’ve had a few appointments since then, and i’m down to once a week. it still hurts a bit, even now, but i can move my neck without wincing or making little gasping noises. it takes me no time to get up in the morning – i mean, no more than is usual. the appointments themselves are pretty great. during one morning appointment, the chiropractor said my shoulder muscles were really tight, and he was going to use some kind of electronic stimulation that would cause my muscles to spontaneously contract and relax. essentially, he hooked me up to a battery for ten minutes, and i got to watch my arms jump about of their own accord. he said i’m the only patient that’s ever laughed their way through such a session.

anyway, i’m glad my neck works again.

it’s going to take a little doing to get back in the swing of sitting down to blog. normally, ophelia lays on my feet while i make fun of myself on the interwebs, and it feels wrong to be doing this without her. however, life continues, and i do like writing, even if i’m not terribly funny all the time. i have ideas coming, things that do get past the internal editor. like, i really want to talk about all the badly misspelled signs i’ve been seeing. but that needs photos, and i just haven’t gotten around to it.

so, thanks for stopping by. i hope you continue to stop by. it’s only gonna get weirder.

ophelia thunderpaws

mah bubbeh

time of death: friday, march 13, 2009. 9:15pm

i just couldn’t let her suffer anymore.

y’all excuse me for a bit.

there is truly a website for everything. i love the interwebs with a fierceness that, frankly, scares me a little.

dogs with cones

i mean, really?

but this one has some teeth, i tell you.

first, as some of you know, we have the interwebs at my house, but our network was a shaky mess. i’d set it up, z would use the desktop in the living room, and manage to do something spectacular to screw it up. my computing skills are not the bomb, so i have no idea where the error was really happening. all i knew was my laptop had a hell of a time getting online at home.

and then, the other day? she upgraded the computer in the living room, and i re-set the network. and i made some kind of hellfire-and-brimstone speech about not touching the settings. and then, i slapped a password on our little network. and then, in my room? carmen-the-laptop chirpped out, “hey, we have an internet. do we want to use it, do you think?”

we do, carmen. and thus far, the network is staying, um, networked. so, yay! i’m posting in my pajamas!

point is, now that i can actually post from bed, i have no excuse to not post. so, now we will resume actual regular-ish posting practices.

woot!

but since it is so close to bedtime for me (i have roughly one more week of this getting up at 3 in the flipping morning craziness, then on to a schedule that makes sense), i have a few little snippets to share.

i am now officially working full-time. yay!

ooo, features

i have procured photoshop. i still don’t know how to use most of the features.

rca, he is not

bentley was nervously chewing the fur off his tuckus, so he had to wear the megaphone. i was calling him the megadog for awhile, which has a very godzilla sound to it.

what's a mammal like you doing in a place like this?

shameles flirtation with YMCrae’s dog, as per usual.

and that’s all i got for now. stay frosty, people.

and, as per usual, thanks for stopping by.

yeah.

the next few days will be all about playing catch up here at chez lapin. not that my schedule has simmered down any, but i’m tired of starting blog posts and never coming back to them. i’m pretty sure i’ve lost seven of my nine regular readers, but… well, i have no one but myself to blame for that.

so, i’ll be performing feats of updating in the next few days. largely because the cafes have air conditioning, and the house has… issues. like, my roommate thinks 80 degrees is just fine in terms of the a/c. i’d prefer something closer to 70. i compromise and set it as 75, but then she shuts it off. so, i spend a fair part of my day just dripping sweat. i’d open a window, but it’s been in the triple digits here. which is nothing if you’re living in the southern part of the country. but, in oregon? it’s crazy talk.

also? the a/c makes it easier for me to knit. and if i don’t knit, no one’s happy.

now, i had planned on a meatier post today, but i noticed that i hadn’t been downloading anything onto flickr lately. so, i’ve spent the last three hours cleaning up and uploading over there. and now, my butt’s a little numb. so, y’all will have to pardon me while i get some blood flow happening.

and maybe some food.

thanks for stopping by.

not the number of socks i’ve knit, or posts i’ve started and not hit the publish button.

thirty-two years old. been blogging for about… uh… three of those. but that’s an anniversary for next month.

and here’s the problem with my birthday. remember how i was saying a few weeks ago, about how you shouldn’t treat people like obligations? for a long time, my birthday was treated like an obligation. by me as well as other people. and i just got tired of being let down. friends would never remember my birthday, and i’d feel like an idiot reminding them. i keep starting sentences to illustrate my point here, and i keep deleting them, because they sound sooo petty. i really wanted people in my life to take notice of this one little day. i didn’t give a crap about presents. all i wanted was eye contact and a happy birthday wish. possibly, i was not easy to read in this regard.

on my twenty-fourth birthday, i was told i had ovarian cancer. which is a great time to be told you have a potentially fatal problem somewhere in your nether regions. the best part of that was, the guy i was dating at the time was such an idiot that, when i told him the doctor said i had cancer, he actually said, well you didn’t get it from me.

yup. this is the same guy i would beat with a baseball bat later that same year. such a winner, you know?

so, before cancer my birthday was no big deal. after cancer, i really wanted it to be a big deal. i mean, my body had tried to kill me, but i was still here and alive. which is a reason to celebrate, right? right. a guy i knew threw a huge party for my twenty-fifth, and i was tearily thankful. not just for the party, but for being at the party, you know? i spent most of the night just hugging people. i was seriously so glad to still be walking and talking. to be above ground. it’s a feeling i have each and every day, although on a much smaller scale.

fast-forward to this year. after having an argument with a friend about how low-key i was being about the big day, i had to stop and think why i was so not interested in my birthday this year. it’s not a depression over getting older. while i have wrinkles in places i don’t deserve to have wrinkles, i’m thrilled with getting older. again, if i hadn’t whooped cancer’s butt twice, i wouldn’t be given this chance to age.

here’s the deal. i’m just tired of being let down. it’s not like my current circle of friends make me feel like the last item on a to-do list. far from it. but… well, i’ve spent enough time in my past being let down. by others as well as myself. i’ve spent too much time feeling inadequate, and feeling like maybe i shoulda just let the cancer kill me. like maybe everyone would be happier if i weren’t here.

hi, i am 12, apparently.

my point is this: i’m going to appreciate everyone and anyone that takes time to wish me a happy birthday. even a belated birthday. and i’m not going to mope over how so-and-so paid no attention to my birthday, and how it must mean they don’t care. i’m glad to be alive, but somewhere along the line i lost my ability to be joyful for simply that. for just being alive.

so, today? for the first time in my working life, i did not take the day off work. instead, i volunteered to do the blood draws for the oncology department. almost as difficult as finding a vein on a 24-hour old baby. i’ve done both, and believe me, the baby is easier.

anyway. i went to work. i took care of people. i saved a woman’s life when she started choking two rooms down from where i was, and her granddaughter screamed and no nurses were available. i’m not saying i made a difference. i’m saying that the last few years, since the last time i had cancer, have been a struggle. and i’m just now getting to the point where i say things that sound totally trite. like, i’m here. i’m alive. i’m so glad to be here.

here. portland specifically. the planet in general. above ground.

y’all have no idea. but thanks for stopping by.

first, i need to say: the last post? where i was derailed by a picture of someone’s snuggler? it’s not really how i feel about things, but more of an instant/ gut reaction. really, now. as long as my crush is happy, and he’s getting what he needs (in many different ways. get your minds out of the gutter), then it’s all good. i’m happy for him, and i hope it works out. in my defense, sometimes it’s frustrating to have the obvious pointed out. especially if you’re already in a weakened state.

i’m going to point at my girl hormones and be done with it. this elaborate hand gesture that you can’t see? this is me washing my hands of being a little wuss.

okay, wait. i’m not really done with it. i tend to think in pictures, and i tend to think of people’s lives as… um… orbits. although, they look more like arcs and trajectories, rather than something that follows the same path endlessly.

which possibly makes no sense. but in my head, it all looks like a tilt-a-whirl. we randomly whiz through time and space, but in a semi-ordered fashion. controlled chaos, okay? and we cross paths with others based on this chaos. you have overlap, or you follow the same trajectory for awhile. and then you may veer away from each other. sometimes it’s a good feeling, that zipping away. sometimes, you hope everything rolls and rotates and arcs in the same manner, so that you can return to that other person. or that other place, event, what-have-you. one of my big phrases is oh yeah, when the planets align and all that. meaning, it may be awhile before i get back to that enter-thing-space-person-relationship-here. but i intend to try to get back there. you know what i mean?

so. i’m on the tilt-a-whirl. my car is whizzing in strange directions. i’m kinda hoping i see more of his face again. but i’m also kinda hoping to not puke. did i have a corndog before coming on this ride?

anyway.

in other news, i got an email from my former boss-lady, whom i love. i put her down as a reference for a lab job here at hospital a, and she wrote me today to tell me they called, and she laid it on pretty thick. so, i either owe her a knitted purse, or a bottle of booze. hospital b wants me to apply for this newly-created position, which isn’t really what i want. it’s less stabbing, but more processing. so, more playing with poo and pee instead of needles. like i said, not really what i want. but i’ll be applying directly, because it’s a lab position, and it could lead me to what i want in time.

psh. when people find out about my crazy schedule, they always ask me why. and my response is, we do what we do to get what we want. when you set your sights on something, you know it may not be easy, and it may require a bit of sacrifice. but if it’s what you really want, the sacrifice is justified. and this is what i really want. it’s a strange calling, especially for someone who used to have a fear of needles. but there it is. i love my time in the lab, and i’m good at what i do. that’s a twofer in my book. and it’s worth the crazy schedule. because, the way i see it, a person can do anything for ten weeks. and i have four more weeks to go.

i’m looking forward to it. i can hardly wait. i may even be doing the pee dance right now, in my seat.

thanks for stopping by.