My grandfather sent me a Christmas card with a check in it. I am grateful for the check but I am seriously offended that he put "Grandpa and Grandma Bowman" on the return address. That woman is NOT my grandmother and never will be.

MRI Tuesday. I'm sort of weirdly excited about it. I've never had one, or any sort of scan or EKG or anything more involved than an x-ray, which I've only had once. So I'm intrigued to see what it will be like and what the neurologist gets out of it. I'm going to have to wear pajama pants and a sports bra with my t-shirt though, because all my regular bras are underwire with metal hooks and I don't have any other pants (except for a pair of palazzo pants that are three inches too long) that don't have metal snaps or rivets or buttons or zippers.

I am also finally on medication that will hopefully, eventually, reduce both the frequency and severity of my headaches and my migraines. So far it's not working, but it's been less than a week and I'm on the lowest dose. She said most people with chronic headaches end up needing double what I'm getting. I suppose I understand the concept of not taking more of a drug than you absolutely need, but at the same time, if you know, based on extensive experience with the drug from treating patients with similar conditions, that this dosage is almost certainly too low, why bother with it? I had the same question when I started Wellbutrin. I went back three weeks later and the doctor tripled my Wellbutrin dose. It seems like a waste of time to start so low. But what do I know. I'm not the MD here.

My sister is pregnant. The in vitro worked, first time out. I should be happy for her, shouldn't I?

There's a house in foreclosure in Bloomington.

I fell in love with it the first time I saw it. I was so distracted, staring at it, that I missed the weird quick turn I have to take there and got turned around, and had to go back to the last mailbox I'd delivered and try again. It's blue, with white lattice work and bay windows, a big tree in the yard with a circular bench around it, a gazebo in the back.

Shortly before the housing market tanked, a "For Sale by Owner" sign went up. The regular carrier on that route told me that the couple who lived there had moved here from back East somewhere. He had serious health issues, and they hoped that our more arid climate would help him. It didn't, and he died. She was selling because she was moving back to be with her family. The carrier's wife also thought the house was beautiful, so he called the number and asked about the house. I only remember two of the things he told me she'd said. There was a mother-in-law apartment attached to the house, and she was asking $489,000 for it. I could never afford that, so I wrote it off as an impossible dream, and just stared longingly every time I delivered mail out there.

Yesterday, the regular carrier told me it's in foreclosure. "You can buy it!" he said. "They'll take the highest bid. Twenty-five bucks!" I sort of rolled my eyes at him. But it started me thinking, and while I was delivering the first part of that route I built up a scenario in my head where I somehow could buy it for a couple thousand. I'm good at unattainable dreams.

When I reached the house, I parked the truck and went up to read the foreclosure notice on the window. The auction is the 27th, at 1 pm. The money is due in a cashier's check to the bank's lawyer in Salt Lake the 28th. The real hitch is that they require $5000 in addition to whatever the final, highest bid is. I'm not sure why that five grand was such a kick in the teeth - there's no way that a house like that, even depreciated as it is now, would go for the couple thousand I could scrounge up, so it's not like I really had a chance. But this is the closest I'll ever come to owning that house, and it's incredibly depressing that it's still so out of reach.

I console myself (sort of) with the thought that I've never been inside and have no idea what it's really like, that the grass is dead now, that it might need expensive restoration, that it would take more work to keep up both inside and out, that I absolutely hate moving.

But the bay window would be the perfect place for a baby grand (which I don't own and can't afford). And if I picked up that house for a song, I could take out a home equity loan and pay everything else off, and get right-side up with my current mortgage, and sell the town house, or even keep it and rent it out.

Oh well, right?

I'm not doing group anymore. I lasted three months, which is three months longer than I would have last year and three months longer than I thought I would. I'm overwhelmingly relieved but at the same time, I feel like I've failed myself and my therapist by giving up. Things sort of came to a head a couple of weeks ago, when one of the other women tried to manipulate me into doing something she wanted me to do, and then said, among other things, that she didn't trust me not to judge her because I'm a Mormon. Hello, irony. She judged me to be incapable of not judging her, based solely on whatever screwed up idea she has of What Mormons Are. Clearly she's had some run-ins with less than Christ-like members, but so what? So have I. There are morons and jerks and hypocrites in every religion, and Mormons are not the Borg. Most of us don't check our brains at the door, and I'll guarantee you that my opinions and perspective are different from any other person's, let alone any other Mormon's, because I am not them. Rar.

Clearly I am not over this.

I thought I was. I thought I had worked through my reactions, thought I truly understood that this was her problem, her issues, and not really about me at all. And maybe I have more than I think, but last week I literally felt myself closing off as soon as I heard her voice. I can't make any progress when I'm shut down like that. I'll go back to one-on-one sessions as soon as I can get over my embarrassment at bailing enough to make an appointment with him. He's fantastic. He said he's committed to me. I don't know which is more surprising to me - that he said it, or that I believe he means it.

My youngest sister is going in for in vitro in a couple of weeks. I think I faked interest well enough when I was talking to my mom, but I don't want to hear about it. I can't be excited or hopeful for her at all. Her wedding was the hardest for me to take, and so will any pregnancies she manages. Which, she may not, and she'll have to take a crap load of hormones to maintain the pregnancy if it takes. She's ten years younger than I am, and obnoxious and abrasive and incredibly difficult to deal with, and it feels so unfair that she's married and might have kids and I'm not and don't. I don't seem to be able to be an adult about this, or about her.

The Wellbutrin isn't working yet. October 6th can't get here soon enough. I'm not really excited about talking to the doctor again because he's weird, but I expect he'll increase my dosage. I hope. Also, I am slowly accepting the fact that I'm going to have to see a neurologist. I've never had two migraines in one week before and it sucks.

Time sure flies when you're going insane

• I seriously seriously want management to pull their collective heads out and realize that punishing people for efficiency is probably not the best way to, you know, promote efficiency.
• My brother's dog died unexpectedly. She was fine Monday morning, violently ill Monday afternoon and dead by 8:30. The vet said that when they go that fast, it's usually poison, but the bloodwork didn't show anything. They don't know what happened. My nephew keeps telling his mother that she needs to die so she can go to heaven and bring Ellie back. My brother and his wife are both devastated.
• I started Wellbutrin yesterday. I just simply can't cope without help any more, and after discussing it with my therapist (who thinks America is over-medicated and rarely suggests drugs) we decided to try it. It's intended to be a temporary boost while I work through my therapy. I was not terribly impressed with the psychiatrist, and honestly, would probably go to a GP if I had it to do over again, but he gave me the prescription, only charged me a co-pay, and wants to see me in a month to gauge how effective the low dose he started me on is. He thinks we'll end up increasing it, because it's rare for someone to respond to 100mg, but it can be overstimulating and so it's better to start small and work up if necessary.
• My friends are driving up from San Diego this weekend. We'll take the one's son to see the dinosaur tracks and then watch the new Supernatural dvds I got Tuesday and be fangirls together. I am really excited. They were going to come a couple of weeks ago but had to cancel last minute, and I'm so grateful they were able to reschedule. I've missed them a lot.
  

This is why blogspot needs a reply-to-comments option. I choose door number three, Kamille.

Visiting my parents wounds my soul. Every single time.

I have the hardest time driving through Salt Lake when I get to about 45th South, because the animal shelter has that big marquee that shows pictures of some of the adoptable pets available. I always want to take them all home with me and I hate that I can't.

I was endowed ten years ago today. During the tornado, actually. My cousin told me at the time that he thought the tornado was a sign of some kind. There are times when I think he might have been right.

Someday there will be a day when I am not exhausted. Today is not that day. Somehow I doubt tomorrow will be that day either.

I'm sorry, but who the hell has carpet cleaners over at 8 pm on a Saturday night? That stupid machine has been running outside my door for nearly an hour now.

*adds yet ANOTHER reason to the list of why I HATE MY NEIGHBORS*

My mother called this morning to tell me that they're turning off the life support that I didn't know my aunt was on. Apparently she had a massive heart attack a few days ago precipitated by kidney failure and has been in a coma ever since. I can't help but wonder what my uncle will do without her. He's schizophrenic, and does fine as long as he stays on his meds, but I'm not sure how consistent he'll be without her there to monitor him. Doesn't quite seem fair, does it?

And now the IRS is after me. FAIL, LIFE. EPIC FAIL.

And the neighbor kids are running around screaming outside again. At least it's not ELEVEN O'CLOCK AT NIGHT LIKE USUAL.

*BIG EMO SIGH*

I don't want to be a grown up any more. I just want to go back to hiding in my parents' basement.

I am an idiot, a procrastinator and a Daddy's girl

Waaaaaaaaaaay back in April, Dad told me that my car battery tested low and that it needed to be replaced. It's seven years old, so it's definitely long past time. At the time, I thought "I need to remember to get a new battery soon." Aaaaaand, I didn't.

Fast forward to this morning when my car completely and totally refused to start. RAR. I called my supervisor first, to tell him I'd be there as soon as I could, and then had NO IDEA what to do. At all. I thought of a cab, I thought about a rental. I did not, at that point, think about the battery. I had no idea how I was going to get to work. Then I remembered my friend Ryan from work telling me to call him if I needed anything, or offering to help me several times in the past. I called him, and he came to get me so I could go to work.

Then, while waiting for Ryan, I called my dad. Because of COURSE he can help from 300 miles away. *eyeroll* I ended up leaving him a rambling voicemail. I mentioned the battery (which I had finally remembered) and said I had no idea how to get it somewhere to get it fixed, that I'd probably have to have it towed. Then Ryan arrived and I went to work and when Dad called me back I said "hello" and he said "JOSLYN. You don't have the car TOWED for a battery. The tow would cost more than the battery!" He said a new battery would run anywhere from 50-100 bucks and that all I had to do was get a new one at Checker or somewhere similar and that they would help me get it put in. I told him Ryan had jumper cables.

After work, Ryan gave me a jump and I drove straight to Checker and, 90 dollars later, the guy put the battery in and the car is running just fine. The clock is brighter and I can even tell it has more juice now. It took less than twenty minutes from the jump to getting back home, and I even stopped at Wendy's for a salad.

The moral of the story is, change the frickin' battery in April.

I so rarely have something to say...

I hate having neighbors. I struggle to not hate my job. I am tired of having three church jobs but know myself well enough to know that if I didn't have to be there for Sacrament meeting I wouldn't go every week.

See? Nothing worth saying.

OH. BTW. Kamille is not a loser :P

It's 9:30 at night and it's pitch dark and it's pouring rain and the neighborhood kids are outside running around. They're elementary school age. Yeah, school's out, but they're ALWAYS running around outside after eight and nine and even ten.

Seriously? Parent fail. Right there.

Grandpa does not have cancer, thank goodness. He does have a growth they are watching, however. Dad's surgery apparently went well and he's on crutches now. Here's hoping he stays off his feet enough that his knee will heal. *sigh*

My dad is having knee surgery tomorrow, and my grandfather might have pancreatic cancer, and my mom didn't think either one was something I needed to know. She was very "oh, by the way" about the cancer and STILL hasn't told me about the surgery. I found out about that from a sister.

FAIL, MOM. FAIL.

Just for Kamille *g*

I was a loner girl at the movies. I used to hate doing that, but now it's not a big deal, which is a good thing because otherwise I wouldn't go see the few movies I do catch in the theater. In some ways it's even easier.

I'd almost forgotten how much I adore Ewan in my overinvestment in Jared and Jensen, and then I started watching his bits on various talk shows and fell all over again. You should watch this video of him with Craig Ferguson. They're both seriously crazy Scots.

It was movie marathon weekend in my neck of the woods. First day off in two weeks was today, and I was able to be done and off early yesterday too, so I was lazy and did nothing but hang at the Stadium 10.

Well, not really. But almost. I saw Wolverine yesterday before choir practice and then went to Star Trek this afternoon and hit Angels & Demons at 6. They were all great, I enjoyed them immensely for different reasons, but I have to say Star Trek was by far my favorite of the three. I really wish I could have seen it with my dad. I can't wait to see it again.

Side note 1: Ewan McGregor makes EVERYTHING better. He's just gorgeous and I adore his acting, but adore his live appearances more. I went to England to see him live. Of course I wouldn't miss driving up the street to see him on the big screen. He was the best part of A&D.

Side note 2: The teenage boys sitting next to me in A&D were actually better behaved than the retired couple on my right during Star Trek. They waited until the movie was over to start acting like stupid kids and talking - the older guy spent pretty much the entire time explaining Star Trek to his wife. I was seriously not impressed.

I fail at being Supergirl today. Saturday I cased two routes, split one into two pieces and delivered the other, collected a LOT of food, took it to the drop off and unloaded it and got back to the office and cleaned up in 8 hours straight. I didn't take a lunch and so was able to leave at 3:30 instead of 4.

Today I cased two routes (one the same as Saturday, one not), split one into four pieces and delivered the other. Actually had one bag of food for the food drive, too. Had more mail - we had the money mailers today - but not a LOT more. I didn't get back to the office until 5, and that didn't include, obviously, the food bank stop. I did take half an hour for lunch, but still.

I hate Mondays.

I'm really kind of tired of having the ward expect me to be The Music Person, of being required to submit the music in advance, of being held responsible for planning it, and then having people do end runs around me to change things. I am tired of feeling stupid because no one tells me what the heck is going on. I am tired of having to just roll with it.

Seriously. Just keep me in the frickin' loop, people, it's not that hard. I am GLAD to turn things over to someone else for a song or two instead of doing the arm waving thing. I PROMISE.

I want to go back to the good old days when no one in the ward knew who I was, and I didn't have any jobs, and I sat in the very back and snuck out after Sacrament meeting.

People elected as a member of one party should not be allowed to switch parties and keep their position. Their constituents elected them under certain assumptions, and I think it's wrong for the elected person to jump ship and bail on those assumptions. I think it's true regardless of which party they leave and which they join. If they want to switch for the next election, fine. If they want to switch and give up their position, fine. But I think it's profoundly dishonest to switch parties mid-term and keep the job.

Rar.

Also! Is there a way to answer comments directly? My other blog works that way and it's awesome but I don't see any 'reply' links in this format. FAIL, BLOGSPOT. FAIL. *sigh*

Aaaaaaaaanyway. PLEASE BUY HER HOUSE, KAMILLE. OR TAMMY'S. I'M NOT PICKY. As for the shrine, I moved out of that bedroom in 1995. It was completely redecorated for my sisters when they took it over, so while it was the refuge of my teen years, I have no actual personal investment in it any more. So, mostly I'm amused. Her obsessiveness toward her hobby makes me feel less of a freak in my obsessiveness. Of course, she produces beautifully functional things and I don't, but whatever. *grin*

Randomly Unrelated Thoughts

Got it in one, Kamille. I'm not surprised you guessed it right.

• I think it's really unfair that I can't just sleep for, like, a week. I should totally be independently wealthy so I can just never leave the house again.

• I am looking forward to going back to choir again next week. This class has been good for me even though it has been difficult and I have not done all the assignments but I am ready for it to be over.

• I realized last Friday that my mother will never ever approve of the way I do things. Anything at all, ever. More importantly, though, I realized that I don't need her approval to be okay. She loves me. She doesn't understand me and probably never will, and that's okay. I think I can stop hoping for the approval that isn't there and start appreciating the things that are, and hopefully have a better perspective on her and me and our relationship now. This is not entirely unrelated to the above thought, because of the things we've been talking about in class.

I've never been able to separate her opinion on the way I do things with her opinion of me personally before. They're related, sure, but they aren't the same thing. And her disapproval is based on her perspective, her idea of what she thinks it is I do and don't do. Her complete lack of a fangirl gene factors in hugely. I get that from Dad, although he's not a fanboy. He has an appreciation of pop culture that completely baffles her, and of course I took that appreciation and magnified it a thousandfold into actual fangirlism. She never really even had a hobby until she took up quilting a couple years ago. So I tell her I'm going to a fan convention and get nothing but crickets. Literally. She completely has no idea what to say and so says nothing. It's sort of funny in a totally ironic way - she can't believe I'm willing to spend so much money on tickets and hotels and airfare and pictures with/autographs from certain celebrities (and ONLY certain celebs -I am totally monogamous with whichever fandom I am currently in; I am not wired for polyamoury panfandom interaction) and at the same time, she was seriously giddy over finding a special quilting machine which was more than the total cost of one of my con trips which she bought and set up in my old bedroom at her house. I SWEAR, MOM, IT'S THE SAME THING. REALLY.

I drink a lot of cherry diet Pepsi. So when it's on sale for a good price, I stock up. Regular price is 4.29 for a 12 can pack, so if the grocery store has them for 4 for $11, I'll go in almost every day and buy 4 or sometimes 8. They limit on those sales to 4 per purchase, so sometimes I don't want to go back in. I always feel like I'm doing something wrong, lol.

Anyway. I keep it on shelves in my detached garage. I didn't lock the door, either, until one day several weeks ago when I got home from work and noticed two 12 packs missing. It's not that they stole my Pepsi, it's that someone invaded my space and took something that didn't belong to them. It's not really about the Pepsi. But. Still. It's my Pepsi. I was irritated but not angry, and I simply started locking the door to the garage. No big.

So this morning, I'm lying in bed half awake and hear the neighbor kids outside. I heard a rattling sound and then a very disappointed little boy's voice: "The door's locked!"

Me, 1, obnoxious neighbor kid, 0. I feel very smug.

Sometimes I'm kind of a b*tch

There was a woman in my ward who sort of drove me nuts. I called her Rambly Woman when I mentioned her to friends in texts. She always had a story, and it was always a lot longer than it needed to be, and it frequently had nothing to do with whatever we were talking about in class. But everyone else seemed to love her and love her stories, so, you know. Whatever.

Last Sunday, the counselor conducting announced that she was sick, so sick in fact that she'd only been given a few days, and that her family was requesting no visitors so that they could spend her few remaining days with her themselves. They didn't seem to object to having help arranging the funeral though. Again, whatever. So yeah - funeral. She died Wednesday.

Everyone seemed so upset about the news last Sunday, and I sort of felt off. Like I frequently do. I mean. Her husband of several decades died fairly recently, so she's with him again. And she's done. She gets to go home and doesn't have to deal with this crap here on Earth any more. Where's the sorrow in that? Part of me feels like I should feel bad because everyone else clearly does, but I don't. She's better off, and she's not around to annoy me anymore. Everyone wins.

I think this sort of attitude may be part of the reason I don't really have many friends.

My supervisor's husband brought her in yesterday while most of the carriers were out so she could see a few people and see the workplace under the least stressful situation possible. (She was in an bike accident and has some brain damage, although she's recovering both physically and mentally remarkably well.) I am almost always done first and got back to the office while she was there.

She didn't recognize me. I was prepared for that, honestly. She didn't always recognize her husband at first and is missing a lot of details from the last few years. She remembers the employees who have been there a long time, but not those of us who are newer. So yeah, I was expecting it, but it still stung a little. I've worked for her for almost three years. She knows more about me than my own parents do, is the reason I was able to start seeing this therapist who wasn't taking new clients, helped me move into my new house, and she looked blankly at me yesterday without the first clue who I was.

And then I woke up with a migraine this morning. It's not related - I have had a bad headache literally since I left my group therapy class last Thursday and nothing has helped. But it wasn't bad enough to call in sick until this morning, and even though I've slept most of the day, it still isn't really going away.

Sometimes life just sucks.

Dear ward organist,

I am not up there leading just so I can wave my arms around. Part of my job is to set the tempo. Part of your job is to follow the tempo I set. When our positions are reversed for choir, I follow your leading. Please, please do me the courtesy of returning the respect. Otherwise we have a day like today, when you were seriously three beats behind me by the end of the first line in all three songs and I felt like I was trying to drive freeway speeds in second gear.

Rar.

For some reason, my car is fine until my parents visit. Especially my tires. The last time both parents were here, I blew out a tire about four blocks from home. I managed to get my car into my garage but was driving on the rims by then. Dad put the spare on for me and I went up to Big-O. I ended up buying two new tires. That was about eighteen months ago.

Yesterday, Dad noticed that my tire was low (same one I blew out before, coincidentally - front passenger side) so he drove my car to the Maverick and filled it. He drove it up to my grandpa's condo, which was maybe six blocks at most, and then I drove it home, which was another six or eight blocks. It sat in my garage all night. I pulled out of the garage this morning to go to work and could tell something was wrong, so I pulled over and got out and lo and behold, the tire was completely flat.

I tried to call Dad but his phone was off. It was 7:30, so he was possibly still asleep. So then I called work to tell them I'd be late but would definitely be there, and started to try to change the tire myself. Some guy I have never seen before was out jogging, and stopped to help me change it. I am so grateful. I miss steps when I try to do car things - last time, I didn't get the hubcap off before trying to remove the lug nuts. This time, I was jacking the car up before loosening the nuts. That sort of thing. And the guy ended up literally jumping on the wrench to get the nuts loosened, too, so I probably could not have done it myself at all. But we got the spare on and I got to work.

Dad called me after a couple of hours and I told him what had happened. He said, "I wonder if the valve shaft (I think that's what he said, anyway) is broken. That's really strange." A couple hours more and Mom called. She and Dad ended up coming to get my keys and take my car to Big-O for me while I was at work. So instead of spending hours sitting at Big-O after a full shift at work, it was fixed just in time for Dad to pick it up and bring it to me at the end of my shift.

Whatever valve thingie he thought was broken was broken. And he had them replace some something belts (I am awesomely informed about cars, clearly) because they were cracking and if they had broken, my car would not run. And they told him my battery isn't holding a full charge any more. Which, it's seven years old, so I am not surprised. But it's yet another thing that wouldn't have occurred to me until the car was dead. Now I can replace it in the next few weeks before it's a problem.

These are the times I hate being so far away from my dad. Because I never think about these sorts of things in advance. But I have so far been very lucky, and things have only gone wrong when he was here to help me fix them.

My parents are coming! I miss my dad a lot, so I can't wait to see them again. Mom will be disgusted by how messy my house is and she will hate the color my hair is, but that's okay because she loves me anyway. And Dad will look at the towel rack in my bathroom that is coming loose. And after they leave, I will hang my giant Jensen banner up in my room. Because Mom will never let me live that one down.

A REAL POST, or something.

Hi! I am Joslyn. I love my cats and music and Supernatural, not necessarily in that order. Depends on the day. I also love Chuck and NCIS and The Mentalist and The Big Bang Theory, also not necessarily in that order.

I currently work for the US Postal Service as a letter carrier. I've got a good ten years plus with them under my belt, doing everything from data entry to sorting mail to selling stamps. Delivering is my favorite out of all of that, but I hope not to be doing it forever. My knees won't last that long. I am, however, happy to answer any postal-related questions.

I am a first alto with the Southern Utah Heritage Choir, although I am currently on leave and will return to rehearsals May 7, just in time to learn all the music for the Summer Concerts on the 29th and 30th.

Fascinating, isn't it?

This is all Kamille's fault. No, really, it is.