Away

I am doing this thing called “getting away from it all,” which consists of fleeing all of my responsibilities by traveling by myself to a remote cabin in the woods in order to focus on my responsibilities. Yeah, I don’t get it, either. The first couple of days, I lolled around like a Hutt, although I did not eat like a Hutt because all I brought with me were ingredients for a stew, and I quickly got nauseated by the idea of stew.

But then a little spark of something, most probably guilt, took hold and I actually began working, mostly studying for my national board exams. “Studying” is not the correct word; I am making study sheets that I hope to study from at some unspecified future date, but those sheets are not going to make themselves. If they did, I would pay them a hundred dollars. If they made themselves and then disguised themselves as me to go and take the high-security exam, which they then passed in my name so I do not have to bother, I would pay them a million dollars. If they made themselves and brought me a pizza, I would pay them ten dollars.

I also did my weekly cafe bookkeeping, planned updates to my acupuncture website, and then lolled around some more just for the heck of it.

Hello.

Hello. I hope you can hear me over the deafening clamor for my return. Hello. Hello. That ticker-tape parade might be a bit much, but thank you. Where do you even get ticker tape in this day and age? I applaud this initiative, but it was unnecessary. You could have just thrown iPads, which are readily available, and when I say “thrown iPads,” I mean, “placed the unopened iPad boxes gently in the back of my car.”

Hello.

So, look, I am not only writing this because it was on my to-do list. It was on my to-do list plenty of times in the past few weeks and did not get to-done. Daffodil season came and went without any insightful comments from yours truly. I have plenty of ideas on the subject of marathons and quasi-domestic terror.

I am writing now because I missed you.

And I could also use a new iPad.

Undisclosed

It is time to face the music, a tune that says that I have been remiss in my writing here, and I have brought shame upon myself and my ancestors. And I am shamed, although I have some excuses, which are that I have been overburdened, lazy, focusing on minutia and not the big picture, and on an emotional roller-coaster. I have also been to Disneyland. I mean, Undisclosed Locationland, a term I prefer because I do not like to rub it in that I was whooping it up with robot ghosts and pirates while you were slaving away on a shrimp boat, or whatever it is you do, which I cannot be bothered to keep track of. (See above excuses.) Anyway, hello. Like Frankenstein, I am alive. Like the Terminator, I am back. Like Mickey Mouse—I mean, Undisclosed Secret Mouse—I am seeing you again because I like you.

I would say more now, but the Republicans have cut my funding.

What Exactly Is It That You Do Do?

If one were to have begun reading these pages recently, he or she could be forgiven for imagining I while away the hours pondering the motivations of monsters, ghosts, and a little Boston terrier named Goblin Foo. And then there are the fictions, frequently cited, of studying for some impossible board exam, building my acupuncture practice, and so forth. All of this is hogwash except for the part about Goblin Foo, who continues to advance her claim that she is the Maharincess of Franistan. I also read a book about a boy during the Revolutionary War who was convinced he was some sort of prince and that his poop needed to be weighed and studied on a daily basis, and that sounds like it’s right up GFU’s alley, as well. In any case, I’m afraid my actual actions have been labeled Top Secret by the Franistan Ministry For Security And The Advancement Of Feeding Boston Terriers Chicken From Your Own Dinner Plate, so you will just have to speculate, but you will probably be wrong.

The Next Big Thing

My monster carols were such a big hit that I have considered branching out into other monster-oriented ditties. Monster country-and-western songs might be a good place to start, because “Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Chupacabras” has been going through my head, although I have already written and performed a song about chupacabras. I think the wolf man is next. Also, a friend and I have created a character called GUN WOLF, which is a gun that turns into a werewolf during the full moon. As you might imagine, he has a complicated origin story.

FRIDAY CHUPACABRA BLOGGING

Oh, come on.

What We Usually Play

When I was a little kid, the little girl who lived around the corner and I used to do this thing called “Sing and Swing.” Given who we are talking about, moi, it probably seems equally improbable that “Sing and Swing” would be either dirty or innocent. As it happens, it was the latter, and Deena and I spent many jovial afternoons on the swing set in my back yard, singing the songs we learned in school and the Elvis songs she was obsessed with. The higher we swung, the louder we sung, and I imagine our high-pitched croons rattling the windows of the surrounding houses. Besides the two regular swings, the swing set also featured a sort of swaying gondola for toddlers, which we appropriated for use as Glinda’s Magic Bubble when we played “Wizard of Oz.” We also played “What We Usually Play,” which was an interactive jumble of imaginary characters from all of the TV shows and movies we had seen, including “The Lone Ranger,” which we watched religiously every afternoon in syndication. I don’t know how old we were; pretty young, although we had no supervision and could wander the neighborhood at will as long as we were home for dinner. This leniency did not include going into each other’s houses, which required special permission since our mothers were sworn enemies, so we watched “The Lone Ranger” separately and rendezvoused later to compare notes. Often, in the midst of “What We Usually Play,” the Lone Ranger and Tonto would get confused and end up on hovering in Glinda’s Magic Bubble, singing the soulful tunes of Elvis Presley. The Lone Ranger was inconsolable when Elvis died. I remember her sending a kiss in every direction of the compass, as well as up to heaven and (just in case) down to hell, just to be sure it would reach him wherever he ended up; she made me shake hands in all of those directions along with her. In my mind, this somehow made sense, and I imagined that musical ghost collecting air kisses and air handshakes from mourners the world over.

We also collected caterpillars.

Evolution

I remember when I was a little kid and cordless phones were suddenly a thing. Communicating without wires was magic. I had a Dukes of Hazzard walkie-talkie, which could sometimes be relied upon to transmit static from the back yard to the front, but cordless telephones were a whole nother ball of wax. My mother bought one for my grandparents, a hunk of heavy plastic with an antenna that must have extended three feet. We tested it out before we mailed it to them in Florida, and I felt like Buck Rogers talking to the moon. Much later, when I was in high school and cordless phones had metamorphosed into fussy devices with built-in answering machines, I worked at the electronics counter of a department store. I sold those and cassette Walkmans and electric typewriters with built-in correction tape. I sold a satellite phone that was the size of two bricks taped together and cost over a thousand dollars.

Now, I am old, and I jab people with needles for a living. And I have an iPhone. The end.

Anti-Ping-Pongical Acts

I just watched a ping pong ball penetrate a ping pong paddle. You can witness this phenomenon, too, in the video above, although I warn you that this unnatural act occurs only after several minutes of scientific jibber jabber.

Unnatural, yes. Verily, ping pong balls are not supposed to penetrate ping pong paddles! A reading from The Laws of Table Tennis: 

Chapter 2, Verse 3:

2.3.1 The ball shall be spherical, with a diameter of 40mm.

2.3.2 The ball shall weigh 2.7g.

2.3.3 The ball shall be made of celluloid or  similar  plastics  material  and  shall  be white or orange, and matte.

Chapter 2, Verse 4:

2.4.2 At least 85% of the blade by thickness shall be of natural wood; an adhesive layer within the blade may be reinforced with fibrous material such as carbon fibre, glass fibre or compressed paper, but shall not be thicker than 7.5% of the total thickness or 0.35mm, whichever is the smaller.

2.4.3 A side of the blade used for striking the ball shall be covered with either ordinary pimpled rubber, with pimples outwards having a total thickness including adhesive of not more than 2.0mm, or sandwich rubber, with pimples inwards or outwards, having a total thickness including adhesive of not more than 4.0mm.

2.4.3.1 Ordinary pimpled rubber is a single layer of non-cellular rubber, natural or synthetic, with pimples evenly distributed over its surface at a density of not less than 10 per cm² and not more than 30 per cm².

2.4.3.2 Sandwich rubber is a single layer of cellular rubber covered with a single outer layer of ordinary pimpled rubber, the thickness of the pimpled rubber not being more than 2.0mm.

I say unto thee, brothers and sisters, a 40mm 2.7g spherical object cannot pass through a blade of a minimum 85% natural wood, possibly reinforced by carbon fiber, and covered by ordinary pimpled rubber!

Can I get a hallelujah for Ordinary Pimpled Rubber?

The very idea is an offense to all that is good and decent in this world. Science has given us this abomination, my people. Science and homosexuals! Working in tandem, these sinful bedfellows have brought forth an unholy and unnatural act of penetration. Witness ye the blizzard called Nemo, wrought as revenge from an angry Nature and set against the most wicked land of the Atlantic Northeast, where science flourishes and homosexuals engage in anti-ping-pongical acts of matrimony!

Ahem. Pardon me, I seem to have gotten carried away.

FRIDAY CHUPACABRA BLOGGING, DAY LATE AND DOLLAR SHORT EDITION

What you see here is a baby chupacabra. He is, um, sleeping. A sleeping baby chupacabra. It is no wonder that the chupacabra is an endangered species because people are picking sleeping baby chupacabras out of their nests and handling them. You should know that if you touch a baby chupacabra, its mother will stop loving it. Then you will have to raise it yourself. Several times a day, you will have to cut open a goat’s neck and hand the baby chupacabra a straw. This will make you unpopular in the goat community, but I don’t make the rules. Maybe you will find a nice, understanding goat, I don’t know. You could barter. It’s possible.

This particular baby chupacabra turned out not to be very active, so the goat got off easy.

In other news, as I was trying to sleep last night, I kept thinking of my friend, the Starship Enterprise. I kept picturing him with a damaged hull, and honestly, when has he NOT had a damaged hull? That thing has been blown up more times than good heavens I can’t think of a comparison on the spur of the moment but something good, and it looks like that is his fate again in the upcoming movie with the hotter Captain Kirk. Blowing up the Enterprise is a multimillion-dollar enterprise.

Status Stylus

I’ll bet you weren’t expecting to see me here, but TA DA! After my Superb Owl win, I should be in Disney World. Come to think of it, I really should be in Disney World. I had a trip booked for this very week, but I sold it on sleazy eBay, criminal lair of the nickel-and-dimers. Now some family from Minnesota or Missouri or one of those middle-American M states is stinking up the room I picked out. Michigan? I have no idea.

In other news, everything continues apace. I am starting to practice acupuncture in a third location next week. Book-writing, check. Studying, check. Cafe, check. Blogging, check. Sort-of check. I missed a couple of days, yes. Get over it. Bad back, check. Maybe calling it bad is setting up an unnecessary opposition. Good-back-doing-bad-things, check. Meditation, no. I have missed a few days of that, too. I think I am not necessarily the meditating sort. But maybe I should redefine myself as the meditating sort so I will do it. I am the meditating sort who is not meditating. Check.

Also, I put some little Vine videos on Twitter @UDHippo. I will see if I can put one here.

vine.co/v/b1D69QuneFn

— Upside-down Hippo (@UDHippo) February 3, 2013

Hmm, that isn’t quite right. I can’t be bothered with this anymore, but click on that link if you want to. It has sound, too.

And Winter Turns to Spring

I am lying on a heating pad under a pile of blankets, textbooks stacked around me, a cup of tea at hand, as snow drifts by the darkening window. It is a cozy winter’s afternoon. I am supposed to be studying, but I thought I’d talk to you for a bit instead. Hello.

I have been thinking a lot about life lately—my life in particular, but I suppose they do all tend to connect. There is something floating just beyond my awareness, like the snow outside the window, invisible now that I’ve turned on a lamp. It is something important. I have probably said that a lot here over the years; I have always looked for meaning beyond what I know or for ways to be peaceful with where I am. And I have always thought those quests opposite ends of the same continuum, like yin and yang, combining to make a meaningful life. Indeed, at Ye Olde Acupuncture School, we were taught something similar, that life is perfect as it is, and it can always be otherwise if we choose.

There must be some sort of disturbance in the Force, as I don’t know where I am on that continuum right now, or where I should be. Perhaps the disturbance itself is the perfection, that discomfortable, unknowing place on the creative cycle that we must inhabit before we can burst forth. Maybe this is what the plants feel like as they start sensing the longer days, the sap vibrating uneasily in their cold roots, knowing that a bloom awaits them.

But a plant knows in its bones what shape its flowers will take, and it knows that its place is where it has been growing. On this cozy winter’s afternoon, I don’t know those things for myself. And in this moment, I will take a breath, savor the heating pad, and not think about the invisible snow.

FRIDAY CHUPACABRA BLOGGING: MOVIN’ ON UP EDITION

Today would have been Sherman Hemsley’s seventy-fifth birthday, if he were alive. I suppose it is whether he is alive or not, but he isn’t. Isabel Sanford, whose birthday is in August, will be ninety-six this year. She died in July 2004, and Sherman Hemsley died in July 2012. July, you are a cruel mistress.

Speaking of cruel, here is a chupacabra with a tribal tattoo, steampunk goggles, and a man purse. I cannot help but wonder what he has in his man purse. A straw? Additional accessories? I like his tattoo, but I don’t feel like this chupacabra and I would be friends. His look may seem effortless, but in a way, he is Trying Too Hard.

In other news, I made a Twitter feed for this blog: @UDHippo. If you negligently canceled your Facebook account, you now have a way of following all of my antics. Except I haven’t posted any antics there yet. Antics coming soon.

365 Days Hath January

I used to really love winter, and I still do in theory, but there is something about January that I am starting to find unsettling. It’s not really about the weather, although these stretches of spring-like temperatures are both a pleasant break from the chill and a terrifying hint of future chaos. There is just something that seems interminable about this month, as if I’ve gone through a whole year in a mere thirty-one days. Maybe I’m feeling that way in particular this year, as I’ve purposely heaped a lot on my plate, or maybe this infernal back pain has really been a reminder to take it easy. I’ve spent an awful lot of time on a heating pad this January.

Well, today is the last day of January, and I think things are going to speed up. If my back does not heal, I’m going to have it surgically removed, and that will cut one of the anchors that are slowing me down. I will just be a front zipping about my business, the jauntiest front in town. It’s just the sunny side of the hill for me in February.

Despite All My Rage

I read once, I think in a scientific journal, that the ghosts of our ancestors are watching us all the time, even when we poop and have sex. But that they aren’t judging us on the quality of our pooping or sex techniques or anything; those ghosts are so evolved beyond bodies that they are just amused at the demands being corporeal places on us lowly humans. It is like us watching the habits of animals at the zoo, said the scientific journal. I don’t go to the zoo very often, but I watch an animal in my bedroom all the time. This particular animal retreats to her corner to gnaw on cow bones or slurp on her own forepaws for hours at a stretch. Regularly, she will emerge to issue demands that her stuffed yeti be tossed or her belly rubbed. This is an alien creature, I will think, with a correspondingly perplexing worldview. We try to communicate, but as with the ghosts of our ancestors, we are each trapped on our own side of the veil, doing whatever it is we do.

There is a meditation I’ve been doing lately that invites us to imagine that we are not our thoughts and deeds, but the silent space that contains them; that we can observe our thoughts and be the observer and not the thinker. Esoteric, but I thought I understood enough of the gist after a few weeks that I would watch my thinking with a certain detachment. “This is not me, this is just what I am doing right now.” Which in itself is sort of liberating but nothing compared to when I woke up in middle of last night and, accidentally, conjured up the real deal. Was my brain sleep addled? Was it a psychotic break? I felt a tremendous calmness and suddenly had a unique perspective on my life, as if I were a ghost watching from the outside, as if I were a Boston terrier peeking out of a corner at the confounding behavior of her human. I saw that not just my thinking and emotions and actions, but my very perceptions are cage that I habitually navigate, almost blindly, responding to external triggers rather than shaping my own experience. And honestly, even the idea of “external triggers” is ceding too much power, as they are really flare-ups of my own exhausted or insecure or self-centered mind. This seems a bit depressing to type, but honestly, the feeling I had as it was occurring to me was calm, optimistic, liberating.

Today, in the waking world, it was business as usual in my brain, but every once in a while, I did catch a glimpse of the cage of my thinking and, blessedly, the space beyond.

In other news, I am starting to regret not having had any descendants. Who am I going to watch when I am a ghost?

My Encounters with the Healing Professions

All of these visits to the skeleton doctor remind me of when I was caught in a feedback loop between the frankenstein and the mad scientist, the former wanting me to talk through my problems and the latter wanting to medicate me into forgetting I had any. No pharmaceutical on earth was up to that heroic task, and I was tied in knots by the frankenstein’s grab bag of uplifting metaphors: I think I was supposed to be swimming over waves while pedaling a bicycle at one point, and I don’t even know how to swim. Luckily, acupuncture saved the day back then, but it’s taking its sweet time with this back pain situation, which is ironic since half of my patients are now former back pain sufferers thanks to me and my needles of stinging love. I think I have started psychically absorbing their symptoms, sort of like Jesus, except, I hope, with a better outcome.

The Chupacabra of Inflammatory Foods

Written last night:

I have eaten nothing but wholesome, nutritious foods for the past two days, having eliminated sugar, dairy, gluten, grains, and (my preciousssssss!) wine. Red meat, citrus fruits, and soy are other random items on the verboten list. I could tell you more, but there is not a person on earth who under any circumstances cares what another person on earth is eating; my entire agenda for bringing it up was as a prelude for announcing that I feel like shite. Shite, I say! Yes, I know that eliminating processed foods and genetically modified foods and potential allergens and whatnot is supposed to make you feel as perky and joyful as an angel’s boobs, but that smug and blissful state comes on the other side of the WITHDRAWAL. OMG, THE WITHDRAWAL!!!!!!!!! Headache, malaise, lack of focus, depression, bouts of rage, intense cravings. In. Tense. Cravings. Let’s just say that if Twinkie the Kid were passing by, I would take him in every way a boy can take a Twinkie.

Written today:

Whew. Perky and joyful, that’s me. I felt a little off in the morning, but have been energetic, cheerful, and focused since then. Breathing easier, thinking clearer, and I think my back even feels a bit better now that I’ve gotten that damned chupacabra off of it. The chupacabra of inflammatory foods! That is the worst kind of chupacabra.

A Transition

Yesterday, after having my hair cut by Fabulous New Stylist Cara, I decided to drop into the adjacent dog grooming studio—not because I felt the need to have Cara’s work adjusted, but because the same woman who owns the dog grooming studio sold me an eight-week-old Goblin Foo Uvula on October 7, 2000, and I wanted to say hello. She was delighted to learn that Goblin is alive and well and full of sass and pizzazz, and to inform that Goblin’s older brother, Bob, is alive, although now deaf and mostly blind.

Goblin’s mother, Annie, died a couple of years ago.

It was information that weighed on me for the rest of the day. At bedtime, as we were getting comfortable, I scooped Goblin into my arms and broke the news as gently as I could. She took it placidly, her cloudy eyes meeting my gaze for several seconds. Maybe she didn’t remember her mother, or maybe she had already known, somehow, in the way dogs seem to know things. And we snuggled extra close under the covers. And I was still rubbing her tummy when she started snoring.

FRIDAY CHUPACABRA BLOGGING, FIRESIDE CHAT EDITION

“I want to talk for a few minutes with the people of the United States about chupacabras—with the comparatively few who have always understood the dangers of chupacabras, but more particularly with the overwhelming majority who, until recently, saw chupacabras as a distant and imaginary species. I want to tell you what has been done in the last few days, why it was done, and what the next steps are going to be. I recognize that the many proclamations from State Capitols and from Washington, the legislation, the Chupacabra regulations, etc., couched for the most part in cryptozoological and military terms, should be explained for the benefit of the average citizen. I owe this in particular because of the fortitude and good temper with which everybody has accepted the inconvenience and terrors of the Chupacabra Red Alert. I know that when you understand what we in Washington have been about, I shall continue to have your cooperation and not have to order that you be shot on sight.”

—President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 12 March 1933

The Species that Dare Not Speak Its Name

I don’t know why chupacabras are not a part of our national discourse. They did not get a shout-out in President Obama’s stirring inaugural speech. There are no hot chupacabra-oriented questions on Quora. It’s as if they don’t exist. And from my self-appointed throne as America’s Chupacabra Expert, I declare this omission unacceptable. I declare it unAmerican. 

In other news, I woke up today with the kind of headache that comes from wildly underestimating how much Bailey’s Irish Cream is left in the bottle when you think you might as well pour the rest of it into a glass to finish it off. Also, my visit to the skeleton doctor went swimmingly, and I had an encouraging meeting about my upcoming wellness practices book.

That’s What Happens

Are you still here? I confess, I thought one of us would have given up on this thing by now. I am running out of material.

Today, I ate a black bean burger and a little bag of potato chips and went into a blood sugar coma that knocked me out for hours. My brain synapses are still flickering tentatively back on one by one. In contrast, whenever I drink a cup of coffee, I am awake for days. And don’t get me started on the heroin. I am so delicate, like a flower. But not an ugly flower like the daffodil. I think I would make a nice daisy, if you want to know the truth. Maybe a tulip. Sleek and uncomplicated, that’s what I would be, and that’s what you should be, too.

Well, I’d love to stay and chat, but I have to go climb Kilimanjaro.

History

Happy Inauguration Day! Hey, do you remember that time that little girl on “Love Sidney” was playing with matches and accidentally burned down the couch? Or was that Punky Brewster. Anyway, in the interim, we got into some wars and financial crises and then we got a black president. (One of these things is not like the others.) I am not at the festivities because I have a patient later, and also because I can’t leave Goblin unsupervised for that long. If nineteen-eighties sitcoms have taught us anything, it is that plucky little girls are a danger to us all.

My memory, or lack thereof, is a familiar topic around these here parts. Why can I remember the words to every 1980s sitcom theme but not, I don’t know, Spanish? Why can I remember that “BJ and the Bear” was preempted the day they released the Iran hostages but not what the new movie about the Iran hostages is called? These are mysterious times. I will put on my paranoia cap and blame our black president. First he came for my memory, and I did not speak out because I forgot to. Then he came for my guns, and hoo boy!

Sign Right Here, Mr. Jones

I have made a deal with the devil. The devil requires that I perform certain rituals to initially heighten and eventually alleviate my suffering. The devil knows that the only way out is through.

Whereas, etc. etc., in this year of 2013, blah blah . . . hmm, oh, here we go . . . David solemnly promises to do the following on a daily basis: (1) Write one page of his wellness practices book, until such a time as it is completed. (2) Write one page of his ancient, languishing novel, until such a time as it is completed, OR (3) write one blog entry. (4) Study for ninety minutes for the national acupuncture board exams, until such a time that he has passed all three of them. (5) Meditate for fifteen minutes.

In exchange for participation in these rituals, etc. etc., the devil agrees to provide: (1) A completed wellness practices book, (2) a completed novel, (3) many thousands of loving blog readers who send me many thousands of presents, (4) some additional letters after my name (Dipl.Ac.) that will allow me to practice acupuncture in most states outside of Maryland, (5) complete peace of mind.

This is my fifth day into the agreement, and I think I need to call my lawyer.

A Social Life

I do, so, leave the house. Last night, I went to a party attended by all of the people I have been too otherwise-focused to meet for the past decade. Buffeted by a wave of alcohol, I navigated my own intense social awkwardness, the drinks spilled in my vicinity, and yes, that man who hit on me without shame. That last was actually the easiest to deal with because of my past life as a slut who was simultaneously hard to get, whereas I’ve never known how to get red wine out of wool.

Something else that happened was a kind party-goer complimented me on my store, which shut down during the recession. I usually avoid this topic—an emotionally bloody one for the past four years—at all costs; in this instance, as I do when it comes up without warning, I prepared myself for an Ocean Of Regret and was surprised when it was barely a River Of Regret. Possibly a Creek Of Regret. Maybe in another four years, it will be something I can integrate more comfortably into the wider tapestry of my life, a mere Thread Of Regret I use as a conversation starter at parties the way I used the ancient Chinese theory of immunology  last night. (And maybe it is something that won’t send my fellow guests running for the booze table to escape. See again: last night.)

By the way, the guy who hit on me insisted I take his email address and call him daddy, both of which I had drunk enough to do, if only ironically on the latter. Maybe I should stay home more often.

FRIDAY CHUPACABRA BLOGGING

I am going to go on the record as having no idea what to make of this chupacabra. This chupacabra is All Over The Place. You may accuse me of being a chupacabra racist, but where are her eyes? What is that honeycomb thing in the background? Do chupacabras live in bee colonies now? Also: those are the pointiest elbows in town.

I know, I know. Who am I to go around critiquing other people’s chupacabras? Who died and made me the grand poobah of all the chupacabras? I will tell you who: the Internet. Behold the search results for this very blog.

I know what you’re going to say, that I could perhaps pull in some extra income by advertising as a chupacabra consultant, but that is a game for the young. At 15,001 days old, I have bigger fish to fry.

Since Before Your Sun Burned Hot in Space

It is my 15,000th Day Alive! I can’t calculate my exact time on earth any more granularly than that since my mother claims she forgot what time of day I was born, an unlikely story no doubt concocted to cover the involvement of space aliens. Let us say it is somewhere around 360,016 hours or 1,296,000,000 seconds, give or take a few. I refuse to lament here over how much of that time was unproductive, although the idea is certainly on my mind. There is something about my encroaching middle age that leads to a reflexive review of my decisions to date. In general, I think I have done the best I can with what I’ve had, but at the same time, vanishing in a puff of smoke is an increasingly appealing lifestyle choice.

But you’re stuck with me for the time being.

INSERT JOKE HERE

Are you there, god? It’s me, Margaret. Do you know how many times I’ve made that joke in these pages? And my name isn’t even Margaret, for god’s sake. But I do keep sort of trailing off and then bursting back onto the blogging scene, better than ever. Quite possibly not bursting, but sort of appearing stealthily and largely ignored? And quite possibly not better?

In any case, as a part of my plan to dust off some cobwebby aspects of my life that I’ve been missing, as well as to inspire myself to keep going in some new and exciting directions . . .

Ta da!

So what’s new with me is that I went from being in arguably the best shape of my life to being an inert puddle of goo in the past month thanks to a mysterious stabby pain that has appeared in the middle of my back, which no acupuncture or rolfing adventure has yet cured. Nonetheless, my acupuncture business is taking off in fits and starts, I’m finally able to focus on a book that I am supposedly writing, and I plan to stop putting off studying for the national acupuncture board exams any day now thanks to my new Accountability Buddy of Doom. (She does not know about the Doom part yet.)

What’s new with you?

Happy Horrordays! (Part Five)

Two posts in one day?! Hey, you, don’t get used to this. This one is brought to you by Kraken brand spiced rum. It may be apocryphal to the canon, I’m not sure.

O COME ALL YE MUMMIES

O come all ye mummies,
Wrapped in strips of linen,
O come ye, O come ye to terrorize the populace.
Although it’s unclear
What you will do if you catch them.
You don’t have any fangs,
You don’t have any talons,
You don’t have a machine gun,
You are a mummy.

O, hey, here an idea!
Linens make a good noose!
Maybe if you braid some strips toge-e-ether,
You can choke someone
Or give a nasty bru-u-uise
Around a person’s neck.
Oh, really, what the heck
Are you gonna to do
To earn your street cred?

O sad little mummies,
Former glorious pharaohs,
Why this caree-eer change so la-ate in life?
Maybe you won’t go
Into the monster hall of fame,
But you’re still plenty scary,
Or maybe you’re just dusty.
Well, you can give a hankie
When I-I-I-I sneeze!

It’s going to be my birthday in a couple of hours, so yeah.

Happy Horrordays! (Part 4)

Once upon a time, I proclaimed myself the Antichristmas and acted as the scourge of holiday crassness and commercialism masked as cheer. This year, I have been too lazy and preoccupied. But oh, my little candy canes, did I knock myself out for you this morning! I present here, for the first time in ages, a new monster carol. You can find my previous efforts, parts one through three, here.

And now, with no further ado . . .

DO YOU FEAR WHAT I FEAR? 

Said the night wind to the little goat
Do you smell what I smell? (Do you smell what I smell?)
Wafting through the air, little goat?
Do you smell what I smell? (Do you smell what I smell?)
A stench, a stench,
A permeating smell
That tells me all is not well
Yes, it tells me all is not well!

Said the little goat to his little friends
Do you fear what I fear? (Do you fear what I fear?)
On this cold, dark night, little friends?
Do you fear what I fear? (Do you fear what I fear?)
A fearsome beast
Devourer of goats
And we all should protect our throats
Yes, everyone, cover your throats!

Said the chupacabra to the frightened herd
Do you taste what I taste? (Do you taste what I taste?)
Coursing through your veins, little goats?
Do you taste what I taste? (Do you taste what I taste?)
It’s blood! Sweet blood!
My favorite delicacy!
I shall suck it from you into me
Yes, I’ll suck it all into me!

Said the crime scene detectives the next day
Do you see what I see? (Do you see what I see?)
Spread across this desolate field? 
Do you see what I see? (Do you see what I see?)
Entrails! Corpses! 
And we haven’t any leads
It must have been a coyote
Yes, it must have been a coyote!

And now, a special bonus chupacabra, enjoying the season (with a link to where you can purchase this heirloom-quality ornament):

Harpy Diem

This morning, upon awakening, I posted some self-directed inspirational messages on Facebook of the do-it-now!, get-things-done!, get-off-your-lazy-ass! variety. I am going to seize this day, I told myself. I am going to jump out of bed, drink a glass of water, accomplish three important things, and start a gratitude journal. I am as grateful as fuck, and it’s time a journal knew about it. 

Then I sort of lurched out of bed, went to lunch at a brewery, developed a headache, and took a nap for the rest of the afternoon.

I am so totally going to seize tomorrow if I feel like it.

FRIDAY CHUPACABRA BLOGGING

Autumn turns to winter,
And winter turns to spring.
It doesn’t go just for seasons you know,
It goes for everything.

Oh, wise Brady kids, avatars of the cosmos, you summed up the three years of my latest degree so poetically. Autumn turns to winter, turns to spring, turns to summer, turns to late summer, turns to autumn. This is the cycle of creation, the circle of all life, and life is movement. When it’s time to change, it’s time to rearrange—and oh, my little turnips, oh, how I have changed, how I have rearranged.

I chose as my default browser Google Chrome.

Safari, dear Safari, you crashed one too many times. You eliminated the features I cherished. You became ordinary. Once, you were the backbone of my existence, and I love you dearly, but the time has come for tough love and tough choices. Winter is coming. Mayans are in the air, apocalyptic and apoplectic. Whereas I must be nimble to cope with these dangers and the uncertainties that lie beyond them, you held me back. You weighed me down. You wandered off the path.

And so, for now, we part ways. It is better that spend some time apart, a few weeks, a few months. The autumn air will crisp into the bitter winter’s cold of your absence. Separately, we will fight for survival. We will grow tougher. We will struggle to adapt and adapt to struggle. And at night, those desolate nights as the trains howl in the forlorn distance, we will look out into the dark void, dimly lit by the cold pinpricks of Orion the Hunter, and we will think of each other, and we will take strength from our time together, and we will dream of spring.

Support for this blog was provided by the Chupacabra Foundation, creating a better world through sucking one goat at a time.