Totino's, why dost thou mock me?

I have a sick love of Totino's pizza rolls. Sick, I tells ya.

When I had my eye injury a few years back, Steve went to the store and laid in an industrial supply of pizza rolls. I would sit in the dark, sniffling, and eating pizza rolls.

A few days ago, we saw new pizza rolls. Mega pizza rolls. More pizza! More roll!

In reality, just more filling. More scalding filling that smooshes from the end with every bite. More tomato-like sauce on my shirt. A blister on the roof of my mouth.

I did not find them mega satisfying. Not that they mega sucked or anything. But they are not an improvement on the tried and true original pizza roll. Trust me.

There is a ripple in the space-time continuum!

Or, at least, a ripple in my monitor. Every once in a while, the screen ripples and dances, like a horse's skin when a bluefly lands on it.

I assume this isn't a good sign.

My brother used to work with TV tubes, and he would tell me of people dying because their TVs exploded, impaling them on the glass.

I can see the headline: "Killed by Blogging: What Should Be Done?"

I'll be a cause celebre!

Now on the team

A couple of days ago, Cleveland acquired a young player by the name of Shin-Soo Choo.

I thought that after I heard it a few dozen times I would be able to pronounce Shin-Soo Choo.

But no.

I keep saying Shin-Shoo. Shin-Shoo Choo. Steve had me saying it right by saying, "Rhyme it with Ginsu!" Ginsu. Ginsu. Shinsu. Shinsu. And then a second later? Shin-Shoo Choo.

I also can't say "free throw" or "rear-wheel drive." I hope the Goodnight Show never has a poem about baseball, basketball, and a winter storm, or my goose is cooked.

Before the llama song, there were the singing horses

My husband never understood my love of this particular flash animation, but perhaps you will. I give you Singing Horses.

There's no IQ test for blogging is there?

I was toodling down the road, listening to the Indians lose, when a buzzing rattle started up. I turned the radio off. The buzzing went away. Ah, I think, it was static. Radio on. Buzz buzz. Radio off. Buzz buzz. Oh dear. Buzz buzz. Air conditioner off. The buzzing went away. Ah. Radio on. Buzz buzz. Wha? Buzz buzz. I bang the dashboard. Buzz buzz. I'm sweating. Radio off. Buzz buzz. Buzz buzz. Buzz buzz.

It was my phone.

And because I'm too stupid to shut up about it, I tell all of you!

Oh dear, now I'm a ~poet~

So, the proverbial cat is out of the bag and running around the room yowling.

My mother bought copies of pseudophakia and told my family. Of course, this is what I expected, but still. We had a family luncheon yesterday, and I was the talk of the room. Horrifying. I was squirming with discomfort.

I partake in a hobby, a pastime, a vocation, that embarrasses me. It felt as if I showed up for the luncheon naked. I really don't want to get into in-depth conversations about my feelings about death. Well, online is fine. Face-to-face it feels like a conversation about my sex life. Danger, Will Robinson. Inappropriate! INAPPROPRIATE!

You know what else gives me the hinks the same way? Religion. I'll talk about it on the internet, but as soon as someone brings religion up in person? I start sidling toward the door.

New Goodnight Show

A new Goodnight Show is available now. I only did one reading for this one, so it's new to me, as well!

Kerboom

Well, despite good intentions, I have flamed out at Erato.

I was around for the beginning of the site, and it was a lot of fun. I think we were all a little giddy at having a place to talk metrical poetry, but it was approached with joy and humility. Then something happened.

I haven't fit in there in a long time. I don't believe meter and/or rhyme is better or worse than free verse, and the whole idea of writing empty vessels that happen to be able to be called "sonnets" bores the fuck out of me.

Back to poetry on the blog exclusively, I think.

We like short shorts

I love short poems. I love reading them. I love writing them. And I love that this journal is dedicated to printing them.

Inch.

1 to 9 lines.

Great price for subscriptions, too.

But no email submissions, so I inch away, disconsolate.

With thanks to Ivy at Dumbfoundry for the linkie.

New gadget

I just love photo gadgets. This one turned me into a collage. In my next life, I'll be a college. Just you wait!

All too true

I actually have Vonage at home, and most of the time it's great. TiVo staged a death match with Vonage which called for intervention, so I had to switch the TiVos over to use the network instead of the phone line. But otherwise, it's been good. Less than half the price I was paying for the old phone line, and since we make about 10 calls a month, it's a good deal.

But we definitely get some noises that sound like the new Superman's extendo hearing. Boing. Boing.

Numfar, do the dance of joy!

The library has a book I've been waiting for.

Now I have to reread the first two books in the series. Yay for Greg Keyes.

Now I remember why I don't workshop

Sackcloth is "An incoherant and ridiculous attempt at verse" that apparently is beyond understanding.

I can't decide if I'm perplexed or just depressed.

$16,000

Got the first bill from the surgery.

So, um, yeah. Boss, about that raise...

Steve Kronen sent me books

I am a happy happy egg.

Rare nights of unsleep

I'm usually a sleeper, a hell of a sleeper. I can sleep through terrible things.

A few years ago, my cat Tuffy stuck a claw in my eye. I went downstairs, asked Steve if I was bleeding, and when he said no, I went back to bed. The doctor at the emergency room the next day just gaped at me.

"But this is the sort of thing that brings people here immediately."

I shrugged. "I was sleepy."

But the past few days have been filled with restlessness. Unease. Last night was the new bed and I hoped to drop off in a cloud of blissful luxury firm. Instead, I thrashed and woke every few minutes, sure that my alarm was about to go off.

The answer is simple: I gots de stress, baybee.

I got offered a raise today and...

I turned it down.

And now I'm left wondering, seriously wondering, if I'm as stupid as that sounds.

I am. I really could have used that money. Some impulse rose up and I found myself saying that no, it's not important and no, I don't think I've earned it and oh, have you considered giving it to X instead?

And then I get to come home and look through the bills and feel sick.

I got my new bed, though, and it's purty.

Wait, this is a good opportunity to plug my book.

Buy a copy. Feed a stupid poet!

I don't think I have a future in advertising.

Waiting, waiting, waiting

Waiting, waiting, waiting
We're anticipating
Delivery guys uncrating
New beds!

Mattresses all puffy
Sheets and bedskirts fluffy
Silky smooth not rough-y
New beds!

Load 'em up! Haul 'em in!
Set 'em up! New beds!

Tall as trees! Soft as breeze!
Jubilees! New beeeds!

Frankenwrist rides again!

According to the plastic surgeon today, the wrist is lookin' good. But dang there are a lot of stitches on that thing. I keep expecting a lightning strike and a shout of "It's aliiiive!"

I could so do my hair like Elsa Lanchester.

If I ever put a photo on the back of a book, I will.

Do you suppose my tub doors

Are intentionally ugly? Like the person who picked them out wanted to make sure her in-laws didn't come for an extended visit or something?

The tub is baby blue. That's bad.

But the doors are three panels of baby blue plastic, with an embossed design that looks straight out of an anatomy book.

And each edge of the embossing seems to grab all passing water spray and transform it into a lime deposit that could be cut into blocks and used to make a courthouse!

Woe.

Weekend plans--lookit me goooo

I still have too much to do, but I've actually done some of it.

Done: Mow, grocery, trap, sheets, covers, storage, paint picked out.

Started: Transcription practice.

Not started: Painting, flooring, decarpeting, dechairing, cleaning.

Still waiting for: Smack upside head.

In possession of: Caffeine. Woo!

I even found a caffeinated Kool-Aid type beverage. Hot damn.

All those good intentions are ...

... not getting me very far. I haven't crossed anything off my list yet.

And I need caffeine.

Weekend plans

I have too much to do. I need to finish two sections of transcription practice, mow, paint the bathroom, lay the floor, take the rest of the carpet off the stairs, haul the rest of the recliner to the dump, do a general cleaning, and go to the grocery.

Oh, I also need another trap for my sink, new sheets for the new mattress set that's coming Wednesday, covers for the box springs, under bed storage, cat food, a new paint roller, and a smack upside the head.

All we like sheep

At the hospital, they said that we would be given a number and could watch a giant electronic tote board, following our loved ones as they progressed from preop to op to postop like good little lambs.

It was 4:50 am, and the girl behind the computer was beautiful--blond and chipper and young and almost chirping. We were her first. This morning? No, ever. She was just out of training, so alive. Unbeaten.

She checked Steve in, then led us upstairs and told us about the tote board as we stood in front of it. I had his number clutched in my hand, and my hand was sweating around it. I wondered how fast the ink would be, how blue my hand when I peeled it back, but I shouldn't have worried. It was legible, oh so neat writing, with fat numbers. No little hearts to dot an i because there was no i at all, just 8s like bulbous snowmen, 9s with a clever hook in the tail.

And the board didn't work.

You could watch us all, drifting like gulls, looking to find and point and cry "mine!" but left staring at three lonely numbers that never changed. 11 am one said. 1:34 pm. 5:16. Who were these people, kept on the board all night, or all weekend, or always? They were the teasers, telling us what could be if the hospital chose. This is what we could know.

5 am. 6. 7. I told other gulls that the board wasn't working. They'd stare at their paper and up. Down and up. My news was greeted with an oh, sad, defeated, and they'd slouch back to a seat.

But I stood there. Well, paced there is more accurate. Around and around like a tetherball. "It's not working. Been here since 5. Not working. Hasn't changed." All we like sheep. Wooly. Confused. Bleating.

Should I be shutting up?

My mother asked how I was promoting my book and I told her that I had talked about it on my blog and posted in two places. And, though the posting wasn't even primarily about the book, I still felt like I might be being pushy about it.

Please, if I am being pushy, tell me to stop. I can be dense.

It's aliiiiive!

I'm back. Who missed me? *crickets*

It feels like forever since I've blogged, but it's only been a day or two.

Yet another wrist appointment tomorrow. And the sink is leaking. But otherwise skies are pretty blue in Julieland today.

We're home

Exhausted. I am reeling.

Steve's left arm is numb from his shoulder to his fingertips, and it's in a sling. This is his first sling! We're so proud.

The surgery went well, according to the surgeon. Did I mention the surgeon is a novelist? Did I mention he looks like he's twelve? Scary times.

Aaaaaaaaaand we're off!

Get outta my way, Ohio, I stop for no man!

And damn. Who knew I'd be hungry this early? I want pancakes.

Maybe my life can return to normal

Seven hours until we have to leave for Steve's surgery. I'm more concerned than I was for past ones, probably because this is pretty much a last-ditch effort.

They want him to wear an anti-nausea patch. They didn't offer me one, or I would wear one, too.

Almost six months. Is there a light at the end of the tunnel that isn't a train?

Blog memes ahoy!

I don't have anything worthwhile to say, so I'll do memes. Yay!

This one via twitches at The Twitching Line.

1) Your Rock Star name: (first pet and current street name)
Charlie Columbus. Rock on!

2) Your Movie Star name: (grandfather/grandmother on your dad's side and your favourite candy)
Oh dear. Bertha Toasted Log. Steve's would be Burness Smartie.

3) Your 'Fly Girl/Guy" name: (first initial of first name and the first two or three letters of your last name)
J-Car!

4) Your Detective name: (favourite animal and favourite colour)
Cat Red, baby.

5) Your Soap Opera name: (middle name and the city where you were born)
Ann Lancaster. Steve's is Ray Bowling Green!

6) Your Star Wars name: (first three letters of your last name, last three letters of your mum's maiden name, and first three letters of your pet's name)
Car Oos Alb

8) Your Porn Star name: (middle name, father's middle initial, and the street you grew up on)
Ann A Bethel

9) Your Superhero name: ('The', your favourite colour, and the automobile you drive)
The Red Liberty! Steve is The Blue Mustang.

10) Your Ghetto name: (first two or three letters of your first name, -Shawn/Quan/Quita/Niqua, last name of whatever Prime Minister is on the currency you pull out of your pocket)
JuQuita Bush.

Oh dear.

I chose "anxious"

On a message board, a game thread asked people to choose one word to describe them. I chose "anxious."

It's been a couple of days, and every time I look at that thread, I assume I'll come up with a different word, a more fitting word, maybe a more flattering word. But no. "Anxious."

And you just know that a person who picks anxious is going to worry about what it means.

More Goodnights

Didi set Luc and me loose and we put together a show for miPO here.

I got to plug that wonderful poem by Steve Kronen again (scroll down for the Madonna poem).

And I got to plug a poem by Gary McDowell that I found through the WEE reviews, "Bones Hurt When They Have Flesh on Them".

Others, too, but they are surprises that I haven't mentioned before here, so you'll have to check them out.

Go ahead, prove me wrong!

The Indians didn't suck last night, but there's still time. A whole half-season. Prove me wrong, ya punks!

I made my mother cry

This is the one she chose as her favorite from pseudophakia.

Arrest

If I could hide within the hoops of bone
the surgeons cracked and spread like swallow wings
to free your heart, I would. You cannot doubt.
I'd ease beneath the sutures in your skin,
breathe only when you breathed, stop up my ears
to any noise but hushing blood. And when
you died no one could pry me out again.

The second half

The second half of the baseball season begins today. The Indians have to play the Twins in the dome. Francisco Liriano. The half will begin as the half ended, with a whimper.

The whimperer will be me.

And I don't have any Diet Cokes to ease my woe.

Fortunately, the ringing in my ears is still there, so maybe my head will explode before the game gets out of hand.

End of shift (archive)

End of shift at the fiberglass factory

The workers glint in glass each afternoon
as if Rapunzel draped them in her hair
before they sauntered past my window, soon
to wash the glitter strands from face and hands.

They leave in crystal, eager to be gone
and plain again; parade before my stare
like mythic beasts of silica and bone
who shed their glassy scales as daylight fails.

One ringie dingie

My ears are ringing, and when I answer there's no one there!

Project Runway!

Starts tonight! Apparently, there was a sneakpeek episode last night, but I was watching baseball. *sniff*

Fame!

My answers are dumb, but check out the others e-terviewed on John Baker's blog. Some interesting bloggers out there.

Correction to pseudophakia

I forgot to credit Steve with the great picture on the front, so mentally add a credit for him.

I've added it to any future prints. See? Errata! That'll make your editions worth more. Really.

I think the WriMos have officially fried me

I was going to do a July version of a WriMo, but I think I've officially burnt out. I kept it going for longer than I would have thought possible, but I don't think I have it in me. Maybe when I get over this cold. I never write well when I'm depressed or sick or with a generalized malaise.

That's such a great word. If I had the oomph, I'd use it in a poem.

I feel better

But instead of Julie Carter, I sound like Julie Kavner with congestion. It's bad. And if I talk for more than a few sentences, I start coughing. I did a recording, but listening to it actually made my eyes water. Ack. Hack. Cough cough cough.

My mother likes it!

Okay, so it's not a big surprise, but still. Mom was the reason I made pseudophakia in the first place, so her delight with the book is worth a lot.

Break's over, everyone back on your heads!

So we get a letter today telling us how Steve is scheduled for surgery on the 17th. Not a problem.

At 7 am.

Hmm.

Over an hour away.

Er.

And supposed to be there 2 hours before the procedure.

I did the math.

I am a sad potato, a mirthless toast, an angry sock.

Dream interpretation

So, I've had the same dream two nights running.

The guy who played Boromir? Naked. In a castle.

I'm not sure why he's naked in a castle, though I would suspect that the answer is something very much like "Because I want him to be." Though if you had asked me before these dreams started if I wanted Boromir to be naked in a castle I would have thought you were insane.

Ah, the mysteries of the mind.

Bah

Having problems with Blogger again, but you know what? I didn't have anything important to say anyway.

Blah.

Let these be allergies

Because otherwise, I have the cold from hell.

I just sneezed on the entire county. I'm going to have to hand out wipes if I'm not careful.

The money flies, as if winged

This past weekend was one of the most expensive on record, including the purchase of a new mattress set, a new vacuum, a new haircut, a new bed, and a new weedwhacker. It did not include the purchase of a new attitude because I'm still hoping to pick one up used.

My new anti-smoking campaign

Yes, this blog is coming out against smoking. I am fundamentally opposed to my vacuum cleaner catching on fire. Again.

It's not a good sign when the smoke starts billowing. It's a worse sign when your first thought is, "Did I run over a cat?"

In any case, we spent some portion of our afternoon vacuum shopping, getting haircuts, and trying not to get smacked on the head by tornadoes. We live exciting lives.

The Goodnight Show, Independence Day edition

The July 4th Goodnight Show is now up for your listening pleasure. I show up again, like a bad penny!

My life in pictures!

I think this captures me, and Steve's normal reaction to me, pretty darn well!

You can make your own South Park character here.

With thanks to Meg of blogcabin for the link!

Well, gosh, is that validation?

My husband is none too fond of my poetry, but he has decided to give a copy of pseudophakia to his niece for her birthday. I think that's as close to a thumbs up as I'm gonna get!

I know it's a sign of insanity

But I really want this cd.

Steve would probably go back to Kentucky if I played it, though.

Someone has parked in my driveway!

Apparently the Jeep being gone is a signal to park in my driveway. Today is the village's 4th of July celebration just a ways down the hill, so parking is always a problem. My driveway!

I'm calling a tow truck. This is ridiculous.

Falling down the stairs is vastly overrated

If someone suggests it to you, simply say no thanks and walk on by. After walking on by, turn around and suckerpunch the sadist.

I have a bump the size of a certain poet's ego on my head and you wouldn't believe how many fingers I've got. Dozens. Orson isn't sorry, either. What he doesn't know is that the last cat who made me fall down the stairs got given away and had to go live in a house with a great big dog. Just you wait, ornery Orson. Just you wait. You'll be sorry but your tears will be too late. Please be kind enough to imagine that sung, and in a broad Cockney accent. Thanks.