Blogosaurus Vex

Resolutions

December 31st, 2007 by Blogosaurus

Do I need a new year’s resolution?  Or am I already perfect?  You be the judge: today I read a book that is considered one of the world’s best (of a living writer); prepared home made Mexican sweet garlic soup with feta cheese, green onions, tomato dice, avocado, and egg whisked in just before serving; took a bath while reading the Impressive Book and attending to some less than perfect toe callouses; had lunch with a friend; pondered the meaning of life.

How does one improve upon perfection?

Okay, I admit it: I also ate seven Turtles (rah! rah! rah!).  And did some rather unlady-like picking at the aforementioned callouses.  Perhaps I could resolve to simply be perfect at all times, rather than just most?

I think I’ll resolve to be very attentive to my nutrition.  I got a book about nutrition for vegetarians, and it’s about time I made a more serious study of it.  Time to make sure I’m hitting all the benchmarks for advised intake of micro and macro nutrients.  Aaaaaand, dare I say it, to exercise regularly.  When it gets warm it will be easy, since I love cycling, but I absolutely hate cycling in poor weather so I need some kind of rain substitute.  Maybe I’ll take up swimming?

What are your resolutions?

Posted in Health & Wellness, Personal | No Comments »

Ghosts of Christmas Past

December 31st, 2007 by Blogosaurus

Okay.  The much awaited Christmas report.

This year was the best year for Husband and I in terms of Christmas.  In the beginning, our Christmasses involved flying home from Halifax, then jamming in five or six major social engagements over just a few days, which is a bitch under the best of circumstances, but totally unmanageable when you add in Husband’s inflexible need to meet up with Andy and Esan for nightly drinking in the city.  Our families live in the valley.   So we spent our holidays driving frantically from one place to another, hung over, and, on one notable occasion, both down with a feverish flu.  And of course we were usually house guests somewhere, actually at Esan’s, which is very gracious and kind of him, but it’s never easy being a guest in someone else’s home.  You know.  You’re always worried about being tidy enough, cheerful enough, non-imposing enough, and this is exhausting (but let it be said, Esan is an excellent host who never once complained about how we totally took over the entire living area of his apartment.  If, for any reason, he finds himself in need of crash space, our home is always open to him.).

So.  Husband is what I would call slow to warm to others, and those early years of visiting my family were not well tolerated by him.  I’m sure he was counting the minutes it took away from the partying he wanted to be doing, and I was similarly counting the time we’d have to waste with his parents, whom I admit here and before god that I actively dislike.  We were tired from flying, stressed about multiple commitments, irritated by each other’s families, and pressured by the encroaching return flight time.  It sucked.

Add to this that Christmas was just about the only time I got to see my family while I lived in Halifax.  I missed them terribly and hated being out of the family unit.  It was really important to me that I spend time with them, and equally important to Husband (then Boyfriend, and finally Fiance) to avoid them.  Just imagine what that did to our relationship!  Oh the delightful conversations we had on that little topic!  Anyway, the thing is, and I know this is totally mundane and you’ll roll your eyes at me for being such a softy, but I had a really hard time with my parents’ divorce.  Christmas became the time of year that the divorce was most obvious, because, hello, I spent the weeks leading up to is nervously attending to the formulation of plans for how my brother (who is ten years younger than me) would be shared between our parents.  I always just went where he did, which seemed the right thing to do, but it tied me into the delicate negotiations.  Who got Christmas dinner?  Morning?  Boxing day?  Ugh.

And then the days themselves: always watching the clock, when do we have to leave, where would we rather be, guilt about having a preference.  And for me, the emptyness of having Christmas be just the three of us, no longer a foursome.  It wasn’t the same.  Even though my parents were a bad match, and the divorce was, in my opinion, a necessary ingredient in my dad’s decision to quit drinking (three and a half years dry this winter- thank god!).  I know divorce is super common and since I was about twenty when it happened, I should have been able to handle it with aplomb.  But I didn’t, and maybe this is the secret of divorce: it’s not a little thing.  It’s hard on everyone, and maybe shouldn’t be thought of as something one gets over quickly.

Anyway, Christmas became the time when I tried to recapture the family feeling in the absence of my family as I grew up knowing it.  I clung pretty hard to the family traditions.  When my mom changed up the order of Christmas morning (breakfast before presents instead of vice versa), I was thoroughly put out.  How dare she?  Well, really, who cares?  Someone who’s trying to make things the way they used to and can never be again, that’s who.  And this is the scene Husband came into: me, missing my family and fighting to keep the old ways, but in only a few days and with the added necessity of visiting his parents.

So looking back on it, I think it was probably inevitable that we’d not have a good time over the holidays.  Moving home to Vancouver really helped, of course, because we can visit my family whenever we (or I, since Husband isn’t really into visiting them) want.  The time pressure is off.  Also, we no longer see Husband’s parents, which is good for lots of perfectly valid reasons that have nothing to do with Christmas, but also has the side effect of taking some pressure off the holidays.  One less major visit to make, you know?  And, I’ve gotten better about the new shape of my family.  My brother is older now, graduating high school this year.  I feel less of a need to protect him.  I am finally getting along with my mom’s boyfriend (he’s a good guy, but almost unbelievably slow to warm, and we just never got friendly until about the time I got married, which was several years after they got together).  My dad is doing well, much more settled than he was in the past.  So there’s less emotional urgency to the holidays.

This year, Husband and I had a very good time at every place we went.  We reserved part of Christmas eve just for us, and shared a bottle of champagne while watching The Grinch (cartoon, not Jim Carrey), and exchanged our presents that night.  Earlier that day we had Husband’s sister and her family for dinner, which was very nice.  Christmas morning was at my dad’s, where we had a great visit before popping briefly over to my sort-of grandparents (it’s a long story, but they’re my dad’s first ex-wife’s parents).  After that, we spent the day loafing and reading and chatting before hosting a big family dinner at dad’s.  Boxing day is reserved for my mom, and we spent the day at her apartment in the city, talking, eating, playing bingo with my step-siblings (who are, I believe, nine and thirteen), and reading.  It was, all in all, a relaxed pace and a positive experience at each place.

Having that part of Christmas eve at home was crucial.  For the first time, I’m making my own Christmas traditions that do not rely on a memory of the past, rather than working frantically to recreate an unrecreatable past.  It felt great to place that anchor.  I think we’ll keep doing that.

So, I guess that’s all I have to say about the holidays.  My main feeling, now that it is done, is relief.  Everything went well.  Husband and I had some great times together.  I saw everyone I wanted to (well, mostly - I have some dear friends who live too far away to visit), and was able to unpack a lot of my emotional baggage.  This holiday was more real, more rooted in the present, than any I’ve had since my parents split.  What a wonderful experience!

Posted in Married Life, Personal | No Comments »

Migraine Aborted

December 30th, 2007 by Blogosaurus

I just got out from underneath what I can best describe as an impending migraine.  I haven’t had a proper migraine in years because I discovered at some point that if I catch the first signs quickly (usually a feeling of heaviness in my right eye, or a twinge of headache at the base of my neck), 600mg of ibuprofen stops it dead in its tracks and the migraine never materializes.  To this end I am never without ibuprofen (Advil) of some kind - I keep it in my purse, car, back pack, and in various places around the house.  I buy the big bottle of it from Costco and restock my littler, name brand bottles for ease of stashing.  (And isn’t it delightfully roguish to put super cheap pills into bottles that formerly held rather dear ones?  Oh I live to damn the man!  I damn him!)

Anyway, today, for the first time in who knows how long, I got a migraine that just couldn’t be stopped by a couple of over the counter pills.  It was clearly slowed by the meds, but I could feel the growing intensity - my right eye became outright painful, and I began to feel nauseated.  Husband and I were watching the new documentary about the making of Blade Runner (I’ve been a big Philip K. Dick fan for years, and we both love Blade Runner) and I was uneasily monitoring the migraine’s progression from the couch while simultaneously oooh-ing over the total lack of computers used in the making of those lens flares.  (Imagine that - lens flare made with real lenses!)  And I was enjoying watching Rutger Hauer, who I think is damn sexy and very underrated as an actor.  Anyway!  This is a long way of saying I finally got the migraine cut off before it reached any kind of strong peak, and now I feel great.

But still I won’t update about Christmas, because I’m absorbed by reading.  I can’t tell you how much I enjoy reading for pure pleasure.  I wish I had another month to do so before school resumes, because I’ve missed it.

Posted in Health & Wellness | No Comments »

A Brief Update In The Aftermath of Xmas

December 28th, 2007 by Blogosaurus

I’m still recovering from The Christmas, so the full report won’t be posted for a while yet.  Maybe a couple of days.  Right now I’m all busy napping, reading, watching TV, and totally loafing.  Finally, I have no obligations except to relax.  Relax and eat the leftover chocolates and assorted other goodies before January, which is when we go back on a diet.

I will say that this was a wonderful holiday.  It’s certainly the most joyful and relaxing that Husband and I have had together.  We have seen lots of family (mine mostly), and the pace of social engagements wasn’t too hectic, and we both got some great books as gifts, so what more could you ask for?  …a blog update?  Well, I’m getting to it.

Posted in Domesticity | No Comments »

Scriptural Reading: It’s Not In Me To Do Good

December 24th, 2007 by Blogosaurus

In honour of it being Christmas Eve, we here at Blogosaurus Vex have decided to dedicate today’s entry to a scriptural reading. I was aided in the preparation of this post by Husband, who was once a pretty hard core born again Christian. (Now he’s a grumpy athiest like me, but still has a head full of theological trivia.) Without further ado, let us review what the Bible has to say about people who decorate Christmas trees:

Jeremiah 10:2-5, 8

Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the ways of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not. They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good. …But they are altogether brutish and foolish: the stock is a doctrine of vanities.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Posted in Educational Public Service Announcment | 1 Comment »

Work Party Is Actually Fun

December 22nd, 2007 by Blogosaurus

Well, colour me surprised: the work party was a good time.  I ended up sitting with some people I knew in Halifax, which was nice, and the other two couples at our table were comprised of one set of vegetarians and one set including a member who quilts and is a Christmas nut.  It’s like Jeebus created a table just for me!  And, we won a gift certificate for a french restaurant downtown, but wisely acknowledging that this would only cost us money (one hundred dollars does not buy you a meal at a fancy french restaurant), we swapped it for a very old bottle of port.  I loves me some port!  The food was pretty good, particularly the German dessert bar, and then there was dancing to a live swing band.  So, by the end of the night I had had good conversation, good food, good port, and dancing.

I am still pleasantly surprised about the whole affair.  What a nice evening!

Posted in Personal | 1 Comment »

Work Party

December 21st, 2007 by Blogosaurus

Did I tell you we’re going to Husband’s work party tonight?  My stomach is already in knots.  Joe, maybe you’d like to stand in for me?  You like parties!

I really do dislike parties.  I never go to them if I can help it.  I occasionally threaten to host them but basically I never do.  I think the perfect gathering has four or maybe five people.  As soon as the number gets higher, the fun drops dramatically.  I am known for being the person who leaves the party early - and it doesn’t mean I don’t like the people there or anything, I’m just pretty crap at being a party guest.

And, it’s going to be a bunch of strangers, Husband’s colleagues, who are sussing me out for traits of trophy-wifishness.  Husband and I are eleven years apart (he’s older), and it’s not a secret that I don’t work.  So you know what that means.  Obviously I’m a bimbo who gets by on her tits.  Maybe I’m paranoid… but I always feel this incredible pressure to appear brilliant and independent.  Thank god it doesn’t turn me into a bragging fat head (not that I have much to brag about anyway), but it does increase my general nervousness with strangers and makes the entire evening a misery.   My choices are to remain silent, or talk and clearly appear nervous, or to get drunk and embarrass myself that way.  Notice there are no options that retain dignity and involve enjoyment?

Oh god.  Why do I have to go to these things.

Posted in Married Life, Personal | No Comments »

Life at Home

December 21st, 2007 by Blogosaurus

Last night I went to a work party with the agency I volunteered with earlier this year.  I had a really nice time, though I was sick and pulled a few socially-awkward boffos.  I managed to avoid a proper conversation with anyone because, you know, I’m kind of bad at that stuff with people I don’t know really well.  What I am very good at is the non-starter conversation where as some point both parties end up staring at each other saying nothing and trying to be cool about it - But nonetheless I had a very happy evening.  The food was spectacular!  I’m an apologetic vegetarian and was totally blown away by some of the very kind modifications that were made to dinner on my behalf.  The only boo-boo was the chicken stock used in the soup that I wasn’t alerted to until after the fact (though with much horror and apologies), but upon closer inspection of the packaging of the stock, it turns out it was that fake chemical stuff anyway so no chickens were harmed in the making of my carrot ginger soup.

By around 9:30 I was pretty wiped out and seeking a way to avoid playing Charades, so I got Husband to pick me up and bring me home so I could crash with sickness on the couch.  But then I was gripped with a strange urge to shop, so at 11pm I hit Safeway.  Did you know that’s an awesome time to shop?  No one is there!  Literally no one!  (No, not literally.)  I came home with milk and the fixins for a home made vegetable soup, which simmered in the crock pot all night.  Now the house smells great.  I just added some corn and by lunch time it’ll be all ready for diving in.  Yum!

Posted in Domesticity | 3 Comments »

Fatigue

December 19th, 2007 by Blogosaurus

Today I went to the post office to pick up a parcel and, I must admit it, everything went smoothly.  I have ordered all kinds of thing for Christmas and in a total about face, Canada Post has delivered each and every one on time.  I haven’t had to call and complain once.  Not once!  It’s rather anti-climactic, actually.  I’ve gotten used to hating them and don’t quite know what to do when they deliver as promised.  Send chocolates?  Stop sending my poo in Ziploc bags?  What would Emily Post say?

So, this has been my day so far: wake up, scrap with Husband (we’re over it now), go back to bed for a nap, go to post office, get home, nap, wrap presents, write on blog.  Holy crapoly, I am exhausted.  I wrapped five presents and couldn’t even attach the tag to the last one because I have no energy left.  I’m watching Cold Case Files on TV because I can’t summon up the energy to change the channel (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it).  I’m sick and tired.  I need someone to deliver peanut M&M’s to me and stroke my hair and say “there there… there there.”  Alas, I do not know anyone who will do these things.  I will have to settle for whining while laying sprawled on the couch watching bad TV.

But!  I still have the Christmas spirit and may get all riled up to attach that tag later, after I’ve napped and recharged.   Now I am too tired to keep writing so this will be the end of this entry.  See ya!

Posted in Health & Wellness | 1 Comment »

Ill, Yo.

December 18th, 2007 by Blogosaurus

In keeping with my fine, fine tradition, I appear to be getting sick again.  I woke up all snotty and head-stuffed-up feeling, and now I notice that the extreme effort of sitting at the dining table reading blogs is causing sweat to roll down my ribs and pool in the waist band of my jammies.  Fever until proven otherwise.  But that’s okay, I have nothing to do today.  Except:

1. Do Husband’s piles and piles of billing so we can have money.

2. Buy an ice cream cake for Husband, who has a birthday today and is not ashamed to admit loving Dairy Queen.

3. Make a nice dinner and then go out for drinks after, with the cake inserted in between because, hello, it’s his birthday!

4. Have sex.  See 3.

5. Work on mom’s christmas skirt, which is a christmas present and absolutely cannot be late.

6. Do other housework because it never ends.  Never!

7. Cry.  See numbers 1 through 6.

Posted in Health & Wellness | 3 Comments »

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