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Saturday, May 26th, 2012
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12:43 pm - Feeling Grounded
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Being "grounded" sounds like a bad thing if you grew up in the 80s or 90s; in my case, being grounded means having a sturdy, supportive foundation.
Recently I have been spending mutually-grounding evenings with a friend from college. Being with B reminded me that I do have value, that I bring things into relationships, that I'm real and un-alone (especially in thinking, "where do I belong? Which path is right? Am I doing this right???") There have been a lot of synchronous moments, like Neil Gaiman's commencement speech (which I highly suggest you listen to if you're a struggling artist) being in my facebook feed and becoming aware (through B's affirmations) that I am actually worth noticing.
The culminating pinnacle of the grounding came about on my me-time date to the farmer's market/cafe breakfast: a girl saw me art-ing (working on C [my fiancee*]'s birthday present) and reached out. I feel like I've known this girl all my life and I want to be instant friends with her/collaborate/be accepted with her. She graduated from SCAD and is trying to break through; I gave her a suggestion on how to start as a photographer of foods (come into my cafe and we can build a website together) and told her of my own rejection (my gorgeous idea of how to shape a storefront shot down because of my "retail experience/not being interactive" -- "how clique-ish" we agree). So I have plans to, with this new friend, do something awesome that will hopefully lead to dream-goals.
* C and I are separated by about 9.5 years, and we have very similar philosophies on how to raise children, clean things (no bleach!), and our preferred age of children are complementary; "clearly we should wed" I said, and she agreed, and so we became affianced.
current mood: positive
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| Thursday, May 17th, 2012
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9:58 pm - yoga
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I started my yoga class at Durham Tech last night and so tonight I spent some time meditating, saluting the sun, and attempting other poses I used to do. I feel pretty out of shape, but you have to start somewhere, right?? I mean, I can only improve.
Also! Congrats to ![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) bell for getting her Canadian residency! <3 I'll attempt to use tags more so as not to confuse readers.
current mood:  sleepy
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| Tuesday, May 15th, 2012
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9:29 pm - Bridesmaids
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( beeru spoilers - not really spoilers for others ;) )
Overall, it was a good dinner/movie date with my brother's boyfriend! He cooked this amazing vegetable I don't know what you'd call it, but it was awesome!
Today was a nice day off-- got some painting done (almost finished), started a new watercolor (with pencil) piece, spent some time with kitties, ate lunch with friends, went shopping, took a wonderful nap (wonderful nap means bodily contact with both cats, with one or both (bonus points!) purring).
current mood:  amused
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| Tuesday, May 8th, 2012
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8:29 pm - The Marriage Amendment
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If the Catholic Church were the law of the land, then both of my brothers and I would be considered bastards, having been conceived and born out of wedlock. My parents are interfaith, Catholic and Jewish, and they legally married at the justice of the peace. In the eyes of the church, however, my father had committed a mortal sin and was denied communion, heaven, and having his children baptized/go to heaven/receive communion, until my mom and dad had a church wedding.*
Doesn't this sound backwards?
Marriage is defined, in the state of NC, as the union between a man and a woman, i.e. if you are not heterosexual, you may not get married in NC.
"The Amendment" that was on the ballot was this:
"Marriage between one man and one woman is the only domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized in this State."
Continuing, from wikipedia (but absent from the ballot):
"This section does not prohibit a private party from entering into contracts with another private party; nor does this section prohibit courts from adjudicating the rights of private parties pursuant to such contracts."
The bill prohibits not only same-sex marriages, but civil unions."
Which means that unmarried people carrying dependents on their insurance, caring for children in their home, visiting a sick/injured/dying partner in hospital will no longer be recognized and protected by the state. If you're unmarried, according to the government and not just to your church, you're "living in sin." So, disguising this as a religious issue, proponents of this bill know that it's really about money, privilege, and being able to discriminate against supposed undesirables.
Gay marriage is already illegal here.
It's still discrimination. It's wrong.
*Yes, I know that as an adult or child of my own accord I could/can choose to convert to Catholicism, but Catholics baptize as a baby in the event of infant mortality/childhood illness, and these things scared the living hell out of me as a kid.
current mood:  crushed
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| Monday, May 7th, 2012
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10:46 pm - First cavities! and teeth bleaching!
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Today was hectic! But I signed up for the interview, worked, drove to Roxboro, got my teeth drilled (knowing what a drill looks like and what the specific drill bits do, a bit unnerving), filled (no need for pain meds, which was awesome), went home for a few minutes, drove back to Durham, fed cats, ran to class, finished up web design, came home, and am waiting for the bleach treatment to be over.
It's oddly foamy and uncomfortable. But, my roommate swears it's worth it.
Two more minutes...
current mood: mouthfullofbleach
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| Sunday, May 6th, 2012
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8:59 pm - procrastinationnnnn
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I'm figuring stuff out with CSS and I think I ought to do what I did in class: style using CSS in the html, then cut/paste into a text document (saved as a .css, of course)
My website at first is not going to be a thousand pages like I planned at first! In fact, by tomorrow, I will be surprised if I even have three pages strung together.
::sigh::
Tomorrow I get my first two fillings ever. And I need to sign up for that interview in Charlotte on Saturday, since I'm off. And sign up for a science praxis. Holy crap, is this my life???
(good news? I'M A KITTY AUNT OMG SHE IS THE MOST GORGEOUS KITTY (of course I'm biased) Maybe I can be promoted to godmother?? I SHOULD KNIT HER A BLANKET)
current mood: freaking out
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| Saturday, May 5th, 2012
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11:50 am - Audition, Depression-PMS
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I auditioned for 15 or so directors this morning, where we were told NOT TO BE LATE, so naturally, I got stopped at ALL THE LIGHTS, parked where I could, and ran like a crazy person through several blocks of farmer's market and around cars and between pedestrians and cyclists, to make it to the theatre, three minutes before the audition, covered in sweat and red-faced. I handed my pre-printed-out audition form and a hand-written "resume" with a hand-drawn "headshot" of myself (I definitely made a statement, whether that's a good thing or not is yet to be determined), and waited for my one-minute monologue in a tiny room that serves as a theatre with ten other actors.
I grew up on stage, and I was never, ever nervous performing. Practice, practice, practice, dress rehearsal, and then the curtains come aside and you have an audience's eyes and blinding, hot lights on you and it just FLOWS. I really believed as a kid that I would be a successful Broadway star, that I had potential, that I was unique.
Standing in front of directors in search of new blood for local theatrical projects, being overweight and self-conscious and worried my monologue would run over and I'd get told "thank you" by the event MC, I ran through my monologue and skipped a few parts and probably did it in 30 seconds, rather than the 55-65 second average of my practice-sessions. And while everyone else did play-monologues, I adapted something from a less-mainstream comic book. I definitely made a statement; good or bad is yet to be determined.
I tried to brush off the blues and self-loathing as I left by going through the market, seeing all the produce and flowers. And then the local artists. There are hundreds of artists who do their own thing and don't make any money, and they're all better than me, and who am I to even think that I matter? Or that I have the right to do art?
I write this entry not to depress you, dear readers, but to tell you that, if you feel this way about your life? You are not alone. I've come to realize that this is how my body handles PMS, not by lashing out at others and being generally bitchy (the current and shunned form of PMS), but by beating myself to bits. It's awful. So I got into my car and drove home, pushed myself to go through feelings and write them here. I need to get back into writing, to blogging, to movement and action.
I'm still doing my art. I'm going strawberry picking today, and then swing dancing tonight. And back to work tomorrow.
current mood:  sad
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| Friday, May 4th, 2012
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10:05 am - Website Launch
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I plan on using DW as my blogging platform for my website, which hopefully will go up in the next two weeks. So, get into the practice of blogging again, self!
It's been so long since I really blogged. All of my previous blogs were filled with angst. So today, I start off with a clean slate and with pictures (because I have been re-sizing things, wow!) because pictures are infinitely more interesting than words words words.
... except I need an image url. ;;sigh;;
Last night I made:
kinpira gobo (for sushi) -- burdock root (gobo is easier to say) strips, sauteed in soy sauce, sake, and sugar-- it is actually the most delicious dish in the world.
sushi --
inari (the sweet fried tofu/bean-curd that you stuff with rice and sesame seeds!)
avocado, cucumber, umeshiso, wasabi (my friend R made a wasabi sushi without rice. WOW.)
Meranie-curry - so, my idea of a successful curry includes tofu, kabocha (pumpkin*), and satsumaimo (sweet potato*), in that order. Last night's curry was all of the above plus broccoli, carrot, and onion. YUM!
Iced tea! I made it by mixing houjicha (a roasted green tea), barley tea, and roasted corn tea, and diluting with water. I was going for a 16cha (16-flavored tea-- if you live in Japan or Korea (it's 17-flavors there, I think) taste, and I feel it was somewhat successful. It was refreshing!
My friend R brought mochi ice cream for C, as this was an impromptu surprise birthday party in her honor, and we sat around my living room with my roommate's cats laughing and having a good time.
Surprise on-the-fly party: success.
What would I do differently?
Make snacking sushi ahead of time, also to provide an idea of what kind of sushi everyone wants to make
cook 2 batches of rice.
remember to make tamagoyaki (egg omelet*)
set up some kind of picnic blanket on floor rather than eating over carpet
*but better! These are approximations in English.
current mood: cheerful
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| Thursday, December 29th, 2011
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12:04 am - Rollercoaster
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I keep reminding myself that there is no book with the answers for what to do correctly, for what career path to follow, etc. The biggest frustration in my life currently is what to do about Velcro, who has been declining in health recently. I realize I don't post much on LJ anymore; this may be my last post (I have to break my LJ habit and just convert do DW already...)
Anyway, I wanted to say that the downward emotional rollercoaster has shifted in a more positive direction. Velcro was feeling awful yesterday morning, so I gave him fluids before work. I came home and he was happy, wanted to eat, was playful and alert. Awesome. And today seemed to be more of the same. (We had a three-hour nap-- it was glorious) So, until I see him vomiting or exhibiting signs of dehydration (two nights ago), I will hold out on the liquids; he doesn't seem to benefit from them unless he's going through rough patches. The renal diet caused him to get acne and then lose appetite altogether. He currently eats about half of what Cricket eats of the Castor & Pollux, which is a significantly smaller amount than what he was eating before I began fluids. There is no book with answers, nor can Velcro tell me what he wants. I just do what I can and, I want to remember that there were at least two days after Christmas that were better than the others.
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| Saturday, December 24th, 2011
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11:28 am - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
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| Sunday, December 4th, 2011
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3:30 pm - CAKE! and being female
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The past few years have been rough, and one of the roughest patches occurred last year. I got through one spot with a mix by fruitypoundcake, and after buying a few Weezer CDs off a friend, I realized that it was not Rivers Cuomo who made my levels euphoric, no; CAKE was what made me the happiest. I became a huge CAKE consumer, escaping in my car on the way to work or to the bank or home to catchy, upbeat, sometimes violent and angry music that made me feel better about life.
They seemed like such cool guys, and so when I found out they were coming this close to me (by which I mean not west coast and not Europe, which they do a lot more than ye olde bible belt), I was... I HAD to go. And I was more psyched about this concert than just about anything else. So I packed up my Felix and drove to Charlotte and it was so much fun!
Except for a few things.
( Possibly trigger-y, if you're a girl, but come on, can't you take a joke?? )
On to the show-- I feel like they might have been a bit trashed? Or high? Or both? Whatever... it was fun. M said that the lead singer nodded at me (I made the heart symbol with my hands), and I think he may have liked the crowd until someone tried to get up on stage, and then he turned into an angry man, saying how we had hoped it had gotten violent. (Not me!!) And he kept getting mad at people taking videos.
I'm formulating a thank-you note for them. They are not the best live band, but they were a lot of fun and, as I said earlier, they have contributed a lot in the "make-meranie-feel-better" movement.
One final note-- I didn't realize until seeing them live that CAKE has an AMAZING guitarist. The bassist was awesome, and the trumpet player does great vocals (we won't mention the trumpeting...), and the drummer made my night by giving his sticks to a kid after the first encore.
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| Friday, November 25th, 2011
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10:23 am - Giving Your Cat Fluids
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The hardest part about giving your cat fluids is knowing that you're actually puncturing the skin.
It's surprisingly not difficult to administer fluids via IV, and getting Velcro to adapt to a renal diet was not a challenge at all (he was like, GIMME THAT FOOD OMG OMNOMNOM). The trick is consistency and being able to afford it all.
EDITED TO ADD:
Velcro's appetite and alertness has gone up exponentially and I think he's feeling much better. Administering fluids may be a bit expensive, but I found a support website for CRF-cats with bulk suppliers, so I'm optimistic. Plus, the treatment is clearly worth it.
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| Monday, June 13th, 2011
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10:45 pm
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Feeling a fit of emo angst coming on, so as to not be emo all over teh intarwebs, I de-activated my FB, signed out of twitter, and I'll be checking LJ sporadically (mostly b/c of Janni & Beeru-tachi (Zulu, you're officially part of Beeru-tachi!), who regularly update), but I'm going e-mail only for a while.
-m
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| Saturday, June 11th, 2011
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7:10 am - To do list for today:
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- revamp resume (it's been a week, and there's a new job prospect in Chapel Hill for Asian-experts and women's health issues. Hmmmmm, up my alley? Why, yes!)
- clean apartment/laundry/her cats' litter before getting Julie at the airport (which she called to say there was a delay)
- Work on updating my tumblr (username meranie, currently empty!) But I'm trying to get stuff established with Diana.
And after I do these things, I can:
- take a nap (I was up til 2 last night, at a party?!?!)
- ???
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| Saturday, April 23rd, 2011
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11:19 am - 750 words
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I'm pretty happy with this website.
Let's see if I can stick with typing out my morning pages rather than writing longhand.
Haachan, THANK YOU!!! <3
p.s. ArtSushi is in progress.
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| Saturday, April 9th, 2011
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1:50 pm - Addendum on brother & dog
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My brother is like a homeless person.
And the dog will not be put down. My parents have decided to let her stay outside during the week they're away during the day and go in at night. I guess this means more driving to and from Roxboro.
I'm still pretty stressed out.
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| Wednesday, April 6th, 2011
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5:17 pm - In which I talk about Cocoa and my MIA-brother
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My youngest brother M has always been a bit of a tough cookie.
We suspect he has some type of autism; he's able to understand things like calculus with ease, but tying shoelaces and communicating with family members prove problematic for him. In fact, he has been MIA since December when his phone stopped working. And rather than my mother harassing his best friend for his whereabouts, we just have been completely unable to contact him... which has been driving both my parents mad with worry and has kept M out of the loop with things like the fact that my dad was in hospital for 3 days last month (regulating medicines for atrial fibrillation - really, it was a boring hospital stay, which is always better than an exciting one, or so the doctors say), my grandfather doing his final (leukemia, they say) death dance, my grandmother's continued descent into senile crotchetiness, and now, the putting-down of our 16.5-year-old dalmation/pit-bull/lab mix Cocoa.
I call her my sister for obvious reasons.
The decision to put her down sooner rather than later makes sense, and my parents have been cleaning after her deteriorating control of her bowels and rear legs. They let her out and in of the house at will because she's restless. She isn't in pain, and she still enjoys her food and loves attention, and so they've decided to let her go before things get worse.
Which makes sense in my logical brain. I wish that humans could decide for themselves with as much ease (which, honestly, is not easy). It's just harder to accept that she's going to not be there. That, you know, if I weren't working all the (god-damned motherfucking) time, I could ease the burden on my family and let her live out the rest of her old-lady life. I regret more than almost anything else when the same thing happened with the lady that I considered my grandmother, when we insisted that she put her retirement money into living at a nursing facility rather than next door in her house (where I was partially her caregiver). I regret taking all those AP classes and honors classes and working hard at school which, in the end, got me into a mediocre college which has ended with me working 48-hours a week with no overtime on my feet serving people. I could still be where I am right now and have had a few more months with her and her quality of life would have been better.
But I digress. Cocoa's been around over half my life. My mom, who never ever let us convince her with cute puppies, fell completely and madly in love with her friend's runt-of-the-accidental-litter, this tiny brown puppy with blue eyes and white-with-brown-freckles feet and star-on-her-chest and muzzle.
She's had a good life. She's outlived two of our other dogs. She's the most spoiled-rotten creature, loyal and sweet. There's nothing like having her curled up next to you. She has warning growls and, though we weren't always gentle with her, she never bit us out of annoyance.
We all love her. M, especially, loves her. Like me, M could care less about the dying grandfather or the bitchy grandmother. I got contact information for him yesterday and he replied to my text with a phone call at midnight, and now I have an address.
So it's good in a way because we'll all be together with her before she goes. It's easier to end a story when you know the when and where rather than playing the waiting game.
I just wish that I could accept it without breaking down and crying.
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| Friday, February 25th, 2011
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7:43 am
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So, I went to Canada and a lot of my customers were like, "Where were you?!?!?" and a lot of panic genuinely flooded their hearts 'til B (who was filling in for me) explained I was at my best friend's wedding (which was awesome, by the way) and would be back in a week.
I'd been back for almost a week and this semi-regular customer (a practicing physician and teacher of medical field type people) heard me mention Canada when she came in on Wednesday, and as she's heading out the door (which she held wide open), said to me:
"You know, they had a big earthquake this morning. It's all over the news."
"Where in Canada? It's kind of a big country."
"The whole island. It's pretty bad; you should contact your relatives and see if they're okay."
So this morning I remembered the whole thing, googled "earthquake," and the one she was referring to happened, no, not in Canada.
New. Zealand.
I love America.
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| Saturday, December 18th, 2010
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8:36 am - Christmas Trees
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I haven't had a Christmas tree in years.
The Christmas tree I remember from my childhood went from this enormous, perfectly-decorated, gorgeous thing with presents galore beneath it to pain-in-the-ass chore within a few years (probably right around the time we were figuring out that there is no such thing as Santa Claus). I think when I was in high school my parents stopped doing the tree. My dad brought home a real one (for the smell, which in later years we achieved by burning a very large, 3-wick pine-scented candle) to my whatever-I-was-activisting-about horror one year. Since college my mom has been using her bead-crafting baubles to hang on the Norfolk pine, which is something I like. None of these old cardboard boxes full of delicate and timeless ornaments from my dad's childhood that, if broken, cause angst. Just little colorful glass drops on a tree left behind from a family friend's move to another state.
My roommate Julie went to Ohio to visit family for Thanksgiving. Before she left, we'd discussed getting a tree. It is something that means so much to her, that she enjoys so much, that I began to get a bit excited about. But before she went to Ohio, she told me she may not be coming back. Her uncle had passed away and was possibly leaving her a house and she had an unsolicited but sweet-deal job interview. If those things worked out, she would be leaving NC. Suddenly putting up a tree the day after Thanksgiving (as opposed to December 1) was not something I felt like arguing about. Instead, I felt like crying. What if she wasn't coming back? My work-life would turn to hell within 20 seconds. My personal life (i.e. the one outside of work) would go to hell as well; she knows how to turn "I want to die I am so tired" to "hey, let's do something fun, yay!" The week she was gone was excruciatingly sad.
So, she came back from Ohio, hadn't gone to the interview, uncle's will voided (default everything goes to his brother, Julie's dad), and glad to be "home" in NC. I was ready to get a Christmas tree that day, but we waited a bit.
And waited.
And waited.
Pretty soon, I was the one asking almost daily, "when are we going to get the Christmas tree?" I felt like an impatient child. I found myself buying (wtf) Christmas presents.
So on Tuesday, which felt like the coldest night of the year, Julie comes home and we drive to Home Depot. We pick out a tree very quickly and we buy it and she shows me how to strap it onto a car. Now, keep in mind, if I were to bring home a Christmas tree, I would have put it in my back seat. Julie showed me how to string a tree to your roof-- it was so much fun and we laughed so hard each time she threw the ball of string to me and I dropped it. Then we went and got frozen yogurt (peppermint flavored) and then came home and put up the tree, decorating it with three different colors of lights (blue and white were hers-- I told her "I thought this was supposed to be a Christian tree!", and pinkish/magenta were mine) and ornaments that she had (plasticky, non breakable ones for the bottom layers/cats, and glass and delicate-r ones for the top), and then she told me to get out my ornaments. So I took down from my window the things I had hanging and put them on the tree. My little UFO catcher Rilakkuma, Memetchi (which Saachan won for me in Namba), bunny fairies and glass thingies and moon-shapes.
When we come home now, we have this gorgeous lit-up thing that smells great and makes us smile. We have a fireplace that works and good company and warm cats that don't get along.
I feel like a lot has gone wrong in my life this year, but rooming with Julie is by far the best choice made. And I think I may actually like Christmas.
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| Wednesday, September 8th, 2010
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4:21 pm
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