There Will Be No Scents Knowing Today.

I’m still alive! My writing brain has not been quite so lucky. It decided to jump out the window a few months back. One snowy day in January it was hanging by one finger on the ledge of total writer’s block and I tried so very hard to pull it back inside the forefront of my brain but to no avail. It let that last finger slip and fell into an empty pit of blank thoughts and settled down next to my local chatty cathy – aka disjointed thoughts. I call my disjointed thoughts chatty cathy because they don’t tend to shut up. And they don’t make sense. Think about any chatty cathy you’ve ever known in your life. You can’t get a word in edgewise and you can’t keep up. Now think about having one in your own head! Chatty cathy hijacked my writer’s brain and kept it hostage with unending words about whether one should leave the house when there’s an inch of snow on the ground (horrible thoughts to have where I live) or what happens if the cats get out of the house (not going there quite yet…)?

Luckily, the spring air has lured my writer’s brain back and it is slowly climbing the brick wall back up into the forefront of my brain. Today it has decided to grace me with its appearance because I’m undergoing something that so deserves to be blogged about.

My delayed winter cold has ripped away my most beloved possession: My sense of smell.

How will I live? My blog’s name is Knows Scents for a reason! I experience the world through my nose! How am I supposed to enjoy the things in my life if I can’t smell them?? I hugged my husband good-bye this morning and died a little inside because I was not able to smell him. I know this sounds odd but anyone who knows me knows that I smell EVERYTHING. It’s the way I asess my surroundings. While others asses with their ears and eyes, I can smell out a situation. Does it smell like flowers? Okay, I’m safe. Does it smell like gasoline and garbage? I should leave, I’m in an alley and might get mugged.  Get the picture? I WANT MY SENSE OF SMELL BACK!

The other horrendous thing that happens when sense of smell gets compromised is taste follows right along behind like a lost little puppy dog looking for its mommy. Stupid, lonely sense of taste. You couldn’t just take one for the team and stick around? Nope, out the door!

Therefore, the rest of this blog will outline a few of the things that I miss due to my lack of senses. Just because I feel the need to share with the world the heartbreak ensuing inside my soul as I go into the third day without them.

 

 1. The smell of coffee brewing. I stuck my nose inside my bag of coffee grounds     this morning and absolutely nothing registered.

2. On the same note, coffee tastes stale and old. Not Irish creamy and delectable like it should.

3. Guacamole. I made guacamole yesterday for a staff meeting titled “Tacos!” yesterday. I could not smell it. I could not taste it. The only reason I knew I was chopping red onion was my eyes teared up so bad I almost cut my finger off. The only way I knew the guacamole was decent was my co-workers kept adding more to their plates. To me it tasted like the blandest thing I’d ever eaten despite the amount of garlic, onion, and cilantro I’d added to it. Sad, sad day.

4. I had a Yuengling last night. Nastiest thing I’ve ever tasted in my life. That was not beer I took a sip of. Did the cat’s break into my beer, discard the contents, and use the bottle as a litter box???? Never, I say, never drink a beer when you don’t have a sense of taste. Normally this is one of my favorites. Hopefully re-attaching the bottle cap and sticking it in the fridge will keep it from going flat for a little while…

5. I was so excited on Monday to see that General Mills products were on sale at Wegmans. This meant Cinnamon Toast Crunch being CHEAP! 🙂 However, now I can’t even taste it. There’s a slight zing of what I know is cinnamon because, well, it’s cinnamon toast crunch. However, if I hadn’t known that all I’d be able to tell you is that something in that cereal made my tongue tingle. Once again I say, sad, sad day!

Now for the very few things I DON’T miss about my lack of smell:

 1. I walked into our office yesterday and startled Isaac who was using his facilities. He finished his business and leapt out of the box eager to come nuzzle my hand, leaving his creation uncovered. Usually this causes a stench to waft throughout the upstairs and while I’m sure the stench did not fail, I had the pleasure of not having to experience it 🙂

 2. As I stated earlier, I made guacamole yesterday and therefore threw out 4 avocado shells, onion skins, garlic skins, and a whole slew of other quick to rot items. The garbage was already quite full yesterday afternoon when I was cooking  so when I walked into the house after work I was expecting to get a nose  full of dirty garbage smell. Again, while I’m sure it was there, I was able to enter my house without the feeling a ick that overcomes me when my kitchen smells like rotting food.

I’m sure I could keep listing items but I am starting to get hungry and really should eat my tasteless lunch. I was thinking of doing Wendy’s today but what’s the point of paying 5 dollars for food you can’t even taste? Therefore I shall head home and eat peanut butter with my kitties and hopefully my presence for the lunch hour will make Duncan content enough that he won’t pee around our house in spite as has become his custom on the days I work fulltime.

Weather Patterns and Cat Naps

Beautiful isn’t it? (This statement directed at my fellow beach lovers, my fellow ‘would do anything to get my butt on the beach at least once a year’ folks.) This picture was taken in Key Biscayne, Miami, FL. It’s quite a deceiving picture actually because the sky with the blue water and palm trees, in addition to knowing its Miami, makes one think that you could hop into the picture and experience 90 degree weather. However, it was not the case, it was more around 68 or 69 degrees that day. But temperature does not matter when one is walking through sand (well temp does decide whether shoes stay on or come flying off…). I was happy as a clam walking around that beach taking in all of the sensations that create my passion for the sea. The smell of salt water and sand,  the feel of the breeze, the sound of the palm tree leaves mixed with the sound of the waves… the beach and all of it’s sense tickling properties brings me into an almost hypnotic state.

Ignore the power cord running through the sign 😉

 

I found this sign in Key West and found it highly applicable to my life 😉  

The pictures above are also the reason my blog has been lonely for 2 weeks. My parents decided that this year they were not going to spend the winter months shoveling snow, putting on 8 layers of clothing, and avoiding their back twisty curvy roads they live on when the major snow storms hit. They decided to spend their winter months visiting beaches, sitting on their balcony, and visiting various bird/manatee/general wildlife viewing areas in Florida. *gasp* who would do such a thing? Perhaps half of the northeast? If I could retire now at the ripe old age of 25 and become the world’s youngest snow bird I’d be there in a  second. Now, one of the perks to being the daughter of a snow bird is winter VACATION!! My husband and I were able to spend 10 days with my parents touring all over Florida and soaking up as much vitamin D and warm weather as possible to bring with us back to, as Matt calls it, the frozen tundra that is upstate New York.

Our vacation looked something like this: 

Florida Jungle

All in all, it was a great vacation comprised of manatees, beaches, and wonderful family in the Tampa Bay area and beaches, pelicans, egrets, whales, and a visit to a wonderful Anglican church in Miami/Florida Keys. Successful Florida break!

But all great things must come to an end and our vacation ended with a blast of 5 degree air throwing itself through the jetway as we stepped off the plane and back into our beloved “tundra”.

I believe I’m somewhat unlucky in terms of weather. This year, as I’ve travelled back and forth across the state I’ve brought snow with me everywhere I go. Almost all of the snowstorms Albany has had so far have rolled in with my arrival to the city limits, including a snowstorm that hit the night before Matt and I had to board our plane (in Albany) to fly to Florida. We had a fun drive getting to my parent’s house that night… I hoped maybe this trend would cease but alas a cold front whooshed through northern and central Florida a day after we arrived and the first 4 days in Tampa were filled with Freeze Warning alerts blipping from my obnoxious weather channel app on my phone. Luckily, we left the cold (erm, “cold”, 55 degrees is NOT cold comparatively but it IS cold relatively) and went down to Miami. The day before we arrived to Miami it was in the low 80s upper 70s but the cold front followed and the 3 days we were there held upper 60’s and low 70’s weather, which resulted in absolutely no complaints. It was absolutely glorious. However, the day after we left Miami, guess what? The temperature shot back up to the 80’s. I feel I could forecast weather based on where my body is. And to further confirm my weather forecasting abilities, the days that we arrived back home happened to be the coldest we’ve had in upstate new york yet this year. Ah well, what can ya do? Keep me as far away from you as possible if you want to stay warm!!! 😉

As I stated before, we arrived in Albany in the 5 degree weather and trekked the 2.5 hours back to home. What we found when we got home was this:

Hallelujah, a miracle has happened!! My kitties cuddle! And bathe each other! And play! And share! And generally love each other 🙂 Here is a quote from my last post:

“Someday, oh maybe someday, this whole thing will blow over and I’ll be posting a blog about how cute they are when snuggled up together. Looks to be far from now but one can hope!”

When writing about the hatred felt between my cats just 3 weeks ago, I wrote this closing sentence with absolutely no idea this would actually happen within the month!

So, here it is, LOOK HOW CUTE MY KITTIES ARE WHEN SNUGGLED UP TOGETHER!!!! 🙂

Okay I blogged about it 😉

But really, this was a great treat to come home to. I will forever be indebted to my wonderful friend who house/cat sat as I believe she is the reason they snuggle. I don’t know how she did it but it happened and it’s beautiful. No more icy tension, no more constant surveillance. Just the occasional nip at the neck from big kitty to small kitty which is easily remedied by the appearance of a spray bottle.

For the next 3 months I will slowly pull out the stored Vitamin D and sunshine I bottled while in Florida and douse it over myself once a week just to get me through. And I’ll cuddle with my cats as much as possible. Winter may not be so bad after all.

Sibling Rivalry of the Feline Kind

My house has become a war zone. There is an icy tension that will not go away. My husband uses the word “frosty” to describe it. But let me back up a bit and give you the story behind why.

First, however, let me just say that animals are strange.  

 How many birds do you see in this picture? At first glimpse it’s your average forest bird staring at an oddly shaped smiley face object. Oh, but eyes can deceive. That is not just any smiley face, it is actually the male bird wooing his lass and trying to convince her to let him be the father of her chicks. Seriously?! He poofs up like a smiley face? Really, it’s one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen.

I was a dog person for most of my life. I loved the fact that they are loyal, friendly, and generally enjoy being around people. I was adamantly against cats and thought anyone who owned a cat was nuts. Why would you want something so stuck up, prissy, and unamiable? This probably has something to do with the fact that I was slashed across the arm by one when I was 7 years old. Really, all I was trying to do was rigorously rub his tummy, animals like it when you do that… we had a misunderstanding. My side lasted about 13 years. However, when I graduated college almost all of my friends got cats. I went to my friend Jill’s apartment and was greeted at the door by an adorable little kitty that was cuddly and loving. Then I met our now closest friends in Syracuse who had two door kitties (the kind that greet you at the door and require love to make up for the fact that you left them). Slowly, the feline species started growing on me. After much time spent with various friendly kitties, I realized I had become *gasp* a cat person!

This resulted in Duncan. Our little dude. The apple of our eye. The center of our ((domesticated animal)) world. The reason Matt and I would say “kitty” like the little girl from Monsters Inc. every time we’d pull into our townhouse complex. And he knew it. He would grump when we left him for too long and then yuk up all the love he could when we got home. He knew that our home life revolved around him.

Then this happened:

Meet Isaac. The new member of our family. He is our adorably cuddly little ball of fur. Barely 3 months old, Isaac loves to nuzzle noses, sit in laps, and groundhog on his hind legs while playing with string. I fell in love immediately. Duncan did not.

You know, dogs are great in the fact that they will love anything that sniffs their butt and doesn’t bite their face off. You put two dogs in a room together who’ve never known each other before and chances are you’ll either get immediate butt sniffs and love or loud barking and gnashing of teeth. In a matter of 5 minutes, you know whether these two canines are going to love each other or hate each other. Basically, the way men work.

Cats are a completely different ball game. They need to establish a hierarchy, and until that hierarchy is established and boundaries are made extremely clear, they stalk and hiss and make ungodly noises. It amazes me how long it can take a cat to accept the presence of another cat. Duncan and Isaac are no exception. Which brings me back to the first paragraph. My house is a war zone.

Yesterday we let the two felines hang out downstairs together for awhile. This resulted in Isaac playing with all of Duncan’s toys, Duncan stalking the kitten with his ears back  and occasionally running up and hissing , which would cause Isaac to poof up (absolutely adorable when a kitten does it) and slowly back away. But Isaac is very brave and would then turn around and begin playing with something else leaving Duncan very unnerved that his hissing didn’t really have an effect on the newbie. Duncan is not used to being dominant, I feel that he was probably the submissive one at the shelter and in his old home. But this is his home and these are his toys. So he really wants to be dominant. A few times he’d work up his courage (he’s terrified of the thing) and bop the kitten with his paw (as is petrifyingly normal for cats…. I’m not a fan of this…..) and Isaac would submit and run away. But we can see where this relationship is going. Once Duncan womped the thing a few times, he got very satisfied with himself and calmed down a bit. But he’s very annoyed, much like a teenage boy would be with his 2-year-old brother who’s rummaging through his drawers and playing with his $800 guitar. This is good because we know that Duncan does not feel overly hostile towards the kitten, as in he doesn’t have the intention to attack and kill immediately; he just wants to establish some boundaries and let it be known that he is very unhappy with his presence and rules the roost.

However, for now it’s still quite frosty between the two. And we are still unsure of what Duncan is capable of if he gets annoyed enough. Last night, after the two had been separated for awhile, the kitten came downstairs and startled Duncan, causing Duncan to massively poof, Isaac sensed the danger and dashed back up the stairs, Duncan then tore up after him chasing him underneath the bed. It must’ve sounded like an earthquake to our neighboring tenants because Matt and I went scrambling up the stairs after the two, unsure of what Duncan was going to do. Luckily, all that happened is Duncan chased the poor kitten under the bed, only to stop and hiss at it! No attack, no womping, just a hiss. There possibly would’ve been a womp had the kitten not darted out and back into the middle of the room. But Matt pointed out that there were no claws, no grabbing and kicking, and no biting. This is especially good because Duncan could’ve very well done it if he wanted seeing as he’d cornered it under the bed and is twice Isaac’s size.

Which again baffles me why Duncan’s afraid of it. It’s TINY and has shown no hostility towards him whatsoever. It’s amazing how territorial cats can be. At the end of the night we put the kitten back into his room to eat and play by himself with no stress of the larger, stalking cat. Duncan then did this:

Duncan is not a lap kitty. He’s never initiated lap or cuddling time. He gets satisfaction just from following us around the house and inspecting our chores to make sure we are doing them to his satisfaction. It is quite apparent that Duncan is not only feeling threatened over the ownership of his home, toys, and food but also his people. Aww Duncan. He sat there for quite awhile purring and nuzzling Matt before moving on happily and comfortably the way he would any other normal, kitten-less night.

Right now, Isaac is in his room for the day, batting around his jingly toys and sleeping. And hopefully Duncan is not stalking his door as has become his favorite perch since we acquired our lovely little furball.

Someday, oh maybe someday, this whole thing will blow over and I’ll be posting a blog about how cute they are when snuggled up together. Looks to be far from now but one can hope! 😉

The 5 Wonders of Christmas

Okay, so the title may be a bit cheesy… but really I wanted to blog today about my favorite parts of the Christmas season. Mainly so I can remind myself as I shovel out of 18 feet of snow twice a day, that it’s not all in vain. It’s almost Christmas! Snow is miniscule compared to Christmas. Even 18 feet of it. So here follows my 5 favorite things about Christmas.

1. Lights! A room looks so much more cozy when Christmas lights are the only thing lighting the room. During Christmas-time it is actually acceptable to put a large piece of foliage in your living room and cover it with Christmas lights (or buy one with the lights already installed, see previous post 😉 ). It is also acceptable to string lit foliage around your house at random and in mass quantities! The first thing I do when I come home at the end of the day is turn on the various lit garlands around our house and the Christmas tree. I then proceed to bask in the lovely glow that is created. While it makes dinner a bit difficult to cook since the kitchen is void of lights at this point, it’s quite worth it. Plus my kitty loves the glow as well. He parks himself right in the middle of it.

Aww Duncan.

2. Christmas songs! I really love Christmastime because of the Christmas music. But to be honest, I’m a bit sick of the regular Christmas music you hear on the radio like All I Want For Christmas Is You and I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus. We listen to Christmas music in the clinic and these songs probably waft throughout the rooms about 3-4 times a day. I’m talking about new songs, parodies, and comedies. Some examples: My favorite band is Coldplay. I have listened to their most recent album to the point where it’s completely memorized. I even used one of the songs in my wedding. So you can imagine my delight when I heard that they had released a new song. And not only a new song but a new Christmas song. I pulled up YouTube on my handy-dandy droid and watched the music video. They did not disappoint. While the song is quite depressing for being a Christmas song, their melodies, harmonies, and instrumentation are just as beautiful as I expect from Coldplay. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1rYmzQ8C9Q

And, as I was sitting writing the first two paragraphs I noticed a beautiful noise coming from the clinic speakers. I know I’m on a Christmas radio station but I hear Owl City’s melodic voice ringing in my ears… can it be?! Yes it can!! Owl City has also made a Christmas song! This is wonderful! It’s name is Peppermint Winter. Oh Owl City you make me so happy.

The second thing I mentioned was parodies. I enjoy Christmas parodies. My favorite being one that was played on my radio station growing up, Fly 92. This song is called the 12 Pains of Christmas. This song makes me giggle every time I listen to it. They add to a favorite Christmas classic the most annoying things about Christmas. It highlights christmas shopping and the parking that’s required of that, rigging up christmas lights, and paying those christmas gift bills. I’d highly recommend a listen.

Lastly, comedies. Or rather, comedians. Jim Gaffigan being the person I speak of right now. I can’t even explain it. You’ll just have to watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJAxRVeKnTE

3. Christmas parties! I really enjoy a good Christmas party. Especially ones that involve musical improv. Last week Matt and I trekked an hour and a half out to Rochester to enjoy a Christmas party with my college friends. This was probably the best Christmas party I have been to. There were singalongs, mudslides with peppermint schnapps, and countless games of Catch-phrase. At one point during the evening a piano materialized from a different part of the house, two djembes were brought out, as well as two guitars. Megan played us a song she wrote for her musical therapy students and then chords to typical Christmas songs like O Holy Night and Angels We Have Heard On High were displayed up on the large screen tv above the fireplace. We played songs in every style imaginable. From an operatic version of O Holy Night to a spanish version of O Come O Come Emmanuel, carols were sung in ways that only a room full of music majors and enthusiasts can sing them. After some of the energy fizzled, one of our friends decided it was time for some musical improv. A scene and setting were picked and two of my friends were up in front of the room acting out a Black Friday shopping scene… operaticly. They were allowed to talk only until the music started and then they had to sing along with the style of music Daniel played on the piano. This then turned into the most bizarre musical about two people stuck on top of a ski resort and a dog bringing them down the mountain Grinch-style. It was one-of-a-kind.

Janet, Scott, and Megan performing The Lost Ski

4. Amazon.com. I almost feel like I don’t need to write anything else. Matt and I scheduled last Saturday as our Christmas shopping day. The day went like this: Matt came home from work around 12. I finished getting ready for the day since the former Christmas party was happening in the evening. Once ready we both went into our office, booted up the computer, and commenced said Christmas shopping. No parking, no lines, no screaming babies, just us and the office. Happiness, really.

5. Gift Cards. This one is almost on-par with number 4 but you can’t really go wrong with gift cards! I know they can be a bit boring, but half of Matt and my family asked for them for Christmas so I’m not going to say, “no! that’s boring!” I’m going to rejoice in the fact that Matt and I can go to Wegmans tonight and pick up 6 gift cards and our Christmas shopping is complete! Amazon.com gifts are all ordered and on their way (as known because every other minute my phone buzzes because it received an email from Amazon telling me the next step my gifts are at…) and gift cards will be all set. Next, we have some serious creative work to do in wrapping these gift cards so they aren’t quite AS boring… o:) heh… this could be a lot of fun.

I really wish I could be someone with a sixth wonder and put the dreaded “S” word that I’ve seen so many people blog about in happy ways. But I really can’t bring myself to do that. I will live vicariously through everyone else’s lovely snow stories but the following picture is not my idea of a fun time. Note Matt’s warrior-ness as he gets ready to tackle my car. It was like this yesterday AND today and will be like this more than likely tomorrow. Seriously, how much snow can fall?

In the mean-time, however, I will listen to as many funny Christmas parodies as I can, put the Coldplay and now Owl City Christmas songs on repeat, snuggle under my heating blanket with my kitty and Christmas lights and ignore the fluffy white stuff outside. There are plenty of people out there who enjoy it enough to enjoy it for me 😉

Merry Christmas season!

Deathly Pine. Or a pinely death.

Today was one of those days where I really didn’t want to get out of bed.  I awoke to the sound of the rain pouring hard on the window, the cat gnawing on Matt’s feet (the movement of Matt kicking him is what really woke me up), my stomach and head angry at me, and the feeling that another half hour of sleep would make me feel that much more  rested. Seeing as Wednesdays are a day where I can get that extra half hour, I rolled over and sunk back into my pillow top mattress and fell back to sleep. It was quite, quite  needed today.

I’m allergic to pine trees. Sad but true. Real Christmas trees make me sniff and sneeze, gag and hack, and worst of all make me feel like my throat is closing up when it’s really not. All of this results in very sore sinuses and the feeling that my head has turned into a pressurized slow cooker. Growing up, the years that we had a real Christmas tree in my house were years that I woke up with fevers on the morning of Christmas. I now wonder if those fevers were allergy induced?

My husband and I went out and bought our first Christmas tree together on Saturday. I wish I could tell you that we had that spectacular moment of finding the perfect tree, chopping it down together, and lugging it home to put in a beautiful tree stand and hang all of our individualized precious ornaments and lights on it and then bask in the awesomeness of the day we just had. Well, in all actuality, I don’t wish we had that moment because if we’d had that moment my face would be the size of a house. Our Christmas tree buying experience went as follows: Matt and I piled into his parents mini van with his parents and 12-year-old brother in tow. We drove through Syracuse snow and parked in the closest space we could find to the halfway point of the parking lot (because of course the entire front half was jam-packed with people waiting in line for parking spots…)and then entered the mega-store known as Wal-mart. I scanned the massive room for the Christmas shop and made a bee-line in its direction. I carefully examined every tree they had for sale and asked my husband millions of questions, “Is this one too scrawny?” “Do you like white or multi-colored lights?” “Is this one too tall?” “Is this one too short?” “Will the cat try to climb this one?” “Is this one full enough?” My eyes fell on a tree that was perfectly shaped, the lights were dispersed perfectly, and it wasn’t too tall, too skinny, or too short. Just right. We grabbed the box and loaded it onto the shopping cart. Step 1 complete. Next step: ornaments. How does one who doesn’t own any ornaments decorate a tree? They buy 5 dollar box sets of ornament balls!!! Wal-mart has pretty much any color and design you could possibly imagine. We grabbed two boxes – one red and one silver. Step 2 complete. Step 3: Get pine scented candles so my husband could still feel like we had a real Christmas tree since he prefers them. We weaved our way through the Christmas aisles picking up random things like light up garland, a tree skirt, and amazingly scented pine cones. In the very last aisle we found the candles. And we were in luck! They were selling a 5 pack of pine scented candles for a great price. We grabbed the box and deemed the trip complete.

That night we put the tree up, watched the cat go berserk trying to figure out what the new thing in the living room was, and decorated it. All was well and lovely. The next night, I tapped into my inner-Martha Stewart and put the garland around various doorways, put the heavenly pinecones on display, broke out my red tablecloth and green placements, put up the advent wreath, and finally lit the pine scented candles around the room.  I settled into my couch under my heating blanket and started watching some tv. Fifteen minutes went by before I noticed that my sinuses were starting to hurt a little. Then my throat started to become scratchy. Then my eyes started watering. And then the sneezing started and I went into a full-blown allergy attack. My eyes couldn’t stay open, I couldn’t breathe out of my nose, my throat hurt, and my face felt like it was going to implode. I could not figure out what in the world sparked this… and then my eyes drifted to the candle glowing on the coffee table in front of me… pine scented candles… do they have pine?! I blew out the candles and started to speculate whether 9 dollar Wal-Mart candles could have possibly be made with real pine? Nothing else could explain the allergy attack, however. Nothing else in the house had changed. So now, we have 5 pine scented candles hanging around my house for looks and not for smell. And a very frustrated me, because of all things to be allergic to, why does it have to be something that smells lovely? I love my smells… but I don’t love it when they make my face rebel against my body.

As a result of this pine attack, my allergies have been going nuts. One piece of dander flies up my nose and the troops are all called in to fight it off, thus producing a sneezing fit, itchy watery eyes, an extremely stuffed nose, or all of the above. Duncan leaves his dander all over our house so the aforementioned sequence of events has been happening quite often which has been keeping me awake at night. Until last night… last night I slept great. It was a beautiful sleep. To tie this back to the first paragraph…because sleep felt so lovely last night, it was an amazing feeling to roll back over and sleep just a little bit past my alarm.

And my new goal of the Advent/Christmas season is: avoid as many pine scented things as possible thus reducing the amount of allergy attacks… hmm… I believe this goal might set me up for failure… oh well, more Allegra please?

Even The Tough Stuff Can Be Remedied With Friends

Yesterday, we lost a dear, dear member of our group.  We did not lose a member of the human variety but of the feline variety. While it was not a human who was lost,  it still had (and is currently having) a great impact on those who knew our little friend Maxx. Especially his “mommy” and “daddy”.  It’s amazing the type of bonds that can be created with pets… while it can seem petty or small to greatly mourn the loss of an animal, it really isn’t a small deal at all. They become members of the family. The grief that results when one’s life ends shorter than expected is extremely strong. We all remember Maxx as being the awesome ball of crazy that put a smile on everyone’s face.

However, despite yesterday being extremely difficult on everyone, one thing positively impacted me quite a bit:

Friends. Our entire group of friends assembled last night at their house. We all dropped what we were doing to go and give some encouragement and love to our friends. As Matt and I drove over to their house I cried and Matt talked about Maxx (our opposite coping mechasims: I cry and try to forget, Matt talks and remembers). We arrived at their house, not sure what to expect, and entered into a house full of people. And not only a house full of people, but a house full of laughing people! While the situation was difficult they were able to smile and joke and laugh with everyone. One was even able to provide counsel for a sibling (and hilariously embarass herself in the process! Which provided an AWESOME laugh for all, I might add) Life was going on and friends were there to help the process of grief roll through. And many of us know (some better than others) that when the  numb feeling (which many times accompanies the first stage of grief) creeps over us and settles itself onto our bodies, having friends around creates almost a warm fuzzy feeling for the temporary. Unfortunately, this fuzzy feeling wears off, as does the numbness and we have to let ourselves truly feel the sadness and pain. But having friends around to start the process can make a huge difference and give a kick start to getting through the pain.

Yesterday was a testament to the closeness of our group. Sometimes groups of friends can be shallow and they just hang out to hang out. Our group started out somewhat shallow, as all groups do. There was closeness among members of the group but the group as a whole was not quite to the deep stage. During the past year, however, it’s been taking a turn. The closeness that drew together only certain members of the group has started permeating through the group atmosphere in general. Those that weren’t close to others a year ago are now forming closer bonds. And yesterday proved the depth that exists. The fact that, during the busiest time of year, we were all able to take at least a  2.5 hour chunk of time to spend with each other on a night when nothing was originally planned was huge. It has spoken wonders to me because, unfortunately, I’m not one who always assumes friends will be there when something devastating happens. And that’s not my way of insulting all of my friends… it’s my way of saying that I fear the imperfections of the world and the fact that people, even the closest to us, let us down. So I automatically assume people won’t necessarily be there when I need them. But almost always, they end up being there! And I’m always surprised. (Someday I won’t be surprised anymore… when I get over my perfectionism thing… but that is a post from a previous day and more than likely another day in the future). But to see everyone show up when our friends needed them, proved that we’ve got a good thing going here. And I know it won’t always be the same. It SHOULDN’T always be the same. Stagnancy is never a good thing. But for now, it’s nice to bask in the fact that we’ve got a wonderful, ever-growing group of people to spend time with.

Tonight, the group minus a few members who either weren’t able to get tickets in time or who didn’t desire to see the movie, will be going to see Harry Potter during the midnight showing. I’m getting extremely excited for this. I am an avid Harry Potter fan (a reader not just a movie viewer) and The Deathly Hallows was my favorite book by far. Yet enough time has emassed from when I read the book until now that I don’t think the movie will make me angry like some of the movies have in the past. I’m intrigued… especially because they broke it up into two movies. This hopeully means no choppy story lines! Or at least less of them… But not only am I excited to go to the movie because of what the movie is, I’m also really looking forward to spending a large chunk of time with my friends. I really am an extrovert, especially when we all hang out in this matter. 🙂

So here’s to friends and to Maxx, who’s now chasing an unending amount of foil balls and measuring tape and eating more than his little kitty heart desires.

And then of course, to the  Harry Potter theme music that will be playing loudly throughout a boisterous movie theater in roughly 10.5 hours… but who’s counting? 😉

Mmmm, nougat

The months of October and November are simply lovely. There’s the smell of leaves that are browning and falling which then crunch underneath your feet once they’ve fallen. It starts getting dark at dinner time so the lit candles and low kitchen lighting makes for a very peaceful atmosphere in which to cook. Heating blankets are now acceptable to use… and as a result, kitties are cuddlier. There is no pressure to be outside in the warmth so one can hole up inside and watch tv shows and movies on a Saturday and not feel guilty.

And last but not least: there’s chocolate. Uber and uber amounts of it.

So much joy.

Halloween day my husband and I had a couple we spend a lot of time with over to our house for some laid back friend time. They brought Halloween candy and Matt went out and bought some as well. This candy sat in a big red bowl on our breakfast bar waiting in anticipation for the monsters, whoopie cushion (seriously!), and mustard bottle (yep, it’s true) to show up to claim their loot. That being said, this big red bowl (which was filled and placed at 1 pm) was lonely because of the 4 hours it had to wait to empty itself. And it beckoned to us. It called each of our names one by one until this big red bowl was no longer lonely. Oh no, not lonely at all. It had visitors every few minutes for the entirety of the 4 hours it had to patiently bide it’s time. The result? Very little candy for the whoopie cushion and his friends. By the end of the night of the doorbell ringing, the Grimm Brother’s being paused, and the cat flying up the stairs everytime someone came within 30 feet of our door (he senses these things) the big red bowl had compeltely emptied itself save for a few butterfingers (blech). I was happy about this fact…. no more candy to gorge myself on!! I will have survived Halloween without too much sugar sickness and pounds put on.

Oh, but the thing about the weeks after Halloween is the candy is EVERYWHERE. Everyone is trying to give away their leftover candy… and I’ve even encountered some parents trying to give away the candy their children collected to make sure kiddo’s would sleep and not running on the ceiling! I walked into work on Monday and was immediately faced with a bag of temptation. This bag was sitting smiling at me on the desk where I work. It was a bag of horror and of dread. I say this melodramatically because of what this bag contained. This bag didn’t just contain candy. It contained chocolately, caramel, nougat. I’ll illustrate this bag for you.

Bag of dread and horror.

Those three chocolate  bars you see there happen to be my weakness. They are the candy I avoid at Halloween to save my stomach, my head, and my sanity. You see, when these candy bars are around I lose all sense of “good idea bad idea” and become a hand to mouth being. Candy bar enters hand, brain wonders “well, how did that get there?” and candy bar is inserted into mouth. This happens as many times as possible while they are sitting in front of me.

Luckily, the calorie cutting i’ve been doing for over a year now has increased my self-control and I’ve been able to sit here for 2 hours and only have 1 milky way bar. Woah! I’m now self-talking myself out of a 3 Musketeers Bar reminding myself that I have to fit into a bridesmaid dress in December that will not fit if I gorge myself on candy.

It’s proving to be quite difficult because nougat might possibly be one of my favorite substances on the planet. It’s so fluffy and delicious…. must not eat 3 Musketeers… must not… mmmmmmmm

Well, the chocolate that may or may not be on my face at the time being is in dire need of getting wiped away and the bag of doom with it’s oh-so-innocent seductively sweet smile must be forced into isolation in a place where I can pretend that it’s not. Maybe tomorrow will be a better day 😉

My little dude – aka the townhouse beastie

Here are some accounts of my little critter 🙂 Compliments of my awesome new toy.

I got a Droid Incredible this past weekend and I love it. I told my husband I was in love. He was sad that I found another love. I assured him we’re okay… he’s a close second 😉

Naw. Just kidding. I love my husband more of course but I really am enjoying this thing.

Enjoy the videos of my little sir.

This first one shows the sarcasm and humor of my cat….

 

This one shows his love of climbing inside anything he can…

 

And this one illustrates his love of twistie ties…

Opposite Extreme?

This morning I walked out of my bedroom and into a wall of hideousness. The wall then seemed to dissolve and travel up my nasal passages and right smack into the middle of my gut. This stench was not present in my stairwell minutes before. I considered the bathroom off the hallway and my man of a husband who I inhabit my dwelling with… but no, this was not a human smell. In horror, I looked down my stairs and found a trail of poopy litter leading from our guest room down the stairs and all through our living room. Now, we’ve only had Duncan for 4 months and he’s never pooped outside his litter box so i’m not all too familiar with the smell of cat poop. This would most likely be the reason why I did not first assume the rancid smell was what it really was. But boy, did I get familiar with it today. The reason for the poopy litter is neither here nor there and I’m not trying to hang my husband out for embarrassment but this story helps me introduce the purpose of this blog entry. The reason for the poopy litter was because my poor little sir could not go into his litter box without getting his paws full of dirty litter because the litter box had not been scooped in quite some days. And by quite some, I mean 3. Which directly leads me to the point.

When did I become so freakin’ anal??

People who knew me in high school knew that I would always be at least 10 minutes late to anything… (including school whether I was missing the bus or driving myself), I was not detail oriented in the least and would miss things that were very much right in front of me, and I would regularly knock things over and break them/spill them. I did not receive good grades until my junior year of high school and was fine with being mediocre. I had other things that were more important than my education. Now, really, I was not a bad kid. I just had a raging case of ADHD that swept through me on a daily basis and caused me to be a whirlwind of chaos that regularly lost objects like shoes, car keys, wallets and who couldn’t remember if the meeting was at 12 or 1 so to be safe should arrive at 1:30 instead. My best friends became the feelings in the pit of my stomach that said, “How dare you miss that!” or “I can’t believe you did that? How could you be so foolish?” and my favorite, “You’ll never get your life together, Sarah. It’s hopeless.”

My junior year of high school was the beginning of my turning point into the opposite direction. I was sick of the pit of unhappy feelings and my way to deal with said pit was to put things in my life in order. I started doing my homework on time and studying for tests. As a result, my grades shot up to A’s. The feeling of getting an A reinforced the feeling that if I kept going, my life would come together very nicely. I graduated from high school with a good GPA and got into the college of my choice.

College was a bit of a regression at first. I don’t transition well and college is a large change for someone who’s been living at home and attached to her parents for 18 years. I spent much of my 4 years forgetting to pay for parking tickets and letting the massive piles of clothing build up on my usually unmade bed. I became my own individual person and dealt with millions of emotions that marked the various experiences leading me to becoming a well-adjusted (who’s really that anyway??) adult. Through all this my grades continued to sky-rocket, especially by the end of my 4 years. The more A’s I got, the more I was able to squelch those feelings of inferiority and insecurity.

College ended and I moved home. Cue massive transition # 2. Graduating sparked the feelings of a need to be put together, not just in school but in all areas of life. I spent my first 6 months at home cleaning. My parents had just moved and because I moved back in with them, I had a new living space. This was glorious because the state of my room in the house prior to this new house was a nightmare to clean and move out of. Another reason I decided I needed to keep myself together. I cleaned and organized my life. I started finding joy in baskets and bins and decorations. When a transition would usually force me to fall apart and regress back to old habits, instead I organized with a frenzy that surprised everyone I knew. It also caused a discrepancy inside me. Consciously I was working on disorganized chaos prevention. Subconsciously I was still trying to cope with transitioning. I still lost things and would have emotional breakdowns as a result but instead of just moving on, I would internally punish myself. Instead of the feelings in my stomach coming along when I could not control them, my brain started creating more of them. Not only was I dealing with thoughts that tried to convince me that I’ll never be successful, never be able to maintain a clean house, or never live an organized life, I was also creating thoughts that said, “If you don’t do this, you won’t be succesful” or “If you let that go, you’ll start letting everything go.”  

Over the 2.5 years I spent in graduate school, I created in me the ability to live an organized, well put together, successful life. At the time I saw it as a healthy drive. But when I look back now, I see it as also a way to run away from the degrading feelings and thoughts that haunted me. I graduated with a 4.0 and one of the two Academic Honors Awards given to students from my program. I had a room that was extremely well-organized and was taking care of my money and important documents right as they landed in my hand. I would call a company immediately if I received a bill that did not look right. As a result, many times places like Verizon and USAA would give me the money back because of the mistake they’d made or the flub that happened in their system. This was not a money mooching activity. It was making sure that I was on top of things and wasn’t letting other people’s mistakes in the world affect my well-being. The fact that I almost always received positive results from these actions reinforced them as good and necessary to live a happy life.

Anytime those insecure feelings start raging, even now, I start creating a mental list of all that I have achieved. I’ve earned a Master’s degree, I received the highest score on the comp exam out of everyone in my class, I’m married to a wonderful, hard-working man, and I have a beautiful townhouse that I take care of and keep pristine at all times. This seems to work for a while and then a slip up happens on my part or my husband’s part and the world ends. At least, it does in my brain. The past 2 months have taken me on a quest to see what causes my anxiety and occasional bouts of depression. The matter I’m discussing in this blog was not even on the radar as a reason. I’ve wondered about going on medicine again, about keeping busy, about scheduling vacations and fun plans. But hadn’t gotten down to the real, deep reasons.

The deep, real reason is that I’ve awakened a sleeping monster within me. This monster’s name? Perfectionism.

I’ve also awakened his sleeping cousin: Control.

Perfectionism and Control have been in charge of the reins of my brain for almost a year now. Because it’s been over the past year that I feel I’ve gotten completely out of control in keeping control. If that makes sense? Basically, I’ve gone to the opposite extreme.

This enlightenment came from reading a book with my women’s small group. I almost never read the books that are assigned for anything other than classes and even then it’s rare. I’m a read for pleasure instead of necessity kind of person. But this book seemed to be different from the other “self-help” Christian books that I tend to avoid. And it’s proved to be true. The first chapter alone is what brought to my attention that Perfectionism and Control have taken my brain hostage and I’ve sat back in the corner and allowed myself to stay tied up and just watch as they’ve wreaked havoc and changed my ways of thinking.

Instead of relying on the One to be perfect FOR me, I’ve been trying to be perfect MYSELF. This is totally backwards and the reason I keep going headfirst into a wall, not a wall of hideousness but a wall of impossibility, because it’s impossible for me to be perfect, to keep everything in full control, and to prevent anything bad from ever happening. IMPOSSIBLE. And instead of beat myself up for that fact, I need to accept it and learn to cope with it. Rely on my always perfect Savior who’s the reason why I can live an imperfect life and not need to worry about true, eternal falling apart. My new mantra of thinking has become, “Learn from it and move on” or “Ask for forgiveness and move on” or “That might not have been the smartest choice but it’s not the end of the world, move on.” The common phrase in all of this is MOVE ON. I cannot keep a record of my mistakes… or my husband’s mistakes for that matter! We aren’t perfect and the more I come to terms with the fact that it’s okay to not be perfect, the more freedom I feel. The more I’ll be able to look at cat poop on the stairs and instead of pick a fight with my husband over the cleanliness of the litter box I can just say, “Hey, when you get a chance can you clean it? Looks like we left it a bit too long.” And then MOVE ON. No dwelling. No bringing up the past things that have happened. Who cares what happened?

Now, I embark on my journey of learning the balance. The line between healthy control and raging control. The line between cleanliness and neat freak(ness?). The line between keeping things in life orderly and overreacting when we forget to update the budget on time or overspend in one area. And I’m learning to walk around everyday with the knowledge that I’m taken care of and kept under control by my God who’s so much bigger than me that it surprises me why I haven’t given up the control yet. Amazing what types of things the human brain can come up with but also what it can totally miss and filter out sometimes. Even writing this blog post provided some enlightenment in other areas that were not totally clear yet.  If you’ve read this far, I give you props seeing as this is a long post and most of it was my way of sorting the thoughts and ideas that have been going through my brain the past couple of weeks.

And I can now say that the positive thoughts that were discovered today through writing this blog were partly the result of cat poop. I guess there can be positives to letting things go once and awhile 😉

The Price Chopper lady is different!

For those of you who live in areas where there is traffic and there are Price Choppers in the vicinity, you know that the traffic report is many times given by the Price Chopper Traffic Center. People who live in my new city don’t seem to be as aware of this as people from my old city. Mainly because there’s not much traffic here.

Well, people from here would say there’s traffic seeing as our main highway keeps having random exits shut down and lanes closed for really no reason that can be seen with the naked eye… however, this is due to some form of  construction taking place that my husband and I can still not pin-point the reason for.

Let me go on to explain Albany’s daily traffic.

Hell.

One word sums  it up. Our beloved Northway is one of the only highways that travels into Albany, but it doesn’t even go into downtown. No, to get to downtown (where a majority of the jobs in Albany are) you have to leave the Northway and squeeze onto a 2 lane “highway” extension road that slowly brings you to the one lane exit that shoots you onto the highway that will bring you to the downtown exits. Now the northway is 3 lanes and guaranteed it will be backed up between 8am and 9am every Monday-Friday, and that’s without accidents. Add an accident and it’s backed up for another 30 minutes to an hour longer leaving those of us stranded for longer than our attention spans, paychecks, and supervisors would appreciate. For those of us unfortunate souls who had to get into downtown, we had to leave our cozy 3 lane highway and cram onto the even smaller 2 lane “highway” which then funneled us into the one lane exit ramp that shot us out into the bazillions of people who had waited through fifty million stop lights to get onto the third highway. Which of us were sillier? The ones who skipped the highways altogether but sat through 30 minutes of stop lights? Or those of us who took the highway and sat in 30 minutes of traffic? I’ll still never know but being an impatient person, at least with the traffic we moved a few inches every minute or so where with stop lights you’re stopped and bottle necked and that, to me, is an even worse hell.

Anyways, back to Price Chopper. I remember every morning hearing the words that went something akin to this, “I-87 southbound is a slow ride between exit 9 and the twins. Route 7 is backed up due to a stranded car blocking the right shoulder, and I-787 is a busy ride from exit 6 into the city…From the Price Chopper traffic center, I’m Jessica Lamp.” My response was usually, “HAH, of course, all 3 of my highways are backed up, why did I assume any different today and give myself that extra 5 mintues to shove a bowl of cereal down my throat?” And then I would commence my obnoxious journey and arrive at work in 40-45 minutes, if I was lucky.

Now, I commuted in this traffic for 3 years. But that doesn’t even hold a match to my sister who’s been commuting in the traffic for 12 years. I think she’s nuts. But she also sits in it and does her make up in the rear view mirror so I’d say she’s learned to cope.

The longest bout of traffic I have sat in since I moved was about 15 minutes. This is due to the fact that there are so many highways that run in all different directions around the city. There’s so much space to move it amazes me sometimes. I can take one highway or I can go around the lake on a different highway to avoid the potential of some traffic. It’s really a beautiful thing.

At work this morning there was a traffic report that went something like this, “I-81 is reduced to one lane southbound and at 9am will be reduced to two lanes northbound. This should cause some back ups and a busy ride for some. From the Price Chopper Traffic Center I’m “insert new name here”. Huh??? I’m not sure why I thought Jessica Lamp would move with me but it surprised me this morning that a) the traffic report was so short and menial and b) the Price Chopper lady is different! It was almost ear grating to hear the normal words and not hear the same name at the end of the sentence.

Once again, proof that I think change is awkward.