She's happy as can be, you know, she said so.

Here's a new and exciting twist. I actually feel good today. I'm going to feel like a big silly head if it turns out that all I needed to do to feel better was the laundry.

Today's sing-a-long song: "I feel fine" by The Beatles

HRH

Have you ever stopped and wonder what it is you're searching for?

Here we are at the end of the day, which has been more of an emotional roller coaster than I am cool with. The best part is, I can't, for the life of me, figure out WHY I'm on the up and down.

I've dealt with depression before in my life, gotten the therapy, intropected until I, the most self-absorbed person I know, actually got sick of myself, I've done it. I know the steps I'm supposed to take, the questions to ask, the warning signs to heed. I mean, being depressed young and working my way through it so that I'm equipped to deal with it later in life was one of the things I told myself to feel better about being so damn sad back then.

But this is different. Back then there were reasons to be sad. The fear of failure, loneliness, insecurity about my intelligence and my appearance, the shock of learning how to take care of myself, finding the skeletons in the closet and kicking their asses like a gang-banger on a vengeance beatdown... I could go on. In retrospect it all seems kind of trivial, but I can only say that because I got over it. Now I just can't find an actual reason for why I feel low.

I guess it could actually be SAD and I know that it's real and it can be horrible to deal with, but I suppose it still astounds me that I could feel like such crap because I don't really ever get out in/or see the sun. Chris B suggested today that with losing the weight two years ago and the wedding last year I'm all out of things to obsess and excel at. I think there's a lot to that. And yes I know I have my job, which is engaging and really busy. It's just not enough to occupy my brain on its own.

I dunno. It's all so weird. I have so much love in my life as evidenced by M and all my friends and family that have given me a nudge in the last few weeks to see if I'm holding together okay. I have a career that I enjoy and I think I'm doing well at. I love my home, my cat, my friends and family, my plans for the future. Things are really quite great in my life, but I'll have a day like yesterday where I burst into tears because I feel like a loser for not wanting to deal with the cars in the driveway and decide not to go out to run the errands I'd planned on. I stayed in all day yesterday and hid. I have days where I don't want to go out all the time, but for some reason knowing that I was hiding instead of being lazy made me feel like I'd done the wrong thing.

It's all so cliche. I have a day like today where I felt sad in a way that made my chest hurt, but then I have moments like when I'm running on the treadmill where I'm smiling and almost laughing thinking of something I saw on YouTube. Demento.

It's evidence that things really aren't so bad. I'm still functioning and thriving. I suppose I may just be out of practice with this emotional thing.

Today's sing-a-long song: "Am I The Same Girl" by Swing Out Sister

Shedding

I'm giving myself a deadline of 10 days. If I'm still feeling this way at that point, then I think it may be time to consider that it's more than SAD. I'm not really in a position to understand if what's making me sad is actually making me sad or if it's the SAD making me think that I should be sad about it and there is, in fact, no problem at all.

Ohh I love my brain.

In the meantime I am keeping busy doing some home deco and shedding. I suppose when your head gets cluttered, you can't help but try fix the problem my simplifying, improving and organizing the physical parts of your life. At least it's productive.

My mother was in town last weekend to make me a new table cloth, chair cushion covers and a valence for my kitchen. And they all look fabulous. I'm really happy about it. Once we get a new lamp for the kitchen I'll snap a photo. The new accessories have made it more than apparent that the red thing has got to go. Mum would have also made some new drapes for our bedroom had the sewing machine my grandmother gave to me not totally beefed it in the midst of all the sewing and now rests in peace after many seams sewn. Not to be held back by technology, my mother did most of the sewing for the kitchen by hand. She's awesome and makes me wish that I could sew.

We're also finally getting some of the photos we've taken over the last few years printed and framed. As photographers go, I'm okay, but M, he has a talent for it and I'd much rather see his photos on our walls than what we currently have. So in preparation for all of this I have taken down almost all of the movie posters in the house (except for the Twin Peaks one and whatever exsists in the Matt-Cave). I guess there comes a time when it's more than a bit lame to have Star Wars posters on your wall.

On New Years Eve day I also managed to pack away almost all of my stuffed animals. It actually wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, but I have to confess there's no way I could have done it if I wasn't in this sadly numb state. At least that part is done.

Keeping busy with house stuff is good. I'm finally getting around to doing things I've talked about for years. I don't know if I will ever actually paint in this place. It's not a place that we own and it has more wall than I can really wrap my head around. It may be wise just to save that fun for a place we might own one day. A place, that no doubt if we're still in Toronto, will have a lot less wall.

HRH

I have found my people

See!!! It's not just me. And there are people out there who hate it even more than I do!!!!

I Hate Cilantro!

HRH

Very Victoria

When M and I were in Italy and we had collapsed in our hotel rooms for the evening, we would watch at LOT of MTV Italia. We're video junkies and our Italian being as pitiful as it was, MTV was one of the stations we could kind of comprehend.

Every night at 9 there was this show on called Very Victoria where this very cute Italian woman named Victoria Cabello, who has a most-awesome Wiki entry, would interview Italian celebrities. There would also be the requisite silly gags and risque segments involving people in their underwear that you can only see on TV in Europe or maybe also in Quebec.

Anyway, she was cute and well dressed. Her set looked like it had jumped out of Moulin Rouge and she was a very un-bimbo like TV presenter. A complete and total rarity of modern Europe.

We watched a lot of this show, even though we had NO idea what was going on. I was always mesmerized by the opening dance sequence. First because of the clothes and shoes and second because of the charmingly bad dancing. Every time I see it I am tempted to change the shape of my bangs.



Today's sing-a-long song: "Ruby Blue" by Roisin Murphy

HRH

Mental mash-up

I'm not sure what's up with my head these days. Chose your instability factor, insomnia, boredom, SAD, PMS, general neuroticism, and I think it's factoring into my mental processing these days. The only way to stave off the ill effects is denial through entertainment. Just stick my head in the ground (and by sticking my head in the ground I mean sitting my ass on the couch, cuddling up with M and watching TV, so I guess that would have been a better metaphor, but it's too late for that now, isn't it) and hope that the malaise passes on by like a storm cloud.

The medicine I'm using this time around is the first season DVD of "Animaniacs" (given to me for Christmas by Mike (W00t!), the first season DVD of Robot Chicken (lent to me by Jenn (back on the blog again!) and the sixth season of "24." Always take your crazy with a side of violence.

On Sunday I was down. Down right in the dumps and M had left me in the living room while he made some bacon and eggs. In his absence, and sick of my wallowing in abstract sadness, I put on the animaniacs. Like a morphine drip I was laughing and singing along with the show. ("I take umbrage at that!" "Sure, take all the umbrage.") The good feelings lasted well over two hours and gave me strength enough to start reorganizing the art on the walls of our place.

That was until around 7 p.m. Then the sadness was back. But good news! "24" was on at eight. Happiness again! Absurd plot lines, violence and tolerance to pain again! The show is so over the top it's fantastic and I simply must know who thought of the idea of biting a man to death. Like seriously, where does that idea come from?

You know what, don't answer that.

Lastly, my saving grace is Robot Chicken. I'm just starting into the DVD and it's great. While I was starting in, John R sent me a YouTube link to something from the second season that almost made me shoot my drink out of my nose.

Never underestimate the healing power of laughter.

HRH

The miracle of pumpkin pie

It comes as no secret that I've been a rather finicky person for most of my life. In our house growing up, it was four picky people and the few things that we all agreed were tasty we would eat in repetition. It was a house of staple foods and a champion of the Nordic palette. I never really had a problem with that, but when I met M he was all about me trying everything once, having new foods and culinary experiences.

While I'm no where near the level of food adventurer that he would like me to be, I have come a very, very long way. And I've discovered that there are a lot of things that I had ruled out of my diet without having tried for, really, no good reason at all.

For example, pumpkin pie. Never in my life had I experienced pumpkin pie until this most recent Christmas holiday. I mean, my great aunt's pumpkin pie recipe was used at the Royal York for awhile back in the 50s, and I have NEVER experienced this. So wrong.

I can't even remember why I wouldn't eat pumpkin pie. I imagine it was because I'd assumed that it actually tasted like the bits of pumpkin I would nibble on while doing Hallowe'en carvings. Sure, it was kind of like turnip, but would would want that for dessert. Also I violated my belief that vegetables have no business on your plate after dinner. But I was wrong. So wrong.

I became amenable to the idea of pumpkin pie in several phases. First, a few years back, M's mother made us a pumpkin loaf, and it tasted sweet and yummy. I learned that all things pumpkin didn't mean all things gourd-tasting. Then this summer M and I made lamb burgers (you really should try them Shaver) that were seasoned with pumpkin pie spice. Again, sweet and delicious.

Finally, being friends with Tash and Chris has given me a new appreciation for pie. I've always been a pretty dedicated cake fan and thought that having pie would be like winning runner up in a beauty pageant. Also growing up in my house we usually only had one kind of pie. Lemon meringue, because it was my sister's favourite pie (as she loves all things lemon) and I just hated it. Eventually we discovered the merits of the key lime pie after some time in the southern US. I guess it was there that I began to make my peace with pie.

I have learned that pie is good. And that I have a fondness for pies like key lime pie, chocolate pie and, most importantly pumpkin pie. Tash made pumpkin pie for our annual get together and gift exchange. It was my first pumpkin pie experience and it was as close as an atheist gets to a religious experience. Oh My GOD. If there was a religion that was all about the glory of pumpkin pie and if accepting the host at mass meant actually eating pumpkin pie, I would become a theist so fast...

Anyway, I can't believe I didn't try it sooner. I'm sure that it had been offered time and time again. So it serves as another example of me being pig-headed and stubborn about something I would really enjoy and thereby losing out on years of goodness.

At least I've learned my lesson now.

HRH

Adventures in Eyeliner

I've decided that if I ever write some kind of autobiography or memoir Adventures in Eyeliner is going to have to be the title. Really that seems to be what every day is for me. And as evidenced below, life (or at least my face) is always better with it.
without

with


HRH

Cleaning habits die hard

When I was younger and when I was living on my own, I used to stay up into the wee hours of the morning cleaning. I know, I was so wild and crazy it's hard to imagine how I made it through my youth with all my limbs and organs in tact. There would be days when I would decide that things had to be scrubbed, reorganized and reordered. Living with M for the last seven years ostensibly put an end to the late night OCD cleaning episodes.

Having to respect that there is, indeed, someone else in the house and that it can really mess up his sleeping patterns if I am up at 2 a.m. making all the books in the guest room line up just so, really helped with using the night for more practical things like sleeping. I have to confess that whenever he travels and I am at home alone, I go to bed in the cleanest of all possible worlds. I'd rather have him with me at night one hundred times out of a hundred, but the OCDist within has a special moment when things are properly sorted. I suppose it's a neurotic way of finding solace in being apart. I clean because I miss him?

Anyway, it's after 11 and I have no inklings of being able to sleep. I've been cleaning fairly intensely for a school night. I would have kept going if M hadn't retired for the night.

I guess I just have to go through this a couple of times a year. The last bout of insomnia brought the revelation that turning my clock away from me would end all the terrible clock watching, at it is wonderful to be free of that. Now I just have to sort out how to stop watching the jets on final approach to Pearson through the window all night. I must have passed an hour or two last night wondering about all the people on those planes. Where they were coming from, what their lives were like and if their homes were clean.

Today's sing-a-long song: "Sleep Tonight" by Stars

HRH

Pattern recognition

I am sitting at my desk in the dark of the night listening to my husband not-so-softly snore in bed down the hall. Yes honey, you do snore. I am wondering why I can never sleep in January. I had a look back through my archives and there seemed to be a pattern of insomnia or SAD, all in all leading me to conclude that I don't historically do well this time of year.

Admittedly I was in much higher spirits last winter as I was all giddy from engagement and wedding planning, but even then I couldn't sleep because I was so excited. Now I'm not entirely sure of what to do with myself.

I've already had my annual clean/purge of the house (managed to put the stuffed animals in boxes this year!), finished everything wedding related, started saving money for a house one day, fed Zeus, washed my hair... I'm just out of sorts. Oooh and now I seem to be becoming tired. I must be getting close to a personal revelation and my mind is protecting me from insight with fatigue. I'll take it.

HRH

A remedy in excess

I can make all kinds of excuses, but it doesn't change the fact that today I did a very scary and bad thing. A thing that could be the first nudge in the downward spiral into the bad parts of the status quo.

M's birthday party was a great success last night. I got four %100 performances at the karaoke bar (w00t!). There was much merriment and even though I thought I wasn't going to drink, I ended up drinking and getting a pounding hangover for my efforts. M was far worse for wear and there was food shopping to be done, so I got my ass in gear and made my way to Loblaws.

I discovered that shopping hungover is second only to shopping hungry when it comes to making choices about buying food. I suppose my rationale was "I'd rather get it now so that I can stay home for the rest of eternity and get better instead of having to ever shop again." It was a shopping trip of epic proportions.

On the way home, I decided that only grease would be the remedy that I needed. My typical hangover remedy is either A&W fries and chocolate milk or McDonalds chicken McNuggets and a chocolate milkshake. I still don't know Toronto like I should I had I no idea where I could find any of that food available in drive through. I can handle parking in Toronto most days, but hangover days, there's just no way.

I know where there's a Harvey's so I called M, got his order, and started driving down to the Queensway to get a burger and poutine. Lo and behold on my way down Islington I see a MacDonalds on my right. It took me maybe three nanoseconds to make the choice to turn in and appease my aching head.

You would think that I would just get my order and make my way to Harvey's to get M's, but no. I ate my McNuggets and drank my milkshake on the drive to and in the drive through line-up at Harvey's. And then proceeded to order the poutine for myself anyway.

I've had days of gluttony before. But I think that I did it all without actually standing up in any way is what troubled me the most.

And of course, I still have a pounding hangover.

Today's sing-a-long song: "The Remedy" by Jason Mraz

HRH

Sclemeel, schlemazel, hasenfeffer incorporated.

I am currently making my way through my itunes library in preparation for M's birthday party tomorrow night. A faux pas has generated a puninishment that involves me having to perform "Ice Ice Baby" in a karaoke bar. It will be gruesome, but I will pay my fine for being thoughtless. I guess it's better punishment than having to shovel rocks.

Anyway, as I look over all the songs I like to think that I can sing (I cannot), I am listening to a truly wonderful CD lent to me by my colleague Jenn. A CD with 65 theme songs from television shows from the 70s and 80s.

Now I don't want to suggest that my parents didn't raise me with anything but the most care and attention, but the fact that I know almost all of these theme songs by heart and can remember a lot of the plot lines from the shows does make me wonder if I wasn't, at least slightly, raised by television. (It astounds me that the theme song from "Taxi" still totally annoys me. I never got that show at ALL.)

Really I shouldn't be singing the theme song from "WKRP in Cincinnati" with this much vigour. And have I become so starved for nostalgia that the "Miami Vice" theme song actually sounds good again?

Today's sing-a-long song: "Believe it or not (The Greatest American Hero)" by John Scarbury

HRH

Holiday wrap

I suppose my appearance back at work today means that the holiday season is drawing to a close. It started with some sadness for me this year as I was down about M and I being apart for Christmas. On the train to Kingston, while the cold that often takes over my body as soon as I let it relax took over, I resolved to make the best of my holiday, even though I would be apart from my husband for three days of it. And I was doing pretty decently, though I missed him terribly, and I was rewarded for my positive spirits by yet another holiday surprise from my man.

Mid-afternoon on Christmas day I was coming inside after taking Zeus outside for a walk and my father called me into the living room for something. I walked into the room, look at my Dad, looked at M, then looked at my Dad again and said "What?" Moments later my brain synthesized M's presence in the room and I exploded with glee. He had driven to Kingston a day early so he could be with me for Christmas dinner. And, as always, my family was in on it all. My mother even had me set the dinner table for six guests as part of the ruse. M is now wondering what he can do next year to surprise me to keep the tradition running.

The rest of the holiday was great. We spent time with friends and family, as well as some seriously quality time napping on the couch. There were a couple nights of playing Wii that resulted in a shocking amount of stiffness in the days after, but also in a tremendous amount of fun.

So while my holiday spirit arrived late, it made it in the right amount of time. The holiday season basically finished for me yesterday with the celebration of the wonderful M's 30th birthday. We will be commemorating the occasion fully on Saturday with a healthy amount of friends, drinking, gifting and karaoke singing. I'll try to refrain from making any ending the season on a high note jokes.

HRH