One Pale Fire

lovey dovey broken english *hurl*

So you know that syndrome where a girlfriend seems to drop off the face of the planet when she has a boyfriend? I'm starting to think it's not such a bad thing or else I have the my own proportional syndrome that involves a galpal who is in the "honeymoon" phase of a new relationship - I don't want to hear from her for a couple of weeks til they regain brain function from all the headbangin' on the headboard. You know formerly wry, witty and coherent girlfriend becomes all cutesy, wilting, gigglely and talks about him constantly - and you can always tell when "He" is within eye shot or ear shot or arm's reach because she talks with a smile and they keep finding cute ways to involve him in a conversation with you "oh - ha ha - did you just hear that?" "awww, he said to remind you..." "hahahaha noooo, I didn't stop saying that pookey!" *smoochsmoochsmooch* "uhm, can I can I call you back in a little while?"

<< insert vomit here >>

I know, sour grapes or whatever but seriously they should be sequestered on Fantasy Island until they can carry on a conversation. Its almost worse then a new mother with an attention intensive child of any age - she can't complete a single thought because their kid is apparently always getting into things, climbing on the cabinets with a knife in his teeth, lighting the toilet paper roll on fire, falling at their feet dying of starvation - or at least that's what I envision with "No Bobby! Get down from there!" "I said we will in just a minute - Mommy's trying to talk honey." "Janey stop yanking on the bunny's ears... Janey... Janey!" "OoooK, here is a juice box... in a minute... in a minute..." *klunk BAM!* "OMG! I have to call you back!!!  *click*" .... this was just a dramatization, no children were harmed in the making of this post.

<< insert Asprin & water here >>

Now, I know its just a narcissistic pet peeve but if you seriously can't hold a conversation it's okay you don't have to "phone it in". I know you are busy and I understand - really I do. I can entertain myself until a more convenient time arrives and I'll be happy to see you and catch up then... hopefully one more then one topic of conversation.

This concludes todays bitch fit.

talk is priceless

R & I had a chance to talk for just a little while this morning and I feel better but there are no easy answers. I told him I was feeling the limitations of our situation and how lonely I sometimes become for a regular boyfriend but that I didn't know how to talk to him about that. I wasn't sure how I felt about that before I met him, but I have become more sure since seeing him. I'm just sad our circumstances aren't different - its such an aggravating unhappy sort of honesty... Its not that he travels, or even that he travels a lot - its that there is no assurance of some quality down time with him to even know where to draw a limit on how much work is too much work. Its not as if I have some vague expectation that he'll be home for over 2 weeks in the foreseeable future so there's all these caps on what I can look forward to - too tamped down - and its not for pure expectation's sake, its more about the sense of growing room. After that I told him I needed to know how he felt about me seeing other people - we hadn't talked about that in any detail and maybe it was time we did. He lamented our situation for a moment, said he understood my angst but that he wouldn't feel right discouraging me given our situation, it just wouldn't be fair unless he could offer me more in the way of his being there. How very fair and balanced and rational. I half wanted him to make the decision for me so I didn't have to take responsibility for that - for deciding what's right, for dividing loyalties or putting myself first and ACTING on my behalf. It is so much harder when someone gives you freedom to walk away then when they push you away or fence you in.... I told him I thought he might say that, but, it was also important to me to factor in his feelings and not just what's "right"/smart/sensible  because I was having trouble splitting my own feelings so cleanly and I was also questioning sexual ethics which may mean a change to our situation. To his credit he pretty much stood his ground, he said he gets that its hard, he has trouble with that too... but that I had to "do what I gotta do". When he asserted that I said "yeah I know" and I started to cry because I imagined it leading me away from him and it felt like another lonely decision. Then he said the only thing he was worried about was me disappearing one day - he didn't want that. It felt lovely to hear and to be reminded of that previous conversation of ours. After that I started to calm down but was still weepy... gawd I hate being weepy... I told him I was just really tired from being sick and sleepless - all true - but its also hard for me to be so surface with my emotions. Its a big adjustment from who I'd been for so long and I still let it rattle me.  He heard me still wheezing and sniffling and he told me he didn't want this to be hard on me.... and that he wished there was more he could do. It was sort of a change in tone then before - less simple or flat in statement, more.... hmmm, sympathetic? which surprised me. I don't honestly know how much is a spectrum condition and how much is just the mode of his lifestyle for the last few years - he assumes nothing of others and I had always wondered how he hasn't hung himself by now from such a solitary existence. Gawd I hadn't imagined someone having a more solitary existence then me - the only difference is his scenery is a blur of constantly changing venues and mine is so static and grounded. I told him that I wouldn't disappear on him, that I would likely talk to him again if there was anything happening with someone else and that person would have to understand that he's a friend and he'd be around in some capacity. I mean I sort of hate to describe him that way but what else do I call him - "a fixture (who will probably always think of me in a sexual way), so get used to it"? I know, nothing to decide right now but wow, when people you've loved have left a pattern of severing ties and neglecting once-fond acquaintances when it doesn't work out it gets complicated when someone actually sticks around with integrity and flexibility. So here I am having finally let go of someone else who said he be around and then one day just stopped talking to me without any explanation and still building a relationship with this "always come back for you" fella. Why is it so hard to accept some gifts? He's not physically here, but he's there in other ways.

Asperger's Man

If you had an acquaintance that you were pretty sure had Asperger's Syndrome would you ever bring it up in conversation or ask them about it?

I don't suppose if it was a random acquaintance on the way to becoming a friend there'd be much of a reason to, one would probably just wait to see if it ever came up on it's own. But what if it was someone who had been your friend for a little while or someone you were dating and it had an affect on your relationship with them? Would it benefit your mutual situation or enlighten them if they'd never been diagnosed? Or would it just seem like you were saying something is wrong with them?

I have been dating this guy (who does not read my blog) and almost immediately I noticed an odd formality in his communications when I met him and after getting to know him and witnessing some of his deficiencies in connecting for some time I am almost certain there it is some degree of AS. I know it sounds ridiculous because I have absolutely no clinical background but I just have this feeling - it has been whispering to me almost since I met him even though he is not like the acquaintance I had once had who familiarized me with AS. Nonetheless it is evident in some of his ways and he himself has remarked on an awareness that he is "not like other guys". After getting to know him for sometime now I am certain this "difference" is not just being shy or introverted... I just couldn't think of how to bring it up even if it would help him to know. I mean I kind of think it would and I think it would be helpful if we could talk about it because it does affect the way we relate but again, I wouldn't have the slightest idea what to say or how to ask him about it.

Well, I guess to be more specific I wouldn't know when to bring it up to him either because he travels so much and connecting just verbally has been one of those difficult areas. It has occurred to me through much trial and cyclical upset that having a relationship with someone who is rarely physically here is one thing, but having a relationship with someone who is just very not very tuned in AND rarely physically here is another. And then when you add in how little face-to-face time we have to get tuned in and talk about things when he is here it is just... well I guess it's not doable, not for me anyways. We've broken up before and I am confident we will remain friends so I don't have any bad feelings about things with him (other then sad it doesn't work) but he's just so sweet I sort of worry about him in a way which is why I wondered if this information would help him in any way going forward into other relationships. I know other people with AS have gone through specialized therapy to compensate for their own particular areas of difficulty - like recognizing body language or whatnot.

Gosh, aside from the lack of connectivity, he is one of the sweetest guys I think I've ever known and I always thought I'd be well suited for someone like him who travels but this has been a whole different experience then I would have anticipated and I think it's slowly turning me inside out because its so lonely with this missing dimension of communication and it added to the cycle of his coming & going is growing less endurable when it seems at the least it should be more predictable... I think my friends discount the relationship because of how we met; because he travels so much; or because they think he is just another aloof jerk who has fooled me into liking him via his unavailability - its hard to even get into this aspect of the relationship lacking a specific dimension with any of them - how it feels when he misses chances to connect in conversation or this particular lonely feeling it gives me or what specifically triggers it, so I feel like I have no one to talk to about it which is what has made it so hard to cope with. Even though I've overcome as much of my own precepts and I actually find his lack of guile restful, I still reach my limits at times and despair when there is no one to reach out to when I do.

bold idiot

"Bush administration wants hundreds of billions, new powers ASAP to attack financial crisis"

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080919/financial_meltdown.html omg, can we have the election TODAY?! More power - now? You have GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!

"President Bush, flanked by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, acknowledged that the program will put a 'significant amount of taxpayers' money on the line.'"... Ugh... why do I suddenly get the feeling what tax payers will end up putting out is waaay more then the stimulus checks? I mean the bend over and lube up kinda "waaay more". Bush should be declared a national disaster - seriously - I don't care who is standing up there next to him. I don't trust any of them.

 

I read the whole article and although obviously I am no economist I had to keep asking myself "but don't we all need a little down time?". I mean isn't it a sort of natural progression? How much expansion can really be supported before there is either an implosion or a period of downtime to heal and regenerate. They are talking about artificially pumping continuing expansion and stepping up morgage backed securities and oh oh oh I get such a bad feeling about it - I get a much worse feeling about it then the recent crash. How is anybody supposed to buy a house when they will be too busy tax-paying for everyone else's mistake? I mean I don't see anyone who already lost a house doing any better, they're in financial ruin but the answer is to make that "American dream" available to more people?

Another story reported that the stock market is soaring but that DID NOT actually make me feel any more "secure". It occurred to me sorta like standing up too fast after having passed out from low blood pressure. Maybe you should just sit up for a minute first.

bite me LaCie

I bought one of these LaCie Rugged Hard Drive and have it for about 4 months when it stopped working. Actually here's my review on Apple:

"I had a LaCie drive before this that failed and despite my distaste I decided on the Rugged Drive because of cost comparison, because it was a newer type of hard drive and because my co-worker went on & on & on about what a "great lil hard drive" it was (he has two)... Well please pardon me for being blunt but I am not convinced LaCie drives are very unreliable - this is the second one to simply stop working one day. 

Actually to be fair it worked perfectly... for 4 months... before it died. In the time I had it, it was treated very gently; never left it in my car or briefcase; never left it connected to the computer for days at a time; and never allowed it to overheat... I just went to plug it in one day and NOTHING - it won't boot up, and it won't mount using Disk Utilities. 

If you insist on trusting one of these drives be sure to back-up all data every single time you use it."

Now you will notice there are about 5 other reviews who are just beaming with pride over their LaCies and sure I guess I could be in the minority... or the website is jammed pack with FAKE reviews or FAKE approvals of those reviews)... but it is unfortunate that I can not go back and rewrite the review to include what suckin' customer support they give!!! I corresponded with this nice person over there who after insisting on some trial and error eventually said 'yeah, there's a problem, send it back and we'll fix it'. So I did - at my expense. 

Well I just got it back and they apparently barely touched the thing - they ran some type of scan and then sent it back saying there was NO PROBLEM. Hello? Why would I have sent it in at my own expense if there was NO PROBLEM? Tried on three different computers, two different Operating Systems, about 5 different cables (including the ones it came with), tried it in every different port I have in those three computers and still nothing to write home about (or to Apple with a glowing heart & flowers warm air up your skirt review about)  - either it won't mount at all and I can't even get it up in the Disk Utility or it just sits there switching on & off so fast you can barely download or upload anything - AND I sure as hell wouldn't trust it as far as I could throw it with any of my data. The thing was only 4 months old when it just quit working one day.

I launched another support query and basically said I want my money back or a brand new drive that I can sell and get rid of because I want NOTHING to do with your products if you can't/won't take more then a one minute "scan" to resolve this issue.

do I get any points for trying?

I joined Weight Watchers about 2 years ago I think? Meaning, I joined the website, downloaded a few recipes, went to one meeting, got weighted in and never went back... At the time I really thought I was ready to embrace it all but I dunno, I didn't understand the system, didn't want to ask dumb questions when everyone else seemed to be getting it simply enough and I'm just no good at group things in general. Never been a "joiner". I mean I didn't even like sitting there listening to others talk, feeling some kinda forced communal spirit with a bunch of people I didn't know and probably didn't even like - and to tell the truth - there was definitely the "them" vs "me" factor at work. As in I didn't want to be one of "them". There were plenty of other reasons underlying but that just helped push me over the edge.

Lately something has been changing that made me want to revisit the whole thing. Getting more active had already been in motion - I went on Craigslist and found a walking buddy but then I also become closer to a friend of a friend who had just joined. After a few chats I got up the nerve to ask if she would "tutor" me a little so we went out one night to go over where I had left off and where she was and just to talk about things. It did a lot more to encourage me then the group meeting did but I also learned a minor pitfall too: it's easier to enable on a smaller scale and to co-dependently smooth over your own rational when someone is willing to join you in something. We agreed to share a dessert - or rather I agreed to "have a few bites" if she ordered something. It was the first day I went over my points since I had started attempting to count them. Since then she's also canceled out on workouts or walking invitations - so her I don't see so much right now, although I really do hope she gets a grasp on it.

I have since then cleaned out my cupboard (everything was covered in cobwebs and past the expiration date anyway), bought new condiments (some lower fat, got some vegetables, and acquired a few other staples. Then today I went for a long walk, without the other walking buddy, before coming how to experiment with a mango/cucumber salsa recipe. I am still getting extremely hungry and I miss my mochas but I honestly have come to regard that as fat withdrawals. I seriously believe there was something about fat content that pacified me in some body chemistry way - I mean counting calories, looking at recipes, thinking about what you are eating, when you will eat next, what you will eat and general obsessing about food makes a person extremely hungry to go back on blissful ignore about the one part of their lives they never put limits on is one thing, but this sort of heat in my belly and feeling genuinely very very hungry even though I just ate til I was full, is another! 

It's driving me a little nuts but I think once I get a few meals and the points arranged in my head I can sort of forget about "food" a little bit and go back to more improved sort of autopilot and by then maybe some of the fat cravings will burn off. I am worried about the next bout of PMS but I have already kind of run through it in my head - slip ups come with the territory and they are no excuse to just blow the whole thing out of the water!

The thing I hate most is fat free anything - today specifically its ranch dressing. I was very suspicious of how it could be fat free and then I tasted it - yep, it's fat free alright - watering in texture and just sort of odd tasting. The kind of odd tasting I can't stomach long enough to get used to like some people do diet soft drinks. So I mixed it with some leftover regular calorie stuff and called it a day. Tah-duh! Half the fat!... But seriously I think I have acquired a new found respect for lowered fat products although I know I still need to read the label and check the sodium.

grateful

It was just one of those lyrical days where everything falls into place. Lately I've been having more & more of these almost physic moments where I call just after there's been a cancellation and they can take me in just the right amount of time to get there including the stop on the way to get a mocha - it's funny the people on the other side love it just as much as I do, I'm like a magical grout that fills in the seams. I do it with clients too - I call right as they were thinking of this new project or wanting to talk about a revision. I love when that happens - flow.

I honestly can't believe how lucky I am sometimes and today I just wanted to marvel at it so I did.

Tonight after I parked the car I just had to stand around on the quiet street to enjoy the lighting, gawd I love full moons. I was admiring the reflection on the windshield before I returned my gaze to the surroundings and then I looked up - wow, nice cloudscape and I could even see a few stars! That's rare this close to downtown. I had a pang of guilt for enjoying the weather so much considering Texas & Ike, but all I can do right this second is be okay because someone has got to. I wonder how much trusting they will be okay too helps but that's all I have until I find out more like where to send the check to.