We're Gonna Party Like its My Birthday...

Because it is.

My birthday is next week. Von Tauber's was last week. I am hosting a joint birthday BBQ on Sunday, August 27th from around noon until whenever. You are hereby cordially invited if you follow the following rules:

1. Speak only English.*
2. Do not call it a grill party. Its a BBQ or even grilling out, but not a grill party.
3. Bring one dish to share unless you are Hamish. Hamish gets a free pass because he's Hamish and i'm still not sure if he's going to show up. (J's got the chips so figure something else out.)

So you and your significant other/family/babies/small children/large children are very welcome. Dogs, not so welcome. If it rains we'll be inside and the cats/Sparky will flip out if there is a dog. They are liable to flip out anyway, but to prevent Sparky's head from exploding, its best if puppies stay home.

Otherwise, come on over to Boweltown. Its kinda like a mini blogger meet up. There will proably be a few actual KAKs**, but they have been instructed that during the party, they will be in an American territory so there for they should learn the language.

If you train it, James, our trusty driver will pick up and drop off. Either the Darmstadt Hauptbahnhof or the Eberstadt station.

Email me and I'll give you details.

*german can be used if used in a proper mocking tone.
** KAK= krazy ass Kraut

Time Traveling and Cat Claws

I just finished The Time Traveler's Wife and oh my god, I can barely see through the tears. Kim from Stepping Stones recommended it and I picked it up one day at Hugendubel.

It is so good and so heartbreaking I can barely stand it. Sniff, sniff.

I picked up Scrunchy/Fin (we call him Scrunchy these days because his nose scrunches up when he frequently bites the hand that feeds him) the cat to cuddle and wipe my face on and what do you suppose he did? Yep, he wacked my with a paw and almost blinded me, the damn cat. He not exactly a cuddly cat.

We just got back from a few days in Hamburg. Exciting it was not, but we had some delicious meals and I saw Sparky's office for the first time. It's a nice place filled with freakin' kids. I swear, no one there is older than 25 and as my birthday is around the corner I felt rather uh... old? Beautiful girls in high heels and stylish boys. It is an advertising firm after all. I thought about how to look less dowdy, but if I go in there with high heels, I'd be trying way too hard not to mention the next outfit would be traction as I've never learned to walk more than five feet in heels. The closet to the bedroom I about all I can manage while looking remotely sexy. I should hurry up and have a kid to accessorize my soccer mom look.

It was odd to see Sparky's other life, to realize he has another world separate from me even if its only for a few days every month. We spend so much time together that when he leaves, I don't really think about where he's going just that I can leave my panties on the floor for three days and my shoes will be exactly where I left them. And then I pick him up from the train station and it business as usual.

To see that he has this whole other place to go to talk and interact and eat fabu janpanese whenever he wants kinda tripped me out.

Aside from that, its business as usual around here.

In the fantastic news aisle, my sister's scans all came back clean and she set for SUNI in two weeks. Yahoo and good for you little sister. You worked hard for this.

I gotta go clip some cat claws before I'm bloodied again. Scrunchy is rather attached to those claws and he loves it when they grow sharp enough to climb the curtains. I, however, like to keep my skin, eyeballs and clothing in one piece. Wish me luck.

A Clockwork Orange approach to Cardio Training

So, you all know where I am spending my days. On the treadmill. At my gym, like most gyms, there are like ten TVs in a row so you can watch/listen to just about anything to help distract you from the pain cardio equipment inflicts. I usually do the MTV/VIVA thing and mix in my MP3 player when both are on an ad break.
I was doing my thing, walking faster and harder and at a steeper incline (because the flipside to losing weight is that you don’t burn as many calories as you did when you were a bigger, less fit person and I have to say, I find this totally unfair). I was listening/watching MTV when on a nearby set this show called ClipMix came on. I wasn’t listening to it, just watching occasionally. Bullet for my Valentine was blasting in through my ear canals when on ClipMix this man dressed in white, complete with white hat with ears, is shown crawling across a prairie. He seemed to be calling prairie dogs using this white tail-like thing. And the prairie dogs were responding. Three or four stood up to see what he was up to, looking at each other for more input.

I started to think about some study I read about how prairie dogs have a language that this group was studying and how they hoped to use that to study other animal languages. My mind wandered to how smart they must be and how they look so smart and regal standing up the way they were. Like a cuddly favorite uncle or grandfather.

On the TVs the guy was crawling closer and closer and Bullet was screaming about tears and guilt. I was in a good forget-I’m-in pain-zone. The man crawling was about 20 feet from these cute little prairie dogs when he pulled out a bullet, stuck in a .22 rifle you couldn't see because he was crawling through prairie grass and prepared to shoot.

WTF?

I wasn’t listening to the program, granted, but unless these little guys were wanted for serial murder, I can’t imagine why there would be a program about a guy dressed as a white prairie dog crawling around the prairie shooting unsuspecting prairie dogs. I was horrified and there was nowhere I could go. I was on a god-damned treadmill with 38 minutes left. I felt like Alex in A Clockwork Orange, stuck watching the horrible violence that was about to befall those cute little guys when they cut back to the smiling pair of show hosts. I never saw the actual shooting, but it was implied and tears actually sprang to my eyes.

I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I am a total and complete wuss when it comes to animals. There is a whole Blue Planet disc I can’t watch because of some really mean Orcas. It’s that whole karma thing. As kids, my siblings and I were pretty callous when it came to animals. Now I'm hypersenstive.

So that being said, I was stuck on a treadmill with the prairie dog killer right there next to my MTV. After the ad break Clip Mix switched to kangaroos and koala bears. Much more my speed. The baby koalas were clutching stuffed animals and being very cute and koala like. Little kids were encouraged to pet and hold the koala holding the stuffed animal. It was all very sweet and cuddly. And foolishly, I let down my guard. Koalas do that to a person.

As soon as the koalas left the screen, camel racing stepped up. Then camel fighting. With the owners kicking and punching the camels. Then it switched to sharks and tortoises locked up in rudimentary pens on beaches for tourists to play with and pick up and take photos holding. That it segued into this shark chasing pitbull. He would jump off a small boat and chase the small sharks up to the beach then tear them open and eat parts of it. And I couldn't look away.

The worst part was that Ghetto Blaster in the Sky**. MTV seemed to play songs that were horrifyingly appropriate.

Bullet for my Valentine – Tears Crash - Prairie dog death by rifle
Katie Medula – Nine Million Bicycles - Koalas and stuffed animals, including little kids
Linkin Park – Numb - Camel fights
Eminem –some new song I don’t know yet, but the lyrics were appropriate - Tortoise torture
Robbie Williams – Come undone - Pit bull/shark attack

I was so engrossed in this drama, I didn’t notice that I was on my cool down, my hour and some was done. I didn’t even notice when Sparky walked up to me and tapped my shoulder. As my adrenaline spiked, I screamed, tripped and almost fell of the damn machine.

Seriously, I have never had such a complete cardio workout. I think I need to go watch some Gilmore Girls.


**The GBitS is the soundtrack to our lives. Like having a relationship discussion with the radio playing and all the songs that are played have some sort of connection to your relationship. Or breaking up with someone and "your" song comes on. That sort of thing. GBitS is operated by Ironus, the god of Irony, and his minions.

A Gift and A Curse

I meant what I said about having a one-track mind. Not an interesting blog does it make.

This morning, however, I had other things on my mind, like mental health. I don’t understand is how a simple little storm in the dark of night can turn what I consider a very rational person into a quivering neurotic?

Woken at 5 am with the crack of thunder, I did the serial-killer-in-the-thunderstorm dance again.

All the lights go on in the house. I make sure all the cats are in the house and not on the balconies. I walk the entire loft making sure its safe and not harboring said serial killer. Then I pace for a while. Eventually I go back to bed where Sparky sleeps soundly. I toss and turn, eyes wide open. I watch the flashes of light in the windows waiting for any suspicious movement or shadow.

I have no idea what is wrong with Sparky. Nothing wakes him. Nothing. Well, I should say he wakes briefly, tells me to go back to sleep and then he’s off again to Sleepyland. If only.

I wanted to call my brother. Timing was good, its distracting and he has a job interview tomorrow, but talking on the phone is not a good idea in a thunderstorm.

My usual security team are freaking useless without Cleo. Kiska will stay in the same room, but god forbid you touch her. She really just likes to be admired from afar. However, she is midnight black and moves in the shadows in such a way that if you didn’t know it was her, one might think it was the Woogyman. And that damn redheaded cat. He comes in for a snuggle and bolts the moment something scary happens, like when a lightening strike in a nearby tree shakes the house. And it’s not just a run for cover. It’s a claws-to-the-chest leap into the semi-darkness as if the devil were on his tail, which at that point I totally believe. And believe me when I say I really do not need to add to my list of scary supernatural evil in the middle of a thunderstorm.

I was not made for thunderstorms. Seriously. I like my storms rageful and dramatic as the next person. The pissant milquetoast drizzle we seem to get throughout the year is just annoying. Give me some wind and a good hard rain any day. However, when the pissant drizzle is accompanied by lightening that always strikes in the forest around my house and not, say five miles off the coast, making the sky very pretty far away, I get a little sketchy.

So that being said, the storm has now passed and the sun is up and the rain vapor has almost vanished. My vigil is over and I think I’ll go back to bed.

You know, on the other hand, without my vigilance, this place would be a haven for all those serial killers/evil ghosts stuck in a storm. Good thing Sparky has me.

Book Thieves

As I was power walking my way to the 5 kilometer mark today, I day dreamed about the rest of the day. A list of chores and my new book. My new book. Sitting on the corner of the bed, just waiting for me to open the cover and stretch the binding. It is the latest in the series and I could just imagine dropping back into the life of a really bad bonds bailswoman and all her antics. Thinking about this book took me to my targeted time without even thinking about how many minutes I had left to walk or would I make it to my kilometer goal.

I dropped Sparky off at the train station early this morning, grocery shopped and picked up new cat litter. I was the first in the door at the gym and spent a good three hours torturing myself there. I find it funny that I have to have limbs that feel like jelly to eventually feel like steel. I am really opposed to the “Make It Burn” philosophy of the work out. I’m doing it, isn’t that punishment enough? Why does it have to hurt too? (See, my one-track mind)

Anyway, I got home, put the groceries away, cleaned up a bit and made my lunch. I did everything I needed to do before finding my book, delaying gratification to make it that much better. I could read a chapter or two guilt-free. I looked on the corner of the bed. The book pile was still there, but my new book was not. There was the book I thought I would read next and two books I had already finished, but my new book was gone.

I looked under the bed. Not there. I looked under the sheets and pillows. Not there, either. That’s when it hit me.

Rewind to 6 am.

Alarm goes off. Sparky gets up to shower and shave. As he dresses I slowly open my eyes and snuggle the cat. I get up at precisely 10 minutes before we need to leave for the train station. I dress, brush my teeth and am ready to head out.

Sparky says a lot of things in this time but one comment stands out now

“While you were sleeping, I packed my bag.”

Fast forward to present

Phone in hand, Sparky on the line
“Do you know where the Janet Evanovich is?” she says accusingly.
“Uh… in my bag?” he says wondering if he should have admitted guilt.
“You stole my book while I was sleeping, you thief!”
“I stole nothing. I have a long train ride. I needed something to read.”

I won’t go into how the rest of that conversation went for fear of incriminating myself. Let’s just say that after I make the bed and do all the laundry today, I will have found some vengeance and it might include his side of the bed and kitty litter and will have no idea how it got there.

Those darn cats, I’m telling you…

Did you hear? I think she has a drug problem, but man, is she skinny.

Okay, Okay.... Leave it to a little brother to know how to get me out of my retreat. Jeez Louize. Bringing up all sorts of shit, Jeffrey. Fine, I’m back. Put all the skeletons back into the walk-in closet before they get a mind to unionize.

So, I’ve been gone. Last you heard of me, I was off to see the wizard and I did. He and his camera crew made sure I was healthy from top to bottom and I’m not just using a term of phrase when I say bottom. I had cameras everywhere. It was like the damn paparazzi. Sparky was there, literally in the same room. He played “I Spy” with my doctors while I was out cold with a camera down my throat and up my ass. And sadly, German doctors do not print out pictures of colonoscopies or you all would be getting a nice picture of a very pink and healthy colon.

The wizard was very nice, as was Oz. Magic was performed and even without my ruby slippers I arrived home a day early and in decent shape. I am minus a gall bladder and some other stuff. I have recovered enough to start working out again and resuming normal activities (well those that don’t involve Ben & Jerry, my favorite ménages a trois partners). My previous limited caloric intake and cardio push was to prepare for this and not some anorexic plea for help. It was all part of the bigger picture.

I did have a Nurse Helga. For real. Her name was Helga and she was very scary in that Nurse Helga sort of way. While nervously waiting for the orderly to come and take me away for surgery, she told us about her dead husband and how he was buried in the same tuxedo in which he was married. Totally creeped me out.

Now before the tabloids get any funny ideas about me and Star Jones having more in common than a gay husband, let me just tell you, no need to guess: The vast amount of weight loss is due to… drug use. Drug addiction seems to be so very glamorous.

And who could be more glamorous than the diva herself, Whitney Houston.

However, Jeff is wrong. It’s not crack. Crack is so common and you have to smoke it and I quit smoking a while ago. No, no, it’s not crack. I do like the heroin chic look. Kate Moss hasn’t done so badly since those sick days of Calvin. So I tried heroin, but I just don’t have the veins to shoot up, really and needles, yikes! So, just like Lindsay, Kate lead me to cocaine. It’s up to the coke to make me into a skinny bitch. After all, it seems to work for Lindsay and I saw Less than Zero. It looked like so much fun. Well, until the end, but I’ll stop before it gets to that point. I’m totally in control!

That is the story and I'm sticking to it.

In my recovery, I’ve done nothing but work out, drink lots of water, read celebrity gossip and obsess. I’ve had a rather one track mind which is really boring to EVERYONE except me and I certainly did not want to bore you with it.

Now, since the weather is all nice and cool and I have no desire to go outside and play, I will spend the rest of the day on this glamorous machine. Well, I will after I spend my daily three hours at the fucking gym. I still hate that place, but it seems to be my home away from home these days.

And Jeff, I suggest you spend a little more time in the gym because when I get back to SF in December I am so going to kick your ass.