L I B

ABCD ducks...
LMNO ducks...
SMR some ducks...
LIB... MR ducks!

I think there's another line in there, but I can't remember what it is exactly. In my horrible little mind, it goes something like SMR some ducks... CMP?

Ugh. I'm back at blogpost one. I've written and edited and reduced and erased and deleted... The pressure to be engaging here is fierce. I'm not sure I can be anything but boring, maybe a little whiny, definitely bordering on philosophical. Would you still respect me in the morning?

[SUMMARY: I still have OC stuff, but mostly O stuff. I still have issues. They haven't changed since yesterday.]

A list**. A list would keep the mental shitstorm semi-brief, semi-controlled. Besides, lists are oh-so-blog. All the cool bloggers do lists.

I present to you mindbits, in no particular order... Well, we could get all Freudian about it and determine there are no accidents, nothing is random, but I'll leave that up to you. You're young, you're strong. You're full of piss and vinegar and high hopes... I'm old and I don't think I have the energy.

1. Um, no knitting pictures. Awake at 4:00, up at 4:30 (the noise of the morning papers hitting the porches makes it almost impossible for me to go back to sleep), did a load of laundry, cleaned a little in anticipation of Book Club, found too late the camera battery was dead. It's on the charger. Knitting pictures are still forthcoming. Things will still get better.
2. I did not finish the Book Club book, though I only have 40 pages and I read fast.
3. Kelly called at 11:00 yesterday morning to say, "I already need a cocktail if you still want to go out." We did. It was good. I was mostly good -- i.e. I didn't ask a lot of questions about The Boy (like "Why, Kelly? Why did The Boy leave like that? Did he tell you anything? Was it something I said? Something I did? Does he ever talk about me? Is he seeing anyone? Do you think you could tell him I got my nipples pierced and remind him of my phone number?" Yeah, that would have been embarrassing). And I'm sorry and a little ashamed for writing her off under the heavy cloud of my own paranoia and self-esteem issues. She's better than that, even if I'm a mess. And today's title? My reaction to finding Kelly had called. I said it out loud, "L I B..."
4. Called my boy-best-friend, Steve, when I got home. I like to talk to Steve, and it's not just 'cause he's a boy who will give me strokes (yet generally be honest with me, even about hard stuff, so I can *trust* the strokes). It's because he's way up as one of the smartest people I know and thinks things like The Traffic Channel are funny too ("too" as in, "AntiM thinks the concept of The Traffic Channel is funny and Steve does too.") Anyway... Told him I blog. Gave him the URL. Realised...
5. ...there is a sort of moral issue (or at least a timeless, internal struggle) to all this, isn't there? I mean, I've watched Laurie post her Christmas presents on her blog (instructing the future recipients to forget they saw them), blithely talk of vibrators and wine ("Not wine, Dad! No sir! Coke for me! And all those batteries are really coming in handy for my vast collection of remote controls!") I'm paraphrasing -- Laurie may never have mentioned remote controls. And Marcy actually had a sort of coming out process. So what if I want my dad to read this and it's all full of "fuck" and stuff? And what if I want to whine about a Steve thing but I know he might read it? And do I really want written proof of my dorkitude and angst? How does one maintain blogtherapy under these anti-confidential circumstances?
6. HOWEVER... If you were passive-aggressive, this could be a real boon. All you'd have to do is post about the things you don't want to say real-live-in-person and you'd accomplish the communication, if under the auspices of cowardice. Hmmmm... I'll have to remember that. I'm not a big fan of passive-aggressive (being solidly in the "aggressive" camp myself), but it can be a useful tool. If nothing else, it might be a good way to hint for the right birthday and Christmas presents.
7. Last week, I uttered (actually emailed) the following phrase, which is so good out of context I'm not even going to tell you how it came about: I know the juggling is all in my mind.
8. I have to bake something for Book Club tonight. Or at least provide something. It's a good thing I work well under pressure.
9. I'm hungry. Lunch isn't for another three hours (I'm meeting Laurie -- not that Laurie, Laurie-without-a-link -- and the Suburban Sedation Crew for lunch. BIG social week for this little black duck. Speaking of ducks, remind me to tell you someday about all-purpose ducks. This has just become the mother of all parenthetic boondoggles. Was I really talking about ducks?) and I'm starving. I think eating 200 calories of Lean Cuisine yesterday, then capping the day with 1000 calories of alcohol didn't do my body good. OK, now thinking about being up at 4:30 is making me tired. I'm like a four-year-old.
10. Every list needs a ten (unless, in Spinal Tap fashion, the list goes to eleven). Do y'all watch Pardon the Interruption on ESPN? Love me some Tony Kornheiser. Here's a Mr. Tony phrase (that's not me, that's what he calls himself. I know your loathing of him is growing by the second, but he's really a good and funny head), used when there is such an elite group it bears pointing out just how *tiny* the list is: "That's it, that's the list."

[SUMMARY: I still have no knitting pictures. I am *really* pushing my realm of possibility with tonight's Book Club. I drink, and if I'm lucky, I drink with Kelly. Or Steve. Speaking of Steve (and ducks), I'm worried about having to censor myself, either via limiting my talking points or limiting my audience. I'm a four-year-old who likes Tony Kornheiser who calls himself "Mr. Tony," and that's not as vile as it sounds. I may always have these same issues.]

So that's it, that's the list. Boring, babbling, bungling and all. But I will discipline myself not to edit again... STICK, DAMNIT, STICK!

Knitting pictures. It will all be better with knitting pictures.

**FOOTNOTE: Does anybody else find it weird that the list function places bullets inside the numbers on the list? Also, I didn't asterisk it (don't you love verbing nouns?), but did y'all notice the very festive links I inserted under number 9 up there? I am so proud. I am such a dork.

Parenthetic Expression

*psssst*

Is it still there? The first post? Because I'm *not* looking at it. If I look at it, I'll change it or delete it or re-format it or perform some sort of blogpost origami and change it into something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT (it's a brooch! it's a pterodactyl!)

*whew*

So I was going to post a picture of the sweater I'm planning to knit, but I didn't take the picture, download the (non-existent) picture from the camera, or... well, this whole thing looks pretty automatic, but I'm a little intimidated by the prospect of links and photos and all that fancy stuff. However, I know the blogs I really like have lots of pictures (which makes them hard to read at work and pass off as, well, WORK, but that's another story).

PLUS... I went to B&N last night to buy the book club book. As a side note, there are things you should know about me:

• I have a Barnes & Noble problem. I have a book problem. Every time something new makes its way into my life, I have to buy another book or twelve. I'd be rich if I didn't read.
• Or knit.
• There are two elements to this particular B&N trip that feed into the above ideas: first, I already owned the book club book. I got it for Christmas. (notice how I'm not even mentioning that book club is both tomorrow and of my hosting, so I really should have been more on top of this whole thing and *not* at B&N the Monday before scrounging for the book I picked... you get the idea). But I can't find it. I carried it around in my not-a-briefcase for weeks. Then I cleaned the not-a-briefcase out (so I could carry knitting in it) and I DON'T KNOW WHAT I DID WITH THE BOOK. So I had to buy it again. And since I was there, I looked at the knitting books. And found one. That has a really cool dragonfly sweater in it. For "experienced knitters."
• I have yet to knit a sweater and now I essentially paid $20 for a single pattern that may be out of my skillset.

[SUMMARY: I probably shouldn't be spending so much of my income on books and knitting, yet I shelled out cold, hard cash for a book I already own and a pattern I may not be able to knit.]

What does "experienced knitter" mean, anyway? I read the pattern and there's nothing in it I can't do, on a sort of line-by-pattern-line basis. I have knit a long time and I have knit much. I have knit socks. But mostly I have knit square things. So I wouldn't necessarily term myself an "experienced knitter."

Also, this is Vogue (did I mention this is Vogue?). Back when I was sewing, Mom always warned me away from Vogue patterns as unnecessarily fussy. Does the same hold true for the knitting patterns?

*************

Meanwhile, back in the real world, here's a whole bunch of me and my personal drama all at once**: My mom died a year ago last Thursday (February 22nd). The people who were with me at my At-the-Time Favourite Bar that sad night, last year, decided we should re-create the evening as a memorial this year. I haven't been to said Old Favourite Bar since, oh, October because of The Boy. We met there. I stopped going there because I didn't want to run into him. But we (The Boy and I) had both been going there for a year before we met and neither of us had seen the other (dramatic re-enactment of first converation: "You come here all the time? You *can't* come here all the time. I come here all the time!") so I figured it would be safe. We managed to miss each other for a year. We can manage to miss each other for ONE NIGHT. One (to me) IMPORTANT, LOGICAL night.

(LOGICAL meaning I felt I had good reason and good excuse to be there and couldn't be accused of stalking... because I've lived in fear that since The Boy and I live about a mile apart and shop at the same grocery store and have/had the same Favourite Bar -- albeit I've sort of switched bar alliance to avoid The Boy's Favourite Bar -- that we'd get in some sitcom loop-warp where we ran into each other three times a day for weeks and he'd think I was stalking him and I'd tell him, "I'm not stalking you. Haha. Isn't it funny we never saw each other and now we keep running into each other? Haha..." only cementing the idea that I was, indeed, stalking him... I'm obsessive. And maybe a little paranoid. But don't worry, folks, it's all inside my head -- and by that, I mean I don't make other people party to this. I keep it to myself so I don't look as crazy as I feel. Except to y'all. Y'all get to be party to all the crazy.)

I also figured I would be there with my friends and loved ones and it wouldn't matter if he was there, but I ended up way early because of... well, that's not important. I was an hour early.

I scanned the parking lot for his Jeep, thinking how STUPID that is since there's no way he's there and it was bordering on wishful thinking (and the little part of me that isn't terrorised by the thought of being falsely accused of stalking hopes against hope we might actually run into each other in the grocery store so I could see him again without actually stalking) and deep, personal drama to even go that mental route, but...

I went in (and you know where this is going) and went to the very end of the crowded bar where the wait staff pick up drinks and looked to the person I was shoving down to make room for me and it was... Best Friend of the Boy (Kelly). I met her the last night I was with The Boy (at his insistence. I met her at his insistence. I feel compelled to make that clear.) and LOVED her. Lovelovelove. And I'm not really a girl who's ever liked other girls all that much, and while I did start collecting female friends in my 30s, I still think boys are *much* easier... but I LOVED me some Kelly. When it became apparent that The Boy had, under cover of darkness and in Top Secret, kicked me to the curb, I lamented to several people that one thing that pissed me off was that I would probably never get to see Kelly again.

(Kelly, I have witnesses who will attest to that.)

ANYWAY... y'all know where this is going. I think I even looked directly at her as she said, "Hey, gal, where have you been?" and said, sort of under my breath, if I said it at all, "Oh, fuck me, he's here, isn't he?"

Yep. Right next to her. Don't get me wrong, the shitstorm was all inside my fuzzy little head. I kept it there. The Boy and I were very civilised. Maybe even warm-ish. But I wasn't ready for that little mindfuck (since it was my own mind fucking itself, was it just mental masturbation?). I was trying to celebrate Mom and there he was, usurping all my heart, soul, brain and breathing.

So I drank more than I intended and probably dishonoured my beloved, gone-and-missed mom.

[SUMMARY: I have issues and some of those issues revolve around an ex-sort-of-boyfriend who shall be known as The Boy and The Boy simply stopped calling with no explanation and I haven't seen him in months even though we live in the same basic 'hood and I wasn't really prepared to have grown-up bartime with him, but I *fell* into it (no matter how much I want to say I was pushed) and outwardly handled it well even though my head looked like the inside of a television. Yeah, I don't know what all that shit inside a television is either. That's what I mean.]

Kelly and I exchanged numbers Thursday so we could go have a beer, so I called her last night (nervous as a high school geek boy asking the class princess to the prom) and left what started as a fun, breezy little message...

"Hey, Kelly-girl, it's Marin..."

(and this is where it starts falling apart)

"...um... The Boy's... um... I dunno, ex or whatever... I dunno what you'd call it... anyway, I was thinkingmaybeifyouwantedto ...um... killafewbraincells... um... hours... whatever... um..."

(fucking painful)

So Kelly called me back and said she had a class and she didn't know how long it was going to go and was I doing anything tomorrow (today, for those of you not on tense with me) and maybe she'd maybe call me and maybe we'd do something if she maybe called me maybe tomorrow...

The sheer volume of "maybes" makes me think I'm being set up for a brush-off. And I'd understand. Maybe it's too weird. Maybe after they left Once-Upon-a-Time Favourite Bar, he told her never to speak to me again and that I'm a fucking weirdo (I've always suspected his eventual reaction to me was really an overreaction to a misunderstanding -- and I know it sounds like I'm dissembling, but really and truly. Also, he wouldn't call me a "fucking weirdo" because he doesn't cuss.) or he's afraid if she talks to me he'll have to talk to me. Or he's afraid... Or she worries that... I dunno. I just get a niggling little voice telling me she's not going to call and it would definitely have something to do with him if she didn't. Right? Did I mention I'm obsessive? Just call me Calvin.

[SUMMARY: Kelly is The Boy's best friend and I kinda hoped she and I could be friends and forget the whole shitstorm with The Boy, but it seems she's going to brush me off and I fear it's because of a conversation she had with him that I never heard in which I came out looking like even more of a dork -- maybe even a dangerous dork -- than I already am in real life. And I'm still obsessive.]

Little earthquakes. Little shitstorms.

I'll have knitting pictures tomorrow. It'll all be better with knitting pictures.

**FOOTNOTE: The Boy? The Boy is the sort of subject matter I figured I'd blogtherapy out over time (also my mom, my fear of being an inadvertent stalker, my dead mother, my bar habit), but it all hit me at once so it hit y'all all at once and I'm sort of sorry because I would have liked to be more gentle with you. It won't always be like this.

Obsessive Compulsion (by Calvin Klein)

Somebody save me from myself.

I just ordered yarn to start my first sweater. I've knit socks and hats and scarves and blankets and square shawls. I've knit all manner of lace and cable... but I've never really had to make something *fit* before.

And I have a mild but nagging relationship with OCD. Not "Monk" level. Not even worth the price of therapy. Just enough to make me weird. Case in point: this is the *fourth* introductory blog post I've put up. And I didn't just edit the others into the ground. No, no, no, not your AntiM; I edited them lightly, then I edited them hard and fast, then I changed their whole feel and theme and subject, then I changed blog templates, then I screwed with the font, then I changed some words, then I spoke some Spanish, then I cut-n-pasted, then I saved the end result to a Word document and deleted the post wholesale. THREE TIMES.

Good luck and gods willing and I won't delete this one because it wasn't good enough. Or involve enough Spanish.

[Does anybody remember the SNL spoof of the Calvin Klein Obsession ads?

"A little club soda will get that out..."
"LIAR!"

Laughed so hard I almost snorked my nose inside out. See: funny 'cause it's true.]

Now, I've been lurking around knitblogs for awhile now, and I am greatly comforted by the fact that knitters tend toward a little OCD. Perhaps it's only knitters who blog. Oh, and have cats. Because all the ones I've read that I really like occasionally (or often) feature the bloggers' cats. So if you knit, blog and love you a cat, you probably have some little perfectionist problem.

I'm not sayin'... I'm just sayin'.

This is *not* what I had in mind for my first post. I wanted to be witty, knitty and compelling. I wanted clever. But if I don't for-fuck's-sake just write something and post it, we could be here 'til the rapture (is that supposed to be capitalised?) waiting for me to be cute.

So the girl who took a week to post-and-delete and finally post and STICK, DAMNIT, STICK! is now going to try to knit a sweater.

Gods help us all...