marmotte: September 2005

uncle jeff and great aunt irene

iron ta!

not quite an iron man yet, but did have enough iron (38%!) to donate blood yesterday. third try worked thanks to spinach, oat bran, and liver sausage! the needle didn't make it in right away and she had to wiggle it around a few times before we struck blood. little bruise but other than that doing ok today.

spent the weekend with my sister in chicago- family exclusive this time. good to be around family. Lizie let me vent and put up with my paranoia. my aunt gave me a camera to replace the one i lost! and my uncle gave me perspective. dealing with the pain so well... can't say i would be as strong in his place. and my great aunt irene? 'comme si, comme ca, you know what i mean?'

got home around 12:00 at night from chicago. had to finish the last few hundred pages of 'kite runner'. felt like my mom, making chinese ramen at 3:00 am, think i finally made it to bed at 4:30. nothing like a good storyteller...

riddle~

what kind of friend gives you tea and shelter at 5:00 am when you crash their birthday morning? and loans you their car on their birthday so you can drive (without license) to the bank and then to work? and takes you the next day to the detective bureau to recover stolen car? and isn't upset when your only present is a chicken chucker and a book of short stories (which is something you love and bday girl does not) ? and forgivingly points out your 'oldest trick in the book' after all that?

so yes. 6 years. need to stick together so i can have another chance. cheesecake factory bday/victory lunch was fun but next year we will have to make it happen on the real day. hoping some of the gorgeous (and slightly fuzzy blind) put-togetherness of my jo will rub off on me.

happy birthday jo!

soaking in alcohol~ flaming catapults...

jojo and dan with chicken chucker catapult

su and phil!

el viento viene, el viento se va

c'est fou...

my mom has always held that a hair cut has the power to change your luck. i made an appointment at laura lee this tuesday.

my happy chan janet came to visit for labor day weekend. like ole times- encouraging the enlargement of our respective heads, nostalgic somewhat, and happy! she is a working woman, unlike unemployed blog writer, and had to be at work early monday morning. we planned to leave for the airport at 4:20 in the morning. passed a night of very little sleep (did we get to bed at 12?). babysitting su's dog baruch and she woke us up with her barking in the middle of the night. i brought her back to my room and crawled back into bed around 2. i thought i heard some noises but i assumed it was my room mate jill coming back from her parents house in michigan. got a message from her saying she would be back to the house around 1:30 anyhow. here is a bulletin of the next 10 minutes:::

4:20 roll out of bed and tip toe around looking for shoes, coat, keys.
4:25 can't find keys or purse any where in house.
4:26 (ca) open back door and walk out to car
4:27 ta standing in pajamas next to garage, no car. (unfortunately don't have a pic of this one)
4:28 knock on jill's door to find her, open door to find that jill is not in bed and had not come back
4:30 call jill to ask if she has keys or has borrowed car?....

at this point calm, stately, janet takes over. we call the cleveland heights police and they turn up in the next few minutes. they immediately check windows and find that someone has entered the house. detective owoski is fingerprinting the window, baruch keeping gaurd by ta, ta and jan in joint effort on phone to credit card companies.

well. janet managed to make her plane thanks to a good taxi service and some nice airport folks. lost jill and then found her again. lost my car and then was called this morning and told that it was waiting at the police impound lot for me. detective mike said they had found him, 'just like on tv'! like a yo-yo here. el viento viene y se va, el suerte viene y se va.

the need to be succinct here... my brain wanders through every possibility of why, how, and what if but what i want is a way to block the paranoia and superstition, the jumpiness and need to be surrounded by other people all the time. things will be fine-- i may not be the littlest sharp cookie in the box, but i'm pretty tough. scrappy. right?

so the total: $240, some gift certificates, 5 euro purse from market in firenze, campus bus pass for pau, approx. 250 CD's, digital camera, and freedom to express ease of mind and basic faith in the social contract through unlocked doors and open windows.

and ps:

thank god for baruch (and her parents for leaving her with me), for good friends (who have calm in craziness, let me crash their birthdays, and make bays english muffins!), for parents (my own and my students'), and for everything else. and a tip of the hat to sisyphus. pick up your boulder!

have you seen?

my car... <2002>

happy chan out in land o' cleve

yoga in the morning and then lelolai bakery for a cuban sandwich with jojo and dan! the baker at lelolai invited me to puerto rico again- insists that even though i have to work, a three day weekend getaway will be enough. and he will pay! but you have to love the cubanos-- so much garlic! and the pastel de tres leches...

after lelolai, bodyworlds II exhibit at the great lakes science center. $17 and challenge to digestive fortitude. forbidden to take pics but managed to bootleg some thanks to digital cell phone technology. pic below is of capillary duck... entire blood vessel system plastinated and everything else liquified. crazy. also saw lungs- healthy, smoker, and coal miner. scared to smoke too much now. and obesity. and cancer. scary effects on the body. all seemed very medical at the time but the next day slightly disturbed by the fanciful nature of the whole thing. art made of dead bodies...