Grow a pair, already!

I read. A lot. For a living, for relaxation, to expand my mind.
There is a very disturbing trend of weak female protagonists. The first time I came across one of these, I spewed a flurry of f-bombs that woke the dog. "What the everloving fuck? You fucking weak fucking bink, don't let that fucking bitch talk to you like that! Tell her to fuck off and die!" I railed. Then, I kept seeing it. These weak women who actually swoon at the sight of blood (excuse me, doesn't anyone else know that the average woman sees far more blood in a month than most men do a lifetime?), allow their intrusive families and friends to dictate their dating/mating habits, fold to any bit of pressure, and are generally just wusses.
Simone de Beauvoir. Betty Friedan. Helen Gurly Brown. Hell, Scarlett O Freakin' Hara and Miss Marple had more balls than these shoe-obsessed literary women.
Those are the women I admired, not some limp lass who allows her family to set her up on blind dates, even though she is in an "almost relationship" with the studly guy. What the hell kind of weak, lame message is this sending to the younger generations??
I'll remind my generation and tell the younger generations now:
Grow a pair, or a spine, or something. Be strong. Be unafraid. Be alone and okay, or with your equal and okay, but you have to be better than is currently being written of women.
You just have to be.

"Don't blow a gasket"

Srsly. "Don't blow a gasket." That is now part of my actual doctors' orders. Yes, doctors, plural.
I got the sutures in my head removed yesterday, while finding out I have some cranial blood flow issues, that aren't caused by my heart, although can adversely affect my heart and the mechanical valve. Another round of tests next week, more pills, bed rest & off my feet - never up for over 3 minutes at a time, as little stress as possible *snort* and in the meantime, "don't blow a gasket."
Uh huh.
Is that a clinical term?
I have cats and a dog. I have recipies dancing in my head that beg to come to life (chai cream truffles & a cake pie!), laundry that needs to be done, a house to be taken care of, a lawn to be mowed, 5 books that need to be proofed so I have little things like water, electricity, food...
So, I'm trying to do life in 3 minute increments, with 30 minutes rest in between. 1 cat, Rags, totally gets it. My cuddlemuffin. BratCat is...as advertised. Geo doggy NEEDSTOPLAYMOM and I'm here in a big old pile of guilty trying not to blow a gasket. Logically, I know if I drop dead of a blown gasket, nothing gets done. And with my supersniffer, I can tell I have that smell. The one I had most of last year. The one I get when something has really malfunctioned in my body. The one I smell on people who are deeply ill or dying, that no amount of bathing or deodorants or perfumes can cover. The scent of fundamental unwellness that is a better alarm to me, and the few like me with a sense of smell that makes a bloodhound quit his job in frustration, than all the lab tests in the world.
It's whispering to me, but now it's saying, "Don't blow a gasket."

Little victories and no delivery

I have been going through what is so eloquently referred to as, "A bit of a rough patch," by a dear friend in England.
No shit.
Serious ongoing heart/circulatory health issues, staggeringly bad luck, rotton timing, natural disasters, and compounded by my less than graceful normal self have led circumstances to find me currently sporting 5 sutures in the top of my head, and an inability to stand or bend without passing out of at least becoming woozy. No, I was not Hitler, Pol Pot, Judas Iscariot, or any other infamous bastards in a prior life - that I know of - but life is kicking my ass. And biting it. Yep, 2 spider bites on my left cheek. Nope, not on my face. Looks to be venomous, with some truly wonky neurological side effects, and is being treated.
But I wanted to take a bath. I ~BIG PINK FLUFFY HEART LESS THAN 3 ~ my baths. I require soaking in a deliciously bubble-filled tub, uninterrupted by man nor beast. That hasn't worked so well, as of late, but this morning I declared a State of Bath Emergency and filled that sucker right on up with my favorite feel-smell-good bubbly stuff. At 5 am. Because knowing my recent propensity for hygiene-related incidents, I was also thinking there are 20 farmers less than a few miles away, still home plucking the goats & milking the chickens before dawn, should some sort of mushroom cloud rise from my bathtub and they might get the cats and dog out before any violent bubble damage could occur.
I got in, enjoyed a brief soak and wash, started to get out, and froze. What if I fall and bamage the rest of my drains? I was in mid-crouch, clinging to both safety rails like a lobbyist to a politician for 7 freaking minutes. I was completely convinced that if I moved at all, the whole falldownboomsplat thing would happen yet again, but terrified to move for fear of being trapped in my own bathtub and no restaurant that delivers nearby. As my muscles screamed over the voices in my head and the complaints of 3 furry guys who hadn't had 1st breakfast, another noise began intruding over the cacaphony.... beep... beep... Beep... BEEP.... My phone battery was critically low.
Yeah, I'm not being trapped in a bathtub with no food and no phone.
I took a deep breath and s l o w l y crawled out, yes, crawled over the side of the tub, and managed to get myself upright and dressed. And charged.
And I did it without ending up nekkid head-first in a snowbank next to a funeral on YouTube this time!! But that's a story for another day.

Yeah, I know

Okay, I haven't blogged here in a bit. Is "blogged" in O.E.D.? I can't be bothered to look. Noo wurd, if not. My cat was sick. No,  it isn't a crap excuse. 1 of my cats, BratCat, has a very rare type of Feline Acute Respiratory Disorder (Birth Trauma-Induced, Non-Contagious) which before Brat had a 100% mortality rate by age 2. Brat is 5 1/4, which is huge. Most of that is because nobody bothers to do research on something that is "always" fatal, but we've proved it isn't, so STEP IT THE FUCK UP, VETS!
Yeah, that's a different blog.
Amurika just had another anniversary, accompanied by the requisite fireworks by people with a an illegal B.A.L. and insufficient knowledge of the symbolism of fireworks.
Next year, no matter where I am (and it won't be Nebraska, regardless), I'm going to go around and if anyone in a mile radious of me can't demonstrate a working knowledge of American history, the calender, and fireworks safety through  interpretive dance, I'm confiscating their fireworks.
Try me. I used to make my living blowing up things, and will not hesitate to include morons, again.
That said, I want to talk about something that I read about in a disturbing blog a few weeks back - The Happy Housewife's Hidden Cocktail. Yeah. It's 3/1 freaking mouthwash & vanilla extract over ice. Insert full body rigor here. I make it a habit to never bitch about something I haven't experienced firsthand (not including incest, coprophilia, or being Republican) so I tried a sip. Don't. Just... don't.

No, you don't, unless you have

An acquaintence had a massive heart attack last week, and has severe brain damage from lack of oxygen during and immediately after the cardiac event. He can't speak at all.  It terrifies me.
A few weeks ago, I strolled up to the bike show just as they were doing the rev-up for the hp contest. I hadn't been around a really powerful engine since my surgery, so I wasn't prepared. From 100 yards away I could feel the wires that hold together my ribcage were beginning to vibrate.
People who claim to care about me get butthurt and pissy when I refuse to be around them when they're smoking pot, because I can not have anything illegal in my system in any bloodwork, or I lose my benefits completely.
Same thing about sodium content in foods, stress in general, going out "partying" or socializing with people whom empirical data has shown will end up with at least 1 person in handcuffs. Think felons R us, on parade.
But you don't know what it's like to be gasping, never quite getting enough air, knowing and often hoping that when you close your eyes each time, that you may not wake up.
Unless you've been there, yourself.
I do not owe anyone my health, my heart, my life. If I choose to jump in front of a bullet for you, that is one thing, but I refuse to let anyone's childish, selfish, petty, bullshit behaviour make me drop dead of heart related issues. And only until you've actually been there, do you know.

Murder, she whimpered

My treadmill just tried to kill me.
I hadn't been on Treddy - yes, that's what I call him - in nearly 2 weeks, since I have a sick cat (Yes, I'm a cat person, but that isn't what this is about) and also because my bro, Frank, was visiting to give me a break around the house, and because I gave myself a concussion last week. Yes, I'm that graceful. Not a long story - door, dog, leash, temple, doorframe. I know.
Anyway, I hadn't been on Treddy in 12 days. I had been doing 3 miles a day, every day, for months. That may not sound like a lot, but it is when you consider just a few months back I was on a table with my chest cut open for 17.5 hours to have a valve replaced and a bypass on another. It's been a long road, and I still have a long ways to go, but this also isn't about that.
This is about Treddy. The executioner.
I don't usually walk that fast, about 4 mph, but I have a long stride, so it goes pretty smoothly. Not today. Treddy was looming in judgement every single time I glanced in his general direction, so even though I didn't really feel like it, the cat was having a little better day, so I kicked my own ass onto Treddy. 6 minutes in I heard a pathetic whimpering. It took me a bit to realize was coming from me. 12 minutes in, I started crying. My back and legs screaming for mercy, I stabbed through sweaty blurred vision in the general direction of where I swear the OFF button used to be. It had traded places with the SPEED UP button in what I can only surmise was an attempt to take my life. I was prepared to stop; Treddy sped up. Graceful me, went zooming off the back and was only saved from certain death, or at least another concussion, by landing in the garbage can. That's right. Treddy tried to kill me, then dispose of my body.
My legs are now jelly, and my blood pressure that I'm doing all this to keep lower is now anything but. I've rarely been in greater need of a bottle or 4 of wine. And if my lasix kicks in again any time in the next hour, I'll just have more laundry to do tomorrow. When I can walk again.

Quiche and '76

Yes, in my mind they are connected.
I'm taking a MyDay today, which means unplugging as I see fit, from the world in general. But this is stuck in my head, and I have to get it out, so you, Lucky Reader, get a free trip into the psychotic amusement park that is a fraction of my mind!
You're welcome.
Ever hate someone so much that anything about them, or that reminds you of them, you also hate? Or at least can't really like?
1976.
1 of my exes was born January 5th, 1976. Yes, a few coughcoughcough years younger than me. I hate him far more than any other human being on the planet, for reasons it would take far too long to explain. We got married because of the chemistry - we were both extreme adherents to the chemical life, and I was weak. Same reason we split up, except I stopped the chemicals and became strong.
Anyway, I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate, okay I really dislike anything associated with 76. I won't even get gas from that station. And 1976 wasn't a bad year for me, originally. My family, being the patriotic bunch that we were, celebrated the Bicentennial by going to Canada! Right. Moving on.
I hate 76 so badly that when I hit that Powerball a few months back, my first thought was, Oh I'm so glad 1 & 5  were not my numbers and they cut off before 76! Okay, that was my 2nd thought. My first was, Huh.
Yeah, it takes a lot to shake me. I kind of accept anything astoundingly good as just payment for the incredibly shitty things that have happened, many of which I don't feel were justified. On that scale, I'm still due some amazingly wonderful things, and there's time since I seem to be unbreakable.
The quiche? Oh, yes. 1st, if your quiche seems dry, as my ex used to think until he tasted mine, substitute 2 tablespoons of plain Greek yogurt for your cream.
See what I did there? Yeah, I'm impressed I remembered it, too, but the cats and dog ate snoozing in sunpuddles.