Helpful/Not Helpful

Helpful:  Getting a lot of kind words and wishes on my birthday.

Not Helpful:  Realizing I’m 34 and still have no career to speak of.

Helpful:  Rhymes-with-smell-shoe-chin.  I’m feeling closer to “normal” than I have in at least a month.

Not Helpful:  Orange Cat’s many medicines.  His eye doesn’t seem to be healing.

Helpful:  Looking over my CV and thinking:  this is okay.

Not Helpful:  Learning that a co-worker of mine (in a different discipline) just landed a job here in the city, even though she’s barely half-done with her rather pedestrian formalist diss, and her contract at our job lasted another year.

Helpful:  I’ve started doing a workout DVD, since that’s sposeda help with mental as well as physical health.

Not Helpful:  Realizing that while my weight is fine, I’m puny and weak and embarrassingly out of shape.  Also:  sore all over.

Helpful:  Blogging at Harpyness.  It’s nice to be able to write something, even if it’s not professionally useful.

Not Helpful:  Blogging at Harpyness.  It’s frustrating to be putting all my writing energy into something that’s not professionally useful.

Harumph.

Plus ca change…

It’s been nearly two weeks since I last gave y’all the Wroth Mental Health Status Update.  Since then:

–Robot Boy turned 34 with little ado and many cupcakes

–The Other Dawn had a baby called Squeak (although I like to think of him as Little Robot)

–I’ve been blogging my arse off over at Harpyness

–I started taking an SSRI, which makes me dizzy, but has kept me from crying about every godforsaken thing all the fucking time

–I’ve been happy to spend time with a whole buncha gels who are lovely, some of whom read this-yere blog.  I’ve never had as many ladyfriends as I do now, and I am very grateful.

–I still don’t know what to do about the diss, or the job market, or whatever.  I feel better, or less bad, anyway, but the situation is as craptacular as ever.  I feel like I’m in a Beckett play.

Of Related Interest

On days that I’m working (or lately, not working) at home, I listen to NPR, and at 2pm in my market is a locally produced show called Soundcheck, which is pretty consistently good.

They are in the midst of a series called “Deadly Medleys,” which allots about 40 minutes of the program on seven consecutive Fridays to listening to and talking about songs dealing with each of the seven deadly sins.  Today was week four:  Sloth.  Previously, they’ve covered Lust, Gluttony, and Greed.

You can see the various contributors’ list and listeners’ suggestions at this link, and listen to streaming audio of the past shows, too.  Kinda fun.

Living The Dream

RB and I have lovely friends.

Among these lovely friends are people who have recently upgraded some of their belongings, and were needing to get rid of the “old stuff” (which wasn’t terribly old).

Wroth to the rescue!  Yesterday, we scored a 30″ TV (not HD or digital or newfangled in any particular way) and a sah-weet couch w/ a fold-out bed. RB was more jazzed about the enormo TV than I, but whatever, I just don’t really care about that stuff.

Our now-old TV was smaller, and  due to its rather advanced electronic age of at least 15 years (RB bought in in HS, with money from his fastfood job), it was developing weird color bands:  a green stripe down the left side, and a magenta glow in the lower-left corner.  The now-displaced couch was a fairly fugly futon that was given to us by a vacating neighbor a couple years ago, and did yeoman’s work for any number of visiting friends and relatives.  Both were serviceable, if not ideal, and we were waiting until something went totally kablooey before we would replace it.

But then we didn’t, thanks to aforementioned lovely friends.  

And now we’ve got even better equipment for being indolent mofos.  Couch & TV:  that great American duo.  Add Wroth and Robot Boy:  a serviceable, if not ideal American duo, and we’re all feelin’ mighty fine.

That isn’t the couch.  Or Orange Cat (although he is totally digging the new couch, too).

No Game Today.

Today is the 36th Anniversary of the judgment on Roe v. Wade.  Hence, it is also Blog for Choice Day.

I’ve done this two years in a row, and wanted to do it today, but I had a therapy session-thing, and it was horrible, and I’m  miserable and exhausted.  I direct you to this post, by The Other Dawn, which I think is quite lovely.

The only other thing I can think of is the scene in The Incredibles where Elastigirl/Helen is flying into hostile territory, and Syndrome sends out missiles to blow up her plane.  Not understanding the situation, she radios the island to get them to call off the attack, while also demanding that her daughter Violet throw up a force-field bubble thing around the plane.  The line that always makes me smirk inappropriately is:  “Violet, do it NOW! Abort, abort, abort! ”

No good?  Okay, how ’bout this from the Prez:

Statement of President Obama on the 36th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade

“On the 36th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we are reminded that this decision not only protects women’s health and reproductive freedom, but stands for a broader principle: that government should not intrude on our most private family matters. I remain committed to protecting a woman’s right to choose.

While this is a sensitive and often divisive issue, no matter what our views, we are united in our determination to prevent unintended pregnancies, reduce the need for abortion, and support women and families in the choices they make. To accomplish these goals, we must work to find common ground to expand access to affordable contraception, accurate health information, and preventative services.

On this anniversary, we must also recommit ourselves more broadly to ensuring that our daughters have the same rights and opportunities as our sons: the chance to attain a world-class education; to have fulfilling careers in any industry; to be treated fairly and paid equally for their work; and to have no limits on their dreams. That is what I want for women everywhere.”

Yeah, that’s better.

Trolls live in caves, regardless.

Maybe this is my misanthropy talking, but I feel absolutely no desire at all to be in DC to see or take part in any of the inauguration festivities.  Although I’m as glad as any that GWB’s Reign of Terrah is over, I think that celebrating is a) a bit premature, and b) a misuse of time and money, given all the challenges that the nation (and Mr. Obama) is facing.

RB wants to go to out tomorrow to mark the occasion.  I don’t see the point.  History is not “made” because “you were there” or here, or anywhere.

Another sign that I won the Dude Lottery.

RB brought home the entire HBO series John Adams to get us through a long, cold, life-hatin’ weekend.  Suck it, Oprah.

Here’s what I need:

A small, quiet, profoundly boring room with no windows, a door which closes the world out, a desk and chair, an electrical outlet, and no internet access, wireless or otherwise. 

Where can I find one of these?  I will trade all my golf pencils, jam, calendars, magnets, and the vast majority of my socks for access to such a room.  If it doesn’t force me to get some work done, it will at least be appropriate punishment for my failures.

Silky Puppies and Naughty Students

I got my hair cut this evening.  It is much shorter and has some new layers. I will never have the full, bouncy pre-Raphaelite waves I covet, but I also no longer have the non-style of a homely 12-year-old.   We’ll see what happens when it’s my turn to wash and dry it–I don’t have the tools, skills, patience, or arm strength to blow-dry it so meticulously.  RB likes it:  “Ooh, so shiny, like a silky puppy.”

We spent the morning in bed, enjoying the fall-back of Daylight Savings Time, and the afternoon eating candy and avoiding homework.  We will pay for all of these sins, of course, but it was a good day, while it lasted.

Change of Venue

I think I need one.

When I’m elsewhere–at my job, on the train, doing laundry–I get all kinds of good ideas and think of all kinds of do-able, practical stuff about my dissertation (or whatever other academic work I’ve got going on).  I always have pen and paper handy, and I take notes and make lists, and I feel really energized and positive about what I’ll accomplish, both in the long term and the short term.

The second I get to my desk, all that good juju just slips away.  I start getting nervous about my work, I procrastinate on all but the easiest, quickest tasks, and I second-guess whatever strategies or approaches I’ve come up with.  There’s a lot of anxiety in this little nook of my apartment.  Maybe it’s bad fung shui–the office is close to the bathroom, so all my good ideas get flushed away?  I don’t know.  But I’m thinking that since I’m making this major shift in my structure, maybe I need a major shift in my environment, too.

Tomorrow, I’m going to take my laptop over to some coffee shop in the area and see what, if anything, I can produce in an hour away from my desk.  Wish me luck.