A Batman week

I suppose I haven't written a "depressed" entry (or any entry) lately, so I guess we're about due for one.

I've had an eventful week.

My birthday. August 20th, I turned 29. I woke up sore, crampy, and knowing I'd likely be neck-deep in Shark Week before the day was done. Plus, I had to work. Needless to say, I was in a bad mood.

No one at work wished me a happy birthday. This I didn't mind because I don't think I've even told anyone the date of my birthday, but it was still annoying to waste half the day on such mundane occupations such as the work that pays my bills.

Husband e-mailed me to ask if I wanted to get some dinner in my work city, but I was all in a boo-hoo, poor me mood already so I said no. I was truly in a foul mood.

I got some birthday moolah from my mother-in-law and my aunt, so I happily went to Target to procure some new clothes. Do you know how long it's been since I've gotten something new at the store? Anyway, I was a little disappointed because they didn't have some things I'd looked at online, and others were more expensive than online had promised, and in fact I formed the opinion that online was a magical non-existent fairyland full of sweet, sweet glittery lies. I managed to find plenty of stuff anyway...I just had to spend more to do it.

That night I tried my home-made hard cider, which I'd had high-ish hopes for. It was definitely alcoholic, but I'd not added enough sugar, I guess, so it was fairly dry and more like an odd apple champagne than hard cider. So a little disappointing, but still successful. I got drunk and that pretty much ended my uneventful birthday.

Wah, wah. No reason for me to feel upset. I was given cash to spend, I had successfully completed a project, I had a tame workday, my husband even ASKED if I wanted to eat out (we never eat out), and I had roughly 6 or 7 outfits and a bathing suit for something like $95, which I think is pretty darn good. My mother-in-law had even bought me a pint of Ben and Jerry's and made me some of my favorite hot wings, so I had tasty nummies that I didn't have to make/buy myself. Honestly, it wasn't THAT bad a birthday. I've had worse.

I chalked it up to hormones, and this turned out to be correct.

Aunt Flo. Every month on Facebook and/or Twitter, I make a post on some aspect of my period. This is because I'm a lazy motherfucker and don't feel like charting, and I'm not on the Pill so I've no other way to keep track of when to expect the crime scene in my pants. I have a quite regular cycle, and thanks to my Facebooking, I knew to expect my period on about the 18th.

It still hadn't come by my birthday. This led to obvious worries.

Now without going into too many details, let's just say there were...opportunities this month for my uterus to gain an occupant. Unlikely opportunities due to non-hormonal protection, but stranger things have happened. People get preggers on the Pill AND using condoms AND their husband supposedly got snipped ages ago.

I didn't think it could be possible. I mean, again, without going into too many details, you know when the statistics mention "perfect use?" Our use is about as perfect as it gets. I figured it had to be something else.

I took up exercising every day a while back in the hopes that I'd build a good habit. I thought my body might be reacting to that. I'd cut severely back on my intake of soy and wheat. I thought since soy mimics estrogen, hey, who knows? I thought it might be stress, but I hadn't really been all that stressed lately. I thought it might be my thyroid playing tricks, but...again, except for moodiness, I've been feeling pretty good lately (might be due to the exercise).

I told myself to not make assumptions and leap to conclusions like I always do. After all, to quote a friend of mine, "Who hasn't had a 30-day cycle?"

Of course, the next day I still hadn't gotten it. That made it something like 32 days.

I took a pregnancy test. No dice. So...that just made it weird. I read that it could possibly be too early for a test to show up as negative, so there was that, but I was also busy worrying about whatever else it could be.

All in all, not a great scenario.

I hadn't gotten it by the morning of the 22nd, but I felt like I'd be getting it any second. I started spotting just the tiniest little bit, and thought to myself, "Okay, if it's going to come, then just COME ALREADY." Then I also thought, "That's what she said" because I am a dork.

Finally, it arrived, irrevocably and unmistakably around lunchtime. The part of me that secretly wanted to be pregnant wailed, "Maybe this little bit is all that will come! Women have little mini-periods all the time in early pregnancy!" But, alas, it was not to be.

It came on all in a flood that night and it was like my midsection was clawing its way out of my body for the next three days, which is not at all the norm for me. Heavier than normal, too. Supposedly a lot of the time when you're late and then you get a heavy period, it means you've miscarried a very early pregnancy. That idea made me more unhappy than just getting my period late did...I mean, really, what's better, just getting your period late for a random reason, or getting pregnant and then losing it a couple weeks in?

So of course those four days of uncertainty made me all moody and depressed and droopy, in addition feeling like crap physically. I'm blowing all this way out of proportion, of course, but I do that. Pregnancy and other reproduction-related topics are kind of not good for me lately.

Miscellaneous. And then there were lots of arguments and misunderstandings, blah blah blahs. Left me feeling very uncertain and harboring several fantasies that would change my life immensely and not for the better. But I won't discuss that here.

Let's just say it was a dark week.

But hey, I got new clothes finally!

L’oiseau que tu croyais surprendere battit d’aile et s’envola.

Sitting here on a Tuesday morning, sipping on my half-regular, half-decaf coffee (don't want to get jittery like a withdrawing junkie with a seizure disorder), eating my Very Healthy breakfast of blue corn tortilla chips, and enjoying my hour or two of solitude before I have to start cooking for the next couple of days.

It's a very exciting life, mine.

Oh! Oh! I have a new little mini-project I have to show and tell! "Have to" because it's one I actually finished! I am proud! I should probably be less proud!

I have several friends (read: know several people) who home-brew, and while it doesn't appeal to me as a hobby beyond the casual (because I don't like beer and wine is only so-so), I am interested enough that I wanted to try making something I DO like with the fermentation process: hard cider, and ginger ale.

Since I am too lazy and poor (drink three shots, readers) to bother with all the S locks and stoppers and tubing and food-grade pails and crap that proper homebrewing involves, I went the ghetto route: glass jars, rubber bands, and *ahem* saran wrap.

It's pretty easy, actually. You mix some brewer's yeast (bought for 80 cents a pack at the local homebrew store...you know I live in Hippie Heaven when we've got an honest-to-god, brick-and-mortar HOMEBREW STORE, for heaven's sake, and yes, 80 cents I can manage) with sugar, dump it into your container along with your liquid and whatever other ingredients (I put grated ginger root and lemon juice in the ginger ale), and then add some water. Stretch the plastic wrap over the mouth of the vessel very tightly, secure with rubber band, poke the tiniest little hole so the evil bacteria (hopefully) won't get in, put in a warmish, darkish area....and wait.

My hard cider won't be ready for a couple of days (it takes a week because all the little yeasties are eating the sugar and pooping out alcohol), but my ginger ale was ready last night!




I obviously have to strain all the ginger and errant lemon seeds and crap out of it first, but look at that glass! YOU CAN SEE BUBBLES.

it turned out pretty well! Fizzy and gingery and decidedly not fake-tasting like most ginger ale. I futzed up the recipe by mistake, because I put all the ingredients into a quart jar instead of a 2-liter bottle, so it was waaaay too sweet, and I hadn't had a whole lemon, so it wasn't as tart as it could have been, but all in all, I'm ready to call my first attempt at homebrewing a resounding success.



Now I just hope the hard cider turns out. Friday is my 29th birthday, and I aim to get shit done. And by "shit" I mean "liquorin'."

You know it's time, you see the sign

Sometimes you stumble upon stuff that is just so YOU. Here's more of the crazy colorful bohemian stuff that I love, and some color palette inspirations, and whatnot.



I love layers and drapey things. I have to be careful with them, being knee-high to a grasshopper and squarely built all at once, or they make me look like I'm a foot tall. (Pics from here, here, here, and here.)



Mmmm, tie-die/acid/paint splatter/sunset-y goodness. (Pic from here.)



Maybe I will take my 394873984 plain black shirts and spruce them up a bit. (Pic from here.)



These are so simple, yet I love them. (Pics from here, here, and here.)



I like crazy tights. Someday I should take pictures of the stockings my mom got me from Italy a few years back. One of the best clothing-related gifts she's ever given me. Usually she's...a little fail at it. Alas. (Pic from here.)



I WANT TO WEAR THIS ROOM. And live in it! (Pic from here.)



I almost had an embroidery-gasm at the sight of this. Would this not be absolutely breathtaking as a free-form embroidery piece? Haha, I can't even tell what it is, a painting or drawing or whatever. For all I know is IT a free-form embroidery. Anyway, it's gorgeous. Would love it printed on a t-shirt or a skirt. (Pic from here.)


I really have been stepping up the effort to not dress like a schlub, at least on the days I have to leave the house. Let me tell you, "effort" is not even an exaggeration. It's hard to be creative sometimes! One of these days I'll actually get around to taking pictures of my outfits. Compared to my previous uniform of jeans and a t-shirt and sneakers of some kind, they are splendiferously wacky.

And boy howdy, do they make me feel great! I've gotten compliments on my pieces every workday since I've started this project, and I walk out the door feeling like a sexy hipster with my bad self. Why did I not do this before?