The longest night and cheap laundry

Well, that was harrowing.

It's winter in New England already, which means the start of power outage season. Oh, who am I kidding? That's year round.

If it rains, the power goes out. If it snows, the power goes out. If it's windy, the power goes out. If it's the nicest day you've ever seen, the power will probably go out.

It's not even that the power goes out, it's that it stays out for days and weeks. Season after season, massive power outages. You'd think they'd work harder to build a better infrastructure, but no.

Luckily, I live in a heavily populated area so we get priority- we were only without power for 17 hours. Some places mere miles from here are expected to be without power at least a week.

Last night we read scary stories by candlelight, and Anton only set himself on fire once.

And drank. Of course. Isn't that what everyone does when the power goes out?

I was resigning myself to weeks. months. years. without power and making plans on which cat would be eaten first when all the lights suddenly came on and I may or may not have yelped.

Anyway.

Before the six inches of heavy wet snow that brought down our power, I was sitting down to write a post about my newest obsession: homemade laundry detergent.

I'm not a fan of most commercial detergents- most conventional cleaning agents give me hives for some dumb reason; just walking down that aisle in the grocery store turns my skin red and blotchy. So, I usually use something like 7th Generation or Ecover and what ever granola crunching brands there are. They're great, but they are pricey.

Random clicking on Pinterest lead me to someone's fancy homemade laundry detergent, and more searching from there found the easiest recipe.

I knew that I've seen most of those ingridents at the grocery story- in the midwest at least. We went to Target, then Home Depot, then Lowes....without finding anything (well, except for the Oxyclean and Purex, but I didn't want those). Finally, the Ace down the street had the Fels Naptha soap and at least knew what Borax was, even if they didn't have it. Then, to the grocery story and sure enough- both washing soda and borax, side by side in the laundry aisle, and cheaper then I've seen anyone talk about. So hurrah.

The actual making of the soap was quick and relatively painless, with the exception of grating the soap- I made three batches so I wouldn't have to do that very often. Anton tried grating it with a hand grater for about  2 seconds before realizing how long it would take and we put it through the food processor. And that was it. Maybe five minutes all together.

I did a test load of laundry last night (pre-power outage) and...they were clean, albeit a bit soapy still- I have a HE washer and I think the tablespoon of this particular mix is still too much. I'm going to halve it next time and see what happens. Other than that- it's friggin awesome, and cheap, and my next goal is to perfect the dishwashing detergent recipe I found. Hurray frugality! 

No time to wallow in the mire

I've been home on sick leave for the past week and a half, but I've only been up to sitting up for maybe the last day or two. I don't recommend getting surgery in your abdomen region if you plan on doing things. I kept being told recovery was going to be so quick that I'd be bored and begging to go back to work. First of all, anyone who knows me knows I would never beg to go back to work. I go back only resigned to my fate, but never eager. Second, I was lucky enough to develop post-surgery anemia which slowed me down quite a bit- even without the medication I've been on, standing for any length of time would make me dizzy and winded. Standing. Add that to the pain heaped with pain, and it's been a pretty crappy week and a half. The only positive (which,was the goal, really) is that it has seemed to solve the problems I was having pre-surgery. So YAY.

My big plan for the obligatory two weeks off of work was to write, write, write. I keep saying what I need is a few weeks away from work to recharge so I can actually focus on writing, but I was overstretching it thinking I could do it while cut up. Today was the first day I actually pulled out my notebook, but I didn't write anything new. I did start typing the current draft, which is smart considering how many times I've misplaced my notebooks the past several months- even left one at my grandmother's when I visited in August.

I had a list of goals I wanted to do before I turn 30 in a few months- several of which I've actually accomplished, a few I won't be able to (thanks to my body turning on me over the summer. Jerk body. At least that is sorted now.) but one I'm going to be very fucking angry with myself if I don't manage it is getting this fucking story to the point I'd actually start looking for an agent or trying to shop it out to a publisher myself. I have wasted too much of the last decade half-assing and dreaming, and the time to hesitate is fucking through. 


Not that this particular story has been in the works for 10 years- last 3 in bits and pieces. I just get frustrated at myself for not having anything to show for the past ten years of my life. I've done nothing, contributed nothing.

I have three more days left until I have to go back to work, and then NaNoWriMo rolls around again. For whatever reason, it was very helpful last year (10th times the charm?) and I'm hoping the same holds true this year. I might even go to some of the meet ups this time if only to have some one to read for me. I love my family but they're not exactly the people you go to for constructive criticism. 

Spoilery, rambly goodbye

I'm trying to gather my thoughts on the end of an era. It's hard. I have been part of this fandom for a decade- okay, maybe not really involved with the fandom, but...

I love to hate popular things. It should be listed as one of my hobbies. If everyone loves it, I probably hate it, just to hate it. When Harry Potter first came around, it was popular, so naturally, I hated it. Thought it was stupid and silly, without ever picking up a book. I was working in a movie theater in Jackson, Tennessee when the first movie came out, and I gleefully mocked all those kids who came dressed up and were so earnestly excited. A few months later, I got mine when, bored and depressed, I started reading the books.

My mom is a 4th grade teacher, and like a good teacher she had copies of all the books the kids raved about with the intention of reading them, but never really got around to it. All through high school I was the guinea pig- she'd hand me some books and I'd report back on if they were good, fluff, or just plain awful. So, trying to convince myself I was going to read the books for the good of her students, I picked up the first one. And within three days had finished the first four books, all that was out a decade ago. I immediately bought the first movie (my first DVD evar, as it happens- I even scorned that media for years because everyone took to it so fast.).

I made friends because of mutual adoration for the Harry Potter books- some of my closest friends, friends that got me through some of my darkest times in Port Huron. Midnight book releases and movies were major events. When the Order of the Phoenix came out, we dressed up and stood in line at midnight, and took our books across the street to Denny's to read together. After a few hours, we all went home and I kept reading- through the night, and then went to see those same friends play in an outdoor music festival and read. And went to my cousin's open house and dished with another cousin about how fantastic the book was.

Please stop taking pictures of me and let me read.

I took the first dvd to my grandparents house, and my grandfather- not a fan of fantasy at all, he was more the western, bang bang shoot 'em up, black and white movie watcher- and even he got into it, and wanted to know why the Dursley's weren't taken to jail for their mistreatment of Harry. My second tattoo is the barcode from the first book. Every year I re-read the series. When the Half Blood Prince came out, I went to the midnight release alone, but picked up a spare copy for my friend (with me above) who had just had a baby and wasn't able to get her own. We read together and cooed at her baby, who is now unbelievably six and starting first grade in the fall.

One of the first movies Anton and I saw together was the Goblet of Fire- midnight release, of course. The test of a new relationship- if he could put up with my fandoms, then I guess it was meant to be. That Christmas he got me a time-turner.

The midnight release for Deathly Hallows was bittersweet- would there ever be another book I'd be so excited about that I'd be willing to wait in a crowd of people to get it instead of ordering it from Amazon? I hate people, but I love Potter people.

Anton drove me nuts that night. He found a leaked copy on the internets and kept interrupting me to see if I'd gotten to the next death.I finally banned him from the room. I hate being spoiled for anything, especially the joy of reading something I hold dear. I've lost count of how many times I've read the books- but the only other books I re-read so frequently  are few: The Chronicles of Prydain, Dirk Gently series, Quest for a Maid and Mists of Avalon. The spines are all cracked, pages are loose, and I won't let anyone else touch them.

For me, the real test of a good story is if it can make me laugh out loud, if it can make me think, and if it can make me cry. The first time that happened was when I was reading the conclusion to the Chronicles of Prydain- I was 11,12 at the time, had read hundreds of books already, but none had moved me at all emotionally until then.  The moment I knew I was truly hooked on Harry Potter was the Goblet of Fire. Cederic's death caught me so off guard I stopped reading for a good 15 minutes and just sobbed. In the books, and movies I suppose, his death is when it stops being for kids and shit gets real. I can't watch Goblet of Fire without crying over it, and reading "Kill the spare" still makes my heart just clench. Knowing ahead of time that someone died in Order of the Phoenix took the gut punch out of Sirus' death, but it still makes me chocked up and teary.

Jo Rowling is magical. She has created a world in which one can't help but care for it's characters- cheer them on, mourn with them, and face palm at their mistakes. She's also incredibly clever, which many a writer tries to emulate but she just pulls it off so damn well. There are casually mentioned answers in book one that make you headdesk in book seven for not figuring out sooner. The world she made is rich and inviting and managed to do what Lloyd Alexander did so well by showing that the world is not split into "good people and Death Eaters."

Seeing the Deathly Hallows this past week was painful and joyous- I mourn the end of such a beautiful world but I'm so grateful for the richness it brought to my life. Even the silly fandom wank- Potter Pals, Wizard Rock, and of course, A Very Potter Musical/A Very Potter Sequel (and enough fanfic to fill a library). The epilogue to the move hit me right in the gut more so then the book version managed to do. Seeing the trio send their wee wizards off to Hogwarts made it finally hit home that it's all over, it's done- but  whole new generation will come up and find new and wonderful things through Harry Potter. It's almost like turning over the keys of the kingdom- we've had our adventure, now it's your turn. It's so hard to believe that something that always gave me something to look forward to is done.

Not to say I'm going to pack up my books and movies and be done. But my children will never experience Harry Potter the way so many of us did. The anticipation between each book and movie release (YEARS. YEARS OF WAITING.), the massive years long ongoing discussions between books trying to figure out what was going to come next. For so many people, myself included, even though movie canon and book canon take very different paths, the movie actors are who we see as the book characters. I ignore descriptions of characters in the books that don't match their movie counterpart. The last two books you can see a shift of certain characters (Snape, mostly) where she started writing the character to match more closely to how the actor was portraying them.

We're planning a trip to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter for my 30th birthday, as a send off to my very Potter twenties.

I don't think I'll stop hoping in the very back of my mind that an owl will finally show up with my Hogwarts letter. Better late then never.

Goodbye, the Boy Who Lived and all the fantastic witches and wizards, squibs and muggles from along the way. I'll always have a special place for you in my heart and on my book shelf.

making plans

When I was 13, after months of testing and seeing more of the inside of hospitals I ever wanted to see in my lifetime, I was diagnosed with IBS (which does not stand for International Breakdancing Society, which would be way more awesome). Even though I was in excruciating pain, my doctor treated the diagnosis as if it was what he first suspected: that I was faking being sick. The only reason he had even consented to any tests in the first place is because my father has Crohns disease, which hasn't proven to be hereditary but is likely to be- my father's father and my father's uncle both have the disease as well. So, since it wasn't the more serious diseases dealing with your digestive system, my doctor decided to not give me any sort of treatment plan aside from "take an advil". Great advice.

When I was in my late teens, early twenties, I had another bad flare up. New doctor, but same school of medicine apparently. I went back to the hospital for a ridiculous series of tests, followed up with a colonoscopy in which I almost died (the nurse let air get into the needle, my heart almost stopped, and my doctor told me it wasn't a big deal...yeah. ) and again, it wasn't Crohns, "just" IBS, so get over yourself and get back to work.

So, for the better part of my life, I've just dealt with the pain and need to always be close to a bathroom. I love road trips but only take them if I know we'll be close to a bathroom of some sort. I won't go camping or anything in the out of doors for longer than an hour and only if I don't eat or drink anything hours before. Even then I've had ridiculously close calls. I never feel good, but some days are better then others.

After we moved to Massachusetts, I had another really bad flare up. Went through all the tests again (all to ensure it wasn't the dreaded Crohns, but at this point in my life if I was going to develop Crohns, it would have shown up by now. Most people are diagnosed by late teens, early twenties, and I have had more tests then anyone needs for that to show up.) but the doctor went one step further and had me tested for Cealiacs. Negative, but at least she started looking beyond Crohns for the source of my pain.

Again, at the end of the testing, she came back with the same answer. IBS- but instead of shunting me out the door, she put me on painkillers and told me to find ways to de-stress and even got me in touch with a clinical study out of one of the medical colleges in Boston. The painkillers didn't work, but a few months later I found out about my wheat allergy. Cutting wheat out of my diet seemed to help- the pain remained but it wasn't as debilitating as it had been.

Cut to last week. Work has been more stressful than usual- I received an unpaid 'promotion' in February, which I'm pretty sure is just my boss's way of seeing how quickly he can get me to lose it daily. The later it is in the week, the earlier I break down. I leave work in tears or shaking in anger most days. My boss fought to create the position (after I indicated I wanted to leave the department and move to working as a product specialist in tech support), and once he got permission to create lead positions, he's done everything he can to work against us (the leads). It's been a frustrating, exhausting couple of months. The only person I could go to for help is in China most of the year now, and is scheduled with all day meetings the rare weeks he's back in the country.

Most nights I don't sleep more than 4 hours a night because my anxiety is out of control. I know all of this, yet I was taken by surprise last week when I was down for the count in crazy amounts of pain- pain so strong I couldn't go to work, and I always go to work. Blizzards, floods, no power, flu, laryngitis, fevers, it doesn't matter. I'm always there.

I had made Thai curry the night before with a mix I found at the store. I normally don't like Thai curry (coconut milk is of the devil) but figured almond milk would be a tasty alternative. The mix ended up being too salty for either of us to eat, so I just ate copious amounts of rice...and was sick the whole night through. I thought it was food poisoning at first- but Anton didn't get sick at all. By 6, when I hadn't slept a wink, I called out, wrapped myself in a heating pad and laid in the fetal position most of the day. Nothing helped- Pepto, Mylanta, ginger...nothing. I went back to work on Friday and by Sunday I was mostly feeling better.

Wednesday came around and I almost left work, the pain had gotten to ridiculous portions again. By Friday, Anton demanded I go to the ER. But I am Midwestern, and pain is no reason for an ER visit, so I consented to go to the Urgent Care instead.

The rotation doctor did a quick exam then literally threw his hands up and went "I don't have a good plan for you." Well, thanks for being honest.

So, he told me to reduce my stress (which at this point would mean never leaving my apartment. I don't think my work will pay me not to come in.) and doubled the dose on my pain killers. After I told him the don't work, upped the frequency I should take them as well. I left, dejected- I've been on these pills for two years and they've never helped, and advise to "de-stress" is unhelpful and annoying.

But, after my first higher dose pill, I promptly fell asleep. I've spent most of the weekend in kind of a limbo- the pain is still there, but most of the edge is off so I can actually move and do things and eat (the pain is usually so bad after eating that eating is, for many other reasons as well, my least favorite things to do). I'm going to make an appointment with my regular doctor on Monday, but I'm not confident if she's going to be able to help. The next step from here is to go on an anti-anxiety pill, but I really hate the idea of being medicated just so I can work.

I'm trying to explore my options. I've looked for other jobs, but there isn't much and I don't want to get stuck in the same cycle I'm in. I could tell my boss I need to step back from the responsibilities, but I don't think that would help- the problem is, even if I take a step down,those responsibilities are still mine AND it's the only hope I have for a raise in the near future. But in two weeks I've missed three days of work because of pain related with IBS and the pain is a result from stress and no amount of pills is going to help me lose the stress.

Eowyn, Nayowyn.

Sometimes I find myself worrying about what would happen to my cats should anything happen to myself and Anton. They're all a little weird and have their own special needs and nuances. Chester is clingy and distrusting of anyone but the two of us. Kira is needy and delicate (or so she'd have you believe. Annabelle is straight up crazy and particular, almost to the point of OCD, and Boyd is his own special brand of nut. If any of them was going to do well in another home, it would be Eowyn. She is gregarious- she loves and adores everyone she meets, from friends and family to maintenance or the cable guy. The others I got while they were still young enough to have their age counted in weeks, bu she was almost twice that age when I brought her home. She definitely doesn't view me as a surrogate parent like Boyd and Chester, who were both bottle fed by me.

The spring after Taran died, a coworker mentioned finding a stray gray kitten and thinking it belonged with me. I told her no thanks- three cats was more than enough. A few weeks went by and I stopped at her house after work, just to hang out, and her husband met me in the driveway, a little gray bundle in his arms. I said I'd see. We went in, and she sat next to me the entire night. She was not even vaguely interested in exploring their house or their cats. I left with her, and she sat, very sweetly, on the car seat next to me on the short drive home.

I made a vet appointment, locked her in the spare room, and fell asleep on the couch. I woke up later to find that Boyd had expressed his outrage in the only way he knew how- he managed to get out the window, onto the balcony and out into the world. 

Employing my mom and her husband, we looked all day for that orange brat, finally finding him under a car the next building over. Apparently he decided he'd come back home, confused which building and sat outside the doors on the second story, crying his head of before hiding under the dirty car. He's nothing if not melodramatic. 

Tangent: When our crackhead neighbors burnt us out of our apartment a year laer, the cats moved in with my mom and we went to stay at my grandparents home until our new apartment was ready. The day we went to pick up the cats and move, Boyd waltzed into the room, ignored us as we called to him, hopped up into the tv cabinet and wedged himself behind the cable box and refused to come out. 

After Boyd was safely home and washed, I went back and forth on whether I should keep his new cat. One the one hand, I had room and she needed a home. On the other, none of my other cats seemed to like her at all. But she was sweet and mousy and meeped instead of meowed...

When we picked up the cats at my mom's, and Boyd was such a jerk, Mom happily handed over Boyd, Kira and Annabelle, but offered to keep Eowyn. She wouldn't leave them alone the few weeks she stayed there. She has this annoying habit of poking you and meeping until you pay attention to her, and they ate it up. A few summers ago when Anton's parents stayed with us, she was the same way. She absolutely smothered them (these people who do not like cats, especially not in the house)- she slept in the bed with them, sat on the table while they drank their morning coffee, sat on their laps while they watched tv...

The last week they stayed with us- probably the last night if I'm remembering correctly, Chester, who hid almost the entire time they were with us, cautiously climbed onto the couch, crept onto my father-in-law's lap, sat there, very still, for less then a minute, then went and hid again. Night and day, those two.

But Eowyn is not my cat. She tolerates me, somewhat. She usually only wants my attention if Anton isn't home. She bully's Kira and Annabelle- she even drove Annabelle to destroy our carpet in our last apartment because she wouldn't allow Belle into the bathroom where the litter boxes were. 

She is, for all intents, Anton's cat. When he first moved in with me, she was still in the hyperactive and frisky stage of kittenhood, and the caricature of a cat: destroying furniture, climbing the drapes, eating lasagna... He hated her. But, everyday he was home alone she sat next to him, wouldn't leave his side. As she got older and calmed down he decided cats weren't that bad. Even now he says if we split, he'd keep her and leave the rest for me. 

Not that I don't love that cat. I do. Around Christmas I found a bump on her side. I tried not to panic- the cats are always giving each other nips and knocks. A month later, it was still there. Thankfully, it turned out to be nothing but she still had me up nights worrying about her. Right now, she's got our whole household topsy turvy because Ms. Thang still thinks she lives on the streets and has to eat ALL THE FOOD. When Chester was still young, she was able to keep the weight off because he tormented her, but now both of them are a wee bit chunky. So, now, the cats are on a feeding schedule which my older cats absolutely hate. They've always free fed and it's always been fine. Now, Boyd wakes me up at 5 in the morning to remind me that he has not eaten since 8 the night before. It's so. Much. Fun. 

But I'd like to keep them all around as long as possible, so if I get less sleep so she can continue to pester us for the next decade or two, so be it. 

Jealous of normal people

I need to hurry up and find a way to be a brilliant author and/or Mega Millions winner so I can have absolute control over my workspace.

It's not uncommon for me to have mild allergic reactions at work- I work with people who like to eat, and eat a lot.And eat everywhere. And are terrible at cleaning up after themselves. I'd say I get hives at least once a week from either something in the air or food that people don't clean off surfaces. It's never that bad, and I just go on with my itchy day.

This week, we had a crap ton of snow, again, and since the people I work with are too retarded to go "oh, it's going to snow a shit ton tomorrow, I should probably take a lunch since eating out won't be an option." EVERY. FUCKING. TIME. the company orders food for these idiots to eat.  Every time, it's pizza. And every time, I have a mild allergic reaction. I don't eat the food.I don't touch the food. But my dairy allergy is severe enough that the smell (which is it's ickly little proteins floating in the air, and it's the ickle little proteins I'm allergic to) can cause a reaction. I have to take the long way to the veg section at Whole Foods because their open air cheese area has been known to make me develop hives in my throat.  It's just crap- if I eat something knowingly, that's my own damn fault, but to not be able to be in a building because it sets my allergies off is just plain stupid.

So. Tuesday, they order pizza. I had a mild reaction (just hives on my arms) itchy, but meh. Wednesday, they order pizza again. And this time, I broke out in hives from my scalp to my feet. My eyes itched, my lips itched. Everywhere fucking itched. I thought about taking an antihistmine, but I didn't want to drive while doped, as Benadryl tends to make me sleep, and sleep hard. 

Then my breathing got worse. I started to wheeze. My throat got tight and my chest became swollen (usually happens when I have a bad asthma attack) and then the hives in my mouth and throat turned up. Fucking. Party. I wheezed my way over to my boss and asked to leave, and he asked if someone should take me to the hospital instead. 

Had I been thinking clearly, I would have just taken the antishistamine at the first fucking sign and had Anton come get me, but nooooo. I waited until 3 hours after the first little hive broke out, and narrowly avoided going to the hospital when it took the second Benadryl to get my breathing some what normal.

I spent most of my night itching and wheezing, and chugging on Throw Back Pepsi because Anton was too nervous to let me sleep. Using my handy Epi pen would have probably done the trick, but it would have meant hours at the ER and as I was already in a state of panic, spending time in a place people go to die was at the bottom of my list. I ran out of Benadryl last night, so early this morning Anton drove me to CVS and stocked up on it, along with Cortizone cream and Dramamine (aside from only working in four hour shifts, Benadryl makes me insanely nauseated and dizzy). I called out of work and slept most of the day. 

I'm feeling mostly better now- my chest is still swollen and I'm still a bit itchy on my arms, but compared to yesterday, I'm fine. 

What I'm mainly struggling with is how to make sure this doesn't happen again. I don't think I can get away with banning dairy from the workplace like people have been able to ban fragrances, but it's not right that I should have to put my health at risk because people eat it. I'm taking my test Epipen to work tomorrow for people to practice on, should something like that happen again, but it's not enough. I lost 10 hours of vacation time because people are too stupid to prepare their own lunches. Had I waited any longer to take my first Benadryl, I would have had no choice but to go to the ER. I have no idea what to do to keep this from happening again that doesn't alienate people or hinder their right to eat what they want. 

Vegan, Gluten Free curry roux

So. I love Japanese style curry. I could eat it every day, all day. We used to buy a roux by S&B, and both Anton and I could polish off a package alone. That's like, 2 family portions.

After I was diagnosed with a wheat allergy, curry had to go along with bread and other things that taste good. Jamie was a very sad panda.

While I haven't found a decent vegan gluten free bread yet (SERIOUSLY WHY IS IT SO HARD), I have managed to perfect a gluten free curry that is oh, so good. A friend on Facebook asked for the recipe tonight, and since I had to type it up, I thought I may as well share this deliciousness with you lovely people as well. You are welcome.

Curry 

2 Tbs butter o' your choice

2 Tbs flour (I use brown rice, adds a nice flavor)

3 Tbs brown sugar

1 tsp grated ginger*

1 tsp grated garlic*

1 onion, thinly sliced

2 Tbs curry powder

2 C. broth (more if you like your curry thinner)

1/2 tsp garam masala (if you don't have any, substitute with chili and red pepper flakes)

Salt to taste

*if you use fresh ginger/garlic, cook with the onion. If you use the powder equivalent, add in with curry powder

Saute onions on low heat until brown

Meanwhile, heat butter until melted, then add in flour. Saute on low. Add curry powder. Slowly add in broth- mix well, and take your time so the curry gets thick before each addition of broth.  Simmer until desired thickness, add onions. 

If you like your curry with vegetables (potatoes, peppers, corn, whateves) in a more stew like fashion, double the recipe above and add the vegetables when you add the onion, and cook another 20 minutes. 

Serve it with rice or quinoa, or just eat it straight out of the pan. I like mine with rice and edamame.