Here is a picture of my living room, the computer that Wasn't and Then Was Again, and The Best Slippers In the World - available cheaply, from Barratt's! (Altough they kind of terrify the Small Cat, actually. In a sort of Bluebeardish way, I imagine.)
So, remember yesterday, when I no longer had a computer and I was all sad? And when I woke up today it was still the same and I was still sad, only more so? And when I went to my seminar (and what a waste of I-could-have-been-in-bed-watching-telly hours that was!) the lecturer was doing her presentation from a laptop WHICH WAS EXACTLY LIKE MINE ONLY ALIVE, and it was like the Universe was laughing at me? Mocking me. Tormenting me. Stamping on my shins with high heeled boots as I lay there whimpering.
And so when Z called me to say that Using Magical Powers and All the Bloody Luck That God Gives Sagittarians he had brought my computer back to life, as far as I was concerned he could have set up an altar to himself and I would have been on my knees, worshipping. Suddenly, it was like the world made sense again! There was hope! And my marriage wasn't going to fail because I confiscated my husband's computer (because NaBloPoMo is more important than gaming, duh!) while he gnashed his teeth and rolled his eyes and snorted fire and sulfur.
As a small token of my appreciation, I immediately decided to collect all the plates and cups I like to scatter along the surfaces of our house and transfer them back to the kitchen. And when he informed me that he had rescued all my documents, I even did the washing up (train your spouse to have low expectations, there's a key to a good marriage!). And then we fell into each other's arms all dewy-eyed with mutual appreciation, and the love, it was resurrected. And at once the air about us burst into song, and birds twittered, and fluffy bunnies ran about frolicking in meadows and my heart became a garden of exotic creepers and bright orange flowers.
My God, it's like I've got my own personal Mercury Retrograde hanging over the household long after everyone else's has moved on. Will there be no end to the sorrow?
Today, my beautiful, my beloved laptop has switched on its last and at the moment appears to be dead as a rock (I have tried pleading, begging, rending garments, promising firstborn child but The Blue Screen Of Doom is merciless and unrelenting like a Romanian customs official). The horror and loss are intense and immediate. If I had some ash to hand, I would be smearing my face with it right now.
Why did it have to die at all? And particularly why did it have to die just a few days away from the completion of NaBloPoMo? Is it all a conspiracy, too much coincidence? Did it die or was it MUREDERED?
It's really not like I need the extra aggro considering:
Please tell me something happy.
A year ago, dawn in Belgrade
Today I had a long, hard day at work during the course of which I wanted to hex a number of infants, and I came home full of Sadness and Rage and had a fight with everybody* and First Cat had a fight and came home with his mouth full of Ennemy Fur and it was all very meh, except for when it was more like aaargh, aaaaaargh, aaaargh.
I unsettled my neighbours by invading their swing set in order to be able to have a nice cry, and I unsettled the cats who congregated around my legs and studied me with worried eyes, and Small Cat sat in my lap while First Cat put his hind legs in my lap and his front on my shoulders and didn't seem to mind when I sobbed into his neck.
And when the upset hit at my stomach and my stomach hit back and I spent a ridiculous amount of time communing with the toilet, Small Cat showed her support by keeping me company and sat by my feet so long that she fell asleep.
The animals may be worth their vet bills after all.
*Everyone is okay with one another now, just a bit winded and bruised** in the wake of all the drah-mah! emo! etc.
**On the other hand I'm looking forward to some extra hot make-peace-not-misunderstandings sex.
And in Gratuity News, here's a shot of my tighted, booted legs.
For my lovely commenter:
On Books:
I've just finished reading Ten Thousand Lovers by Edeet Ravel and enjoyed it very much. The style is lovely and understated, and the Jewish-Palestinian conflict in Israel is described without rhetoric or dramatics. The story is simple but hard-hitting, and it contains bonus discussions of words and origins of words.
Currently reading Little Children by Tom Perrotta, which is all kinds of sad and grotesque and sublime and gripping. Since I've been leaning towards the slightly mocking and grotesque in my own tastes I've appreciated Perrotta's flawed, hopeful characters. He writes like a man in the midst of a Saturn transit, beautifully, but ultimately about facing up to the consequences of one's actions and growing the hell up.
Tried reading Until I Find You by John Irving, but never really got into it and ultimately abandoned it on the bedside table to be perused at those times when I've read everything else in the house. At the best of times I struggle with Irving (exception - The Cider House Rules); his characters and his style really wind me up (e.g. I kept wanting to punch Owen Meany in the mouth; similarly to how the only redeamable feature of Ana Karenina for me was when she chucks herslef under the train) perhaps because it is too grotesque somehow, too raw, the wrong sort of bizzarre (as opposed to the right sort of bizzarre of magical realism).
About to start The Kite Runner which everyone and their grandmother has reccomended.
On Cats:
I try not to talk too much about my cats so as not to quite reveal the degree of my obsession, but I've been dying to do it, so now I can pretend to do it because the internets want to know and not because I'm sick with love and devotion.
Sliding Slope to Being That Old Lady Presents A Hypnosis in Three Acts starring First Cat (Three thousand priors for solicitation) and Small Cat (12% Fluff, 88% Maniac, 60% RDA of cute)
ACT 1 [Lights up; Scene Left A Young Male is about to expose his privates in search of sensual gratification)
First Cat: Yo , stroke my belly! Stroke my belly I said! For I expose myself to you, because I'm A Big Whore.
ACT 2 [Lights Up; From Stage Right Small Cat trots up In The Mood For Love]
Small Cat: I am Little. And Fluffy. Admit it, my tail is the fluffiest thing you have ever seen. I could be a duster to the Queen. Do not resist me. Touch the Fluffy, Stroke the Fluffy. That Thing You Were Doing On the Computer is Uninmportant. Look into my eyes. Succumb to the Love. Don't struggle. Because dude, seriously, I.Am.That.Soft. I am soft as midnight whispers, I am fluffy like the featheriest dream of God.
Run your fingers underneath my chin, across my silky little ears. Touch my tail. Just. Touch. It.
Let us fall into one another's arms and drink Baileys.
ACT 3 - All three lie in bed watching television. The shadow in the corner of Nina's mouth suggests ice cream.
Because interaction is as much the Nina way as sloth, Agent of Distraction welcomes your opinion of what you'd like to see in this blog.
Drop me off a comment on what you'd like me to write about and as long as it doesn't involve anal sex or garden gnomes (unless of course it's garden gnomes having hott dirrty relations with one another, in which case, maybe) I'll be happy to oblige.
Any requests,oh Internets?
Today the Virgo in my chart marched itself to the forefront of the personality and bitch slapped me until I agreed to clean the house and organise my papers and Other Assorted Rubbish. It also meant that I got around to downloading pictures from ages ago (February 05) and decided (joyfully!spontaneously! as I do!) to post here at least one random picture per day until the end of NaNoBloMo.
I present to you Any Olde Rubbishe I Had Sitting On My Camera, the First:
Pointless Experiemnt, #2468
Q: Can one's medication be fashioned into an entertaining shape, such as a castle, or a robot?
A: I think I can, I think I can
Where will your medication take you?
Today is turning out to be a hectic and busy day, and I'm working on a post that's thoughtful and may feature the proper use of grammar but am not sure I'll get to complete and post it before midnight due to running-aroundness - so for the interim here's a list of links and some of my favourite newfound things.
Mimi Smartypants! If you haven't come across this blog already, you should go over there and read it right now. Obsessively clicking back through her archives is optional, but may lead you onto a wealth of excellent links that you will exclaim over and cherish forevermore. Like so:
Japanese Anti-Smoking Adverts and more goodness from the same poster Random Things in Japan
How to Cook an Egg using two mobile phones (I am so trying this as soon as Z comes home from work, and I'm glad I've not known about it before because it's not like my mind needs extra possibilities when it comes to ridiculous experiementation).
So far most entertaining Google search that hath led people here:
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| 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |
| 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 |
| 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 |
| 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
