Under what rock have I been that I didn’t realize The Walking Dead comes back in FIVE DAYS! First I found a quarter and now this! Everything is going my way today.
Today’s bangles: black Clic-Clac, two little Native American cuffs of mine from back in the day, my lucky figa charm bracelet, and the Fontaine de Bartholdi skinny bangle.
This is the week, folks. The week of important anniversaries that changed my life. Today is the day that eight years ago I… Well… Let me set the scene.
It was a Monday evening. I was working in downtown San Francisco. This was life before my darling little shop back when I was a small fry in a huge international corporation. My job was shaking hands with clients and showing them how to use a computer program (ha! Right? Like I knew how to use a computer program!!!) So really I spent most of my day going to appointments while pretending either to look busy or to know what the hell I was saying.
To relieve all this make believe I went out. A lot. Even on Monday nights. I know my mom is shaking her head right now going “but it was a school night!” It was a school night! Can you believe it? Not literally, because I wasn’t in school. Though it was still literally a school night. Blah, whatever! It was a school night, just not for me. There.
Anyway, back to setting my scene. It was a Monday, afterwork. I probably had changed my outfit. Which is not an important detail but to get the writing juices going I had to let you know. An acquaintance and I hit up some bar on Pine Street, though I had a headache so I briefly considered going home. However, she urged me to tag along with her to meet her friends at another bar, the Cellar. It was a karaoke night! “Margaret does not karaoke,” I’m certain I told her. But I was young, 27! And went anyway. Hangover on Tuesday be damned.
Once there we scooched into a sparkly vinyl booth. I leaned over the table and asked her “Are there going to be any cute single guys?” And she said yes. And guess what? There was! For narrative sake I’ll say he walked in right then. He carried a motorcycle helmet under one arm, wore this big hulking bomber jacket and glasses. Which, as we all know, is the recipe for female catnip. When I found out he was going to sing a song I told him “Margaret does not karaoke but she does dance”, and volunteered to be his back up dancer.
And guess what? That guy is my honey! Cruel man that he is he made me back up dance to the Cranberries “Ode to my Family” (you know how hard it is to dance to that song?!). So today is the 8 year anniversary of that, my first major life change: I now karaoke.
But more importantly it’s the anniversary of the day that I met my honey. I just now went into the bedroom and kissed him and said “I’ve known you for 8 years, honey!”
Picture of us (me dancing or, rather, posing for the camera, and him singing the Cranberries) from that very first night. This picture, my friends? It is a bona fide film photo. As in not digital. Woh! Blows your mind, right? And I still have this dress though Bandit ate the boots at some point. Anyway, Aaron and I were pretty hot and heavy right out of the gates; a date almost every night of the week! And I’m going to tell you all about them! Because they were full of firsts.
To be cont…
1.15.2007 bangles: my blue Hermès Cape Cod watch, and skinny Orange Clic-Clac
Today’s jewelry are all the ones from my honey:
Hermès Collier de Chien from this Christmas, Hermès Astrologie from last Christmas, Tiffany’s pearl bracelet from my 30th birthday, Jawbone UP from last birthday (35), rose gold wedding band, engagement ring, rose gold Tiffany earrings from a birthday (33?), and pink pearl necklace he won at an auction. Last is our anniversary ring with Leroy’s head, my honey adds a stone at each anniversary. The colors are for the married years.
I just realized maybe I’ve never before revealed my husband’s name. It’s Aaron, but I’ll probably continue to call him honey. Because that is how I do it!
If I were a graduate student studying modern American television (people totally do that, right? TV Studies? No?) I’d write my thesis on the Gilmore Girls. Specifically the dynamic between Lorelei Gilmore and Rory Gilmore. The title would be Lorelei & Rory: the role of the dominant and the submissive in family dynamics. And then I’d write about that. But since this is a blog, I get to cheat and invent imaginary thesis titles without actually needing to do any leg work.
Ugh! I can’t even explain the insidious addiction of this show. I never watched it first time around. Then when it became available on Netflix streaming I figured I ought to give it a shot because people I respect love it. It turns out it’s awful. But I can’t stop watching!
I hate Lorelei. She’s so smug and self absorbed. Basically selfishly forcing her daughter to be her best friend. I just can’t get behind this whole mom + daughter = best friend thing. It’s weird! Yo. I talk to my mom every day, I see her in person multiple times per week. I have a great relationship with my mom. But she’s my mom, not my best friend. Side note, I also find it creepy when spouses call each other “best friends”. Anyway, Lorelei is so intent on being “cool” and quasi witty that she’s awful and obnoxious to her entire community. Including her own parents! Come on already, grow up, Lorelei!
Oh, and the theme song? It’s the worst. THE WORST. For all the effort the show goes to name dropping bands (Belle & Sebastian, Metallica, I heard some Rammstein, Otis Redding) you’d think they would have a decent theme song. But no. It’s the worst. If you’re curious what song it is it’s Where You Lead by Carole King. Listen, I may be down with Linda Ronstadt but no thank you, Carole King. You can take what you are selling elsewhere.
Oh, hello broken English Korean mom. What are you doing here? Why? Why must Mrs. Kim speak broken English? Her grammar is nearly impeccable but the writer’s love dropping the verb every once in a while. It’s so inconsistent! ESL people tend to be consistent in the idiosyncrasies of their speech. The Vietnamese family down the street sell “gingersnappers” at their sandwich shop. Which I think is ridiculously cute, BUT it’s always gingersnappers. Well, except when it’s chocolate chip cookie day. Then there’s no gingersnappers. Consistency.
Besides, I can hear Mrs. Kim’s American accent behind the awful fake Korean accent. Why must they do this? There are so few Asians on TV to begin with, must the token ones be such a stereotype? I’m looking at you Two Broke Girls. You’re part of the problem, too.
So there’s a lot, A LOT that I dislike about this show and yet…. I can’t stop watching it. Where you lead, I will follow, apparently. Like a lobotomized rat, I hate the maze but I can’t escape it. Poor rat 😦
It’s Rory. She is the cheese that makes the maze worth while. But now she’s getting all mixed up with this bad kid, Jess. I’m worried she’s going to cheat on Dean. Stupid Lorelei almost had a decent moment of parenting, nearly pointing out this kid Jess’s many flaws, but then she blew it. As usual. So right now I’m just so concerned for Rory and her future. Oh, yeah, I like Paris, Kirk and Suki too. It’s these characters that outweigh the general awfulness of the show.
Now hush, Jess is cleaning the gutters and I know he has that bracelet of Rory’s. I just hope she figures out he is terrible before she jeopardizes her relationship.
Today’s bracelets are assymetrical brass Goodwill find now up at my shop, tiny HiHo Silver knot, cream Clic Clac, chain of silver hearts, and silver ID bracelet that read WWRS from Goodwill. I’m guessing that R is for Rita since she ‘loves ya’ on the flip side.
There will be no end of orange and black in October. The amount of orange walking around SF today is impressive. Smart retailers should always send their surplus orange clothing to stores in our town. And Detroit. Because who buys orange? San Franciscans do. I’ve got my orange poof coat, orange (well coral) pants, orange dress, orange scarves. How much orange do you have in your closet? Probably not as much as I.
Anyway, today is kind of exciting. Grab a seat, my dear readers, because I’m about to tell you about IVF.
Today was the first ultrasound to start the process, which, if you recall, is round two for me and my husband. I’m trying not to be someone who fixates on it, because that only leads to disappointment. For that reason I plan to not blog about it all the time, either. Just be all casual like, you know?
But it’s so interesting, I thought people might like to know what it involves. If I only knew about this stuff when I was in school, I think I’d consider it as a career. And then, oh! The bangles I could buy!!
I’m going through IVF because I have a low egg reserve and I produce few eggs. My follicle count (yep! Like hair follicles, your eggs grow in follicles in your ovaries) is naturally about 1 or 2 per month. Most women are closer to 6 or 8. When one of the eggs reaches a mature size, you ovulate, which means the follicle ruptures releasing the egg. So even though usually just one egg releases, many others grow but don’t release and become reabsorbed. IVF tweaks your hormones to encourage follicular development and to hold off the ovulation process so as to collect multiple mature eggs.
My IVF process is called the Antagonist Protocol, which I’m certain my mother would agree is an apt name for any process of mine. Right now I’m taking some 25 or so vitamins, then in two days I start some baby aspirin and a giant antibiotic.
November 4th we get down to the shot business. For about two weeks, my honey shoots me in the gut morning and evening with a bunch of hormones to stimulate the follicles into production. Fortunately these shots do NOT make me a crazy lady. Unlike when I was taking these oral hormones similar to Clomid that made me so angry. I got in a fight with my honey about dinner and I was all “if he doesn’t want dinner, fine! Then we will never have dinner again! Fuck dinner!” And I threw out ALL of our food. There was even a moment in that mania where I stopped to question my actions, to analyze if I was acting crazy and then I was like “Nope! This is not crazy. He needs to be taught a lesson!”
So the injections are much preffered. But our neighbors must think we’re junkies because there we are, sitting in the living room, my honey injecting me in the gut for all the people across the street to see.
During this period of time, I pop over to Kaiser every other day or so to get blood tests and ultrasounds that monitor the growth progress. Which is super easy because we are just three blocks away from Kaiser.
Then, when the follicles reach the correct size, they harvest the eggs by knocking me unconscious. That same day they collect my husband’s “specimen”. That’s doctor code for he has to retreat to a closet in the office to jerk off into a cup. Making babies is sooooo romantic!
They combine the best quality eggs with the sperm, and presto! Test tube embryos! And then we wait three or five days (fingers crossed for five) as the cells divide. Judging on the quality of the embryos, they then return a small number to me.
And then we wait two weeks. Which is the worst worst worst part. There’s a little “what to expect about the process” video they make you watch that is all scientific until this part where the doctor says “Those two weeks will feel like they last forever.” The doctor! The other funny part of the video was after reinsertion the doctor says “Don’t worry, the embryos won’t fall out.” Clearly that is everyone’s concern so they had to address it.
My goals this time (which I have absolutely no control over) are to produce enough eggs, have enough of them fertilize properly so as to have left overs to put into deep freeze. It’ll save me from going through the injections again which also cuts down on the cost. Shit be expensive! Oh, to think of all the bangles I could have 😦
Final share about the process, this is where the magic of life kicked in. Some of my dad’s life insurance payments arrived just when the bills started. So it’s still going on the credit card for the points, but we have the cash to pay for it in our bank account. It makes me cry, I’m so grateful to my dad.
Anyways, there’s that. Lessons here: always sign up for life insurance, and ladiezzz, no matter your age you might want to ask your OB about your follicle count. I don’t know if my life would be different if I had known at age 28, but maybe. Any questions?
Today’s bangles are silver Goodwill find, a stone Goodwill find, orange and black Clic Clacs.
My mom and I spent the morning packing up stuff in my dad’s apartment. Maybe this is a regular thing to discover after a death, but there’s so much of my dad that I’m realizing he kept from me. Photo albums of romantic trips to Venice, letters, birthday card jokes, the context of which I don’t understand. It makes me sad. We were so close, but I wish I understood him better. I wish he knew that I wanted to know these things about him. Maybe he’d still be here.
My mom found this ring in it’s gift bag in a drawer. Who was it for? Not me, his one daughter. He gave me bracelets, as you all know. It’s so heavy on my finger right now. Typing this is awkward. The ring is amber in silver. It’s mine now. But what do I do with it? What do I do with all of this stuff? My car is loaded with his coffee table books to sell at Green Apple Books after work today. What compelled him to buy so many damn coffee books? If there’s a lesson from this morning it’s that nobody need ever buy coffee table books and that dying reveals secrets but creates questions.
My bangles are the North Africanish bangle, Brazil, Clic Clac Orange and Clic Clac Cream.
It’s fall now, right?! I just read such a good mood setting Apple Cider recipe on Heather Bergdahl’s Blog that gave me license to wear my favorite dress. It’s a jack o lantern by I’m Your Present on Etsy. To tell the truth, I wear this even without fall license. For example, on my birthday this year. Which is in April. And I’m probably too old for this but I don’t care!
For my bracelets I have on my two orange Clic Clacs and a wide orange Calèche.
Today’s bangles are: a North African piece I bought years ago in the streets of NY from one of those sidewalk vendors, black Clic Clac, Astrologie Nouvelle, and two horn bangles.
So I’m here, at work, typing away trying to figure out wordpress stuff (why’s my picture HUGE when in draft form, huh? I don’t get it. I like the iPad app better) and a customer walks in and I’m all working on my gurnal and annoyed they are even present. Great customer service, right? Then I realize I always always think of “journal” as gurnal, grâce à Wet Hot American Summer. You’ve ruined me, WHAS. We can now add gurnal to my list of verbal must-says including:
1. Kiss my ass, Seabass
2. Chorkpop
3. Just for the Halibut
I can’t NOT say these things whenever I hear or read the trigger words. Only now am I noticing all but gurnal are food related. I guess that’s an improvement?
Are you addicted to word swappage? What’s your trigger? Also, thanks At the Library for teaching me how to insert a youtube 😸
Running out the door with my noir et or…. 🙂 parfum, Astrologie Nouvelle (from my honey at XMas), balcon de Guadalquivir, and black clicclac to match my panda necklace.
What color combo does this remind you of? Flag of India maybe? We got here the cream Clous, Caleche Verte, skinny Caleche Rouge, and classic Orange Clic Clac, with a horn bangle floating around in the mix.
Caleche x 2 + clic clac x 2 + my mom’s blue chain from the 80s.
Very Bangled 