You're Doing It Wrong

Last night I got a call asking me to participate in a survey having to do with healthcare in Washington. My usual policy is to refuse to talk to anyone I don’t know when they call me on the phone during the evening while I’m trying to eat and watch my shows. But in this case, I’d already eaten and I did have a vague recollection of some flier sent to the house about a problem with Washington healthcare so I went along with it.

He said it was 15-20 minutes and he wasn’t kidding. Geez, there are few things we didn’t talk about. Both actual questions about my health, habits, recent illnesses mental and physicial and questions about my healthcare coverage and random situations in my household. Like: did we have a carbon monoxide detector? (no) did we read the little flier we get about our drinking water quality? (yes) do we have a gas powered generator in our home? (no) in the past year have we gone without phone service for more than two weeks not related to weather outages? (no) have I ever heard of radon? (no).

It went on and on. A lot of the questions were about my general health and as we were going through it was like, “I am kicking ass on this survey!” have you been so depressed you couldn’t get out of bed? (no!) have you ever been diagnosed with heart disease? (no!) used drugs with needles even just one time or had sex w/ someone who has? (no!) something about chicken pox in the past 2 years (no!)

Then we got to the alcoholic beverage intake question: in the last 30 days, how many days have you consumed at least 1 alcoholic beverage? (um, 30) how many days have you consumed at least 2 alcoholic beverages? (um, 30) how many days have you consumed 4 or more alcoholic beverages (zero, yes!)

I already posted this once and then deleted because it was taking too long to figure out exactly what I wanted to say and it didn’t come out sounding right. Instead of an opinion I’ll just give you the URLs and you can track down the stories and think about them quietly to yourself.

Recently several writers have been revealed as big fat liars. First, there was J.T. Leroy whose fake past included a stint as a truck-stop hooker and a drug-fueled time in San Francisco. I read one J.T. Leroy thing and thought he was a fawning nitwit. Turns out he was invented by a couple who claimed to have saved him from this life and was played by the man’s half sister.

Then there was James Frey whose tall tales were exposed by Smoking Gun and he got a good public flogging on Oprah for his trouble.

Then there’s the author whose fake name is Nasdijj who pretended to be a Navajo Indian when he wrote his heart-wrenching and totally made up memoir. The LA Weekly provides evidence that the writer is actually a former actor and gay porn writer.

Sherman Alexie read the memoir in galleys and quickly identified it as a fake. In spite of his objections, the book was published. When the author’s alleged true identity was revealed, Alexie wrote a piece for Time:

In 1999 a Native American writer, born fragile and poor on a destitute Indian reservation, published an essay, "The Blood Runs like a River Through My Dreams," in Esquire. It earned a National Magazine Award nomination and was later expanded into a memoir of the same title that became a finalist for a PEN/Martha Albrand Award. That rez-to-riches tale of courage and redemption sounds like a Horatio Alger story, doesn't it? … Of course, I'm biased, because, well, it's my story. Kind of.

Read the full story here.

On that topic, The National Review also does a story about people who claim to be Indian but are not claiming it’s “almost epidemic” which seems a little hysterical to me, but it’s worth a read.

Between 1960 and 2000, the number of Americans claiming Indian ancestry on their census forms jumped by a factor of six. Neither birthrates nor counting methodologies can account for this explosive growth. Instead, the phenomenon arises in large part from the increasingly idealistic place Indians occupy in the popular imagination. Much of it is based on harmless sentiment mixed into a hash of unverifiable family legends and wishful thinking among folks who hang dreamcatchers from their rearview mirrors.

The entire story is here.

A Girl’s First Drill
Remember back in November when I said I asked my Dad for a drill for xmas? (For some reason that’s not linking to the exact post so you have to scroll down to Nov 4 if you want to see it.) Well, I got one. It’s really cool. You have one battery that you charge and an extra so you can drill with one and have another on standby. You know, when you have a really busy day of drilling ahead of you. And it has a keyless chunk and 2 speed gear and there are bits and kibbles and all sorts of neat parts.

I need to think of some drilling projects. Maybe there’s an abandoned house somewhere and I can drill holes in the walls all day. Have you seen that commercial where that girl goes to Home Despot and the employee is this dad-like for real helpful person who helps her get her whole apartment spiffed up in an afternoon? That’s more than I’ve done in the last, um, eight years since we bought the house. Oh well, I’ve seen 5 seasons of Angel and 7 seasons of Buffy. Not like I wasn’t doing anything. And now that I have a drill that’s all going to change.

We’ve got a smoke alarm to reinstall. Let’s see how many holes I have to make before I can get it right.

Later, pumpkin pie baking. After this, only 12 more cups of pumpkin left.

I call this one: Picnic Area Closed

I finished a fantastic book yesterday: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. If you haven’t read it yet, you’re lucky because you have something to look forward to. I’ve been close to the end for ages but I have such a hard time reading right before bed these days. On the weekdays I’m fried and I’ll read a chapter or two and then I can’t remember anything the next day and I’m too lazy to read it again.

During this book I got some characters confused. But it’s over 800 pages and I was happy to be there for most of it. I woke up at 3am yesterday but I was thrilled because I was wide awake and had no interruptions and could finish the book.

It’s about magicians in England in the early 1800’s and it has so many incredible details, and footnotes and side stories and background stuff that it became hard for me to believe the author had made it all up. (She does blend in some actual historical figures, I understand that she didn’t make those up). I chose a few things to check online and everything lead back to the author. What an imagination.

It’s not raining at this second and it would be a good time to get back out there and hack at the roses, except my hands and arms are sore from yesterday. Perhaps a more powerful pair of nippers is needed.

When Ya Gonna Ring It?
There are certain bands that I like the idea of but never listen to. The White Stripes (or White Strips, as I keep typing) is one of those bands.

Actually I’m not sure I even knew what they sounded like but I’m not 22 anymore and my entire self worth doesn’t rely on being hip to the latest bands so I never know what the next big thing is until I’ve been beaten over the head with it and it’s already last year’s next big thing. Apparently at the moment it’s Arctic Monkeys.

But back to the White Stripes – they were on The Daily Show and they played this song called: My Doorbell.

For some reason when he was singing it, I thought he was saying, “I’m thinking about my love bell, when ya gonna ring it, when ya gonna ring it.” And I thought that was sort of clever and went around singing that to myself for a few days.

Then I heard the song on the radio and realized he was singing “I’m thinking about my doorbell … “

I suppose euphemistically or metaphorically [do either of those words apply? can you use them interchangeably?] my version and Jack’s are going for the same idea. But with further thought, my version is fairly 80’s hairband Warrant “Cherry Pie” cheesy.

But then think about his version. He could be thinking about his latest fashion statement: those black and red Lederhosen he found on eBay and when is UPS going to deliver them?

Is there something going on that I need to know about? It took me 18 minutes to drive home from work tonight. I drove the actual speed limit at 6pm on a weeknight. I tapped my brakes once at the bridge. For a second I thought I was doing something wrong.

Say Nothing
I have an index card that I scribble on when I want to remember to write something here. I have no idea where it is right now and really, nothing to write about. But that won’t stop me.

Over the weekend I had zero obligations. Sometimes I think having too much time is like having not enough time. I had so many ideas for things I wanted to do that I couldn’t get started on anything.

I worked on my Photoshop with my new book that Erin gave me for xmas. The thing about a book is that you work through pages for several hours and then all you’ve done is learned about a couple of tools and shortcuts. You haven’t made anything. So I skipped ahead to Ch. 18 so I could work on a tutorial but now I didn’t have the benefit of learning about the other 300 tools and shorts cuts from chapters 2-17. After trying to quick mask my Delphinium for about 45 minutes, I’d had enough of that.

I figured out how to backup up my iTunes. I think. I still don’t understand sound file formats and data v. audio and what’s best and what converts to what, etc. I transferred a whole lot of something onto a disk.

I bought the Jose Gonzalez. I used to buy 3-4 albums a week way back in the day. Now I hardly listen to what I have and apparently I’m some aberration of nature because I don’t like to spend money on things I don’t use. Now I buy about 1 album a year. I didn’t even remember how the iTunes store worked. Shouldn’t there be a big “check out” button?

The other computer project I did was I finally wiped Yoda (my green iMac) and reinstalled the original software to prepare it for donation. There’s something appealing about it as an objet d’art but it’s so heavy and takes up so much space that it’s going to be nice to get it out of the house.

Wow, this is the most boring post ever. All we’re missing is a list of what I ate yesterday, then we could slip into a coma.

I GOT THE SONG
It’s Deathcab for Cutie, Soul Meets Body and I figured it out using the search engine and lyrics. I just kept trying.

I thought it might be something we have in the house and turns out: WE DO.

Other newly discovered favorite: Jose Gonzalez.

Sew Lookie Here
Have I written about sewing yet? I can’t remember.

I’ve been talking about taking a sewing class forever and when I quit writing that was one of the things I wanted to do. I wasn’t sure what to do about a sewing machine. I knew Mom had one. But I also considered buying one. I checked PatternReview.com to get an idea of what sort of features I should think about and that sort of thing. I found a whole thread on beginners and sewing machines and they said, whatever you do, don’t buy your first sewing machine. You need to find out whether you like sewing and what you want to make before you run off and buy one.

Priscilla had already given hers away but 1 email later I had my hands on Doni’s (according to the owner’s manual purchased 2-7-80) via Kathy. This was back in the Fall and I was taking Photoshop then so I decided to take a class in Winter. It starts Feb. 1.

The owner’s manual said if you hadn’t used the machine in a few months, you might want to oil it – only with sewing machine oil. Since I didn’t even sewing machine oil existed, and since who knows how long since the machine’s been used – I thought it would be worth it to get it serviced. I first went to Sears but as I wandered around I realized it’s a godless place and I didn’t want to spend half the afternoon waiting in line and then have to go back across town and wait again to pick it up.

Instead I took it to the local House of Vacuums and Sewing Machines (yes, a real place). Gary told me my machine was “a tank” and couldn’t say enough good things about Kenmore. When I mentioned I was a newbie and starting a class, he told me when I pick it up he will give me a 15 minute demo so I’m not the biggest loser in the class. (My words). He’s now by best friend and if you need to spend any money on vacuums or sewing machines: go to Hazel Dell to the place next to the bowling alley on Hwy 99.

In preparation, I cleaned out my sewing box, which was a gift probably 30+ years ago. It’s very cute and it’s been filled with all sorts of little treasures that I never use but could never throw away: a little change purse in the shape of a boot that my babysitter Mrs. McMasters gave me. It has “Pammy” taped to the bottom; a fan that my Grandma brought back from Japan, a harmonica, a yo-yo, money from Egypt, Belgium and France and my girl scout sash.

I noticed I earned the sewing badge. Wonder what I made. Probably the little blue pin cushion in the sewing kit.