Warhead On Legs

( Gaeilge )

I am about to the point of throwing my hands up in the air and shrieking "I GIVE UP" except that would be horribly misleading because giving up on me looks more like "FINE I'LL JUST SIT HERE AND STUDY LANGUAGES AND DANCE AND READ AND COOK AND SURL FOREVER." I think the usual definition of giving up looks more like hiding under the covers and never coming out, and I'd get awfully bored. Something. I'm giving up something anyway, and it might as well be hope and the delusion that going to DC in February will be anything but the last time I ever see my grandpa.

Yeah, it's down to that. They're moving him into my Mom's house because it's not so much that there's anything medical to be done, he's just very weak and would be better off living somewhere with people. I'm pretty sure he lived in that senior community apartment thing for less than a year.

So tired. I came home to that, told the boy, discussed whether or not I wanted him to go with me, decided that, yes, that'd be nice. Assuming there's time for him to get the days off and it's not a "Ok, hop in the car tonight/get plane tickets for tomorrow morning" thing. Heh. Bless my family and/or my credit card that that latter is even an option.

Stuff to do. In no particular order, I suppose: macro-edits for the Deli Counter story, finish two dime novels, finish a couple other blog entries, do another chapter in Graves, copy the Ogham alphabet to the Graves notebook, update my CS scratch pad (with eyeshadow colors for eyes, makeup brush cleaning solutions, among other things), make a schedule, tag Russian ep comments. When at home, cut peppers and brown meat. Probably make that into Skyline chili, that'd be nice. I'm so damn tired, and I have 1001 things to do, and all I want to do is take a week like my weekend and curl up with a book on the couch for hours on end. Maybe set an alarm to get up every 15 and stretch. That's not going to happen, is it.

All right. Let's start knocking shit down. At least I have chocolates and girl time to look forward to tonight.

( Gaeilge )

No Russian yesterday, largely because I got distracted and forgot. Need to quit doing that. But today, at least, I will start with the damn corrections from the past two and move from there. I also need to get back to picking up the house, not sure why that fell down as much as it did. Maybe just trying to get the blog post out on time and get back into the swing of things. And get rest. That's been in shorter supply lately than I'd like. At least we have groceries, and maybe the dishes will get done now that the boy's feeling better and I actually am sort of cooking again. One of the plus sides to the last week is that we ended up with shittons of leftovers we've been eating through.

Today! Today today. I have not gotten nearly enough done on Gods and Monsters as I wanted, mostly because blogwork in the evening but also because tired during the day. Argh. So I need to get that done, which, at least it's 3/5 of the way done. Maybe 3/4, depending. If I can get that done today, tonight I finish the Wed blog post and then this weekend I can go back to writing all the blogwork all mornings and my evenings can be freed up to do other writing stuff again. So, okay. Gods and Monsters today, and typing up the edits from the paper version of Blood in the Gutters which hopefully will clear that off. If I have extra time, more blog posts! This is totally doable, I swear.

Called Mom last night and got to talk to her, hear how Grandpa's doing which is... both good and not so. Apparently they think he's too old and too fragile for surgery on the bladder cancer or chemotherapy, so they're treating him with radiation only and palliative measures, comfort measures. On the one hand, that's a type of cancer that has a pretty good prognosis, pretty high survival rate. On the other hand, when Mom's talking around the phrase 'comfort measures' that makes me very uneasy. And on the gripping hand... I don't know. I don't feel as freaked about this as I thought I would? Which either means my imminent death sense isn't pinging or I really am okay with this. Which also goes a bit towards the grieving backwards, but ... something. I still don't know. And for all I know comfort measures doesn't mean the kind of imminent death that it normally does. It's funny, I meant to call Mom and freak out about a citation from the city about our weeds overgrowing the sidewalk (really? REALLY?) but that was a week ago, we got the all clear from the city after some weed whacking with a friend's machine, and now I'm pretty much fine and I was just trying to call her because I'd left a message earlier. And then this. I do need to get home pretty soon, though. See everyone. Say goodbye if necessary.

Still on the Falling Skies rewatch. Still love Pope. It's funny, two of the first things ... three of the first things we learn about Pope are 1) he's a Grade A selfish asshole, 2) He REALLY likes killing aliens, and 3) He has kids and an ex-wife. And the first two get a lot of play, but every so often he gets a moment with a kid, in a couple episodes in the first season it's the protag's kid, where you see how he can be paternal and caring in his own gruff way. There's a moment also in the third season, not with a kid, but telling some of his backstory. I love how they balance redeeming qualities with, generally, the kind of crap behavior that makes him a pain in the ass and hard to deal with. He's an unrepentant jerkass, and they don't do anything to mitigate that. It's more balanced than most portrayals, where the caring exists alongside the jackassery rather than replacing it periodically. I like that.

( Gaeilge )

That was not the early bedtime I was aiming for. Goddammit. And now I'm exhausted and I woke up wheezing again.

So, short Irish lesson today, though I did get a few more minutes done on Person of Interest. And a few exercises, and I'm starting out with poached egg eyes already, yum. At least this weekend was productive? I got things cleaned up quite a bit in the house, only to have things now full of weird stuff on every available surface because Aunt and Elf Lord brought things back from DC. Including some more of grandma's jewelry which I swear must have gotten mended at some point. I think. Also a bunch of old little knickknacks I loved, Grandpa's old Russian leader matryoshka dolls, which must have been duty free kitsch at the time but which I loved as a kid. And Grandpa's black fur Russian style hat. I absolutely adored that hat as a kid. The boy thinks Mom must have remembered me always wanting to wear it and play with it and put it in the box; maybe so. It's one of those things that's both poignant and delightful all at once. Helped, though, by the fact that this isn't disbursing things after a death, this is disbursing things after Grandpa decided screw material goods going off to live simply in a smaller apartment.

I also seem to have inherited grandma's linens, and great grandma's. Somehow I'd forgotten that along with all our eccentricities, that we're the type of family who has linens. I suppose I'd better get a suitable table for it now.

So, that happened. I'm not even going to try to start cleaning that stuff OFF all available surfaces till next weekend. Thursday I'll take pictures so people can see. Till then it's just surviving through another installment of Gods and Monsters and another blog entry that I completely forgot was mine to do this week, so ended up not doing it on the weekend like I should have. Oops.

I also did manage to go clothes shopping and escape with my self esteem intact. Amazingly. And four new pair of pants! At least two of which need to be hemmed, so I started that last night and depending on how soon I finish the blog entry, may finish that Wed or Thursday night. We shall see. I cleaned the house over the weekend, the boy mowed the back lawn, I didn't get weeding done but I didn't kill any plants and the second amaryllis is about to bloom, yay. I feel sure I did something else, but too tired to think of what that might be. Off to drag myself through work again, today, then. Woo.

ETA: Among the other things found in Grandpa's apartment are apparently land grants signed by Ulysses S Grant from the 1800s. My family, ladies and gentlemen.

( Russian )

Okay, that's apparently all the Russian 'm getting done today, on account of getting distracted by calling Mom and looking for my soft case (and sneakily securing financial aid on the dentist bill while I'm at it) and finding out about family stuff. And then babbling about the family dacha to Kiki. Oops.

So, okay, the dentist visit wasn't that bad. And by not that bad I mean I actually almost fell asleep in the middle of the root canal. That's how not bad it was. I love my dentist and his copious use of localized painkillers. I swear, I don't know what he's using but that shit could go for a fortune on the black market, probably. And it's not even a strong general! It's, swab with the gel, inject a local a couple of times, and suddenly all I can feel is the vibrations for a while. The vibrations are annoying, the smell and the sound is annoying. Having to get my own drool and the rinsing water constantly sucked up is kind of annoying, but oh my god the man is painless. I love him.

There's a tree down over half the road leading into the apartment complex. Just, crack, fell over, jagged edges poking up and everything. There's also caution tape in front of it, sort of, that fell down, so I'm assuming someone reported it and they're going to send someone out eventually, but. It puzzles me because while there was some sprinkling last night, it seemed like it was mostly sound and fury signifying no real precipitation at all. Hm. Either way, it made for an interesting walk. Definitely a walk, not a run. After yesterday and feeling weak most of the day, hot and sweaty the rest? No running this morning. Running tomorrow. (Always a boom tomorrow.)

So, grandpa's selling the family dacha in Shenandoah. Which is kind of sad because I did want to spend more time there, but when I was a kid and through my teenage years and into my wild and crazy plans it was a toss-up between there and, well. Here. With the farm and everything. And now I'm here, so I don't need to split my time between Shenandoah and Asheville. It's bad enough with the hour or so drive from the town to the farm. And I'm sure there's people in the family who could use the money, me with a spouseish type SO type thing out of work, my cousin with a year old? baby, my siblings in college. So, yeah. And! Plus. There's already restrictions in place on the land so that it can't be developed and such due to it being literally right up against a national park. It's protected land. So, woot!

Hopefully my damn chip case will arrive today. And then I need to find stickers to put on that and my bento. I made a bento lunch today! Which consisted at least halfway of leftovers. And I found a pretty damn awesome recipe for chicken last night, but I'm not sure what else to cook it with besides noodles. Although the noodles were good. So, hmm. It takes a while, though. Not time consuming to make, itself, but it takes 50 or so minutes to bake in the oven. Homemade shake 'n' bake. And before, lightly browned in olive oil, onions, and garlic. MMMMM. (Onion-sensitives may omit the onions >.> details to follow!)

When I was very little, up until the last few years, really, my grandfather worked for the World Bank. I don't know what his actual title was, but as far as I knew then he traveled around the world helping countries rebuild their economies. For me, this meant he was gone for weeks at a time, and when he came back he had stories and books and things like that. Little toys. Trinkets. Not the plastic tourist shit, though some of it was your standard fare. But also, strange things. He also brought me back travel soap. And travel bags. He flew first class or business class, and back then that meant that they gave you a little pleather or canvas bag with single serving shampoos, soaps. I had a bunch of those little bottles of "eau de toilette" and I didn't know what it meant but it smelled real pretty. This was right at the end of Pan Am, and I had a couple little bags with Pan Am on them. I don't know where they are now. Probably got thrown away. I remember their logo was white and blue. I think, a white globe.

I used those stupid little canvas travel bags for bloody everything.

When I was little, he would go to the Soviet Union. It took me for freakin' ever to stop calling it the Soviet Union. And after that I never knew what to call it because "former Soviet Socialist Republics" sounded way too clumsy but that's what it was. And saying just the Ukraine or Kazakhstan or whatever might have been inaccurate because it wasn't always just the one country.

He brought back all kinds of things from Russia and the Ukraine. Including, I think, stories of meeting with Gorbachev and the cabinet. I don't remember this very clearly anymore, but I remember he brought back two big books, one white, one red and green and gold, of Russian and Ukranian fairy tales. "Tales of Russia and the Ukraine" I think was the title of one of them. The only title I can remember now is Bash Tislek (sp?) the Man of Steel, but I can't remember what it was about. It was all full of three brothers who did tasks and combs that turned into forests and wolves that spoke and let you ride on them. I loved those stories as a kid. I absolutely adored them. I wanted to be a princess in the stories, but the kind that had adventures of riding on wolves and breaking magic eggs and things like that.

I also did want to be a ballerina.

At some point, we acquired a videotape of the Bolshoi Ballet performing the Nutcracker. I still need to get that on DVD. I can't remember who the choreographer was but I could if I saw it again, and it's probably the most common copy anyway, so its' got to be around here somewhere. Anyway, I must have watched that video a thousand times. I can still picture it in my head. And by then I was already taking ballet classes but that was one of the videos that made me want to become a ballerina. I wanted to run away and join the Bolshoi Ballet. My grandmother actually took me to see them when they came to the STates. I remember seeing Giselle at the Barns of Wolf Trap. I didn't go to sleep till three, four hours after the performance. I must have been eight or nine.

Grandpa brought back some more videotapes of the Bolshoi Ballet from his travels, but we couldn't play them. Stupid different formatting. We kept meaning to find a place that would convert them for us but we never did.

He also brought back matrioshka dolls. Lots of them. I think we had four or five sets at the very least. I remember we had two sets of Russian politicians, one that ended with Gorbachev and one that ended with Yeltsin. We had one set of American politicians, and at least one set of ordinary babushkas. That one was red, I remember. Predominantly red, with gold workings and then all the colors in the flowers and things. They were made out of... balsawood, I think, or something similar. They were very light and thin, but lovely and painted. They were on a cabinet near all the books, white and pressboard wood with glass shelves. I used to take them out and play with them, just arranging them in different ways.

Really, that's probably where my fascination with or want to learn Russian came from. Those dolls, and those Russian/Ukranian fairy tales. Maybe someday I can read them in the original. Maybe someday soon. Grandpa spoke a little Russian, I think, possibly enough to get by in the city, but I don't think he was ever fluent enough to conduct business in it. I asked him once, but he said he was never very good. I think, though, that he was proud of the rest of us because we all spoke Spanish. I don't know how good he was at that. Grandma was fluent; she translated at a free prenatal/post partum clinic in DC for a while until very near her death. Come to think of it, I think Grandpa is, too. I don't know if he remembers any Russian, though. But I think he can still speak Spanish with the family.

I forget a lot of things about my childhood, I think. Kind of like when Grandma died I whitewashed them over so I wouldn't be sad. But now I want to remember them. I remember that Grandpa taught me all kinds of high-minded-sounding ways to pad my papers with fancy language. He said economists and politicians talked that way. I was twelve. Thirteen. He told me that bankers really walked that way, when I saw Mary Poppins and Dick Van Dyke and the rest of them were doing their Very Serious Walk in the song about ... whatever. In the bank. He sort of translated it for me. I thought that was so cool.

I shoudl remember that I don't have to remember this all at once.