Tiny Little Mopeds in Your Mind.

My employer is moving to downtown Detroit after being in our current building for a bazillion years. It's a good move because the city where we are currently located is a pretty depressing place. There's a retail area/strip mall that is completely empty. There are "WE BUY GOLD" signs and a Planned Parenthood. Don't get me wrong. I'm a huge fan of Planned Parenthood. I got my prenatal care there when I was first pregnant with my son and didn't have medical insurance. But Planned Parenthoods are not usually in the most desirable neighborhoods.

I went to a nail salon once by work and it looked like a place where former nail technicians go to die. The bottles of nail polish were all dried up and there wasn't a bottle of disinfectant in sight. I think the last time it had received a good scrub was probably somewhere around the Carter administration.

I have a co-worker who used to get blowouts just down the street from our office on Fridays for $20. She was so excited she found a place to give her hair a blowout for $20! The only problem was that the hair stylist gave her said blowout while simultaneously smoking a cigarette. My friend did notice she smelled like smoke on Friday nights. So we renamed the $20 Blowout, "The Smokey Blowout."

Anyway, it's quite industrial, this stretch of a highway. It cuts through the east side of Detroit and carves a path through a town that's been left behind to slowly rot into the concrete that surrounds it as folks move further and further north and leave this old Blue Collar town behind. This is the kind of town that was inhabited by the workers of the many automotive plants that loom along this stretch of road.

Most days I look out my window and see concrete as far as my eye can see. Concrete parking lots. Concrete buildings. Concrete sky. It's a town that's been built up and beaten down by the very industry that sustains it. Anyway, moving to the thriving entertainment district of Detroit will be quite an improvement for us in many ways. Downtown Detroit has a lot going on (despite what you may have heard) and we will be right in the middle of all of it. I'll also be able to have lunch with my husband on occasion, who also works downtown. We'll be like real city folk instead of the boutique suburbanites we've become.

So there are moving boxes and oddities littering the halls of my office building now. We have to box up all of our personal belongings and take them home. Only our desk chairs and our desktops (if we have them) and two containers of office supplies and other necessities will be moved to the new location. I walked by a typewriter today. I saw an empty Miller Lite can in the sink. I sifted through artwork that my son Cracky made for me when he was a toddler and I had just started working here. He drew me as a large balloon-like lady with sticks for arms and legs. I'm so enormous that I dwarf everything else in the picture, including his Defensive Tackle father, himself, the sun, the moon. I am that god-like and all-powerful. Seven years later and I still think he sees me that way.

In other news, my teeth ache from a new Invisalign-type device my orthodontist has inflicted on me in order to shove a wayward tooth back into place. It's like the first week of braces all over again. When I take the retainer off, my teeth feel loose and wiggle in their sockets. My gums throb with the beat of my own heart. I believe orthodontia would be a good torture device. I'm surprised our leaders haven't looked into this. I mean, sure, yeah, it's cruel and painful. But all of our war criminals leave with nice straight teeth! You can't Geneva Convention us for that.

Just kidding. I don't even know what the Geneva Convention is. I write ads for a living.

I started off the week with a bizarre form of food poisoning from red kidney beans. Did you know that they're toxic when they're undercooked? Yes, yes, they are. You either need to eat them out of a can or you need to make sure you boil them for 10 minutes on the stove. Do not cook them in a slow cooker.

REPEAT. DO NOT PUT DRY RED KIDNEY BEANS IN A SLOW COOKER.

If you get nothing else from my blog today, please get that.

Apparently cooking dry kidney beans over long periods of time at 80 degrees or less increases their natural toxicity 4-5 times. I was so violently ill, I didn't know which way or out of which orifice things were going to rocket out of my body. (Apologies for the graphic nature of this kind of poisoning.) After the third or fourth trip to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I briefly wondered whether I could simultaneously reach one end of myself towards the toilet and the other end towards the sink. It was that bad. And worse. But my husband says there are some things I probably shouldn't say on the internet. This coming from a man who is known for being inappropriate and having no boundaries. So, I think I will heed his warning and keep my description somewhat vague. Needless to say, I lost 6 lbs in 6 hours on the Hell Bean Diet. Cook yourself up a batch this weekend!

Then, after all that, I got in a disagreement with my husband. (Re: He was wrong and I was right and he refused to see that.) I guess two people aren't at their best when they've projectile evacuated all the liquids out of their bodies through every available orifice. And it wasn't really a fight, fight. Like, there weren't any punches thrown and I didn't take a baseball to his brand new car. Haha. I know he just flinched while reading that. But truly, I hate conflict of any sort. So does he. Whenever we have a disagreement, we both go and nurse our wounds silently in our own little pain caves. I think we both feel as though each hurtful word has been administered like a baseball bat to the tender hood of a BMW. Hahahaha. Just kidding. (I bet he's removing all the bats from our garage right now.)

All kidding aside, I do feel beaten down. Have you ever noticed that when you start off your day with a good hard cry, you feel it in your eyeballs for the rest of the day? I can still feel the salt in my eyes, left there like tiny crystal reminders of an earlier pain.

God. Relationships suck. They are so much work. They get right down to your deepest, darkest places. The places you were most hurt when you were most vulnerable. They conjure up the ghosts of our youth and reenact them like a morality play and you're the only sinner. Blergh. "Working it out" and "Compromise" have been the mantra of my adulthood. These are relatively new words for me and so I'm having to navigate this whole "Conflict Resolution" thing like a stranger in a strange land. I thought running away from conflict solved conflict? If I run away, the conflict is far away. See? All better! This new way is complete bullshit if you ask me. But I guess the trail of disastrous relationships that I've left in my love-wake suggest that maybe it's time I tried a new way. So fine. I'm doing that, but I'm doing it under protest (even if it was my idea).

Aside from all that, I'm stuck in a rut in my book. I'm about 2/3 of the way done and I feel like it's become monotonous. I feel like I'm telling one chronological story after the other, with a neat beginning, middle and an end. I want to break free and not write in any order or not meet some specific plot device. My writing coach is helping me with that. She's given me some free-writing exercises to play with this weekend that have nothing to do with plot. I just want to roll around in the words and luxuriate there. My tiny womb of words. My dreamy cocoon of images from my youth. I want to say something beautiful that has no point.

I want to paint you a picture of a lovely boy and how he looked when he pulled up into my circle driveway in the full lush of spring. I want you to know what it was like to run out of that dark house and into the bright sun with a boy on a moped waiting there for you. I want you to know what his heartbeat felt like when you wrapped your arms around him and got away. Any away. Didn't matter where. And he never asked too many questions. He never judged.

"How bad is it?" he would ask.

And all have you had to say was, "Bad" and he would drive you away like a white knight on a tiny little moped.

Yeah, so it might've been bad, but I had a boy on a bike who would come and get me and take me away. Sometimes life gets to be too much and I close my eyes and I scoot off on a little Honda moped in my mind.

Beep beep, baby.

God it's good to drive. To have a license and a credit card. Maybe it'll take me to the mall where everything is shiny and beautiful and new. It's never that bad if you have someplace to go. Someplace to be free. Someplace where nothing ever changes, beans never go bad, and you never have to compromise like a grownup ever.

Yeah, I wanna go there.

Nude Year Resolution.

I don't care for New Year's Resolutions. They seem like opportunities to disappoint oneself. If I'm going to enact change in my life, I'm going to do it throughout the year and not in one grand statement per annum, thank you.

But if I do make a New Year's Resolution, I try to make it fun. Usually it involves sex or going on vacation or having friends over more often. It never involves weight loss or quitting things that are fun. You get the gist.

So this year my resolution is to go to bed naked every night.

(Sorry mom and dad. And apologies to my son who may google my name someday and find this. I tried to warn you. See? You should listen to your mother.)

Anyway, if you're naked fun things are more likely to happen. Clothes get in the way. They communicate distance or at least offer a bit of a challenge. Going to bed naked every night is an invitation. An open door. The gateway to Sexy Town.

Just kidding. I would never say "Sexy Town." Well, not without laughing.

However, even if it doesn't lead to sex, naked skin leads to more direct contact. Skin on skin contact. I think humans never lose that infantile need to have skin on skin contact. We need it to thrive. All of us. The warmth of skin is healing. The warmth of skin can save lives. If you're freezing to death, you're supposed to strip down naked and get into a sleeping bag together. Or something like that. I read it somewhere, once upon a time. It's the kind of folk knowledge that comes from living in Michigan and other cold places.

It's also 12 degrees here on this New Year's Day. The cat won't get off me. I'm wrapped in a fuzzy blanket and wearing a turtleneck. I've got the thermostat cranked up to 72 but still I feel a draft. Seems like just the right time of year to make a resolution to get under the covers each night without a stitch of clothing.

I've never really been a fan of pajamas anyway. They're so fussy. They get in the way. Seems like we were made naked and we should be naked more often. Give your skin a chance to breathe. Maybe rub up against the naked skin of whoever is in your bed. Yes. I'd say let's have more of that this year.

Happy Couples.

The hilarious Mr. MandyFish.

Yesterday was our 4th wedding anniversary. My husband and I had agreed not to buy each other gifts, but then he decided he wanted to take me shopping anyway. "Gifts" is one of my love languages. He asked me if I needed anything and I didn't since he'd already bought me presents for Buddhakamas.

"I could use a winter purse," I finally said, after he questioned me further.

So we went to the purse store. I tried on various purses and carried them around for him and posed in front of the mirror.

"Do you like this one? Or this one?" I asked, switching the purses back and forth in front of me.

"I like them both," he said.

"Or how about this one?"

"I like that one too."

"Do you like the black one better or the white one better?" I asked, quickly flipping the purses back and forth so he could compare them.

"I like them both."

"I can't decide."

"I think you should get the one you love."

"I love them both. Maybe I love this one more?"

"I knew you wanted that one."

It was an innocuous conversation. Occasionally the saleslady would chime in, but other than that, it lasted about 15 or 20 minutes, I would guess, until we picked out the purse that I loved best. I hugged him and kissed him on the cheek at the register.

"Thank you so much! This is so nice of you! Don't I have a nice husband?" I asked the saleslady.

"You do have a nice husband! But you must be an awfully nice wife who deserves it."

"She definitely deserves it," my husband said.

"It's our anniversary," I added, as if to explain.

"Well you both give me hope for relationships. You seem like such a happy couple."

I was taken aback when she said that. I felt so pleased to hear her say it. It's not often that you consider how you appear to others. I know I genuinely like my husband. I enjoy spending time with him above all others. He's my best friend. He's also the most hilarious person I know and the smartest person I know too. That's an amazing combination. We crack each other up on a regular basis and we learn from each other too. I think we make each other better people. But man, do we both hate conflict.

In fact, we hired a new marriage counselor to help us deal with conflict. In our first session, I told the marriage counselor that I felt like we had a good marriage. Enviable, in fact. But what I wanted, was a great marriage. I wanted one of those marriages that lasts the test of time. I want to grow old with this man. I want us to continue to treat each other kindly, I want to adore one another when we're both old and gray, and I want us both to deal with conflict in a calm and measured way.

But neither one of us is calm and measured when it comes to conflict. Aw hell no.

Personally, I just check out. If I see conflict, I head for the hills.

See ya!

Buh bye.

And that's no damn good for a relationship. I can't spend the rest of my life avoiding conflict. Not if I want to experience intimacy. And so, since things are good between the two of us, we felt like it was time to rock the boat.

Contrary to popular opinion, the best time to seek marriage counseling is not when you're in crisis. If you want to effect change and push yourself to be even closer than you already are, get your ass in therapy when things are good. That way the relationship is strong enough to handle the challenges that therapy can bring.

I suppose it seems like all the cosmic forces in the universe are conspiring to bring my husband and me  closer together. I never imagined I could be this close to anyone. I never thought anyone would know me this well and still love me this much. I mean that. It's sort of mind boggling and it should be scary but instead I am incredibly grateful. I've got an able partner. A partner who is equally ready, willing and open to this process. I think it's beautiful. He blows me away on a daily basis. I've got myself a thoughtful thinker and I can't quite believe he hasn't figured out that he could do better.

He'd probably say the same thing about me, of course. Which makes me think we're a pretty good match.

Anyway, it felt pretty great to hear a complete stranger say that seeing us together made her have hope in relationships again. I'd like to think that we're putting out some good vibes into the atmosphere. I'd like to think that we'll become one of those great relationship success stories.

Our new marriage counselor, after hearing each of our backgrounds, said it was incredible that we'd even found each other at all. She said it was like The Glass Castle met Angela's Ashes and The Liars Club all mixed together in two people. There's a lot of dysfunction and damage in both our of childhoods and yet we found each other somehow. Each of us an empathetic soul who knows what it is to come through hell and back just to survive. I think it's that fighting spirit that will keep us together. I don't see either one of us ever giving up on the other. I may be a fool to put that in print. Part of me is afraid of jinxing it. *Throws salt over shoulder.* But I think something special happened when we met. Kismet. Birds of a feather. Or perhaps we met in a previous life. That sort of thing. We really get each other. It'd be a shame to see such a special pairing go to waste if we didn't take the time and care to nurture it.

And so we do.

I can say that this 4th year of marriage has been the best year yet. And we've had some pretty great years, don't get me wrong. I've known him for 8 years. Almost a decade. Strange to have accumulated this much time already — it's gone by like a heartbeat.

But it's been a lot of work. Don't let anyone tell you different. Relationships aren't easy. I don't like promoting that kind of bullshit ideal. I don't think it helps anyone. We should all be honest about our relationships and admit that they are a shit ton of work. They devastate us. Castrate us. Prostrate us. And then they lift us back up. But if you find someone worth all of that effort, damn, work your ass off on that one. They don't come along quite as easily as you think. I know from this from experience. My husband and I broke up once for 10 months when we were dating. We almost lost each other and that would have been a shame.

I had a rule once upon a time that you should never get back together with an ex. My theory was that you broke up with the ex for a reason, and if you got back together, you would eventually break up again over that same issue. I've only made one exception to that rule and that was my husband.

Thank god I gave in a little that one time. I tend to be a tad stubborn.

I can't quite express in words how lucky I feel to have him in my life. I never thought I would meet anyone like him. He's special. He's the smartest man I ever met. He's hilarious. I mean, side-splitting, inappropriately hilarious. We spend much of our time trying to shock the other with our over-the-top, inappropriate humor. I can tell you, there is no greater joy for me than making that man laugh his ass off.  I feel like the wittiest, smartest, most hilarious person ever when I make him laugh so hard he closes his eyes.

I live for that.

And he repays me with kindness, thoughtfulness and generosity. It's pretty ridiculous how attentive he is. Sometimes I think his only aim in life is to make me happy. In fact, he often says, "Happy wife, happy life." He's that dedicated. (And that wise.) And I dedicate myself to him in the same way. Fortunately we both like the same things. Good food. Nice restaurants. Going to the movies. Spending time with our 5 kids, whenever the older ones are around. Watching HBO and Showtime. Reading articles to each other. Talking way past our bedtimes about life and love and what does it all mean. And making each other laugh, of course.

I suppose it's a simple life, but I never thought I'd have it so good.

So thank you to my husband. You're the best time I've ever had, baby. And that's no lie. I can't wait to see what the next 4 years (or 40) might bring.

Let's grow young together.

Diagnose, This!

A couple of weeks ago I went into the walk-in clinic for some drugs. I'd had a slight touch of the Bubonic Plague for about three weeks and the chronic headache seemed to suggest that I might have developed a sinus infection along the way too. The doctor prescribed a Z-pack and I was good to go.

Until the next morning, when I woke up covered in hives all over my chest and stomach.

Apparently your body can turn on you at any point, people. Your body is a betrayer. One day it's all "Hey, I'm cool with antibiotics" and the next day it's "Fuck you, Cure!" So the days of azithromycin are over for me. Enjoy your youth while you have it, Millennials. Behold. I am Ozmandifish and I am here to tell my tale.

I called the doctor again because I figured hives aren't good. I'm pretty medically savvy that way. I was put on amoxicillin and steroids and I was supposed to get better. Strangely enough, the hives did not go away. I was beginning to worry that they were a permanent feature now, perhaps karmic retribution for the fact that I never got stretch marks with either of my two kids.

I KNOW. I'M SORRY. I DIDN'T EVEN USE COCOA BUTTER OR PUT LOTION ON MY SKIN. YOUR GOD IS NOT A JUST GOD. WHAT CAN I TELL YOU?

Then I woke up this morning.

The ugly red welts were redder, angrier and spreading even further. They were all over my back and all the way down to the tops of my thighs. My breasts and abdomen were covered in angry red welts. It scared me.

I ran to show my husband, who was still in bed.

"WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME? OH MY GOD THIS DOES NOT SEEM LIKE AN OPTIMAL STATE OF HEALTH. DO YOU THINK I HAVE SOME MUTANT STRAIN OF LETHAL MEASLES?" I asked, calmly.

"I think I can diagnose you," he said.

"Really? You can?" I started to calm down.

"I think you have an acute case of HOTNESS! YEAH BABY!" he waggled his eyebrows at me.

"Oh my god. What is wrong with you?" I said. "I'm clearly in a health crisis and you're horny?"

"All I see is a hot naked woman in my bedroom. Oh yeah!" He narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips.

"I'm calling the doctor. You should be ashamed of yourself," I went to find my clothes and the number for the doctor. I did not collapse due to some imminent state of allergic asphyxiation, no thanks to my husband.

You'll be relieved to know I'm on even more steroids now and I've been taken off the amoxicillin. Apparently I'm allergic to that too. And you can also rest assured that my horribly disfigured body will apparently not effect my relationship with my husband. So I've got that going for me.

I Think I Might Have Broke Me & My Husband Wants Me Dead.

True love.

I'm sure I've groused about the same crick in my neck and right shoulder before. I carry all my stress in my shoulders, you see. When I drive, my shoulders hunch up around my ears. I clench my jaw. I'm a very stiff person and not in a good way, if you know what I mean. Wait that doesn't even make sense, I'm a girl.

At any rate, I'm real uptight.

And because of that, I walk around like the Hunchback of Notre Dame half the time. I cripple myself with my own neurosis and up-tightedness. I'm very tense. I like to pretend like I'm this real easy-going, Devil-May-Care, Buddhist type, but really, you could bounce a metaphorical quarter off my psyche.

I've been going through this whole rigmarole of getting massages constantly until my neck and shoulder are unclenched from their death grip of stress. It takes four or five weeks of consecutive massages until I'm not in constant pain.

And then I stop going.

A few weeks later and I'm back in my state of crippled paralysis.

It amuses my husband to no end. Not that he isn't sympathetic, of course. I mean, he's the one that has to rub my shoulders and neck every night while I wince, whimper and flinch.

"You really are a delicate flower, aren't you?" he asks, unwisely, because he is straddling my back and has left his unmentionables vulnerable to a stray elbow of retaliation.

"Very funny. OUCH!" My voice is mostly muffled into a pillow while he inflicts pain on my wrecky body.

"How are you going to outlive me if you're so fragile?" I can hear him snicker and it enrages me.

"I'm not going to die of neck pain, you ass."

"I dunno. You might," he says this in a mock regretful tone, as though he is really sorry that I might die before him.

My husband and I are both competitive types. We might be overachievers. We might even be obnoxious about it. Our entire house is a battlefield of who can be the most OCD neat freak of the land. We each think the other one is losing that battle because we each have separate definitions of what constitutes neatness. I like to scrub and Windex things. He likes to move things off the counter and hide them in nonsensical places like drawers and cupboards. It's not a satisfying battle because we each think we are the victor and we are each frustrated that the other won't admit defeat.

It is in this environment of two competitive freaks of nature that we fight over who is going to die first. Normal couples wouldn't discuss this, I don't think. Or at least they wouldn't be vying to be the one who outlived the other. I think you're supposed to feel like you couldn't live without your spouse and hence would never want to experience the pain of losing the other one? Or something like that.

But no. Not us. Because it's a competition over who's healthier, fitter or may I point out, YOUNGER.

I'm 9 years younger than my husband. And women are supposed to outlive men by 7 years on average. That puts me at outliving him by a good 16 years. I've pointed this out to him and it makes him furious.

"There's no way that is happening," he says. "The sheer rage of even the slightest suggestion that you would beat me will keep me alive."

"That's a fine attitude. I'll have that engraved on your headstone."

"I'll have my ass bending over mooning everyone engraved on your headstone."

"Nice. I'll be sure and bring that comment up when you're dead and I am living with my sister and our 17 cats."

"That's fine. Just never remarry. Dedicate your life to your children and family."

"Don't be ridiculous. I've told you that you could remarry once I've been dead a year and no sooner. You should at least give me that courtesy."

"A whole year?"

"Yes. One year. You need to learn how to live alone and not marry the first woman who lets you touch her boob."

"So no dating whatsoever for one year?"

"Yes. We've had this conversation before and I was very clear."

"But what if someone just let me touch their boob without buying dinner. Would that count?"

"Yes! No dating for one year means no dating for one year! And no sex whatsoever. Dating or not."

"Not even a hand job?"

"NO!"

"Can I 'accidentally' touch some lady's butt in the elevator?"

"God no!"

"Maybe I don't' want to outlive you after all."

"Exactly. Just get some more cats to keep you company."

"Can I touch their butts?"

Clearly, the man can't live without me. And yes I totally realize he's not going to an entire year without the comfort of a woman if I were to pass away. But I've told him I'm going to haunt him and whisper criticisms of his sexual performance in his ear just to ruin the fun for him. Now that's true love, when someone goes Poltergeist on your ass.

Merci. I Have No Idea What You Just Said.

Once a week I've been taking the kids to a French bakery around the corner from my house. It's almost impossible to find an old school bakery anymore. Everything's a chain or it's crap. But the French bakery is the real deal. The owner is French. Like French-French. She closes the shop for the month of August so she can return to France. Like that French.

Hohh hohh hohh.

(That's my French laugh.)

Anyway, I take the kids to the bakery and they each get to pick out one thing. A cookie shaped like a cat. An éclair au chocolat. A tiny sweet shaped like a frog. Pain au chocolat. Whatever they want. I also get a loaf of bread (pain de mie).

I like ordering things in the French bakery because I studied French for 10 years in school, including college. I also spent a summer there during high school as an exchange student of sorts. I lived with a family who had a home in the Haute-Alpes, but they also had a summer home right on the sea in St. Tropez. (I know. Rough life, n'est-ce pas?). And an apartment in Paris. And a home in Nantes. I got to see a lot of France and spoke nothing but French the whole time I was there. I've returned to France once, about 15 years ago, and at that time I spent two weeks there with the same family. Other than that, I haven't practiced my French much.

But hot damn, I can order a pain au chocolat and a pain de mie like a Parisian, I swear.

Bien sur.

Though I order everything correctly, I've never spoken French with the owner and she has never spoken it with me. So last week, I said, "Merci" after she rang me up.

Now in my fantasy life, I have imaginary conversations with French people in which my French flows smoothly and expertly. I say many charming and hilarious things. My accent is perfect. My command, excellent. Unfortunately I have only participated in fantasy French conversations  for the last 15 years, so my memory of how good I was back then is how I assume my French skills still remain.

What happened in the French bakery last week was not the same as what happens in my imaginary conversations with French people. What followed my simple "Merci" was a litany of French words flown at me so fast my little Francophile brain spun around in le cranium.

I think I heard something about my children ("Les enfants") and I don't know what else happened after that. I sort of blacked out. I know that I smiled and nodded and said "Merci" again, as though she was complimenting my children. She may have been saying they were spoiled brats. Wait. That's not true. I know how to say that in French. But you get my point.

I'm assuming I say "Merci" like a fluent person. I mean, this lady was off and running with me on a high-speed highway of the French language. I'm sure she was disappointed when my eyes glazed over and I mumbled sorry little phrases like, "Merci. De rien. Au revoir et bon soir!"

SIGH.

After we left the French bakery and my French shame, we walked next door and got Maman a bottle of vin. No one spoke French at the liquor store. Tant pis. We got two bottles of chocolate milk and a bottle of red wine. I felt a little guilty. Like, here's this lady with two nice kids and their wholesome bottles of chocolate milk ... and here's mommy's booze to help drown her French sorrows. Though I suppose if I can't speak the language anymore, at least I can drink the wine.

A votre santé!

I Think My Professor Is Trying to Kill Me and You Might Not Blame Her.

Eight papers in one semester. 

Eight papers in one semester.

EIGHT PAPERS IN ONE SEMESTER!

Have I mentioned that I have eight papers due this semester? For one grad class? I know I'm being a big whiny baby about this whole going to school at night thing while I still have a full-time job and am writing an epic book that will move America to tears of laughter and sorrow and will poetically speak to the beautiful human struggle that is adolescence and will spectacularly conclude with all of us joining hands like that Coca Cola "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing" commercial only we'll sing "Kum Bah Yah, Motherfuckers" and we will be even more joyous and raucous and super fun than those people in the Coca Cola commercial, only with less 70s armpit hair because nothing crashes a party like too much armpit hair and not enough modern deodorant. Not that there's anything wrong with the crystal rock you rub on your pits so you don't get cancer, of course. Did I mention I was up until midnight every night this week working on my third paper? Wait. What was the point of this?

Hey, even I don't even know anymore.

Oh, yeah. My point was my therapist mentioned that maybe I don't have to work quite so hard on these papers. Maybe I don't have to get a 100% OMG A+++++++++ in this class. And honestly, I had every intention of dialing it in this semester and doing as little work as possible to just coast by and maybe get a B in the class because who really cares, it's just grad school for teachers and I just need the credits, I'm not trying to impress anybody.

And then I started actually taking the class and writing the papers and remembered, oh yeah, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, I'm super-competitive and I need my pats on the head and my gold star on my forehead. I can't stop. You can't stop this kind of brainiac nerd magic. You just can't. So if I'm going to write a paper, I'm going to write the shizz out of it. I'm going to sparkle and shine.

Some of us just shine. We can't help it.

I would like to now add a note for all of my Facebook friends and let them know that they should be thanking me for the restraint I've had while NOT reporting every grade I've received in the class thus far. When I was in college I used to tape my report cards on the refrigerator for my first husband to see. He was an engineering major so he wasn't getting the 3.9s that I was getting as an English major and I think he pretty much wanted to kill me for plastering our refrigerator with my A's and my letters from the Dean. So what I'm saying is that Facebook is now my refrigerator and all of my friends are like a bunch of first husband engineers who would hate me for crowing about my good grades. So like I was saying, I'm really proud of my self-restraint and how much I've matured since I was in my twenties.

Either that, or it's just that now there are things such as blogs and I can inflict my ego on the internets and leave my poor family alone. Okay. I'm not really leaving my poor family alone because I may have run up to my bedroom and pumped my fist and did a little dance of victory for my husband after I finished my paper. And then I told him how awesome I was.

Feel free to send him sympathy cards.

Anyway, I think this blog post is a good representation of my state of mind right now. I'm sort of hyper and I don't know how I'm supposed to go through this emotional rollercoaster five more times before December. Anyway, I'm thinking about writing a book about the Stages of Grief of an Academic. Here's the outline for the first chapter:

Emotional Stages of Writing a Paper

1. Dread

2. Despair

3. Avoidance

4. Resignation

5. Panic

6. Fatigue

7. Hope

8. Mania

Clearly, I'm on Stage 8 right now. I apologize for this post. But it's better than buzzing around my office and talking like a spaz to my co-workers. Oh who are we kidding, we all know I'm going to do that as soon as I'm done typing this.

Does anyone have any left over Halloween candy? I think I need a sugar buzz. Whoo!