Rainy Monday

Thanks to a fairly high dose of prescription Ambien and some more than decent red wine, I've actually managed to get +6 hours of sleep the past two nights in a row. Sure I know it's prob not the most healthy approach to bedtime, but hell - I was so tired I was starting to hear voices. Sooner or later they were going to convince me to walk naked down the overpass or something equally newsworthy.

My apologies for depriving you all of the story.

The architect came in with all of the forms to fill out for divorce yesterday. I was more than a little surprised at the suddenness. I mean, sure I guess I figured it was going to happen, I just thought maybe we'd have a conversation about it or something first, you know? Like I'd get a little forewarning, not just a file folder on the kitchen table when he popped by to help me fix my closet door. He says he wants to get it all over with so we can go back to being best friends, and that he wants me to be happy. He says he wants to start dating and wants me to do the same thing.

I laughed. I'm a chubby, almost 40 loser in a state packed full of lithe blonde prom queens. I'm hardly the ideal date. He's gonna have no problem. In fact he told me that he's already got a girl that he's been talking to. I kinda suspected b/c there is one particular new face on his facebook page that rang an alarm bell for me. C'est la vie, I guess. At least my blog will get (somewhat) interesting again.

annum

So it has, believe it or not, been a year since the architect and I got hitched.

I'm pretty pleased with that situation.

I mean, they say the first year is the hardest. I dunno if I believe that, but I do know that we made it through ok and that I'm just as certain I'd marry him today as I did 364 days ago. (technically our anniversary is tomorrow but we got married on the Saturday and this time last year I was getting my nails did so.....)

When I look back through this blog I read about how I was so convinced I'd never be getting married - always be on my own (probably still in my parents' basement), always be sad. Just goes to show, I suppose, that there is someone out there for everyone.

Here's to many more
xo

So... new images

I'm possibly the luckiest girl in the world, in that I got pretty flowers and bee glasses and dinner at a french bistro and an afternoon adult-themed interlude in the shower. Of course I'm not *that* lucky because the sweet innie car is acting up, so we couldn't go watch hockey in anaheim today.

sigh.

Holy crap when I changed my shirt today, I took my bra off and there was a black cat hair stuck to my nipple and I had a minor heart attack. I saw my sexlife flash before my eyes and imagined weekly waxing sessions at the hair salon. Quelle mortification. Luckily, though, one of the cats was just wearing my bra when we were out last night. Does anyone else's pets romp through their undergarments when they aren't paying attention?

Yeah, didn't think so.

happy vd(ay)

So what with being at home all day I've had some time to get a little crafty. I like playing around with photoshop (I'm self-taught so not that remarkably skilled, as of yet), and I like words, so I muss about and combine them now and again. Take this little image, for example. I came up with it, borrowed a few lines from my main man bill shakespeare, and had them printed onto a transparency (you know, for overhead projectors). Then I folded the transparency over a piece of silvery vellum, stuck a square of pomegranate cardstock to the center of the vellum, wrote some smushy love crap on the cardstock and hey presto, a valentine for the architect.

Look at me go.

Baxter! Is that you? Bark twice if you're in Milwaukee!

guess who found the camera!
well the architect, technically, but still. same difference, right? there was huge drama in the house today - the architect was pissed off & the kid was partially to blame so there was door slamming and yelling and wall punching and it was not fun all over the place. i came and hid in the bedroom and tried my best to stay out of the way. they have similar tempers, those two. le sigh. i hate arguing.

we're off to san deeahhgo today. the weather is calling for it to be sunny and lovely and warm, which is well needed and much better than here where it is supposed to be raining and nasty and gross, though not that cold, apparently.

i shall be spending the next few days (while the architect works) sunning myself and shopping. i can think of worse ways to live.

off i go!

there's a hole in my bucket

in which case my bucket is actually my nose and what is running from that bucket is not water but something else. something much less pleasant than water, let me tell you.

last night my sinuses were so congested by the time i got home from work i popped a couple of tylenol multisymptom allergy pills at 6.30, was asleep by 7.10, woke up to drag myself to bed at 9, and didn't get up till this morning, at which point i still felt high.

yes high - not stoned or drugged up these things made me feel like i'd taken some e full of heroin. seriously. not sure that i enjoyed it. in fact, if i wasn't fairly well versed in various states of altered... er... states i probably would have been freaked out like nobody's business. thank god for illegal pharmaceuticals preparing you for the legal ones.

in other worlds, tomorrow is the architects birthday. i took the day off so that (assuming i feel better) i could take him on a bit of a day-trip type adventure. we are going to go across to bowen island and take the bikes for a spin around if it's nice enough or otherwise just poke around and have a bit of lunch. i think that's a fun day and he seems up for it. tame, yes, but we are going to wolfmother tomorrow night and out with a bunch of people on saturday so it all will come together nicely, i think. i still want to get him a bit of a giftie, but may head out at lunch to see what i can come up with.

there's a bat caught in my chest hair

so how much do monday mornings suck rocks? it's cold, rainy, i took my meds before i went to bed last night so my sleep sucked, the architect is padding about the warm house sporting sleepy eyes and comfy clothes and i'm here. at work. yay.
x`
so it's the architect's birthday on thursday. we're going to see wolfmother and (i think) to see kaskade over the weekend to celebrate, but i have no idea what to get him as a gift.

you see, he has *way* more disposable income than i do, so when he buys gifts he does things like ... oh for example... orders me a new macbook for valentine's day. (insert mad extremely excited giggling here). i, however, am on a major budget, so am not sure what i'll be doing. i know i'm making him a cake, but other than that..... dog only knows. a new hoody? i know he wants a sonicare toothbrush, but isn't that kind of practical gift boring, unromantic and... well... practical?

i get by with a little help

ever have the desire to turn your friends' personal quirks into a drinking game? we used to do it with instructors all the time - i had one who discovered electronic music. every time he mentioned the crystal method or kraftwerk (or spoke german, for that matter) we all took a sip of whatever beverage we had in front of us. of course, the class was at 9am so it was usually coffee, but i will confess i did on occasion supplement the coffee with the baileys.

the architect and i want to do it with our little group of friends. for example, chlorina swears. lots. so every time she says fuck, you take a drink. her boyfriend says wow. lots. same deal. the architect has a bit of a stutter. when he stutters, you drink. me, i blush. i blush all the time, for reasons that you'd never expect. when i blush, everyone drinks.

now this game can, of course, be expanded depending on the group of people you are with. i'm excited about trying it out. it's a great way to laugh at yourself, and to break the ice when you are introducing new people to the group - you bring someone in, you let them know what their little quirk is, and everyone watches for it. fun!

anyhoo - give it a shot if you are out between now and saturday. let me know if it works.


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on the decks - in the mix by tiga & ajax

even if we're just dancing in the dark

it must be said that i make fucking awesome lasagna for a white girl of irish descent. that was my big deal of the weekend - spending half of saturday simmering meat sauce and putting together dinner. well that and riding around steveston on FJ (the cruiserbike i got for christmas) with the architect and the sister. the weather underground kept promising a sunny beautiful weekend but we've been socked in by grey for two days - the skies open up for an hour or two of sun each day before the fog descends. downfalls of living on the ocean, i guess. i really do need to see some sunshine, though. i had huge plans of sunnyday bicycle riding which have not particularly come to fruition. le sigh.

i wish i knew where my camera is - i imagine it's hiding in one of the four boxes still resting unpacked here in the bedroom. every day they stare accusingly at me and every day i ignore them completely. it's like not staring at the pink elephant in the room.

i'm updating my blogroll (spo has a new one) and my dancecard today. i'm having one of those days where i want to spend no time at all away from my computer because i feel as though i'm on the cusp of a breakthrough and i can only reach it by writing. sometimes it takes me putting fingertips to keyboard to be able to really work these things out, you know?

i do know that it has to do with me & the architect and the huge fight we had last week about the only thing that's ... off with us. it has to do with sex and i know you'd never expect that from me but lately all i've wanted to do is go to sleep and i'm not sure why. i think it has something to do with the weird labels in my head and how deep down even though i love sex and am proud of how sexy i am, in my head fucking the way i want to be fucked is dirty and isn't the way that good girls act. and here i am, now, being a good girl - faithful and happy and content and and and. who is this puritan in my head? who put these words these doubts in my soul and why doesn't she just want me to be happy? somebody tell the voices to
just
shut
up

hey big spender

ok so the architect was in a really blah mood yesterday. we had the world's most quiet drive home. once we got in the door he retired to his office to check his email and i put my jammies on and crawled into bed.

this part is hard for me, you know. i'm used to dealing with my own moods, but navigating someone else's is kind of new. the kiddo just gets grumpy - if you leave him alone till he's ready to talk you emerged unscathed by the sharp edge of his tongue. the architect, though, i'm not familiar with to the extent that i can easily separate his ... blues, i guess from me - i can't *not* take it personally. i'll learn, i guess.

anyhoo - i dealt with it by being stupid and cheerful in an attempt to elicit a grin of some sort. once i could see him begin to come around, i suggested a visit to a restaurant i noticed in tsawwassen - illuminate (ill-oo-min-ah-tay). an expensive dinner for a wednesday (dinner and wine for two came to $130) but well worth it when we emerged both smiling and full (mmm i had venison osso bucco). then i took him home and fucked his brains out. rawr.

twas the best of - slash- worst of

**edit** - i started this on the 30th... i'm a bit of a procrastinator, this week. since i'm on vay-kay, all i want to do is lie around in my jammies and read, especially since we ended up not going away for the new year (my back is spasming, the architect has a deadline). anyway onward...

ah the ubiquitous (sp?) list...

1) most frustrating / fascinating debate about me, carried out by people who've never met me: well it has to be a tossup between this one and this one. seems so long ago. plus now i wish i could sit them all down and say "ha! told you so! look where i am now!"

2) worst song of 2006: again, tied between that fucking my chemical romance song (oh for the days when they used to be good), the hinder song about cheating on your girlfriend, or that other 'ladies and gentlemen' song. ohh or maybe the evanescence single? too many to choose from...

3) albums i listened to the most: fabriclive 29 - evilnine; back to mine - adam freeland & back to mine - liam prodigy; 10000 days - tool; alexisonfire - crisis; beck - the information; DFA Remixes - chapters 1 & 2; dj champion - chill 'em all; kasabian - empire; rise against - the sufferer and the witness; swayzak - route de la slack; snow patrol - eyes open.

4) most disappointing album of '06 - sam's town by the killers. hands down.

5) my favourite post i wrote last year: april 5, 2006

6) my favourite movie - a scanner darkly
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ahh i dunno.. i've lost my rhythm. the architect is feeling a bit down today. he's regretting not going away with his friends this weekend, a bit, and worried that we are turning into a 'normal' couple. he doesn't want that - says he doesn't do well with routines and schedules. what do i say to this? we have gone through a very busy month - moving and families and christmas and and and. i hope he's not regretting asking me to live wiht him. it's only been a month - if he's feeling already that things are stagnating we can't be long for this world, i don't think. oh that makes me sick to my stomach, thinking that.

happy blog-day

that's the first photo i ever posted of myself - one year ago today. it's funny, isn't it, what changes a year can bring? (warning - i'm feeling a little emotional 'cause i haven't taken my meds in .. well long enough to feel the effects, but not long enough to have brain shivers)

three years ago in the sanatorium: "this would be my first attempt at this. i am, if you will, a blog virgin. i've been thinking about the wierdness of connecting with people on the internet. it's not like i have trouble meeting people in *real* life-- i am just fascinated by the sheer volume of people that i have no other way of coming in contact with. does this make me a bit of a tart? hmm i wonder."

it's funny, 'cause even as i wrote those words, three years ago, i never thought anything would ever come of this meeting people on line thing. i never really thought i'd develop virtual relationships with like-minded human beings all around the world - people whom, even though i've never really *MET* them, i still miss when i don't hear from them / check in on what's up in their worlds. i wish that i head the means to send plane tickets to him and him, and her and him, and him and everyone else here to have a big party in my house with lots of drinks and stories and drunken teary-eyed confessions and laughter and more drinks. i wish i could, but i can't. the thought is there, though, and the invitation is open - we have an extra bedroom, and some couches, and a kickass purple chaise and they all are open to you, all of you, where-ever you are if you feel like a holiday or a break and head my way.

and, less than a year ago, i met this great guy online. he's incredible, the architect, and, while he may raise an eyebrow if i were to announce that a whole bunch of blog people were coming to visit, would never question it or anything else. he'd just sigh, pat me on the head, and check to see if anyone had bothered to dust the spare room since the *last* time someone came to stay. we're going away on friday. but in the next couple of days i'll try to put together some of my favourite memories of the past year - whether they're good or bad, they are what they are and they made an impact on me. i'd like to hear yours, too, if you don't mind, but whatevs.

xo

a snapshot of life at raspberry's house...

email exchange between the architect and i this morning:

him: what's this world coming to when i have to defrost desserts in anticipation of my lunchtime sugar jonesing?

me: I am a bad, bad girlfriend. Clearly. How dare I prepare several family's worth of baking and then store it in the FREEZER?! For shame....

him: exactly. you're going to get a spanking tonight young (sizzling-hot) lady.


we like spanking...