Monthly Archives: June 2004

If Pat were alive I would be so angry at her…

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Perhaps one of the biggest mysteries of my adult life has just been solved, I think.

To back track, I loved my mom in a lot of ways (and by the way, Pat would have balked at my invoking the word love in her direction, forget about publicly, that would have been inexcusable), but in so many ways her irrational…I don’t know the word to use… phobias, maybe, but also belief system, whatever it was, it was infuriating. The saddest thing about her death, which I think affected a lot of people, most especially her siblings, was the sense it didn’t have to be. Not like with a sudden tragedy, act of god, car accident dramatic sense of it didn’t have to be. No, a literal couldn’t this whole thing have been avoided somehow feeling. Maybe I’m not explaining it well, but throughout the funeral and still to this day, you almost couldn’t, can’t help comparing other women her age (or the age should would have been) and thinking “Hey, they’re alive and doing stuff, why isn’t she?” She allowed her life force to just slip away.

There were symptoms, harbingers of the reality, something just ain’t quite right. Hair loss (and I don’t mean thinning I mean long gone), dessicated skin, appetite issues, chronic pain and wearing sweaters in June. The pain was epic and omnipresent. Walking ached and ached some more over that. (She always said she was arthritic, and she had been treated sometime circa 1964 for it. She never had any of the swollen, gnarled joints of arthritis, and who the fuck knows where medical science was 40 fucking years ago. The weird part is it was always about walking and her legs, but not about her knees, and almost to the end she used her hands to build dollhouses, still able to grip and lift.)

And, of course, there was the chronic depression, which could have been the angst of her ancestors, who wrote poetry and drank and described a bitter and real life and made themselves miserable and wonderful simultaneously (at least, I guess, that’s what I think of when I think of people like Joyce and Shaw). Maybe it was depression with cause, like the three people I know who broke a little bit of her irreparably when they died (a brother, a husband and a boy, essentially part son, part grandson, but it’s complicated). And, those losses were the big ones, the earthquakes. There were more and more life things conspiring against her, sometimes you could almost think, who wouldn’t be depressed?

But, today, with one phone call that’s part worry and relief, all of the questions are answered. It’s all just a fucking hormone. A slight imbalance, adjustable and maintainable by modern medicine.

I’ll stop being all philosophically, bullshitty and cut to the chase, my sister called. She’s not been feeling well (the depth of that statement is really only just being revealed). Finally, she went to the doctor, who was shocked to find she is rocking the charts with record high scores in whatever the test is that comes up hypothyroid!

So, what if you have hypothyroid problems, what happens? From here I got this list:
Fatigue
Weakness
Weight gain or increased difficulty losing weight
Coarse, dry hair
Dry, rough pale skin
Hair loss
Cold intolerance (can’t tolerate the cold like those around you)
Muscle cramps and frequent muscle aches
Constipation
Depression
Irritability
Memory loss
Abnormal menstrual cycles
Decreased libido

I don’t know about the constipation, menstrual cycles or libido, because we weren’t the kind of family to ever talk about that stuff, but I’ll vouch for the rest as matching the very things Pat worried about most.

Fucking hell, she should have gone to the GODDAMN doctors.

Red, the anti-blue

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Firstly, in re the post below on the All Asia show, if you are reading this malarkey, and for some not fully explicable reason decide to come on down to the All Asia and check me out, here’s an idea. If you come up to me and say, “Hey, I’m here because I saw it on Dee-Rob.com,” I’ll buy you a beverage.

If you’re a friend or loved one, it will be the beverage of your choice. If you’re a fun-loving stranger, it will likely be a PBR. If you’re a comic, who has read this post, and reads other things from the Boston comedy scene it will be Diet Coke, rich with the goodness of Nutrasweet, unless you’re scared.

Now, to explain the title of this post. Lately, I’ve been sporting a red leather, biker style jacket (zippers, snaps), and it just makes me laugh. For a bit in the 80s I thought for sure red really would become the new black. Twenty years later, I realize that red leather never really caught fashion fire apart from the flicker when Wacko Jacko was first reengineering his face and was too young to really be a pedophile.

Meanwhile, I think I may be inadvertently turning into the kind of person I hate, practically bristling with positivity. The red probably veritably frames my upbeat, fucking perkiness, a bubbling cheerleader color of precious “spirit.” Fucking hell, smiling folks suck. I realized this horrible reality, my developing douchiness, when talking to another female comic chick, who is much younger than I (most are). She had just broken up with a guy, and a reference she made on stage reminded me about my ex. After breaking up with that astronomically flaming asshole, I drew a line in the sand for myself — No more fucking assholes. Better to be alone than to be apologizing for breathing or waiting for the eternal, perennial other shoe to drop. Fuck the world, I thought back then, now my decisions are for me and my happiness.

I assume it is not purely coincidental that I happened to come across M. post facto of that declaration. Take care of yourself, and hang with people willing to do the same.

So, I’m giving the young comedy chick a ride home, and fucking hear myself, all chipper big-sister like, talking about how she should stay away from the fuckheads, who it seems have been older and baggage ridden, and find herself a nice boy with whom to do nice things. You know how the cliche runs that people who are all happy, couple-y want to find everyone else a happy, couple-y hook up, and the world would then be full of happy, couple-y, bubbly, joyous couples? You know that one? I give all who read this free reign to punch me in the forehead if I start fixing them up or any other such bullshit.

Big fucking deal, M. has turned out to be the walking incarnation of my pre-teen jones, Kwai Chang Cain. Doesn’t mean I got any more sense than I did before. (Yes, M., I know it should have been Bruce. But, I’m a white, suburban chick, product of my environment. I was too young to crush on Cato)

I got no right to be inflicting my mood on other people, good or bad.

Check it out

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Quick scan of a paper flyer.

If you want to see Dee-Rob stand up, check out Sunday, June 13, 8-10 p.m. at the All Asia restaurant in Central Square Cambridge (334 Mass Ave.). The show is Janet Cormier’s Comedy Madness with comics riffing on :”School Dazed.” There’s a $5 cover. (I promised I’d advertise, but I haven’t hung a paper flyer anywhere since I needed a roommate senior year of college…get it? I’m already doing the “school dazed” references.)

Should be fun (and what the hell, it’s Father’s Day and I’m an orphan. Pity me).

flyer

(No doubt the resolution/appearance of a scanned piece of paper must suck in this virtual media. Never fear, I’m sure my OCD will kick in and I will fiddle to a farethewell in Photoshop.)

Note to self

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Write the following in a list on this space about your boyfriend:

  • Doesn’t say “Goodbye” at the end of a telephone conversation
  • Sometimes ends a phone conversation so abruptly I’m not sure it’s ended

    • Less than 24 hours later, you receive a well-vocalized, punctuated “Goodbye” notifying the phone conversation’s end.

    Hmmm. Must use this power, somehow. But, how?

    Digging the Internet

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    So, I’m in like month two or so of the horrible computer plague known as DEMONware. As I’ve written before, it’s a bizarrely regressive system, like going all old school with an Atari set hooked up to a black and white TV. I couldn’t write any more yesterday about the time sucking, soul draining content of the meeting after meeting spiral with which the day had dawned. I couldn’t write on account of the pain, the haunting, aching throb. Here’s the deal on what I learned and needed a day to digest. Apparently, this “enterprise system” that promotes full “business integration” blah blah on it’s website is comprised of various modules that DON’T SPEAK to one another (or at least in a mutually satisfying language).

    SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, in the meeting we were talking about various reports that might be generated from the various databases for financial management (‘cuz, like I thought getting reports, like, you know, output, was the purpose of databases). Turns out (Even though, and here I’m just bluesky estimating, quite a few organizations, and by quite a few I mean every single fucking one of them, has to manage paying people) the payroll component (where the money comes out) doesn’t speak directly to the rest of the financial system (where the money comes from). Now grok this, will you. They aren’t sure if they can write a report that shows who got paid, how much and from what account on a single report, because those are different areas. Think about that. Imagine, a huge fucking multi-million dollar system, supporting a team of scurrying implementation experts, and quite a few well-paid consultants, for over a fucking year, and a fucking abacus is more efficient. Not only can my credit union tell me who I wrote a check to, when I wrote the check, which account was debited, and for how much, it can also provide an on-demand image of the check, all on the Internet. But DEMONware cannot tell me any obvious details, like annual salary on what account. (It will give me weekly (even for people paid monthly), and I have been advised by several implementation experts that if I multiply by 52, I will have the total. Oh.)

    Words like integration, relational and fucking tools are lost in this database maze. I am not the databases’ master; I am slave, I must submit. If it tells me to open a new screen, I must. If it needs a numerical code, it is up to me to look it up on paper, as I must feed the machine. (I shit you not, after many help desk calls and discussions at meetings, they are rolling out tools to help with input and look-up and whatnot. And, what do you need when you have a fully integrated, web-based information system at your fingertips, according to the experts? Word documents to print out and hang on your wall, so that you know what fields mean.) Wasn’t there a whole magical computer movement when junk started getting, say, labeled and you, end user, could throw out your paper cheat sheet of codes? Did I dream that wonderful sense of freedom from memorizing shit and instead having intuitive tools that worked with me, the end user? Is that my Brigadoon?

    But, my favoritest part of all? Imagine say a free angelfire.com or geocities.com website. Imagine a teenager with 1,000 friends, a gigantic buddy list, the ability to cut and paste every flash animation, icon, wacky font, color or widgit, available on other free sites, and full-sized jpegs galore of every day since junior high began. Now, picture that page loading, strobing banner ads and chockful of design-nightmare toys. As it loads, go make yourself a sandwich, IM thirty people, and just let that puppy load. Imagine now, a DEMONware inquiry page loading simultaneously.

    GUESS which one would win?

    The brightside? Thanks to this man, I now know where headquarters lie. So, if later in this life, I happen to be driving cross country, and there’s a mishap in Peoplecrap land, I will swear it’s a coincidence.

    List

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    Several ways in which my boyfriend is like the reincarnation of my mother (insert gratuitous (or tragic) Freud reference here):

  • Likes a nice slice of Spam, fried
  • Doesn’t say “Goodbye” at the end of a telephone conversation
  • Sometimes ends a phone conversation so abruptly I’m not sure it’s ended
  • Likes to give me backhanded compliments, followed by an explanation that it’s so my head doesn’t become big
  • Worries about how much vacation time I take from work (I’ve ended years with extra that has to be forfeited)
  • Thinks Building 19 is like a treasure hunt
  • Enjoys lying on the couch with a blanket and the TV tuned to all news all the time
  • Won’t relinquish control of the “clicker”
  • Marvels at the wonders of an all-you-can-eat Asian buffet
  • Encourages me to get ice cream at an all-you-can-eat Asian buffet
  • Gets a little nervous when you want to spend great big gobs of cash on a single meal (that isn’t an all-you-can-eat buffet)
  • Has little or no patience for people who don’t appreciate the value and necessity of voting
  • Occasionally gives me credit for being smarter than I actually am (shhhh, don’t tell)
  • Makes me laugh
  • Gets called “quiet” by other people (think closet gregariousness)
  • Talks with an accent (man, I miss my mother’s Boston-speak, she came up with stuff un-imitateable and irreproducible)
  • Wouldn’t get new glasses until far after the need was apparent
  • Will do without something for awhile in search of the perfect ratio of phenomenal bargain and satisfying purchase
  • Can’t understand why someone wouldn’t pay almost anything for a child’s education
  • Doesn’t really swear and tsks when I curse too much
  • Absolutely hates the word “shitfaced” (see above)
  • Hates beer
  • LOVES coffee (and can make a cup so strong it almost hurts)
  • Will save me the last piece of something shared or put some shrimp on my plate

    • OK, that’s enough. I’ve creeped myself out. Maybe tomorrow I should work on how they are different. (It’s really the phone thing, the Spam and the voting that had me thinking.)

    Why does work always suck on Monday?

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    Back in the office, after a morning of back to back meetings. Same issues, same people equals a new formula for inertia. Actually, it’s the same old formula for inertia, the one where a body at rest stays at rest. In this case, no matter how many meetings you have to discuss doing something, it ain’t the same as actually doing something. Is there anywhere in the known universe where meetings are actually productive and there are direct results attributable to them? Doubt it.

    By the way, I wish there were a gameshow scoreboard in every conference room. Then, whenever the same people who invariably comment or ask questions that pertain only to their tiny specific world with no translation to the larger world involving a group (you know, the people with whom you are having the meeting), you could press the scoreboard controls and create that annoying buzzer noise that universally means “wrong answer there, sport.” If I wanted to wake up early and jump into a conversation sans coffee about the one piece of paper that is important to you, I’d call you. Else, how’s about we keep it general. (The scoreboard idea is my compromise from writing that those folks could be stabbed with meeting quality, jailhouse shivs. Ever since that blogger got fired from Harvard for various unprofessional wackiness, I figure no reason to cause unnecessary suspicion over the quality and quantity of my psychotic nutbaggedness.)

    And, for the chick who thinks she’s in charge, the word is “USE.” “UTILIZE” is the most over-utilized (yeah, that’s a joke) word in meetings. I don’t utilize reports I use them, the same way that I don’t utilize a spoon to eat my cereal.

    I really should be trying to purge myself of a morning of meetings by actually doing something besides writing here. But, one more point of order — A big shout-out, or whatever the young people say, to a fellow D-Rob. I always knew at heart that I was an adolescent boy (thus explaining the over-active and immature libidinous thought patterns), but now I have the synchronous nickname to prove it.

    Oh, and more self-indulgence

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    I’ve been trying to decide if I can make a joke out of something that’s been in my head. But, it’s so much a part of my alley cat morals and is perversely dark enought I can’t tell if it’s only funny to my pathetic soul, rather than an audience of normal people.

    Towhit — After spending a few days with the geographically distant man in my life, I’m depressed that my vacation brings me back to my celibate existence. Being in a serious relationship with mutual caring is nice and all, but I almost wish I were alone. Then, if I wasn’t getting any, even if there was no man on the horizon, I’d have hope. I mean, when you are single, you just never know when you might be able to get laid. Any stranger on the street might be the one to scratch that itch. Guy at a bar, man at work, cab driver, the list is endless. Every day brings fresh prospects, being alone is hopeful and positive. But, in a relationship? Where’s the promise of a future, the hope?

    OK, it sucks, and it (I hope) doesn’t exactly ring true. But, goddamnit all to hell, it is darn tough knowing for absolutely, for sure, that this girl ain’t be getting any something something for friggin’ months.

    Goddamn maybe it's the rain

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    I now know who thrives in the relentlessly chilly, wet New England this town has become. I almost tripped over this guy on my sidewalk: Slug Positively fat and thriving in slug splendor, a doubtless happy citzen of what has become the land of no sun.

    I spent the weekend foolishly. Foolishly in a funk. Unsocial, make that anti-social, too much inside my own head, questioning every aspect of my life. Maybe just every now and again you got to wallow in the blues, but I’m beginning to bore myself. Not to mention, I honestly know some folks who merit much more some honest to god blues. Mine is transient and self-indulgent, while some people close to me are bitching less about so much more. Shallow and moody, yep, I’m a true humanitarian.

    Perversely, because I enjoy when we are living in parallel (if not together, what with geography and all), I was kind of pleased that M. seemed a tad grumpy this weekend as well. He was ranting in relation to the upcoming election that Democrats who acted without hope of unseating the prez were damning themselves and deserving of what they get. Without hope, he believes, why try, why bother, why live? He’s not usually the one ranting for folks to die. I hope the worst of me hasn’t rubbed off on the poor guy.

    I for one did what I could for the cause, happily wearing my new T-shirt Fuckbush to the mall to buy some stuff at Radioshack. I had previously been happy and proud that my hair is now of a length suitable to demurely hide my decolletage in Lady Godiva style: Godiva (Mostly, I’m happy and proud, because I never had long hair during the rest of my life. A chronic gum-chewer with a busy, harried mom equaled permanent pixie cut or maybe the occasional bob.) Anyway, sadly, the long hair obscures the power of the fuck Bush message. Ah, see, another pointless thing for me to be irrationally sad about. Will the self pity ever end?

    Look if you want to see my delirium

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    Oh, and the product of my efforts, web-wise, is this pale, thin opus. Sadly, the site is offered free as part of my webhosting, but doesn’t let you fully edit the style-sheets or page elements. So, I fought uphill and rigged the whole thing quite unsatisfactorily.

    I am kind of happy with the slight redesign of this page.