Day 15 – Your “comfort” book

L. M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables.

I’ve given up on finding the name of that stupid video game. I’ve looked at COUNTLESS video games produced from 1980-1995ish. I’m sick of them right now. Will suggested that, while it might not have been made by a high school student exactly, it could easily have been “homebrewed” and passed around to friends/acquaintances/whatever, and not a “real” release from a company. I don’t really care to find it anyway, and not remembering the title has stopped bugging me.

I’m still very much enjoying the bellydance classes. In fact, it looks like in September I might be performing the choreography we’re learning right now, at this sort of arts/crafts/town-fair thingy – kind of like the First Fridays in Hillsborough, is my understanding. Anyway, my teacher (Sara) has a two-hour block of time for groups or individuals to perform, and she’s let all her students know, in case they’d like to perform. So…assuming other students are up for it (1-I’m not ready to perform on my own yet, skillwise nor confidence-wise; 2-the choreography kind of needs a group of people, and I think wouldn’t look as good with a very small number), and I think it’s a good bet they will be, I’ll be performing. I’m pretty psyched, but also pretty nervous. Trying to focus on the psyched, though. I’m making a ten-yard skirt (ten yards around at the bottom; tiered, so not ten yards at the top) for it. I went to JoAnn’s tonight in search of fabric – I have a scarf I was going to use as a hip scarf, and was trying to coordinate my skirt fabric with it. Well, I found a good fabric, but then – of course – I found *the perfect* fabric, and they didn’t have anywhere near enough of it for the skirt. (I need 8 yards. Well, apparently it can be done with 5, but they didn’t even have 5 of this fabric, and I’m going to follow the pattern religiously at least for my very first skirt, so 8 yards it is.) I didn’t buy any fabric, nor thread nor decoration for the hem (since I’ll want that to match the fabric), and came home hoping I could get the 8 yards off their website. No dice. And of course that particular fabric is a brand that JoAnn owns, and so only JoAnn carries reliably (and couldn’t find it on ebay or similar). I ended up finding some fabric at Fabric.com that I liked even better, and ordered it. It should be here middle of next week, and then I’ll have two weekends/two weeks-ish, maybe three, to sew furiously and work this skirt out. But I think it’ll be manageable. A couple rectangle tiers with an elasticized waist? No probs there. All the ruffling by hand might kill me, but we’ll see. (I found one ruffle foot at JoAnn’s, but had no idea if it would fit my sewing machine, so…I may go back for it, as hand-gathering is a real pain in the ass, especially for more than ten yards. I think it would be on the order of…fifteen yards at least, that would need gathering to attach to the previous tier. Yikes.)

The only problem is, that fabric…it might match my scarf, but probably not. And even if it does, it might be too busy for me to put them together. (I don’t mind busy, actually, especially for tribal costuming, but I learned at JoAnn’s tonight that I am particular about “busy” – some stuff works for me and is visually interesting, and some stuff is just too much.) So I, uh, kind of caved in and bought a coined hip scarf. Pre-made. And not one of the cheap ones on Amazon – which I’ve seen in person and are not too shabby, I mean “cheap” as in price. What I got is, in my opinion, still reasonably priced, not super-cheap, but more sure to fit me than what Amazon’s got. The only thing is, that scarf won’t ship until Monday or Tuesday, and then it might take up to two weeks. So it may not get here in time for the performance. But! I still want it, and if it doesn’t get here in time, I’ll figure something else out. (The Folkwear pattern that has the 10-yd skirt also has a pattern for a hip scarf, so, worse case? I take a scrap of skirt fabric to JoAnn’s, find something that coordinates, get like two yards, and sew up a scarf, too.)

What I am currently REALLY drooling over, are the sari belts Moondance Bellydance has. (You have to scroll down, sorry – no direct link to the sari belts that I can find.) But I don’t know that they’re quite long enough for me. Also, for the fabric I just ordered, I’d want a copper or dark gold belt, neither of which appear to be in stock. I am seriously drooling over these belts, though, so I may suck it up eventually and get one, and try to figure out some way to add to the ties’ length if they’re not long enough. Or at least have the belt in hand as an example to work from, and make myself one that’s long enough and the colors I want.

Costuming is addictive. But so much fun!

My first semester of ninth grade, I went to this science/math/technology magnet school in Greensboro, and they gave (well, loaned) all the students laptops. Today, for some reason, I remembered that whatever student had had my laptop before me had left alot of Eric Clapton songs on it, and also this really sick computer game. You played like some criminally insane murderer/rapist, and it began with you breaking out of a prison or a mental asylum or something, by killing some guards. I think one of the first weapons you got your hands on was a shovel, I’m pretty sure. It was black and white, not color, and the graphics were okay but not great – I’m thinking late 80s/early 90s game? I have no idea of the platform/console/whatever, but my laptop was a Mac of some sort (I distinctly remember being irritated when I first got it because my family’s computer was a PC and the laptop wasn’t immediately intuitive to use). Once you escaped, I think you ran through the desert, and eventually had sex with a stewardess and maybe a farmer’s wife or daughter? The goal was basically to kill all the male characters you ran into, and either kill or have sex with (or both) all the female characters – and you had the option of getting their consent first, but you didn’t have to. (So, basically, you were killing dudes and raping women.) And there was toplessness all over the place, of course.

At the time, I found it…mainly boring, actually, since I wasn’t really into playing a video game where your main object was to have sex/rape. But I was too much of an asshat to really be offended by it. Now, looking back on it, I think it’s pretty fucking abhorrent (to put it mildly) and can’t believe I played it at all.

But it is driving me crazy that I can’t remember the name of the game. I swear it was something like “Psychotic!” or some shit (and googling for a computer game named something like “Psychotic!” or “Psycho Killer” or what-have-you, that’s a hot mess; I’m not even trying to google for the premise/goal of the game, I can tell that’s a bad idea from miles and miles off), but I’ve been looking at synopses of video games all evening and haven’t come across it. And looked over several lists of the “most offensive,” controversial, and even outright banned videogames – not in there. The more I think about the game, the more disgusted I am – BUT! I cannot get it out of my head because I can’t remember the name and I am nuts like that. So my mind is just whirring, whirring, whirring along, all trying to remember more details about it, all “Maybe you could google this and find it…” UGH. Also, it’s just weird that there’s all the anger (and rightly so) over Rapelay (especially when Amazon was still carrying it), but this game – I was playing it back in 1994, and I don’t remember hearing shit about it then. But I guess gaming wasn’t as widespread? Or just nobody knew about this particular game, since…did we even have Amazon and Ebay back then? I don’t really remember when I first heard about/used them. But now they seem like they’ve been around forever. Oh god, and 1994, I was on old school BBSes and shit, and they were bad. I mean, high tech for the time, but by today’s standards? Ridic. (Greg’s suggested the kid who had the laptop before me might have created the game themselves – but I don’t think that’s very likely. It could have been any kid that would’ve been in the program the year before me – so, freshmen to seniors. And compared to today’s graphics and gameplay, it’s pretty piss-poor, but at the time, it seemed normal. That seems like quite an accomplishment for a high school senior. But maybe.)

It’s kind of like how I was bugged by not being able to remember the book Emerald Eyes, but remembered having read it in eighth grade, and then I finally manage to track it down and get it off Ebay – *before* I remembered how gross it is, plotwise. (I take what solace I can in the fact that I only paid 50 cents for it. Well, and like a dollar shipping.) I don’t want to find a simulator for this game, just remember what the name was (and, okay, also look and see if whoever created it ever got in trouble for making such a fucking awful “game”).

No bellydance yesterday. I was looking forward to our substitute teacher: the regular teacher’s sister, who is supposed to be quite experienced and talented herself, and is…not to put too fine or rude a point on it, closer to my size than the rest of the class. From all accounts (basically whatever I could find on the class discussion threads, tribe.net, facebook, articles about performances), she is a total badass (as is her sister, our regular teacher), so I was especially looking forward to getting to see a total badass closer to my own body type perform, and then *learn* from her. But shit happens, and she didn’t show up and the receptionist lady (receptionist? scheduler? owner? I have no idea) couldn’t get up with her. I’m guessing she either went to the wrong studio, since our teacher does classes all over – and if you go to the wrong studio, once you realize it, you’re too far away for it to be worthwhile, really, to get to the right studio. Like at least half the class would have passed. Or car trouble, which would have really sucked. Or something even more serious. I’m hoping it was something innocuous, like going to the wrong studio. No car repairs or roadside stranding, no personal injury/illness, nothing like that. I was a little disappointed not to have a class with her, but not that upset, actually. I got to chat with two of my classmates – which was awesome, since it turned out to be really easy to chat with them, and usually it’s this huge deal for me to talk to new people. But they were supernice, and they do pig rescue, and it was fascinating to hear them talk about. And we reviewed some of the choreography on our own. Also, I almost didn’t go yesterday, I felt so shitty in the morning, but I was like, “Stop being a baby and go. You’ll be sad to miss it, once you get there you’ll be able to do it, it’s just an hour and fifteen minutes, knock it out and then come home and be whiny later.” So having the class cancelled? Not bad, because it gave me an out and I was guilt-free. I also got to look out the studio windows and watch the rain for about half an hour. I loved all the rain we’ve had recently. If only there were more…

Anyway. So, talking about size and body stuff kind of brings me to this other point I’ve been avoiding, 1-because I’m conflicted about it and 2-because once in a blue moon a troll will come out of hiding and be a dick to me here, and I think this might be one of the things that encourages them to stick their goddamn shitty nose in and be a dick. We’ll see. So, I have fatty liver. It was discovered…three or four years ago? Whenever I had my gall bladder out, it was about that time. Discovered in a sonogram while checking out my gallstones, followed up after I healed from surgery with an MRI. At the time, I was told it was no big deal, I *might* want to lose some weight (to get rid of the fatty liver), but that tons of people had it, it wasn’t at all serious, in fact one of the nurses who did the MRI had it, really nothing to worry about. So I didn’t. Until this year, I had that bruising in my ribs/midsection from hooping, and was all anxious about it being something more serious, and mentioned the fatty liver to my current (awesome) doctor, who was more like, “Uh, that’s potentially a big problem. We need to get on that.” Another sonogram, a couple blood tests to check my liver levels, some frantic worrying on my part. Bottom line? I’m okay for now, but I absolutely have to get rid of the fatty liver. It *might* never develop into anything serious, but it could. And I know for a fact I don’t want anything to do with liver problems or liver failure. (A friend my freshman year in college attempted suicide by swallowing a bottle of tylenol, came very close to dying of liver failure. The doctors – a team of liver specialists, actually – saved him, but he was in excruciating, *excruciating* pain, and they said he’d either have to get a liver transplant or live with pain the rest of his life until his liver finally failed for good, or some combo of both. I saw it, I heard his screams, I want fucking NOTHING to do with it.)

Well, so, how do you get rid of fatty liver? You lose weight. This is kind of a huge deal for me, because I hate how fucked up society is about women and their bodies, and I’m tired of having body image issues – which I had in fucking high school when I weighed 125. 125, people, and I’m 5’8″. (Okay, 5’7″ and 3/4 inch, but just give me that last quarter, because I like whole numbers better.) I was slender, but I felt huge, and I was uncomfortable in clothes and especially bathing suits, and basically had all the same body image issues I do now. And then I look at pictures of myself from back then, and get so mad that I was perfectly fine and couldn’t just realize that and be happy, be content. And then I think about how fucked up our society is:

-If you’re not skinny, that’s bad. You’re fat, and fat is like the worst thing ever. So you have to feel guilty about it, and get on this train of guilt and anxiety and obsessively trying to lose weight and yoyo dieting and just plain bullshit. Oh, and if you want cute clothes? Good luck finding any, and when you do, shit ain’t going to be cheap, because the people who make cute clothes for us fatties? Know they have us in a bind. And you have to hate your body, because you’re fat. And hating your body is pretty much hating yourself, straight up. How can it not be? It’s *your* body, it’s you in a really most basic sense, and you hate yourself. Shitty.

-If you’re skinny, well maybe you’re too skinny. Then you’ve got a lot of scrutiny about your body and your weight and intrusion into your life and speculation about this and that. So you have to feel guilty, AGAIN, and hate your body, AGAIN, and try to gain weight to get bitches off your back. But not too much weight, because then you’re fat. Shitty.

-If you’re slender – not too skinny, not fat – well, you’re still not off the fucking hook, because *at any moment* – not really, but it’s like there’s a hysteria about women’s bodies and weights, so: *at any moment* you could become too skinny or too fat! So you still have to freak out and be anxious and obsess over your body, and kind of hate yourself, or at least behave to yourself/your body in a not very nice fashion. Shitty.

Some women escape this – but I think fewer women escape it than believe they do, it’s so indoctrinated into us with advertising and movies and yada yada. Please see Jean Kilbourne’s fine films and work for more on this. My first of her films was Killing Us Softly, and it blew my mind, it was so right-on, and went over stuff that was blatantly obvious once you really looked at it but that I’d missed for years. Like how frequently in ads, men are positioned over women in threatening, pre-violent stances, but it’s supposed to be interpreted as sexy. (I don’t find getting beaten sexy, but that’s just me.) Or how often women in ads are made up in “edgy” makeup, but if you look at it, really, they’re made up in a way that makes them look like victims of abuse, or starvation, or like corpses. Sick shit. But it operates on such a subliminal level, it gets past most of us, past our defenses, and then we’ve internalized it without realizing, and we haven’t escaped.

Anyway. So this new medicine I’m on, that’s basically doctor-prescribed speed (I don’t know if it’s actually a type of speed, or just enough like speed – the good doctor was explaining it and said, “It’s speed, basically” so…I think it’s a type? who knows), it’s to help suppress my appetite, particularly to help me not succumb to emotional or impulse eating. Which I’m also going to work on in therapy, since I can’t (and don’t want to) stay on this drug for more than a couple months. The hope is, it’ll give me a break, help me not eat emotionally or impulsively, until I can get far enough in therapy to recognize/avoid/deal with the triggers on my own.

So the medicine’s to lose weight, but I personally prefer to think of it as “medicine for my fatty liver,” because – here’s the rub – I got angry about hating my body when I was younger and it was perfectly fine, instead of being content and enjoying it and being comfortable in my skin. I got angry about how fucked up society is and how hard it is to be a woman and like yourself, like your body, be comfortable with it. And then I took one step further and thought, “Maybe it’s just as fucked up for you to hate your body *right now*.” Boom: from anger over the past to body-size activism (even if on a personal scale). So what I’ve *been* trying to work on in therapy, is accepting myself the way I am, because I am perfectly fine and wonderful. I’m fat, who fucking cares. I’m still a person, I’m not gross, I’m pretty cute and witty and funny and a good friend, and I have a killer rack (although I really keep it modest and only “take it out” on special occasions, ha). Why am I wasting so much time being busy hating on myself, hating my body, being anxious, being uncomfortable? It’s bullshit. So I wanted to stop, and start working on accepting myself, learning to be comfortable with myself, learning to love my body. Just the way it was.

I’m conflicted because I still want that, and part of me feels like a fucking sellout for being on these meds, and actively working to eat less and work out more (like every day) and lose weight. But I have to, because I don’t want liver-problem risk-factors that I don’t have to have. I always wanted to eat better and exercise more, but just to be healthier. In a health-at-every-size sort of way. Not to lose weight for the sake of losing weight and “finally” being thin. Fuck that. I wanted to accept myself. And now I’m eating less and working out more and taking speed to lose weight. Because of the fatty liver and legit doctor’s orders/serious recommendations, yes, but I feel like a sellout. I’ve mentioned before that the meds aren’t really great for my mood, my temper, my being calm as opposed to irritable or weepy. Even though my appetite’s suppressed to the point where I don’t feel hungry, eating considerably less than I’m used to and working out considerably more than I’m used to, it’s taking a toll, too, so more irritability and weepiness. Although I think I’m getting better at dealing with it. Except when I have PMS, then I am a monster, as we recently found out. (If your loved one is female and in a similar situation, maybe have her skip the phentermine while PMSing. Learn from my experience, rather than the hard way. And trust me, the hard way is REALLY HARD and SUCKS ALOT.) On top of all that joy to deal with, I feel guilty for losing weight. I had to go in and get weighed (I get to do that periodically, as well as have my blood pressure checked, since phentermine can make it rise): I lost twenty pounds in the first two months. My doctor congratulated me. I almost burst into tears, because it felt like buying into this obsession with body-hating and attaining thinness.

Oh god, and the math, the calorie counting and adding up and recording. I used to get really bitchy and sick-feeling if I’d gone too long without eating. I still feel bad, but in a different way now, and there’s no tummy rumbling ever. (Sometimes my appetite is so suppressed, eating makes me almost nauseous, and it’s an effort. I know, I know: pobre mio. But I think it’s jacked up when I can’t fucking eat, when I could go through a day without food entirely if I didn’t force myself to eat something. It scares me. I have control issues out the wazoo, and I don’t want them to latch on to food. I’m terrified that this could develop into an eating disorder, although I think the likelihood of that is really slim since I’m so afraid of it. Not that my past relationship to food has been totally functional, what with the impulse and emotional eating. But anorexia is fucked up, and I don’t want to wind up there inadvertently. I don’t really think I will, it’s mostly just my anxiety catastrophizing and hand-wringing and running away with me. But still, it scares me nonetheless, for all I tell myself it’s irrational.) Anyway, so now if I go too long between meals or snacks, and all of a sudden am like, “Shit, I need to eat something, that’s why I feel so fucking bad,” and then I have to work out adding up calories so I can record them, and make sure I’m not having too much? Oh, I lose it alot then. I think I’m getting better at that, too, but there’s been some crying and some ridiculous talk about, “This is bullshit, I’d almost rather not eat than do all this fucking counting and adding.” UGH. Someone send me the world’s tiniest violin for a sad, sad concerto. (And, obviously, sometimes all this weepiness and self-pity gets too much for me, too.)

This is long as shit. Sorry. Except not really, because I’ve got more to spew out here. So, my big gripe recently is clothes. I’ve lost twenty pounds in two months (and I’m sure there are people who would be more than happy to accomplish that, but I just can’t bring myself to feel like it’s an accomplishment to be proud of – necessary for my liver and health, yes, but pride-worthy, not so much, given the whole “I want to accept myself” spiel) – my clothes are starting to not fit. Like, seriously not fit. As in, I’ve had to go down two sizes in fucking underwear in about a month, and unexpectedly. (I’m not sure why it was such a surprise, since I *know* I’m losing weight. It’s not like I’m going to lose all the weight I need to lose and the clothes that fit me now will still fit me then. They will look ridiculously large, because they will then *be* way too large.) I had to run out last night and buy underwear because I only had four pair in the size that fits me now, and I only had four pair in that size because the last time they fit was like a year ago. And I’m fucking ill as shit, because I had to buy more underwear last night, and what’s the goddamn point when I’ll probably have to buy underwear in another size two to four weeks from now. And again two to four weeks after that. Lather, rinse, repeat. I got really upset about the clothes thing last night, and Greg tried to spin it positively for me: “Look at it as a valid excuse to buy lots of cute new clothes.” Except that 1-cute new clothes are still not cheap, 2-I especially don’t like having to buy not-cheap new clothes that will only fit for like a fucking month (if I keep losing weight at this rate, which, admittedly, might well be an unrealistic estimate; I can’t believe I’ve lost so much this quickly, so I’m expecting it to slow down or plateau any day now – that’ll be a new set of “joys”), and 3-I have cute clothes right now, goddammit, and I want to keep wearing them. Like, Greg got me this SWEET black dress from Torrid for my birthday, with buckles on it and shit, and grommets, and I put it on and pretend I’m a toughie, and it’s cute as shit. I wore it when we went out to dinner for my birthday, and I wore it once to work. And that’s it, because it’s more dressed up than I usually have a reason/energy/ambition for. But I’m not ready to pack it up any time in the foreseeable future because it’s too big for me, when I’ve only worn it twice. Or my new black jeans that I love and *just got*. If those fuckers start falling off me in a month because I lost more weight, I will be PISSED. This is bullshit. Yeah, some of my clothes I could give up without a problem. My blue jeans aren’t really anything special, they fit, that’s all (or they fit *now*). When they stop fitting, I won’t be crying over it. But stuff I’ve made, or stuff I’m real fond of, the cute stuff, the special stuff? Not ready to stop wearing it, but let’s be honest, I’ve got quite a bit of weight to lose to reach my proper BMI, and I just don’t think they can be altered to fit me at that point without looking like someone SERIOUSLY doesn’t know how to sew. You can only take clothes in so much before you start fucking up the line of them, or run out of places to take them in at. And all my sewing/knitting/crochet works in progress? It’s real hard to motivate myself to work on them, because, again, what’s the fucking point? I bust my ass to finish them, and then a year from now they don’t fit and are way too baggy? Am I going to undo them and redo them? No. So why bother now. Why not wait until I’m at my stupid “goal weight” and make clothes then. Why not wait and buy clothes then, for that matter. (Well, I have to buy some stuff as I’m still changing sizes, because while I’m no fashionista, I have zero interest in living in sweats or similarly shapeless, uncute things while losing weight and changing sizes. But I don’t want to buy more than the bare minimum that I have to, and nothing so cute that I’ll get attached to it and be sad if/when I have to chuck it later.)

That’s basically what I’ve been dealing with lately, and was too ashamed to blog about. And too conflicted to blog about. It’s a fucking mess. I am really good at finding shit to worry about, and really good at being ridiculously hard on myself and mean to myself. So now I’m grappling with, like, this multiple whammy of being down on myself for being fat, being down on myself for working hard to lose weight (even if it’s for the liver reasons and not because I want to be thin, because I don’t, I don’t want it to be about being thin, but I can’t cut myself any slack because I am so hard on myself and I never cut myself slack, that would mean being…not hard on myself, which apparently my ego and superego think is NO FUN), being down on myself for not being able to control my emotions “better” or “be better” because of the meds and the lack of energy (because I’m still adjusting to the less food, more exercise thing – eventually it won’t be such an energy drain, but right now it is), and on top of that, as if it weren’t enough, being down on myself FOR BEING DOWN ON MYSELF. Am I great at this shit, or what? The good days are getting more frequent, though, where I’m not down on myself, or am less down on myself. That’s good.

Anyway, so, this clothes thing. I’ve decided I need to enjoy my cute clothes while they still fit me, but also just accept that if I stick to this liver-necessary stuff like I need to, the cute clothes I have now will probably not fit me in a couple to several months. (And when I say “cute clothes,” I mean my clothes that I like/love/am fond of. I’m not really a fashionista, so what I consider cute, you might find somewhat to pretty atrocious. My Teletubbies skirt, for instance – I love it like crazy, but not everyone’s cup of tea, I get it.) Anyway, in the spirit of enjoying my clothes while I can, and making peace with very probably having to chuck them and replace them, I’m thinking about starting basically what I would consider a vanity project: taking daily pictures of my outfits, just so, for instance, later when that sweet, sweet, badass Torrid toughie dress no longer fits and I am no longer any size that they make that dress in, I can look back at it fondly, all, “That dress was so sweet!” Taking daily pictures will also let me get more of a feel for the specific items I wear on a regular basis (good for when I need to clean the shit I never wear out of my dresser). And also, I have to admit, I’m just kind of basically interested in taking more regular pictures of myself because my face is going to change, and I want to be able to see the changes more clearly. I mean, it changed as a result of gaining this weight, so it’ll change when I lose it, too. But it’ll be gradual, and I might not notice it day to day in the mirror. But if I take pictures, I can look at one from say, June, and then one from December, and it’ll be like, “Shit…yeah, all that’s changed.” I mean, I don’t really know what to think about the changes – whether they’ll be improvements or not. I know what society would think, but when I see pictures of myself at 125, 135, 150 even, I tend to think my face is a little more hawkish looking than I would like. The extra fat since then has rounded my face out a bit, and I personally think it’s cuter than when I looked more bird-y. But then maybe I’m just being hard on myself. Probably I’m being hard on myself. Anyway, I’m, as far as I can tell, neutrally interested in just seeing how my face changes as a result of this. So, pictures.

But 1-I am sooooo bad at posting pictures here at all, much less in any sort of timely fashion, and 2-I don’t want to assume that all my readers (all, what, seven of you? I keed, I keed), whoever they may be, would be interested in a project like this. So I think I’m going to just do it on my flickr account. (If you’re interested in the pictures/outfits/whatever, and don’t know my flickr account, I can point you to it.) There are also groups on flickr that do stuff like post every outfit they wear in a year, or take daily pictures with differing degrees of rules, but I don’t know if I’ll participate in any of those. I feel like I’m not into fashion enough for the outfit groups, and don’t have a clear personal style (I have eclectic taste, by which I mean, I’m all over the place with clothes). And the other groups, I don’t know. And I’m sure as shit not joining any groups that do daily pictures to document weight loss (and I’m sure there must be some, although I’m not searching for them, no way, no how), because I don’t want to get into *that*. Not to shit all over them – if it’s a support mechanism for them, and they need to lose weight for health reasons, or whatever, as long as they’re not hurting themselves, I don’t really have a place to say shit about it. But for me, personally, it would be more guilt over buying into the thinness obsession, so, no. Anyway. And I don’t have a picture from today because I came up with this idea after I got into my nightgown (which is decent and modest but you still can’t see it because I’m feeling prudish). And I don’t know that I’ll reliably (aka, *really* daily) have pics until we get a decent full-length mirror. We’ve got one, but it’s really old and spotted and not clear. So, it’s convince Greg to take pictures for me until I get a full-length mirror and can do it myself. And also it’ll be interesting because maybe I do have some sort of distinct personal style, some sort of inclination towards similar things/accessories/looks, even with all the different clothing items. That would be interesting to find out. Anyway. New project, and will hopefully make me less angsty about the clothes thing.

Goddamn it is late. This is long as shit. I have some Harvest Moon to play. (Do you italicize game titles? What do you do for them? Underline? Quotes? Nothing?) And we had practice for Crotch Rocket tonight (what do you do for bands?), and I wanted to get some more practice in on a couple songs just on my own. So, I’m out. I got to get my singing and virtual-farming on. Laters.

Holy shit, y’all, anusara yoga is fucking hard. I got Ishwari Gonnot’s Heart Flow Vinyasa Yoga (Anusara) dvd – supposedly for beginner, intermediate, and advanced practitioners? I would consider myself a beginner, but not a complete newb to yoga – I used to practice hatha yoga pretty seriously in late middle school/early high school as a way to cope with problems at home. It was definitely calming, centering, helpful, and I’ve been thinking about adding serious practice back into my exercise, uh, regime or whatever. And then all these bellydancers (okay, mainly Sharon Kihara, but some others, too) seem to be into anusara, which seems to add an aspect of compassion/heart-opening to the practice. I’m all over that. So I get this dvd. And that fucker OWNED me in about thirty minutes. But I like it.

Although, it’s weird at about 1:02, where one of the camera people totally leaves Gonnot and the two other ladies, to focus on a snail on a leaf. WTF. I mean, I guess it’s all yoga-y and “one with nature”-y, but…let’s focus on what the instructor’s actually doing, right? And sometimes the resolution is for crap, but not bad enough to keep you from following along.

I totes need to get a real yoga mat and some bricks, though. I am not as flexible as these ladies. (Also, seeing how this video kicked my ass halfway through the practice -

HOLD THE FUCK UP. About 1:05 – why am I seeing the INSTRUCTOR MAKING OUT WITH and apparently DRY HUMPING one of the cameramen? And now she’s stripper dancing? While I’m supposed to be in corpse pose, meditating with my eyes shut? I call shenanigans. I may have to return this to Amazon. I just don’t know. I mean, maybe if it was on the behind-the-scenes reel, but it’s not – it just cuts to this shit in the middle of the guided practice.

On the anxiety tip:

“Who knew that, all this time, when people were talking about a panic attack, what they really meant was a nonstop rocket-sled ride to hell itself, where your soul gets sucked through a straw by demons?”

I know it’s meant to be at least somewhat humorous, and it is, but it’s also pretty true to form. Except that when I have the bad panic attacks, those innocuous things like lamps and rugs aren’t just horrifying in an unspecifiable way, but are morphing into monstrosities like in a bad acid trip, and they’re coming to get me. Fun stuff.

I didn’t finish Torchwood until Tuesday night, and…well, I was gutted.

Here’s the thing – I’m on some new medication, it’s basically speed, and it’s been making me cranky and irritable and short-tempered and emotional and weepy – tons of fun. On top of that, I’m PMSing. I don’t know when PMS became such a problem for me – back in the day, it was like, “PMS? What’s that?” Now, I definitely get it, and I definitely get the emotional symptoms, and it’s just rough. Add the new meds in, and it’s even worse. I totally hulked out Monday – it was fucking awful. I finally took some klonopin and calmed down, figured if I just was more aware of my moods, and paid more attention to being calm and relaxed, I could deal with this.

Yeah, not so much.

So, a friend of mine watched Torchwood long before I did, maybe even read the spoilers, I don’t remember – point is, she knew what happened. And she knows I’m usually a spoiler queen, but lately I’ve been lazy and bad about reading up on my spoilers, so I was unspoiled for Torchwood, and she… I don’t know. I don’t know what she was thinking, and I don’t want to talk about it because I am still pissed. Alot of it Tuesday night was PMS and the new meds, and being blindsided by all the fucking heartbreaking stuff that happened – but even now, that I’ve had some time to chill out, am laying off the new meds until the PMS is done (per doctor’s suggestion), gotten some distance, whatever, I’m still pretty fucking pissed. Because she was all, “Promise me you won’t read the spoilers. It’s good, but it’ll be even better if you’re unspoiled.” And I guess by “good,” she didn’t mean, you know, good shit happens and there’s a happy ending, but that’s not the extent of the discussion, just an example/sum-up, and I kind of feel a little like I was deliberately misled about what sort of thing happened so I wouldn’t read spoilers. If you haven’t seen it yet and don’t want to be spoiled, well, better stop reading right now. So, I basically said, several times, “Cool, I won’t read spoilers if you think it’s even better that way – all I care about really is Ianto. They don’t fuck with Ianto and Jack, right? Nothing happens to Ianto, and they don’t bring up the whole bullshit Ianto-Jack-Gwen triangle crap again, right?” And I was either told (for some of that – like the love triangle) or allowed to believe (for the rest of it) that Ianto was fine, Jack and Ianto were fine. Jack won’t admit he and Ianto are a couple, I start getting antsy, but whatever – so-and-so knows what happens and she wouldn’t have said/implied they were fine if they weren’t, right? I guess I was also assuming she remembered how badly I took it when Owen and Tosh died. Maybe she’d forgotten that. Anyway, they fucking killed Ianto. They fucking killed Ianto, and in his death scene, he’s all, “I love you, Jack. Don’t forget me.” And Jack can’t even say “I love you” back? That’s not the Jack I know. Some people might argue, so I won’t go so far as to say it’s character assassination, but I was mighty disappointed. Nonetheless, I’m sitting there, finishing out Children of Earth because my friend told me Ianto was okay, so surely they’ll fix this somehow, right? At this point, I’m only crying a little, sniffling every once in a while – and I even turn to Greg (who was on the couch with me at this point) and am like, “Honestly, I don’t care if they’re just like, ‘Ianto and Jack had so much sex that some of Jack’s stoopid magickal resurrection powers somehow magically got into Ianto and oh look, he’s not really dead.’” Totally meant it. Totally convinced he wasn’t dead for good.

End of Children of Earth: Ianto’s dead for good. Jack’s betrayed his daughter and killed his grandson (which, yes, was kind of necessary to save Earth’s children, but still shitty). Gwen’s the only remaining member. Torchwood Hub’s blasted to bits. And Jack’s running away to the far reaches of the galaxy. Oh, and I am crying hysterically, like someone real (not just a tv character) died. Or, you know, like a lady that’s PMSing and on speed, basically, and whose emotions are way off, and whose single favorite character in a tv show she’s actually quite attached to just got killed off for good, and for no good reason. Why? So Russell T. Davies can jerk his audience around? Like that shitty-ass scene in Se7en. Or like anytime bitches on any other shows (that I care about, but care about less than I do Torchwood) start talking about how they’re not opposed to killing off “important” characters, because…I don’t know, it’s edgy, and it mixes things up, or they want to prove that they’re daring or some ridiculous bullshit like that. Or because they want a “game-changer.” Fuck that, I hate it.

Anyway. They killed Ianto, and he was my absolute favorite character on this show from the beginning. I know, I’m supposed to like Jack (and I do, or…did before CoE, or still do but not as much, I don’t know), or Gwen. But I loved Ianto. He *was* Torchwood for me. Well, him and Myfanwy. If I had read the spoilers, I would not have watched at all. And if I did watch, it wouldn’t have been Tuesday – I was in absolutely the worst mindset for it, and I was fucking heartbroken. Heartbroken! Over a tv show, yes, but still. I thought Torchwood wasn’t done yet, and that there’d be more episodes next year – I don’t know how they can go on after this. And even worse (as a totally shameless Doctor Who/Torchwood fan with a Seal of Rassilon tattoo/badge of geekdom), if they do go on, I’m pretty sure I won’t be watching. I’m done.

I just wish I’d read the spoilers, and then I wouldn’t have watched, and my last memories of Torchwood wouldn’t have been totally happy (Owen and Tosh died), but they wouldn’t have been this sad. And this is why I read spoilers – not really because I’m too curious not to, which is a part of it, but mainly because, if I’m in the wrong mindset, shit can fuck me up for a long time. Smilla’s Sense of Snow – not even a sad movie, but the setting, the lighting, it’s just so *dark* visually, that it depressed me; I couldn’t get enough light for days after. So whenever we go see a movie, or I get something from Netflix or on demand, I read up on it first to see what I’m getting into. If it’s something I have to be in the right mindset to get through, then I don’t watch it until I’m ready. So, yeah, that’s the absolute last time I will go spoiler-less into something I care about, or something that has the ability to fuck me up so badly. (Pretty sure I can withstand Kathy Griffin’s My Life on the D-List without spoilers – I love every episode, and it’s all good, and even when she’s taking on serious shit like PropH8 and talking about Matthew Shepard, I’m not in the fetal position in bed afterwards bawling like a baby and then still upset days later. Something like Fringe or Supernatural? I’ll check the spoilers just because they could present something that would upset my anxiety if I thought about it too much, or if it was too scary for me, and I am a wuss. But I should’ve known better with Torchwood, especially after Owen and Tosh, and even after the heartbreak on DW with Donna, which I’m still ill over, and they better do something about that. I hear Wilfrid’s going to be a companion for an episode, maybe two. I know they can’t return Donna’s memories, and I’m sure they won’t bother to figure out some way to reunite her with her husband-dude, but goddamn, just throw her a bone. Throw *me* a bone. One of the awesomest companions of all time, and this is what she gets. While whiny-ass Rose gets to marry a Doctor-clone? Fuck. You.)

Anyway, more than enough blathering on about a tv show. But, I hate you bitches for killing Ianto. I’m still mad about it, and still mad about being led to believe he’d be okay, and for going into this shit spoilerless at totally the wrong time. Boo. Recovering with episodes of Leverage and My Life on the D-List and other stuff. (Also had to take a sick day today, totally related to the combo of new speed meds and PMS. So, really, most of today was a washout, and I was sleeping, trying desperately to sleep so I wouldn’t be conscious, or whining at some level about cramping and pooping or the inability thereof. Not a fun-filled day of hooky-playing. But I do feel better for staying home and chilling out and resting, and am ready to get back to work tomorrow and kick ass.)

I’ve probably got quite a bit I need to put on here – haven’t updated in a while. But I just got back from bellydance like an hour ago, showered and had lunch, and now it’s FINALLY time to watch Torchwood: Children of Earth, so….all my attention will be absorbed by that. More blogging later.