Only Nola

Will Those Clean My Cat Box?

So I went shopping the other day. Quelle surprise! I bought, among other things, some new shoes. I found a pair (Okay, four... shut up.) that I liked enough to buy. Gotta love a great pair of high heels. Or four. (...) Anyway. What I really wanted was a pair of boots. Didn't leave with one, but that's what I actually went in there with the intent to buy. The problem? The pair I wanted was apparently made by God. I know this because of the price tag.

Four hundred dollars.

Yeah, that's right, I said four HUNDRED dollars. As in more than my last paycheck. I about had an embolism right in the middle of Dillard's. I mean, seriously... four HUNDRED dollars? For a pair of BOOTS? Okay, sure, they were absolutely gorgeous. Knee high, black leather, spike heel, fit to the calf like a goddamned glove... but unless I'm going to find them up in the middle of the night cleaning out the litter box, I can't seem to wrap my head around justifying spending four HUNDRED dollars for a pair of BOOTS. Elvis better have worn them or something for that kind of money.

Which just left me with a really weird visual...

So I'm slowly but surely getting my energy back. It'd definitely been a process. I'm not all the way there, but I did manage to mow and edge my lawn last night AFTER I went to WAL-MART. Yes, that's right, I said it... I was able to make myself go fight the teeming masses and get some actual groceries. Oh, and when I say I mowed and edged my lawn? I meant half of it. What? Like anyone ever sees my back yard. Not that I'd know it if they did... I could have a small tribe of Pygmies lost back there in that growth and wouldn't know until National Geographic showed up with a film crew.

I even swept the driveway free of grass when I got done. Sure, I only swept it down to the curb, where it'll sit until either a) natural forces such as wind and rain scatter it to the neighbor's curb, or b) hell freezes over and I actually put the debris in a bag and in my dumpster (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... *coughs* Sorry), but still... I swept it.

Today I get to focus on the inside of the house. That would be the part I've been doing my best to ignore for the last month. Now I'm tripping over dust bunnies that are big enough to pay rent, so I have to do some cleaning. Words can't express how thrilled I am. Really.

Oh, and when I went shopping the other day? I got new glasses. I'll try and put a picture up soon to replace the old one. I'm not saying I'll try very hard, but I'll try. I break out in hives when I have to try and actually produce a picture that won't scare small children. Or burn out retinas.

Well, I guess I can't put off the inevitable anymore. When you can't walk through a room without having a close encounter with a shoe, a wicker basket, or a meat-eating dust bunny, well... something has to be done.

Or so they tell me...

This Is Me, Cabbagepatching Around the Room

Well, just to update everyone... my insurance company finally let me know today that my waiting is over. Nameless Underwriter #73 finally got off his fat ass and stamped 'approved' on the life insurance policy I'd been waiting to hear about for FIVE WEEKS. That's like eternity from where I sit, all things being relative.

If I could have, I'd have reached through the phone lines and given the lady at my insurance office a big, sloppy kiss.

TWICE.

Still waiting to hear about the Workman's Comp thing, but I'm losing no sleep over it now. Now I can rest assured that Connor and I won't lose our home and have to turn our lives upside down all over again. Thank GOD.

In other news, I re-entered the world of chat a week or two ago. And you know what I discovered? Shit never changes, it just gets more disturbing as one gets older. I mean, for fuck's sake, the NAMES some of these people come up with for themselves... take, for example, the poet laureate of the chat kingdom... 'rideuhard'.

(...)

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Okay, does some poor man, somewhere (probably in his mother's basement or Delta house), really think that this name is going to attract women? Seriously? What goes through a man's mind when he comes up with shit like that? Or is he so busy with his hand in his pants and wishing he'd had sex in the last 10 years that he just... short circuits? It boggles the mind.

Anyhoo. I'm going to bed early tonight, so this post is short, but I'll make it up to all of you later. Really.

*coughs*

And Here I Sit…

Not much to report right now, but thought I'd check in anyway. 'Cause I know that the world stops turning if I stop blogging. *coughs* Well, I still don't know anything about my car. The insurance is dragging ass on giving me any information whatsoever, which is always nice. Last I heard, there's still muttering going on about charging me with fault in the accident, but let's hope that wiser heads prevail at some point. Contrary to what they seem to think, my car's not the fucking Batmobile, hence rendering me unable, not unwilling, to use my rocket boosters to shoot OVER the dresser. The one in the MIDDLE of the ROAD. In case anyone wasn't clear on which dresser I was talking about. Generally, dressers that are where they're supposed to be, like, oh, say... BEDROOMS... don't get hit by CARS.

But I'm not bitter.

I also learned on Thursday something really neat. We have two life insurance policies on Jonathan... one of our own, and a small one through his work that comes with his health insurance. The small one? The one with the accidental death rider? Isn't going to be giving me the money from the aforementioned accidental death rider. And Why?, you may ask. Well, according to the chick on the phone, it's because he was on the clock. And what does this have to do with anything? Being that his death was, in fact, an accident, one would think that there's no issue. But she said to me, 'Oh, well, we don't pay the accidental death benefits if someone was working when they died, because we figure the family will get workman's comp benefits and doesn't need the money.'

(...)

You're fucking kidding me, right? She didn't really just say that, did she? Did I slip into an alternate universe when I wasn't looking? One run by assbags and the mentally challenged? What in hell's name does the fact I may or may not get workman's comp death benefits have to do with the fact that his policy, the one his company paid for, is supposed to cover accidental death? How is that ANY of their business? That would be like having homeowner's insurance that pays off a mortgage in case of a spouse's death and your life insurance, that you paid for every month, telling you, 'Oh, we know you had a $250,000 policy, but we're only going to give you $150,000, 'cause you're getting your house paid off with that other policy and won't need that money.'

AAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!

The world today just conspires to give me migraines. And bleeding ulcers. I mean, seriously... have you ever heard of such bullshit? My husband died. In a truck ACCIDENT. That should pretty much wrap things up right there. But noooooo... every benefit paying entity that I should be able to count on right now is busy trying to find new and inventive ways to bend me over. I'm sure they'd stick a knife in my back, but for the fact that it's FUCKING FULL.

*sighs*

The icing on the cake, at least for this week, is the fact that one of my cats has suddenly decided that he's going to kill himself... by barfing to death. All over my house. In the middle of the night. With gusto.

I'm ready for a vacation. Anyone want to trade places?

Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?

But Of Course…

'Cause the festivity around here just doesn't stop...

I wiped out my car yesterday.

(...)

I had to be Hitler in my last life. Seriously. I've said it before, but it's just about to stop being funny.

There I was, about 12:30 yesterday afternoon, minding my own business on the James River Freeway. Toodling right along at a respectable speed, nothing big (as opposed to the asshat behind me who was about to eat my tail end). I went to change lanes, from the fast lane to the slow lane (due to the aforementioned asshat and my desire NOT to end up on his windshield). As I was halfway over, perfectly straddling the dividing line between the two lanes, the two cars in front of me, one in the fast lane and one in the slow lane (they were side by side, see?... notice how good I am with pointing out the obvious.), each veered sharply away from the dividing line, thus leaving me staring at a big gap suddenly in front of me in the middle of the road. And in that gap?

A chest of drawers.

(...)

Yes, people, that's right... I said a FUCKING DRESSER right in the middle of the road. 'Cause that's what one would expect to see in the middle of the highway. The highway built for CARS. And FURNITURE.

My options were extremely limited. I swerved to the left, because the storage item in question was slightly more in the right lane than the left. I managed to avoid hitting it dead on, but it raked down the right side of my car and hung on the back corner of my wheel well. That, needless to say, caused a bit of a balance problem. For my car. I fought for control, but the car had other ideas. As did the laws of physics.

Off into the median I went. Some spinning was involved. All I could think was that I'd be seeing Jonathan again a lot sooner than expected. Not to be flippant, but the thought wasn't a bad one for that brief moment in time. Anyway. I continued to fight for some iota of control, and managed, through (according to the many people who stopped after the wreck, including the officer on the scene) driving skill and some small amount of luck, to stop my car... two FEET from the two oncoming lanes of traffic. Two more feet and I'd have been a statistic, since I'd have plowed into a lot of cars doing about 80 mph heading straight toward me. It would have been ugly. Well, it was already ugly, but it would have been a lot uglier. I'm sure I wouldn't have been the only one to die. The freeway was very busy right then, and it probably would have been a pile-up of gigantic proportions.

Lovely.

So there I sat, in the median/on the shoulder of the lanes of oncoming traffic, Billy Joel still playing in the background. I couldn't stop shaking. People were coming up to check on me, and suddenly? I was crying. All I could think about was Jonathan, and how he'd died just three weeks before in a situation not unlike that one. The people all meant well, but I couldn't seem to help wanting to smack them all... they just kept repeating 'Well, at least you're not hurt.'

You're kidding me, right?

No, I'm not physically hurt. I walked away from the accident with all limbs intact. But I was hurt. I felt, emotionally, like I'd just been turned inside out and set on fire. (Nice visual, eh?) It was horrible. And my car? Ugh. It's now sitting down in the tow lot at a local dealer, and I get the joy of waiting to hear if it'll be totaled or not. The bumper and rear fenders were ripped off, as were the bumper mountings. The paintjob is ruined, the rims and tires were damaged, and god knows what happened to the underneath of the stupid thing. With my luck they'll try the repair route, which will totally fuck me when it comes time to trade it in... 'Oh, it's been WRECKED! We'll only give you this much for trade NOW.'

*sighs*

And to top it all off? The claims guy at my insurance company seems to think they'll hold ME responsible for this, count it as a collision against my record. Why?, you ask... 'cause it WASN'T MOVING. The dresser. Wasn't moving. Don't ask me about the logic of this, as it completely escapes me. I just know that there's going to be a fight on their hands if they don't hold me blame free. Even the cop on the scene said it wasn't at all my fault, that there was nothing else I could have done. All the bystanders were telling me, AND telling the cop, AND telling my insurance agent on the phone, that I did a great job in making sure no one else got hurt and getting control of my car the best I could in the nick of time. So how in the name of hell was I supposed to do anything other than what I did when a DRESSER suddenly appears before me in the middle of the goddamned FREEWAY? It's not like I had warning... two cars parted like the red fucking sea and THERE IT WAS.

I'm amazed I'm not in an institution at this point.

Well…

It's been three weeks now. About ten minutes ago marks three weeks since they came to my door to tell me about my husband's death. It's still surreal. It feels, simultaneously, like it's been way longer than that and like it just happened. I know that doesn't make any sense, but there it is. It's been an emotional roller coaster since it happened. I've now settled into a pattern that is, in and of itself, a lack of any pattern whatsoever. My mood swings are getting worse... I catch myself alternating between snapping at my kids for no good reason, crying at the drop of a hat, bouts of manic good humor, and... numbness. I can't begin to tell you how festive it is.

Seriously.

When something like this happens, I don't know what it's like for anyone else. I can't. But I know that, for me, my mind and heart are both split in two. Part of my mind knows and accepts that Jonathan is gone; part of it very persistently believes he's going to come home... that there's just no way he can really be gone. Not possible. And my heart? It can't decide if it wants to just curl up and die or be glad that my husband is finally at peace, which is, absolutely, the selfless thing to focus on. Jonathan lived with a lot of pain in his heart, for many, many years, and at least now he doesn't have that weight, you know? But I'm not selfless. I never claimed to be. The majority of my heart is pretty much telling the smaller, selfless part to fuck off... the pain is too much, the loneliness just grows every day, and the knowledge that there's nothing that's going to change the state of things, that he CAN'T COME HOME, GODDAMMIT... well, that's just unbearable.

My, aren't I the little ray of sunshine?

On a slightly lighter note, I am considering, if and when the various entities get done yanking me around and actually pay out Jonathan's death benefits, taking a small vacation for myself. I just have to get someone to come and sit on Connor, figuratively speaking, for a little bit so I can go alone. I need it, I think. I'm going to spoil myself, just this once. Go someplace that I can completely escape; just get a massage if I want, sit on a patio and watch the water... just have a few days to not have to make a single decision, other than what to eat. Mourn as I need to, recharge as I am able to. So far I'm leaning toward this place in Big Sur, but we'll just have to see how things work out.

And, on an even lighter note? I have both my boys and my nephew here right now. Have had them since Friday evening. And, you'll all be happy to hear, I haven't yet strangled a single one of them. I even took them shopping today (although, in retrospect? That decision was right up there with deciding to cut back on lifeboats on the Titanic.) and bought my oldest son and my nephew their first Abercrombie and Fitch t-shirts, among other things. Nephew was grateful... oldest son was annoyed that he had to enter an establishment that sold clothing. Somewhere along the line his father's genes overpowered mine and rendered him unable to appreciate the world of retail. Sad. I also had another hindsight epiphany... don't take three boys to Ruby Tuesday's for lunch. It's freakin' expensive (who knew they didn't have a lunch menu? I sure as hell didn't. Bastards.) and none of them are capable of looking at a menu and judging with any accuracy whatsoever the amount they can actually eat. Put those two things together and whammo! Migraine. Well, that's not quite fair... my nephew can come pretty close to eating what he orders. Then again, he's 14 years old and six foot one or something like that, 180 pounds. The boy could eat the contents of my refrigerator without batting an eye. So him I don't have to worry about wasting food. EVER.

I hear the buzzer on the dryer, so I guess that's my cue to go do my 5th load of laundry. Woohoo, only 3 more to go!

*crawls under desk*