The Chronicles of Marge

The Raisin

There was a raisin on the floor of the bathroom at work yesterday. Or at least I think it was a raisin. Either way, there it was, on the floor outside of a stall, for everyone who went into the bathroom to see and wonder about.

A few thoughts: why the hell would someone bring food into the toilet at work? Was it inadvertent? Were you actually eating raisins in the toilet? I mean, this is not your home, and if it were your home, I'm not sure I'd want to use the toilet in your house for fear I might sit on the seat and end up with a raisin—or any other dried fruit you might be snacking on while in there—stuck to my ass. I don't understand this eating in the toilet business or this need to bring food into the toilet at all. But I do respect that you have a right to do what you want to do in your house, even if it is gross. However, your house should not come to work with you, so don't bring raisins into the toilet at work, and by all means, if you drop one while in there, pick it up and throw it away.

Seriously, I was left with quite a quandary: do I pick up the raisin and put it in the trash? Or do I leave the raisin there on the floor in the hope that the person who brought the raisin into the toilet returns, is simultaneously horrified and embarrassed, and picks up their raisin and puts it in the trash?

Of course, I chose the latter option, which I am sure means that I am a bad person. But then again, what if it was not a raisin?

I don't even want to go there.

Public Service Announcement From Marge: Look Into Your Kidneys

So I totally dropped off the Face of the Internet for a while there. Herein I shall attempt to get back on it with the following explanation of what derailed the month of January. Actually, the reason is two-fold.

(1) I participated in a church musical production of Amahl and the Night Visitors. When they asked for volunteers for members of the chorus, I held out as long as possible, but the guilt that comes from being one of only a few altos eventually caught up to me, and so there I was, in shepherd garb on a stage in front of a church full of people. Jason said I managed one look the entire performance: The Look of Fear. Although the production was quite impressive, my feelings on the subject are thus: NEVER THE HELL AGAIN. I was not meant for the stage. Or memorizing music. Or being able to control how much I sweat.

(2) I got a kidney infection. So let me provide you all with a helpful Public Service Announcement: the next time you run a high fever for a few days and experience pain radiating from your lower back, look into your kidneys. I thought I just had the flu after 3 days of a high fever and feeling like shit. But I couldn’t sleep because I had what I assumed was a pulled muscle in my back that didn’t allow any position of comfort, and I was convinced that every time I rolled over, I was damaging my back and I would end up with chronic back pain just like Elizabeth Taylor (minus the diamonds, multiple husbands, and friendship with Michael Jackson).

So Sunday morning rolled around and I made Jason take me to urgent care where I begged the doctor for a muscle relaxer, which is something I have never done before but made me feel very much like I was turning into my mother. After the doctor looked me over and made me pee in a cup, he was all, girl, this is not the flu: you have a kidney infection. To which I said, so would this have anything to do with the fact that back in December I went through a period in which I had to urinate all of the time and it kind of burned, you know, down there? And it did.

The doctor then hooked me up with some Cipro, and I was all excited about my road to recovery until I read all 12 pages of the Cipro prescribing information. Side effects of this medication are many, one of which any Nice Southern Girl never has: gas. Or what is a more proper word to use? Wind? Flatulence? Regardless, I am my father's daughter, and my mother, much to her dismay, gave birth to three girls none of whom is qualified to be a Nice Southern Girl based on this criterion. So take the normal and add more to it, and dear God in Heaven, where did all the wind come from? And the burping? It was like my entire chest cavity was full of air. But at the end of the day, the wind was the least of my concerns. Other side effects of this drug included tendinitis, yeast infection, diarrhea, and death. And you can just guess right now which one of those I got because nothing says, “Congratulations, your kidneys are all better,” quite like getting a yeast infection.

Aren't you all glad I decided to write again?

 

Notes from Christmas 2011

You know it’s Christmas when...

• Your husband makes a Jell-O mold in the shape of a fish and everyone is too scared to touch it. Luckily, that shit disappears down the sink when you run hot water over it.
• You are at a party wearing an ugly holiday shirt and the man you are talking to compliments your shirt and then his eyes never leave the shirt and you realize he’s trying to check out your boobs but struggling to find them because you were never blessed with boobs, but the guy keeps looking nonetheless because he’s too drunk to do anything else and he still thinks that Christmas Miracles happen. (They do not—at least not this year.)
• The Christmas Eve dinner at your in-law’s house looks like this: tabbouleh, bean salad, brie, fine European chocolates, German cookies, red wine, and beer.
• The Christmas day dinner with your mother’s family includes the following: baked pineapple casserole with cheddar cheese and Ritz crackers (I know); ham rolled with cream cheese (no, seriously, these still exist); a seven-layer salad that contains both mayonnaise and sour cream (don’t even); a congealed salad that contains nuts, pineapple, and shredded cheddar cheese (I wouldn’t); and a ham salad (just plain wtf? man).
• And nothing really says Merry Christmas like hitting your 5-year-old niece in the face with a Frisbee on the first day of Special Family Time Together With the In-laws. During the ensuing tears and repeated exclamations reminding me of what I had done to her, I finally said, “I know what I did to your face, so don’t tell me again because all you are doing is making me feel bad about myself.” You know, because it is all about me. And for those of you who think I am a heartless, childless bitch: my niece was just fine. In addition, I’ve held a total of three small children over the last week and I didn’t break any of them.

In Search of The Tacky

Tomorrow is the Ugly Holiday Jumper Day at work. After we did this 2 years ago, I returned my ugly jumper to the K-Mart because I felt the $15 I spent on the sweater could go to better use. So when this year rolled around, I was without an ugly jumper but felt confident that the K-Mart would not let me down. Boy, was I wrong. There I was at 7:30 tonight wondering why the hell the merchandise at K-Mart had made such a drastic change as of late because there were no ugly sweaters to be found. So I decided I needed to go into a store in which I had not stepped in 8 years: Wal-Mart. Surely Wal-Mart would have some tacky shit.

Apparently not.

I was getting nervous, and Jason I and were carting around perishable groceries in the car, so I dropped him off at home and headed to one of the worst places in the world during the week before Christmas: The Mall. Y'all, I hit every department store in that joint. And you know when JCPenny doesn't carry a single ugly holiday jumper that there is a problem—a problem called People Apparently Buy This Crazy Shit and Wear it WITHOUT IRONY. In near despair, I stopped in at the Target and ended up crying in the parking lot. When I got home, I busted in the door all anger and noise. Jason, God bless him, had a candle burning and was playing some George Winston in anticipation of my mood. Of course, I yelled at him anyway and then went to the closet and pulled out my sewing machine.

One hour and many nasty things said later, I had put together this piece of work:

It's definitely no jumper, but it is ugly and it may fall apart as tomorrow progresses. I hope I at least get an A for effort. Fredo, our bathroom flamingo, thinks I should.

A Pointless Post

Before So You Think You Can Dance starts and I fail to write about anything apart from jazz hands and sequins until August (and a shout-out to Erin that I indeed will write about our favorite dance show this season!), I decided I better write something—at this point anything—to satisfy my readership, which in the world of blogging translates to a quick boost in my ego knowing that within 24 hours after I post this, 17 people will read my words and all of my self-esteem worries will disappear. For at least 15 minutes. I mean, isn’t that the fundamental purpose of a blog, so you can check on those stats and feel like somebody is paying attention to you, even if it is only repeated visits by your mother? So I tried writing this post about a pair of really unflattering hiking pants that I wore over Memorial Day weekend, and I was even going to include a close-up photo of my mid-section so that you could all share in the horror that I felt when I downloaded the photos and realized that I looked like a 50-year-old school bus driver from Davidson County—not that there is anything wrong with that. However, I am not yet 50 years old, and although I am from Davidson County, I made a life-long commitment to never wear pleated pants of any sort but particularly the sort that accentuates a woman’s abdomen in the world’s most unflattering way—and you all know what I’m talking about. That commitment I have kept because the hiking pants in question did not have pleats, but they might as well have because everyone who passed me on the trail wondered why someone of my age already had a subscription to Good Housekeeping magazine. Although I admit that at $7.97 for 12 months, it is a tempting offer.

But then I read that story and realized it was boring and that I didn’t have the courage to post a picture of my fully clothed crotch on the Internet.

So then I thought I would write about the weave we found in our front yard a couple of weeks ago. You read that right. You see, back when I was a little girl, I dreamed of many things for my future—getting married, having kids, discovering a portal through which I could travel through time, meeting a real-live extraterrestrial (only one of these has so far happened, but I still hold out for my extraterrestrial encounter)—but never did I dream that one day I would find a giant—and I mean GIANT, as in useful for swaddling a large first-grader—weave in my front yard, but it happened, and Jason and I are sure that somebody in Durham is really missing their hair. (And if it happens to be you, I would check with the local landfill because after a weave spends a few days on the side of a busy road, the landfill is the only logical place for it to go from there.) But then I didn’t have anything else to say about that either.

So I offer little but a rather rambling and pointless post. But have no fear, I stand of the threshold of spending 4 days with almost all of Jason’s American family, and, as we all know, time spent with in-laws guarantees the following two things: (1) there will be stories (although it may be best for family relations not to share them on the Internet), and one of the stories most certainly will be about (2) the imminent failure of my gastrointestinal system due to an away-toilet situation aggravated by time spent with 15 non-blood relatives in close quarters. But no worries, I’m taking along dominoes, Betty Blue, and a few bottles of wine. All will be fine.

Wherein I Finally Decide to Write Again...

...About ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. And do you know why? Because I have been without words for months. I mean, I went the entire month of April without posting words to The Chronicles because I had nothing to offer. And more than once I looked at Jason and was like, "I'm really going to shut it down this time," and he just rolled his eyes at me, which is his way of saying the following: you say that every 6 months; one day you'll regret that decision; please remember that you will receive phone calls from your mother about this; and for the love of god woman, quit interrupting me while I'm playing Angry Birds on my iPhone. And yes, you heard that right. One member of the Mathes Household has graduated to an iPhone. We never thought it would happen. Neither of us wanted to become the person at dinner with their head down surfing the Internet rather than interacting with the live human beings in our presence. And you all know what I am talking about BECAUSE THOSE PEOPLE HAVE BECOME UBIQUITOUS (and some of you may be one). You know, this person is completely ignoring everything you have to say and then suddenly comes to attention and interrupts a perfectly good conversation with the latest bit of news that they gathered on facebook, etc., as if they created that news themselves while sitting there metabolizing, and as if I really give a shit. Which I don't. I always kind of want to put a piece of chewed gum in that person's hair when they are not looking because you know what their behavior says to me? It says that I am not as important to them as the Internet is. And if that is the case, then just tell it to my face and let's not do dinner with each other ever again. I am a grown woman. I can handle the emotional sting of being told something that I already know is true in my heart. And I have Tolkein, fine European chocolate, a garden full of plants, and costume dramas to fill the void of whatever hole you leave in my soul because you love your electronics more than you love me. 

And speaking of costume dramas: I think my obsession with them has gotten a bit out of control. Granted, I use them in the winter in place of antidepressants. I know, it's an unprescribed treatment, and I should be careful with stuff like that, but seriously, I know no better way of getting through the winter than spending it in the English countryside of the 1800s (or Middle-Earth, and yes, I did just finish the Silmarillion...for, like, the fifth time). But then spring rolled around and I thought I could move on to something else—say, coming of age movies from the 1980s—but lo and behold, Netflix, that enabler of bad habits, sent me something called Berkeley Square, and after watching the first four episodes (there are 10 in all), I could not stop thinking about it and wasn't sure I could wait until disc two arrived. But I decided to practice a virtue called Patience, and to my delight, disc two arrived in the mail Tuesday. So that night, Jason and I gathered on the couch for dinner and inserted disc two into the computer. We then waited, and we waited some more, and then we tried ejecting the disc and it refused to come out, and I would have been totally fine with that HAD THE DISC DECIDED TO PLAY, fools, but no, the disc never played and it refused to exit the machine. So of course I broke out into an anxiety-induced sweat and I might have said some mean things to my husband—shocking, I know—and when we finally got the disc to eject by restarting the computer, I went straight to the Netflix Web site to register for a replacement disc, which they said would be sent "immediately." And then I practiced a virtue called Hope, and I kept hoping all night for a knock on the door signaling the arrival of disc two—like when your luggage doesn't make the plane with you and they taxi it to your house in the middle of the night once it finally arrives. So I hoped and waited, but the knock never came. Apparently Netflix defines "immediately" as "Thursday," which I define as "Woman on the Verge." 

And now you all realize why I quit writing in the first place: to save the souls of those of you who still check in on The Chronicles because no one wants to read about a sad, almost middle-aged, socially awkward woman who rambles on about her addiction to costume dramas. (Although apparently you just did, and for that I am truly sorry). 

The Next Time I Reach for a Pair of Tights...

I got up this morning and spontaneously decided to take a departure from my normal winter work wardrobe of jeans and a sweater and clunky black shoes. I don’t know why because everyone who knows me knows that I am the least spontaneous person alive. But it happened and into my bag went underwear, a green skirt, a black shirt, a pair of tights, and some black dress shoes with 1.5-inch heels. A daring look, I know. So I rode into work, and go to the bathroom to change out of my spandex and into what must be the fanciest thing I have worn in the workplace since we last saw 80 degrees—meaning, it is February and no one even remembers 80 degrees ago. I put on new underwear; I put on my shirt; and then I put my right foot through the leg of the tights and out comes my foot at the the other end, and I was all, What the...

World: they were FOOTLESS TIGHTS. To make it worse, they had rather large stars on them that got even bigger as you moved up the leg. I couldn’t remember seeing these tights ever before, except that I had seen them before because these were the Yearly Christmas Gift of Tights from my mother circa 2009. And now I will relay the following personal note to my mother via the Internet: MOM: I am 32 years old. Maybe tights with patterns on them are no longer an age-appropriate gift for your daughter. Love, Marge. (PS: I bet you will print this one out for the Ladies at the Office, so here’s a shout-out to the Ladies who I hope are not buying footless decorative tights for their grown daughters.)

To say the least, those footless tights were not a good look. My legs were all big-ass stars supported by two frighteningly white feet stuck in a pair of shoes that were not meant to go with footless tights. I looked like a giant 13-year-old—a giant 13-year-old who would be seen by actual humans around the building—and I wasn’t certain that my seasonally affected self could handle that.

So I called Jason, who, as luck would have it, worked from home today, and I was all, “I brought footless tights to work and I look like a fool. Please sympathize with me now.” And with a heavy sigh, he was all, “Do you want me to bring you some tights with feet?” And I almost said yes, but then I thought about the environment and decided that my self-esteem was not as important as 15 miles worth of carbon emissions. 

And then I changed my mind.

But instead of calling Jason, I called a coworker who lives two blocks from my house and asked if she had left her house yet. She had not, and seriously, elves and unicorns came out of my cell phone and did a dance on my desk when they heard that news. So I called Jason and told him to take all the tights he could find in my underwear drawer and put them in a bag and give the bag to Gail who would stop by to pick up the tights.

Y’all, Jason found FIVE PAIRS OF TIGHTS, including one fishnet, in that drawer. I never knew I had so many—heck, my mother probably doesn't know that I have so many either even though she bought all of them for me at one time or another.

So Gail shows up at 8:15 with the bag full of tights, takes a look at my get-up, and decides that she has indeed performed an act of community service. She was rewarded with a big hug.

As you can see, all ended well for me today, and I even think I learned a few things:

• Never blindly reach into a drawer for a pair of tights. Take your time and inspect. This probably could apply to underwear as well. 
• Jeans are always the best option. Always.
• The Christmas of 2010 is the last time my sisters and I will ever receive a pair of tights from our mother. Because the next time my mom is in the Target and reaches for three packs (one for each of her girls because she always buys in three) of the trendy tight of the month, she will remember that I wrote this and she will THINK TWICE.

In All Earnestness

Our neighbor Mohamed stopped by last night to borrow $20. This happens all of the time, and I admit that the practice initially perturbed me greatly, but after awhile, I realized that I needed to have a bigger heart, I could afford the 20 bucks, and that Mohamed would never stop asking. This is a man who has learned a great lesson in life: Persistence Pays. Literally. Besides, he’s good at paying us back in a fairly timely fashion, which is generally after he’s made a successful trip to the scrap-metal yard. Anyway, last night he came into the house, and the first thing out of his mouth was: “Do I owe y’all any money?” That’s right, I like a person who checks on their debts before they add another one to the list. So Jason went to look for some cash, and while I was hanging out with Mohamed, Mohamed tilted his head down and cut his eyes up at me and in all earnestness said: “Did you get a weave?” And somewhere between the thought schools of Deer in the Headlights and Did He Really Ask That Question, I managed to say, “You mean...in my hair?” And Mohamed was all, “Yeah, did you get a weave?” And I was like, no and why did you think I got a weave in my hair? “It looks longer.” Of course, because if I’m going to get a weave, it’s going to be of the flat-hair chin-length variety.

And So It Continues

So that virus that I have had on and off since Thanksgiving raised its ugly head again on Tuesday...with a vengeance. I thought I could beat it, but I woke up Wednesday morning and was all, SHIT. Desperate, I got in the car and drove to the Kroger and arrived at 6:55 a.m. Y’all, the Kroger is an interesting place at that early of an hour. They don’t have all the lights turned on, there are dudes stocking shelves who they don’t let out in the daytime hours, and there’s an eerie silence that makes you think that you might open the door to reach for an orange juice and something will grab your arm and pull you through to the other side and that will be the last the world will ever hear of you: Victim to Early Morning Kroger Run. But, whatever, I was a woman on a mission called Decongestant, and I was too repulsive for anyone to want to pull me through the orange juice refrigerator anyway. As planned, I ended up buying the biggest bottle of decongestant ever; it said in giant letters on the front “BREAKS UP MUCUS.” I tell ya, marketing works, because had it said “Free Bag of Lindt Chocolate Balls with Purchase” it would not have looked as good as "Breaks up Mucus." So I left the Kroger with $18.68 worth of herbal tea, orange juice, decongestants, and pudding. And now you just learned a secret about me. When I am sick, the only thing I think about eating is pudding. Brand: Jello-O. Flavor: Vanilla. Method of cooking: stove top. And for those of you who make the instant kind: you are all a bunch of lazy-ass losers. And maybe that isn’t a nice thing to say two days before celebrating The Birth in the Manger, but it’s true. That instant stuff is disappointing in taste, texture, and satisfaction. You see, even when I am sick and on my last leg, I like the—you know—1 million hours it takes to stir the pudding and milk together on the stove to get it to just the right consistency. And then I like pouring it into two bowls. The first bowl I eat within 5 minutes, after a very thin congealed layer on the top has formed—I eat that layer first. Then I dive into the still very warm bowl of vanilla pudding and for the few minutes that I eat the pudding, I completely forget about the fact that my sinuses and throat and back hurt, that I’ve developed a zit within my inner ear, and that I haven’t plucked my eyebrows in 2 weeks. It is just me and the pudding.

And then I eat bowl number 2. Still just me and the pudding.

By Wednesday afternoon, I knew that no amount of pudding would help my illness. I was blowing slugs out of my nose at that point and—OMG!—could I have just said anything more disgusting on the Internet? Anyway, a few weeks ago when I went to the urgent care and was diagnosed with the Respiratory Viral Infection of the Century, the doctor gave me an antibiotic prescription, which he wisely told me not to use unless I was really sick because, as everyone should know, antibiotics don’t work on viruses. And yet Americans don’t seem to comprehend this. We want a pill for everything. I mean, we now live in a society in which people think taking a pill for weight loss is a first option. And I’m like, dudes, maybe just don’t eat that bag of Fritos and maybe don’t want so much TV while sitting on our ass. Or even better, just contract the Respiratory Viral Infection of the Century because I’ve lost 4 pounds since Thanksgiving, and seriously, I didn’t need to, but it has happened nonetheless. Which leads me back to the current story...I have become one of those people who is very reticent to take a pill for something unless I think it is absolutely necessary. This could be a controversial statement, I am sure, but that’s not why I’m putting it out there, so please don’t preach to me. I say this because after visiting the urgent care doctor, I put the antibiotic prescription in the paper recycling; I was convinced I didn’t need it and I could overcome on my own.

Had I been born in 1701 I would have already been dead by now because I would not have allowed them to bleed me.

So yesterday, becoming more desperate by the minute and running out of things in the house to blow my nose on—Jason, I tell you now to beware what you touch when you get home—I drug the giant paper recycling container out of the basement and went through every single piece of paper before I found that discarded prescription, and I took that thing to the pharmacist and got it filled. Lord knows if it will actually do anything, but tomorrow I’m singing in a Christmas Eve service and I’m hosting my in-laws for Abendbrot, and then I’m going to spend two days with my family where Jason and I GET TO SLEEP ON THE FLOOR, so those drugs need to work.

Happy Christmas, all!

A Typical Holiday Season

The Chronicles are in a dry spell. I have no stories. Well, that’s not true. I could talk about Thanksgiving, but wading into the river In-Law is really not something safe for the Internet or family relations. But I will say this: Jason and I drove to Nashville, Tennessee; I cooked an entire Thanksgiving meal for a family of 11 (granted, my father-in-law cooked the turkey, and 1 of the 11 was a 6-week-old, so maybe she does not count, but still); I washed a lot of dishes; we drove back to North Carolina; I promptly developed the Respiratory Viral Infection of the Century; I am currently on day 9 of said virus; and I have been in thermal underwear for 3 straight days. On Saturday night, my right nostril had swollen to a size that would have made Rudolph question his job security, so I decided to stick a needle into the sidewall of my nose to try to relieve the pressure. I’m not sure why I thought that was a good idea because it was not a good idea, and it led to the following conversation between me and Jason:

Marge: Am I the grossest person you know?

Jason: No. But you do some of the most disgusting things I’ve ever seen.