And he loves Buffy too!

[To fully appreciate the incredible synchronicity referred to in this post, please read this and this first. You may skip it but - your loss. TRUST ME.]

Oh but this is getting better and better, you will NOT believe what I found!!! I know I KEEP saying it but it keeps being true, what else am I supposed to say? Read on, you'll see!

"Graydon Carter" on "snarky"

My dear Elizabeth:

In my inestimable wisdom I have reached the decision to exscind that chintzy and boorish lexical trinket "snarky" from the venerable yet paper-thin pages of Vanity Fair. This tawdry bit of media argot joins the ever growing list of proscribed vernacular never again to litter the sumptuously rich prose of our hallowed publication.

I have decided to take such drastic action after noting the proliferation of this utterly noisome term throughout the media omniverse. This journalistic desecration has sullied the formerly pristine pages of such august publications as the New York Times, Time, San Francisco Examiner, Slate, The New Republic, Chicago Sun-Times, San Jose Mercury News, and Washington Times along with the New York Post where it has manifested itself in no less than 5 articles. It has also peppered the speech of such celebrity non-entities as Tyra Banks and Weird Al and infiltrated the deliciously wicked prose of that literary harlot (and my much-maligned progenitor), Tina Brown.

And, oh, my dear Elizabeth, it has even blemished your effulgent, urbane sniping. This is too much. It is my mission to see this odium laid low. That said I must now go watch the unwelcome denouement of Buffy impatiently awaiting me on TIVO.

My apologies to Dominick Dunne.
-GRAYDON CARTER

Go here to read the rest.

I don't care that this was fabricated, it's just too bloody funny! Graydon II, I may just heart you a bit as well.

Dead man walking

Imagine you and your girlfriend broke up for good over a year ago
Imagine it wasn’t pretty
Imagine it had a lot to do with your being immature, selfish and insecure to the point where you asked her not to tell you whenever she went for coffee w a male friend
Imagine she laughed at you and wished you good luck with that, as if
Imagine you refused to give her her research polarised sunglasses back
Imagine she can’t be bothered to even start another fight over it, though she misses them bcs they’re ideal for bird-watching
Imagine you meet her by accident a few months later and seem mostly normal so she asks for them and you say yes
Imagine you later decide they are naff and therefore don’t have to return them because, really!!!
Imagine you suggest when she rings you AGAIN you’ll buy her a cool pair instead, how abt that
Imagine you don’t understand why her eyes start glowing red
Imagine you refuse to have her pick them up at your house bcs it’s too complicated
Imagine you refuse to have her pick them up at your job’s reception desk bcs it’s too complicated
Imagine you refuse to have her pick them up at your mother’s house bcs it’s too complicated
Imagine you tell her during yet another phone call from her hat you’ve mailed them to her bcs it’s so much simpler
Imagine she waits for them. And waits for them. And waits for them.
Imagine you tell her when she rings AGAIN, worried, that you actually never mailed them, you just said that to get her off your back
Imagine you finally go over to her house, ring her from your mobile from the main entrance, ask her to open the door, and shove them in the mail, thereby scratching them, bcs you can’t bear to see her in case she dry-humps you, which is terribly likely
Imagine that.

Now imagine this.
Imagine many months pass and suddenly you ring her
Imagine you start the conversation by asking her how things are at the synagogue
Imagine you always had a hard time handling the Jewish factor bcs it made you feel excluded so you didn’t even want to know
Imagine you then tell her you saw her on the telly bcs of Samuel, the kid from Mozambique
Imagine you don’t get much of an answer to either bcs, frankly…???
Imagine you tell her you have a favour to ask, isn’t that some nerve ah ah, imagine she agrees that indeed it is
Imagine you tell he you need to know who Solomon was
Imagine you actually tell her THAT
Imagine she tells you to google it
Imagine you tell her you did and couldn’t find anything really, and was he a Jew, and what did he do
Imagine she tells you yes he was, son of David first king of the Jews, built the First Temple, blabla
Imagine you ask her what Zion is and what happened to it
Imagine she tells you Still standing, it’s the old name for Jerusalem
Imagine you ask if he was indeed a king of theirs or is she just saying it
Imagine she tells you she doesn’t usually manipulate History to fit her non-existing needs and you should really just google it, so much easier for one of the parts and was there anything else
Imagine you ask her Are you getting married yet?
Imagine she asks you how that could possibly interest you
Imagine you say, People ask these things, no big deal
Imagine the conversation is finally over

On a scale of 1-20, how big a loser are YOU? And on a scale of 1-20, what are the odds she’s still asking herself WHAT THE HELL WAS I THINKING???

Stands to treason

There’s this. You should read it or you will not understand what I’m talking about at all. Go on, read it, it’s not long and it will increase your lifespan. I’ll be here waiting. Placidly. Not snarkily at all. Incisives barely showing, I promise. NU, GO ON ALREADY!

All done? You have now met Graydon Carter, esq. I had nearly convinced myself he existed as such because I FOUND HIM, by golly!

Do you see? Isn’t he impressive? I must admit I blushed a little.

But then tragedy struck. My friend, the nosy Viscondessa, googled him. [WHY???] Oh BAD, BAD GOOGLE, damn you and the mare you rode in on!!! You see, he DOES exist. I AM heartbroken. The real Graydon Carter is, al(i)as, the editor of Vanity Fair. Read this if you don’t believe me. V., bless her, got all hysterical (she’s Californian, they’re sadly prone to that) and was convinced I HAD ARRIVED. Sweet. Yes, I did, BEARING GIFTS. It tickled me pink since I am usually the daftly gullible one.

I am fairly [fairly, ha!, make that fully] sure that Mr. Carter does NOT read this blog, and has in fact entered me in NO competition. I must admit he looks dashingly handsome and terribly smooth. I'm sure he has moooves most men can only dream of, to say nothing of his proven political acumen. I am also sure Mr. Carter is a brilliant editor. Actually I’m not, since I don’t read Vanity Fair - but I hope he is or else it’s an appalling waste of power and money. I was very much in the wrong thinking someone called Graydon, a name which would be far more fitting on a scaly, oceanic deity that only leaves the depths to feast on unsuspecting mortals every 13 years, would NOT have a sense of humour (though hard to see how he could have survived WITHOUT one) until I came across this picture. That takes humour, surely? Quite frankly, and irrespective of anything else, anyone who can get Madonna to twirl without being a whirling Dervish [so, so lovely] or a Sephirot master himself has my utmost admiration. Be that as it may, he cannot compare, will NEVER compare to my hero.

Oh Graydon, Graydon… You were far too manly to be true.

OMG I'M SNARK-Y!

I was looking at the Blog Awards Nominations - wait, first you need to know I had no idea what that was until recently, I had absolutely no idea we ourselves could nominate people, I have no idea if they're still going on or if the awards were given out already. I thought I'd take a look and landed in some nomination page whose name had caught my fancy, "Snarkiest Blog". Ha!

To my HUMUNGOUS surprise, I found this:

Posted by: GraydonCarter at December 20, 2004 09:39 PM

I nominate Which Surprised Her.

ME. Apparently, some - well, one - would consider me snarky. Alright, maybe more than one MAY consider me snarky, one thought it actually deserved a prize. It was a case of Which Surprised Her Indeed if I ever saw one, I kept staring at it. There I was, WITH A FULL STOP! Graydon Carter, which I AM SURE IS HIS REAL NAME, YES, has an email that sounds equally legit.

Oh, if you do exist as such my apologies, though I would expect someone with a name like that to not be able to read my blog at all, because we all know that cartographing forests in deep Africa w only the help of the friendly Pygmies - may their self-filed teeth never decay - leaves very little time for anything else. Unless one has wireless, that is. Oh I can picture dahling Graydon fighting off lianas, snakes and leeches [though they have extensive medical uses these days and their image deserves rehabilitation - be nice, they might just save your reattached thumb some day], always with a grin plastered on his mud-besmeared face, because he knows - HE KNOWS - that come evening, oh come evening all will be well, he'll be delighting in his cherished [tin] mug of watery coffee WHILE learning exactly how to perform a cow necropsy [give the buffalos a wide berth though, they tend to gore]. The landscape will be bathed in the soft light of his laptop, conferring it an eerie, piloerection-inducing [yes] look. Wild bunnies will hop over and settle by his feet, mesmerised. Birds will feel compelled to try and help him dress, chirping melodically, even though this is Graydon Carter, The Proper, of the solid British [yes] education, and Graydon Carter would never dream of letting the wilderness get even a glimpse of his not-powder blue longjohns. And that, my friends, makes it all worth while, that's what sustains him as his tattered, bleeding, blister-afflicted feet grow increasingly, unbearably heavier. Poor bastard.

On the other hand, he might just be a humour-riddled lurker. That would make me sad, I've managed to grow quite fond of The Intrepid Explorer in the little while it took me to write this. If you are indeed HIM, thank you - I think. It is very heart-warming, in a way. Sort of. So come out already, do it anonymously if you will, I am rather curious about you. [Oh lurkers, you're such a bloody pain!] And in my case, so sadly true, curiosity kills the cat EVERY SINGLE TIME.

I DO NOT want Jesus around here! (watch your "S")

Dany just emailed me to let me know this URL, http://lioness-pride.blogpot.com/ , leads to - you'll never guess.

Do you know where he ended up? DO YOU? You will never believe it, ever, EVER!!!

ABUNDANT BIBLE
A mega-site of Bible, Christian and religious information & studies; including,audio and written KJV Bible, Bible helps & tools, churches, Doctrine, links, news,prayer, prophecy, sermons, spiritual warfare, statistics, and tracts. Features the Chronological 4 Gospels, Prayer Book, Prophecy Bible, and a photo tour of Israel.

WHAT THE HELL!!! I tried leaving them a message but I got an internal server mistake, and the webmaster's email is invalid as well. Transparency all around.

Bloggers, beware. Dany has just told me this is what they've done: they claimed a name that gets typed a lot (www.blogpot.com) and then redirect all subdomains (ie subdomain.blogpot.com) to their main domain. ANY blogspot subdomainwill redirect to www.blogpot.com. So yes, expect a visit from Christ any time now. If you forget the S, that is, it works for every one of your blogs. THE PIGS!

Because, see, we are blogSpot. With an S. They do NOT have the S, they're blogpot. WHAT THE HELL??? I want to crash and burn their bloody site! Stupid wankers, how is that good, spreading the doctrine while using disresputable methods??? Yes, that does give me hope for Christianity, I wasn't mistrustful enough, not at all... ARGH!!!

Hear Hope

I finally, finally, finally got an .mp3 version of HaTikvah, the Israeli national anthem, for my HaTikvah category - all thanks to the Hasidic Gentile! YEY!!! Do you know how long I surfed the web looking for one? DO YOU? I've wanted it for so long, oy, todah!

Go on, check out the category within the very cool drop-down menu, click on the red link and then tell me it doesn't cause the world's biggest piloerection*! It's a gorgeous melody and yes, the lyrics? *sigh* Beguf koev, belev raev...

[*Pilo = hair, it's up to me to keep you ethologically informed, don't mention it.]

Dam Eretz

WARNING: dream is a bit graphic

I dreamt of Uzi tonight, again. That's not news, I do every single night. Of him, the wave, the debris. I can't always remember it and when I do not it feels worse. It’s always been like this w my bad dreams.

In the dream we were somewhere dark and w not a lot of space so we were sort of sitting next to each other hunching over, especially him. He was telling me, in English, that there had been many survivors beneath the rubble.

- But how did they survive?
- They could breathe bcs the falling buildings created air pockets.
- Yes but how could they survive? What did they eat, how could they go so long without water?
- They ate the bodies of the dead, there was still blood in them, some of them survived for 12 days.
- But you’ve been gone for almost 5 weeks, what about you??? [And where are they now?]
- Well, I don’t know…

And then I woke up. Tig, Tig… THAT’S NOT CLEAR ENOUGH IS IT! If you don’t know how the hell will I??? And forget abt the physiological impossibility of it all in a hot, HOT place.

Fuck.

----------------------

After waking up I always feel disconnected, sluggish. Comes from not sleeping well I suppose. So I sat on the sofa installing my new printer, and took a look at the telly (telly is always on unless I need to memorise by the gallon, I’m a tellyholic and proudly so).

Funny how you know some things. I caught a glimpse of a man, in profile, dark pants, white t-shirt, aiming a gun. I knew he was Israeli security. I KNEW. It took me less than a second and then I was shocked bcs he was, indeed, Israeli security and how did I know that? They are so very identifiable, w their dark glasses, and t-shirt, and button-up shirt over it, unbuttoned (so they can draw their gun w ease, see). But there were no sunglasses, no button-up shirt, I just knew.

Lisa’s posts have been upsetting me. Oh I will read them, I can’t help myself, I am in awe of her capability to so accurately describe how it was then, how we all felt this almost paralysing and so liberating hope, how we were absolutely unprepared to see the Intifada begin, how we would never EVER have believed it could happen in the first place and certainly not that it would have lasted this long. We were getting there we thought, we truly did. And we were grateful, we rejoiced in it. Noorster talks abt it in a very poignant way as well, we could NOT have seen it coming and I still feel betrayed. I think we all do. How could we not, my God.

For me, and Boulder has it spot on, it IS a tainted love now. Ever since I first set foot in Israel everything’s changed. I cannot tell you how I have longed to be back. I have been away for almost 3 and a half years and not a day went by that I didn’t want to be back if only for a little while, that I didn’t hunger for it, ached for it. I used to leave comments on Lisa and Squarepeg’s blogs telling them to stop making me homesick, stop arranging meetings BEFORE MY VERY EYES, the twats!

This was how it once was:

I smoke my last israeli cigarrette.
"Noblesse".
Home.

I remember.

Midnight,
Running in the Old City.
Home,
Where the Stone breathes
And cries
And mourns.
Home,
Where the forehead rested upon the Stone,
The palms caressed the Stone,
And I breathed
And cried
And mourned with it.
Soft, praying, legitimate voices,
Desperate,
Long, dark, legitimate skirts swaying in the cold night.
But davening were my jeans,
Ancient was my soul,
Biblical the air.

And Home is there.
Where the prayer flickers with the candle.

I AM JEWISH.

I wrote this on the 16th January 1996, my epiphany, the night I really understood what the Kotel was all about and who I was. I felt it, I KNEW. It’s gone now.

When I say I hate what this blog became it’s bcs there’s all this death in it now. And I was unprepared for it. It’s not just Uzi I’ll have to mourn some day, it’s my whole life in Israel, past and future, my relationship to it. More than anything else, my Israeli experience was a kibbutz one. I still see Israel through the eyes of a kibbutznik, that was my first language I suppose. And the kibbutz is him, every part of it, my life in Israel is intertwined with his and his lack of life has robbed me of my footing. I do not know how to cherish Israel with him gone. I do not know how to arrange the memories in a way that will not eat me alive. I do not know how to go back with him gone. When I wrote the Just DON’T talk to me!!! post, it was him and Lila I was thinking of (it’s always possible for Israelis to just hop over to Sinai for a few days on short notice). And Israel without any of them isn’t a possiblity. It just isn’t.

And yet I carry Israel with me everywhere I go. I don’t hunger for it anymore, in fact, the thought of going back nauseates me a bit, but I carry it within me. En li eretz acheret. It courses through my veins and there isn’t a thing I can do about it.

Dam eretz. Blood of the nation.

See? No claws!

Squarepeg dahling, the 3rd link is for you. Because I know you LOVE kittie-related posting. On one's blog. Yes. Oh, and just because you love it so much, here's this, from Portieland, with love:

Yes, I knew you'd appreciate it. And I know you are heartbroken I can't upload any others bcs I don't have any scanned yet. Yes. Oh stop sniveling, it's very unbecoming. You should be thankful, it's the last pic of her with all four legs [not for the faint-hearted medically]. A privilege. And if you look carefully, there's THE DOG!!! Looking edibly cute. So two privileges, really.

Seriously, this is ADORABLE, please check it and consider re-thinking your glass surface cleaning method. I know it works for my face - especially eyelids. Kudos to The Protocols of the Yuppies of Zion for the bloody brilliant blog's name the link, and the pic at the end of the post [HEY, don't look yet!]. I dedicate it to my Jewish friends - because some of my best friends ARE Jewish, you know, and THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT. Not a thing. We rock actually.

If you are indeed Jewish or Israeli - no, they're NOT the same, who knew - or just interested in the whole Israel thing *waves hand about all-encompassingly*, you NEED to read Lisa's story of how she got to Israel. Jack's Shack actually ordered the 4 parts in this post. Bet YOU didn't know that - but I do for I am well read *waves hand about janeaustenly*. But beware. You may find out it stirrs memories, loads of memories, not all of them welcome, not all of them good. Unforgettable posts though. Brilliant Lisa.

And if you have ever asked yourself what Israel is like, well this is it. Also.

Bella's Mommie - UPDATE

This is the one thing you need to know about me: you may fuck with me all you want, but stay away from my friends. I will go for the jugular, I promise you. Especially if you choose to kick them when they are at a disadvantage.

I’ve posted here before about the Barren Bitches Brigade, the infertile women who are the ultimate Modern Warriors. Occasionally some people, very often Christian trolls [Chrolls] but by no means always, will get it into their heads that they have a say in what goes on with their lives and reproductive system. Womb vigilantes, as it were. And they will think nothing of telling a woman who just lost a baby that she probably wasn’t meant to be a mummy anyway. They will tell a woman whose twin died in uteru and whose other twin was lost when the pregnancy had to be terminated at 5 months so the mother wouldn’t die that THEY would never do that, they’d let God make a choice (while guzzling antibiotics and having surgery when needed themselves one presumes). They won't be able to see that getting pregnant doesn't mean staying pregnant, and that staying pregnant doesn't mean live baby at the end of it all. Even if they never miscaryy, the pregnancy ensures 9 more months of constant worrying. They will decide these women are disturbed bcs they put themselves, their bodies, their families through hell, emotionally, socially, financially, so they may one day have a baby. They alone hold the truth and the truth is, these women should just buck up and not complain. They should make peace w the fact that God didn’t intend them to be mothers and it’s all for the best. They should, if pregnant, not complain EVER bcs isn’t that what she wanted, never mind that NO ONE IN THEIR RIGHT MIND welcomes discomfort and pain, or that many of them have additional pregnancy problems and their waking minutes and many of their sleeping ones are populated by Dead Baby Thoughts. And if they are so lucky as to give birth to a healthy, live baby, again, they are not to be dismayed, overwhelmed, exhausted, scared and should they feel inadequate - well, that’s not a proof of sanity is it, THERE’S YOUR PROOF that they should never have been mothers. We all know that TRUE women can change 3 babies at once (and their babies NEVER cry or get colicky), all the while flipping pancakes, making the beds, presiding over a Tupperware party and farting lilac-scentedly in your general direction. Well, I did hear about it, and actually read about it, and wasn’t so thrilled abt the story myself, and I plan, in fact, to keep as far away from any place named Stepford as humanly possible. But it's ironic that they spend so many years feeling like sub-females and then all of a sudden are expected, OBLIGATED to be Super-Woman.

These women, who are misunderstood by most, even their doctors (and I mean also physiologically, they make the most hideous life-changing mistakes), who have lost so much already, who are deemed unworthy (often by themselves as well) bcs they are either childless or cannot bear their own, these women, who are daily faced with what they are denied, and daily denied what should by right be theirs by biology and life at large, are then verbally robbed by others of their right to choose to try and have a baby. Blind people are never told You should just accept it. They are never told To want to spend ALL THAT money so you can see is insane, there must be something very wrong w you, you should seek help. [HA!] They are never told Well, you CAN JUST READ BRAILLE, there are so many abandoned Braille books that would love to have you read them!. But these women have open wombs, apparently, come on in, have a look, tell us what you think even if it’s cruel, degrading and unacceptable because you know, “mi utero es su utero”. Yes. And their husbands suffer also, make no mistake.

So a troll sent Tertia an email. Tertia, with her newborn twins, Adam and Kate. Over whom she anguished every day of her pregnancy. Over whom she still anguishes bcs they are preemies, and she is an infertile, and infertiles know that hard comes easy goes, life's made sure they were taught that in a myriad of ways. Tertia, who already lost Luke and Ben, to mention just the most recent. And this troll, this Brenda person, aka bellasmommie, writes:

WHAT A HORRIBLE HUMAN BEING YOU ARE- YOU DO NOT DESERVE CHILDREN!THERE'S A PLACE IN HELL FOR PEOPLE LIKE YOU.

And I am at a loss to understand how anyone can be this abject, this vile. And these people get to breed without knowing a moment of pain. Being self-righteous must indeed be an egg booster. Tertia would normally laughs trolls off but Tertia has her hands full right now, she is exhausted and most of all, she doesn’t deserve this. And especially not from someone named Brenda, with a daughter named Bella, whose husband is probably called Brett. If you define yourself as a MOMMIE, start having some respect for what being a parent really means. No one deserves to be treated like that but Tertia is my friend and, trolls and Brendas alike, should you stumble in here, this is what I have to tell you: don’t pick on the ones who can’t fight back right now. I am here. Let me see how fucking big you really are.

-------------------

UPDATE - I sent The Brenda this: Do you know, my heart goes out to you, must be hard going through life dull and mean and desperate. We're always here for you, always ready to have a laugh at you because frankly, there's nothing like a juicy troll to start off one's day in a most hilarious manner. Next time you feel the need to spew, pick a fight w me, don't target those who cannot fight back just now.

The Brenda answered w this: How am I desperate. Hummm very interesting, I have everything I need, thankyou very much!

Book of Cowards Rule #1: You must be grammatically deficient, invariably stupid and appallingly dumb.

So bloody boring.

Dear all,

you lot rock.

I suppose it's projection. My life's been tainted therefore my blog's been tainted therefore those who read me will be as well.

I still find it hard to understand why anyone would want to read all this but when I put myself in your position I do, crystal clear, and I understand all you are saying. I still don't like what this blog is nowadays but I will not take it down, I'd have to create a new one bcs I cannot not write when I feel the need to. And I'd miss your comments. Please don't take my last post to mean you will now have to be extra careful abt what you say to me or I'll worry. Please do not be careful, please do not treat me differently. Business as usual Chez Pride, alright? I did understand all you said - except for the bit abt my ugly secrets [Serialangel dahling, jump in any time], I actually almost half got up and went looking for skeletons in my closets but then, er, thought better of it. All things considered. [Lighten up, IT'S A JOKE!].

Your presence, named and anonymous, has so often been my buoy, far more than anything IRL right now. One day I may try to figure out exactly why it was so but for now I am just so grateful it is. Grateful you're there.

Muito, muito obrigada.

"Retrieving Sorrow is a kind of religion, too"

WARNING: gruel post

I'm at a loss, I don't know what to do next. I have been pouring over dozens of sites basically looking for one thing at this time, photos of the unidentified victims. The only site that I can open is the Thai police one, and it's got so that the faces are familiar by now. I hope many, most will have been given their names back and returned to their families, I can't tell, there's no English version, I can't bear to think of all of them there, so cold, alone and nameless. It feels like the end of the world every time I find a dead link and it turns out to be exactly that, error message. It breaks my heart. All I want is to look for my best friend and maybe he's there, behind that closed door. Cold and alone and nameless. If I'd known abt these sites sooner I could have started looking for him sooner and maybe found him? But why are the sites down? Is Uzi the only one still missing? Have all victims been identified? I cannot really believe that. WHY HAVE THE SITES BEEN SHUT DOWN???

OTH, the bodies still being found will NOT be photographed, they will be too decomposed for that. So even if they find him now, only DNA and dental records will help. So I cannot do anything, I cannot help him any further. Tig, I so wanted to help bring you home. And I am so so sorry, so very sorry I can't.

------------------------------------

A GOOD WHILE LATER:

I am SO SICK OF THIS BLOG!!!! It used to be a haven and it's turned into a fucking morgue and I cannot help it one fucking bit!!! I've actually considered taking the bloody thing down, I cannot stand to look at it most of the time and I wonder how you lot do it, and believe me, I appreciate that you check in to see how I'm doing bcs if I were in your shoes I'd just fucking run as fast as I could, and I apologise to the poor unsuspecting souls who come via Next Blog, THAT'S GOT TO BE FUN, EH? And now, to top it all, I've apparently developed a pattern, I write a horribly depressing post and THEN get horribly mad so I'll add to it: I will, as of now, add horribly ridiculous links after each one. BECAUSE I CAN, because I am tired to the bone of all this fucking shit and the days don't get any easier, even the easy ones. I am tired of making other people feel bad, the comments often leave me floored bcs I don't think my Uzi posts are that strong, I definitely do not think they are, I can never find the most effective words, I know I talk abt sad things but I thought it was all pretty dull (as in dull knives) bcs of said lack of right words, I only got really mad now a while after reading Beth's comment bcs she echoed what so many of you have told me here and per email, they make you sad, they have made some of you cry, how fucked up is that? You shouldn't have to be this affected, I'm like a STD minus the sex, I am now VIRTUALLY the kind of Pink Panther people so often think I am anyway, a HIGHLY CONTAGIOUS one. I can promise you this, I will be alright. There will come a time surely when I won't be bcs we all know numb doesn't last, as the starlette episode has proven, but even then I will be alright so please, please, please, DO NOT feel like you have to comment or come in at all, I promise I understand if you stay away.

I cannot prevent Sorrow from floating to the surface [neither could John Irving, HA!] but I can promise you Laughter will be there at the end. I WILL "keep passing the open windows". So go on, click on the nice link already [I don't know where I found it anymore, my apologies], you may be traumatised at the end of it but it's ALL GOOD.

D-movies

You know those rather bad movies where the aspiring starlet unexpectedly starts sobbing against the kicthen counter, then slides down till she's sitting on the floor and finally finds herself curled up in front of the refrigerator while the cat licks her salty hands? I am now giving autographs.

So. If any of you regulars and lurkers know of any blog or site where people talk about friends dead and missing from the wave please PLEASE would you let me know, now would be a good time for me to read them, I think I need that now. I can read them in English, French, German, Portuguse, Spanish, Italian and probably Dutch too. NO survivor stories though, I cannot handle the descriptions. Thanks.

-----------------------------

And just so you know, this PISSED ME OFF and it's been aggravating me for days:

The body of Aya Shapira, 28, missing since the tsunami swept through Southeast Asia, was identified yesterday in Thailand. She was the sixth of seven missing Israelis in the disaster to have been identified. Still unidentified is the body of Uzi Saguy, her boyfriend. (Itim)Ha'aretz, Wed., January 19

His body is unidentified??? What body? THERE IS NO BODY! Why does everyone ELSE talk like he's dead? They're not allowed to, only WE are allowed to say such things, he isn't dead yet and will not be until they find him! So just fuck off with the bloody reports, and today is her burial and media madness will abound and I will get to read abt it and I wish they'd stop taking his name in vain.

Quem di diligunt, adolescens moritur?

From my friend Lila's email:

it's really amazing: Uzi's lost,among 170 israelies. then slowly it's only him and Aya and another woman. the 3rd woman was found- dead. and now Aya, and now he's the only missing israeli! seriously the chosen one.

‘Whom the gods love, die young’ was said of yore,

And many deaths do they escape by this:

The death of friends and that which slays even more,

The death of friendship, love, youth, all that is,

Except mere breath. And since the silent shore

Awaits at last even those whom longest miss

The old archer’s shafts, perhaps the early grave,

Which men weep over, may be meant to save.

Lord Byron, Don Juan (Canto IV, stanza 12)

Do you know, it's a good thing really! I am SO happy they die young now, THEY ARE SPARED LIFE, what a relief!!!

I feel SO MUCH better.

I want to thank my director, my agent, my family and God

Oh I want to thank God SO MUCH for making me an American, a true worshipper of the one and only God there is, I don’t care what the minorities have to say. I want to thank Him for making me white and Christian, just imagine, but for His Grace I could have been a heathen! I don’t believe for a moment that there are people still starving here, and the homeless and the unemployed, I mean, there ARE lovely houses and jobs everywhere, maybe they shouldn’t be greedy when looking for one, maybe they should try THAT little bit harder? This is after all the greatest nation on earth, One Nation Under God, as I’ve just heard on TV.

I want to thank God for that beautiful ceremony, our President looked SO handsome in that rugged way of his, Laura looked just DIVINE but I couldn’t see the twins? They will make their Mommy and Daddy so proud one day! Oh but it brings tears to my eyes! I am so thankful to God that we can spend MILLIONS on this lovely celebration, it’s so uplifting and will do so much for our troops’ moral, and people have been spreading all those nasty rumours about certain injuries not being counted as injuries of war, and discharged soldiers not being given any compensation, well, this will surely SHUT THEM UP, I don’t see how anyone can be against it frankly, we are already sending money to those needy, stinky people, and I mean, if they weren’t sinful God wouldn’t have chosen to punish them that way, remember Noah?, but I shouldn’t really be saying this, it’s not kind and I AM a kind person, just ask my bridge group, I go to Church every Sunday and sometimes during the week when I can and I even went to Africa one Summer when I was single to spread the word of Jesus among those poor negroes no, Blacks what’s the word nowadays, coloured? coloured people but they kept asking me for food, and going on and on about schooling and vaccination and hospitals and really that wasn’t very nice, they should be walking with Jesus, embracing him, Jesus will take care of all the details, He cannot be blamed if people don’t lead virtuous lives like those homossexuals, God have mercy and don’t repent, I CERTAINLY cannot, oh but this is bringing tears of JOY to my eyes, this is such a lovely ceremony, oh how the world must envy our greatness right now, I do believe I’ll even have a little sherry!

I also want to thank God for there being NO separation of Church and State, who ever heard of it, we need God in everything we do but, you know, the RIGHT ONE, because really, it’s all very good and fine but we KNOW what the TRUTH is don’t we, Jesus may have been born in the Middle East but he IS blond and blue-eyed, look in any textbook, we must support other cultures to help them see the errors of their ways, I mean, take this sentence I just heard, so beautiful, “Oh Lord, bless him, his family and his administration. I once again declare that no weapon against them shall prosper!”, well but this is very moving, I’m so pleased to see God invoked in the Capitol, and so right, we’ve showed them before what America is all about, just ask them Nipos, oops, *hiccup*, I do believe I am a little tipsy, please don’t for a moment think that I’m intolerant, I treat everyone exceedingly well, my church group is always complimenting me on my generosity, I always smile at the homeless in the most encouraging way, but you know, everyone has their proper place, God has a plan for everyone and there's only so much we can do, it IS His will, and see, that nice man thinks so as well, “We glorify and honour you, respecting people of all faiths I humbly submit this prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.”, ohh so beautifully said, we will bring them SALVATION yet, you just wait, and what an elegant menu as well, crab and lobster, good thing the Greenbergs couldn’t make it there hee-hee, oops, but you know what I mean.

Most of all, I want to thank God because I know that if He could, He’d choose to be an American too. And that is so comforting to me in my darkest hour, so very comforting. GOD BLESS AMERICA!

Ech ledaber im ima shelo?

- Hi, I.
- Hi, Johnnyle.
- Rak ratziti latet lach neshikah lemachar. Aval ze lo machar, nachon, ze beiom rishon?
- Ken. Ma itach?
- Ma iti... Besseder.
- ...
- ...
- ...
- ... Tov, nedaber. Ani etkasher. Bye.
- Bye, Johnnyle.

ECH LA'ASSOT ET ZE???

[Aya's funeral is on Sunday. Still no news abt him.]

"The Door into Summer"*

Babies. Tiny babies, growing babies, healthy, live, very much wanted, very much loved.

I've just gone round the Infertile Realm and babies and mothers are thriving. It comforts me to see all these women, all their partners, all these babies finally here, finally almost here, finally coming into their own. It lessens the pain a bit. There is still too much of it in the infertility world, there always will be. There will always be new ones to replace the ones who were so lucky as to. There will always be too much pain everywhere.

But we have new souls now, you see. No soul is interchangeable or replaceable but we need new ones, unbruised ones, tiny tiny ones in which our hope can find shelter and grow, tiny tiny ones which will help us be brave and big and maybe even, if we are that fortunate, a bit more whole.

I am so very grateful for these babies - their children - and for their happiness.

---------------------------------------
(*here)

I am so scared

I can tell you today. Aya's body has been found, she will be buried on Friday. No sign of Uzi, no sign of Uzi yet, but it's all coming to an end, it's all coming to an end now.

----------------------

Listen, all of you, if you are reading this and know a person who has lost someone, it's very likely you will not know what to tell them. It's likely you will think "what's the point, there's nothing I can say that will make a difference". True, nothing you can say will make it go away but it's not true that you are not helping. It helps to know people are thinking about you and them, it helps to hear words as banal as "I am so sorry", it doesn't do anything for the existence of pain itself but it does smudge its contours for a nanosecond. So don't stay hidden, don't feel inadequate, there is no etiquette in death and grief, you will never find the right words because they do not exist, they couldn’t possibly, but you may ease someone’s pain for a while and at this point really, it’s all we can hope for, to have it not so terrible for a few moments. You don’t even have to talk, just give them a hug, squeeze their hand, offer to baby-sit the kids, walk their dogs, polish their shoes for the funeral, whatever it may be. It helps knowing we are not alone even as we choose to isolate ourselves.

Please, don’t even think of saying things like “He’s in a much better place now”, “He’s with God now”, “It was God’s will” or anything like that unless the people who mourn them are saying it also, we’ll just want to badly hurt you, we want him with us, God doesn’t enter the equation, God is, life happens, death does as well, and especially when they are this young how is it better that they are dead? How is that any comfort to us? Turn your empathy on.

Also, do not be afraid to talk about those who died, one of our deepest long-term fears is that they will be forgotten and people always fear they will cause more pain by bringing their names up. In time, we will need to be able to talk about them, we will need to be able to relive our moments with them, it is good to have them remembered and cherished, it is good to have people willing to do it with us. If the person doesn't want to talk about it at that moment, fine, but don't not do it for fear of hurting them more, death already took care of the ultimate violation, we will have to live the rest of our lives without them, chances are you cannot do much more harm.

Finally, grief has its own timing, don't ever tell anyone "it's been X months/years, you should be over it by now" because frankly, what do you know? if you're one of the lucky ones, nothing at all.

Into Oblivion

This is what happens when one reads GAY BLOGS, they do pervert us, the Crolls are right. So instead of boning up all day, I did only for a bit - and then gave myself a VIRTUAL MAKEOVER! I've always wanted to go to a wig store and try on different styles and colours, get polaroids and then go straight to the hairdresser's. Right now, I really want my old life back please to change something, anything, in my life and there's not much I can do except wait, pray, not think about it at all and maybe go in for some hair mutilation. Right now, since I am forced to be me, I truly want to be as unlike me as humanly possible. And bloody hell, this post started off so well! And who are these sick people who now TATTOO the Wave on their bodies? See, confession time, this is how well I know this isn't going. When I'm awake, I am fine. Really I am. What, there was a catastrophe? Know nothing abt it. But at nights the Floodgates of Hell open and I haven't had a good sleep in days, I rescue people and animals all night long, very disturbing dreams. Also, I have been writing, all chipper, but I do not feel like talking at all. Not even w my best friend. All of a sudden, the written word is the only friendly way to communicate. I don't feel like seeing anyone - even though I feel fine. By fine I mean, I don't cry, I am not particularly sad, I think of him all the time, that hasn't changed, but I don't even flinch, it's like it's a stranger all of a sudden. Note careful avoidance of his name though - even though I feel fine. I haven't left the house for anything but walk the dog - even though I feel fine. And now is when I truly shock you: I have not showered or washed my hair since I came back from Canada. Yup. Seven long days. I do wash as/where needed, to put it delicately, there's no pong, but I can't be bothered to go any further and it feels right. Why bother? I never understood sitting Shiva before, I do now, and it took me a while to even realise I was sort of doing it. What is the point right now in anything other than the most basic necessities? So even though I feel fine, I know - intellectually - that I cannot be fine. And I want to be very far away when the rest of me catches up with what's left of me right now. In the meantime, I HATE THIS, I HATE EVERY BIT OF THIS, I HATE IT ALL!

And this is why I HEART nerds!

Beth, that very human and not at all like this genius HAS MADE MY DAY!!! She is responsible for the most effective net-foraging I have seen - and as a result I now I now have...

... A DROP-DOWN MENU!!!

Yes I do! Welcome to the House of Style, *curtsey*. How I've longed for one, remember this? that would have shut the whiny little thing right up. I actually thought Blogger didn't allow drop-down menus (will have to work harder on my Nerdiction, I know). But Beth, the Best found a way into the wormhole. Pity not all of the categories open but I'm working on that.

Oh I do, I do, I absolutely love nerds!

Nerds are sexy
Nerds are cool
Nerds have the dahlingest gene pool

OMG I'M STUDYING-Y!

If you're a wimp, move on to the post about shoes. This is a Vet School post and believe me, it's not going to be a dainty little thingy. Though some will love me for it [oh look, a link!!!], I just know it.

So yes, I have been studying, since yesterday. Anatomical pathology. I still cannot go anywhere near bones [oh look, ANOTHER link!!!] so I am not studying Osteology yet. But studying it didn't get me anywhere before did it? Ha. So I'm not worrying abt that, there's hope [OH AND WE KNOW I CAN DO HOPE REALLY WELL!] and there's September and then there's Oct/Nov for exams so sod bones and the emaciated mare they rode in on, I'll get around to it. EVENTUALLY. AP is supposed to be my transitional stage (I did stay too close to the States for a while, fully aware of that, can't be helped now).

I have been learning about Euthanasia, and Cadaverisation - for the good people who are CSI fans, it's the process composed of Autolysis (an organism's total or partial decay due to its own enzymes) and Putrefaction (idem but due to bacteria). And even though You-Know-What weighs heavily on my mind, studying this is not bothering me one bit. Well, if I could handle looking at those pics I can handle this much more easily but still, and this is my absolute point, I find the subject ENJOYABLE! May I just say how very often I find studying for any given subject at school enjoyable? I may but IT WOULD BE A BLOODY LIE wouldn't it.

So yes, putrefaction is our word for today. GI tract pathologies coming soon to a theatre near you. Rock on, babe!

-----------------------------------

UPDATE:

WHERE ELSE BUT IN VET SCHOOL…

… would one encounter such sentences:

This post-mortem circulation is also responsible for the cadaveric venous circulation, which in some cases draws ELEGANT figures on the body surface.

Elegant indeed. And I absolutely do know what the author means. Welcome to our world, where we fight for the right to open up dead animals and become immersed in blood and lymph up to our elbows, sometimes lashes on very bad and not all that infrequent days, where sheepishly takes on a new meaning, where abscesses are often described as “very, very cool”, and pictures of all imaginable horrors are carefully filed away in folders lovingly created for those very treasures and shown to envious colleagues.

[I am beginning to feel a bit fey about my mood, through studying I not only ensure that I pass the actual exam but also [and most importantly right now] have been managing to keep very gruel bits of possible reality at bay. It cannot last for very long, I shouldn’t think, but the moment is being kind to me and really, right now, other than that Mighty Miracle I still desperately need, that's all I could wish for.]

"I think i'm in love now"

The Lioness is back, at least for now. Let us all hold hands and sing. I cannot tell you, in view of You-Know-What, how grateful I am that I want to, and actually can, blog about this. 

There is one blogger whom I've deleted from my tentative faves because she pissed me off majorly by ranting about another woman's blog - about shopping. First blogger is most annoyed that, in a world where people starve, get ill, die, in a world where "there's no time left" this supposed bimbo is wasting precious seconds by blogging about [well yes,"aboot" then, sounds so lovely overlapping an English accent, *coughs up furball*] the clothes and shoes she buys.

I say, isn't it so much better to be an activist full time? To live immersed in the world's miseries, suffering, grievances? Isn't it so much better to have reality knocking at our door at all times? To absolutely obsess abt it until all laughter is squeezed from our lives - and no, pardon me but baking my own bread and making my own pasta while breastfeeding my 5-year-old is NOT my idea of a good time. Don't I have much more fun thinking abt U. than abt shoes? Why yes I do, how could I not, why would I ever want it otherwise should I have more than just one Tico and one Teco, the two solitary Portie neurons? And isn't it true that loving clothes and blogging abt them is a SURE SIGN of callousness? And isn't it always the bleeding tree-huggers, in their white-socked Birckenstocks, who unfailingly Throw The First Most Un-Liberal Stone? The ones who go on and on and on about tolerance all the while being so ready to crucify others on very little info, and not because they love Tori [though they might because she is off-stream enough], until I want to just throttle them and bury them under a pile of Full Moon Activated Crystals?

[NOTE: this "tolerance" thing is most annoying, WHO WANTS TO BE TOLERATED and how bloody PATRONISING is it? It is only semantics, granted, but semantics matter and tolerance, as far as I'm concerned, is a bloody cow. So tolerate this.]

Well, Trugger, I can just tell you don't shave your [*shudder*] legs or [*gag*] your armpits and that's very poor form. Very scary, even if pherormonally quite effective. A very heartfelt Bugger You and Your Bloody Smugness. Oh you're welcome, dahling. Now go buy an Epilady and some make up, there's a good girl. Sorry, WOMAN.

Yes.

DOGS IN ELK (I swear this is a funny post, I didn't write one single word of it!)

Dahling lot, this is a true event. It was a thread in a wildlife rehab and made the rounds per email years ago. One of the rehabbers had a bit of a problem. It is a bit longish but I promise you, you WILL enjoy it, it is one of the most hilarious things I ever read.

I felt I owed you - and me - some fun, this blog has been too heavy for my own liking. And I might just be able to present the Pig castration soon as well.

-------------------------------------------

Anne V - 01:01pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT (# 1318 of 1332)
Okay - I know how to take meat away from a dog. How do I take a dog away from meat? This is not, unfortunately, a joke.

AmyC - 01:02pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Um, can you give us a few more specifics here?

Anne V - 01:12pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
They're inside of it. They crawled inside, and now I have a giant incredibly heavy piece of carcass in my yard, with 2 dogs inside of it, and they are NOT getting bored of it and coming out. One of them is snoring. I have company arriving in three hours, and my current plan is to 1. put up a tent over said carcass and 2. hang thousands of fly strips inside it. This has been going on since about 6:40 this morning.

AmyC - 01:19pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Oh. My. God. What sort of carcass is big enough to hold a couple of dogs inside? Given the situation, I'm afraid you're not going to be create enough of a diversion to get the dogs out of the carrion, unless they like greeting company as much as they like rolling around in dead stuff. Which seems unlikely. Can you turn a hose on the festivities?

Ase IK - 01:31pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
I'm sorry Anne. I know this is a problem (and it would have driven me crazy), but it is also incredibly funny.

Anne V - 01:31pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Elk. Elk are very big this year, because of the rain and good grazing and so forth. They aren't rolling. They are alternately napping and eating. They each have a ribcage. Other dogs are working on them from the outside. It's all way too primal in my yard right now. We tried the hose trick. At someone elses house, which is where they climbed in and began to refuse to come out. Many hours ago. I think that the hose mostly helps keep them cool and dislodges little moist snacks for them. hose failed. My new hope is that if they all continue to eat at this rate, they will be finished before the houseguests arrive. The very urban houseguests. Oh, ghod – I know it's funny. It's appalling, and funny, and completely entirely representative of life with dogs.

Kristen R. - 01:37pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
I'm so glad I read this thread, dogless as I am. Dogs in elk. Dogs in elk.

Anne V - 01:41pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
It's like that childrens book out there - dogs in elk, dogs on elk, dogs around elk, dogs outside elk. And there is some elk inside of, as well as on, each dog at this point.

Elizabeth K - 01:57pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Anne, aren't you in Arizona or Nevada? There are elk there? I'm so confused!We definately need to see pics of Gus Pong and Jake in the elk carcass.

Anne V - 02:03pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
I am in New Mexico, but there are elk in both arizona and nevada, yes. There are elk all over the damn place. They don't look out very often. If you stand the ribcage on end they scramble to the top and look out, all red. Otherwise, you kinda have to get in there a little bit yourself to really see them. So I think there will not be pictures.

CoseyM - 02:06pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
"all red;" I'm not sure the deeper horror of all this was fully borne in upon me till I saw that little phrase.

Anne V - 02:10pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Well, you know, the Basenji (that would be Jake) is a desert dog, naturally, and infamous for it's aversion to water. And then, Gus Pong (who is coming to us, live, amplified and with a terrific reverb which is making me a little dizzy) really doesn't mind water, but hates to be cold. Or soapy. And both of them can really run. Sprints of up to 35 mph have been clocked. So. If ever they come out, catching them and returning them to a condition where they can be considered house pets is not going to be, shall we say, pleasant.

CoseyM - 02:15pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
What if you stand the ribcage on end, wait for them to look out, grab them when they do and pull?

Anne V - 02:18pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
They wedge their toes between the ribs. And scream. We tried that before we brought the elk home from the mountain with dogs inside. Jake nearly took my friends arm off. He's already short a toe, so he cherishes the 15 that remain.

LindaH - 02:30pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Have you thought about calling your friendly vet and paying him to come pick up the dogs, elk and letting the dogs stay at the vets overnight. If anyone would know what to do, it would be your vet. It might cost some money, but it would solve the immediate crisis. Keep us posted.

ChristiP - 02:37pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Yikes! My sympathy! When I lived in New Mexico, my best friend's dog (the escape artist) was continually bringing home road kill. When there was no road kill convenient, he would visit the neighbor's house. Said neighbor slaughtered his own beef. The dog found all kinds of impossibly gross toys in the neighbor's trash pit. I have always had medium to large dogs. The smallest dog I ever had was a mutt from the SPCA who matured out at just above knee high and about 55 pounds. Our current dog (daughter's choice) is a Pomeranian. A very small Pomeranian. She's 8 months old now and not quite 4 pounds. I'm afraid I'll break her.

Lori S - 02:38pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Bet you could fit a whole lot of Pomeranians in that there elk carcass! Anne - my condolences on what must be a unbelievable situation!

Anne V - 02:44pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
I did call my vet. He laughed until he was gagging and breathless. He says a lot of things, which can be summed as *what did you expect?* and *no, there is no such thing as too much elk meat for a dog.* He is planning to stop over and take a look on his way home. Thanks, Lori. I am almost surrendered to the absurdity of it.

Lori S - 02:49pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
"He is planning to stop over and take a look on his way home." So he can fall down laughing in person?

Anne V - 02:50pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
Basically, yeah. That would be about it.

AmyC - 02:56pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
no, there is no such thing as too much elk meat for a dog." Oh, sweet lord, Anne. You have my deepest sympathies in this, perhaps the most peculiar of the Gus Pong Adventures. You are truly a woman of superhuman patience. wait -- you carried the carcass down from the mountains with the dogs inside?

Anne V - 02:59pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
the carcass down from the mountains with the dogs inside? no, well, sort of. My part in the whole thing was to get really stressed about a meeting that I had to go to, and say *yeah, ok, whatever* when it was suggested that the ribcages, since we couldn't get the dogs out of them and the dogs couldn't be left there, be brought to my house. Because, you know - I just thought they would get bored of it sooner or later. But it appears to be later, in the misty uncertain future, that they will get bored. Now, they are still interested. And very loud, one singing, one snoring.

Lori S - 03:04pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
And very loud, one singing, one snoring. wow. I can't even begin to imagine the acoustics involved with singing from the inside of an elk.

Anne V - 03:04pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
reverb. lots and lots of reverb.

Anne V - 03:15pm Sep 9, 1999 PDT
I'll tell you the thing that is causing me to lose it again and again, and then I have to go back outside and stay there for a while. After the meeting, I said to my (extraordinary) boss, "look, I've gotta go home for the rest of the day, I think. Jake and Gus Pong are inside some elk ribcages, and my dad is coming tonight, so I've got to get them out somehow." And he said, pale and huge-eyed, "Annie, how did you explain the elk to the clients?" The poor, poor man thought I had the carcasses brought to work with me. For some reason, I find this deeply funny. (weekend pause)

Anne V - 08:37am Sep 13, 1999 PDT
So what we did was put the ribcages (containing dogs) on tarps and drag them around to the side yard, where I figured they would at least be harder to see, and then opened my bedroom window so that the dogs could let me know when they were ready to be plunged into a de-elking solution and let in the house. Then I went to the airport. Came home, no visible elk, no visible dogs. Peeked around the shrubs, and there they were, still in the elk. By this time, they had gnawed out some little portholes between some of the ribs, and you got the occasional very frightening glimpse of something moving around in there if you watched long enough. After a lot of agonizing, I went to bed. I closed the back door, made sure my window was open, talked to the dogs out of it until I as sure they knew it was open,and then I fell asleep.

Sometimes, sleep is a mistake, no matter how tired you are. And especially if you are very very tired, and some of your dogs are outside, inside some elks. Because when you are that tired, you sleep through bumping kind of noises, or you kind of think that it's just the house guests. It wasn't the house guests. It was my dogs, having an attack of teamwork unprecedented in our domestic history. When I finally woke all the way up, it was to a horrible vision. Somehow, 3 dogs with a combined weight of about 90 pounds, managed to hoist one of the ribcages (the meatier one, of course) up 3 feet to rest on top of the swamp cooler outside the window, and push out the screen. What woke me was Gus Pong, howling in frustration from inside the ribcage, very close to my head, combined with feverish little grunts from Jake, who was standing on the nightstand, bracing himself against the curtains with remarkably bloody little feet.

Here are some things I have learned, this Rosh Hashanah weekend:
1. almond milk removes elk blood from curtains and pillowcases,
2. We can all exercise superhuman strength when it comes to getting elk carcasses out of our yard,
3. The sight of elk ribcages hurtling over the fence really frightens the nice deputy sheriff who lives across the street, and
4. the dogs can pop the screens out of the windows, without damaging them, from either side.

Anne V - 09:58am Sep 13, 1999 PDT
What I am is really grateful that they didn't actually get the damn thing in the window, which is clearly the direction they were going in. And that the nice deputy didn't arrest me for terrifying her with elk parts before dawn.

AmyC - 09:59am Sep 13, 1999 PDT
Imagine waking up with a gnawed elk carcass in your bed, like a real-life "Godfather" with an all-dog cast.

Anne V - 10:01am Sep 13, 1999 PDT
There is not enough almond milk in the world to solve an event of that kind.

I refuse to let it not be so

Martunes (?), a 7-year-old Indonesian boy, was found 19 days post-wave. He was wearing our national soccer team shirt.

Now, I really can’t be bothered to explain at length why it makes me absolutely mad that our national team will now, BECAUSE OF THE SHIRT, donate money so the family can buy some land and build a house. [Good thing you were wearing it when the wave struck, kid, eh? Otherwise our great nation, our fine tiny-footed heroes, would have not risen to help. Don’t be too shocked, they only make 6 figures a month. It IS a sacrifice.]

That is us in a nutshell, generous AND misguided. Eduardo Lourenço, a Portuguese writer and thinker, says we are small not bcs of lack of identity but bcs we have too much of it. We want to be big ALONE - er, we have not been big alone in centuries and even then, look what happened, we lost it through over-church/cathedral building and too much court partying. Some of the churches are not finished yet. Ha! Fuckortugal, GET OVER IT.

But that’s a small detour. I believe the universe talks to us. I believe we are givens signs. Omens. The boy WAS wearing a shirt w the Portuguese colours. He was alive 19 days after the W.

I don’t KNOW what that means but it must mean something right? IT MUST. So even though the bad dreams started last night - involving a gorilla I had to save from the dirt and rubble for DNA testing, how I sometimes wish I hadn’t read Anthropology - I choose to believe it’s a good thing. GOOD. GOOD SIGN.

Life, are you paying attention? A GOOD SIGN!

Because, see, one miracle DID happen. And all Uzi needed to survive was the smallest of opportunities, he’ll have absolutely done the right thing without thinking, he'll have made it work. Until someone tells us they found his body, I will be banging the hope drums for him and us.

LOUDLY!!!

Funny thing

I had a very good day today. A Uzi-is-in-a-hospital-unconscious-due-to-severe-concussion-and-that's-why-he-cannot-call day [this is a fantasy I share w his mum]. Scenario B, Uzi-is-on-a-small-island-in-bad-shape-being-taken-care-of-by-a-non-English-speaking-fisherman-and-that's-why-he-cannot-call day [this is a fantasy I share w a friend of ours, L., though it's an old Thai woman in hers. I say, whatever works]. He is not dead. Even as I use the past tense at times, even if I know I am in denial, I know I am not, not really, because somehow somewhere he is alive and will come back to us. And that's that. Or I'll be really, really, REALLY pissed off. And destroyed but remember he is alive? Good.

That being said, I did spend most of yesterday's dawn looking at unidentified bodies from the morgue and police sites. And today was the ceremony on the kibbbutz. So no reason why I should not have had a perfectly hideous day, but I didn't. I don't even feel all that schizoid. Looking at the pics really helped me, for 2 reasons I suppose. Firstly, it helped me see how he could look like, as a victim. I cannot stand not knowing. If I see the horrors, they will not eat me up, I will somehow be in control. Some of them looked very peaceful. Some were in bad shape, from being thrown about and, well, having been in the water for a while. But this has nothing to do with Uzi bcs he is alright. And if he isn't, he was probably crushed by the W [on the beach they were on it was much higher than 30 feet, in some places they reached 140 feet but i'm ok w that bcs I don't know what it means and there's no way in hell I'll fucking ever convert that into metres] before he could even have a lot of time to panic, and with little pain. Not to be gory or anything but a broken neck is faster than and preferable to drowning so. It will have been swift. My doctor friend says so and right now she is God. Secondly, I was finally able to FUCKING DO SOMETHING. I did something for my best friend, I looked for him. I did not want to find him, but I COULD look for him. I could do that much. Since I’m fucking helpless anyway, that helped tremendously. Also, when I was 18 and an exchange student in Germany, my friend Steffen killed himself. It haunted me for years that he threw himself in front of a train. It got better when I came across a picture of someone who’d died the same way. I suppose not knowing is worse for me than knowing, I will not be defeated by my imagination. I wouldn’t have wanted to see him, but I am glad I had the chance to see someone. I am also in vet school. There must be a connection here somewhere, regarding higher threshold for gore. I don’t know, I’m just grateful something eased it all. Again, whatever works. I have even desensitised myself to his pics. Well, the ones here anyway, am going nowhere near his letters, mails, photographs in my flat. Will in fact ask my friend to go through everyhting and put them away to make sure I don't come across them by accident. The one from the missing board, from the "Uzi sheli" post, I came across unexpectedly, a friend of mine sent me a link and I didn't know what it was. I was in Canada then and just started sobbing. A friend was with me and I can't imagine being in his place. As a matter of fact I HAVE been in his place and it sucks rock big time, what can you do to help? Not much really. He just grabbed his guitar, sat by the wall behind me and started playing and do you know, music does tame the beast [I've never thanked you for it but you did rescue me then. So, thank you so much, really.]

The ceremony was, in Lila's words, "a nightmare and very loving". I am very happy, exceedingly happy that I wasn't there. Yanniv's death and the following months are forever etched in my memory, and he was nowhere this close to me. He was not part of my tissues. I do not need that. I cannot imagine being there. At the same time, I cannot believe I wasn't there for it. [I didn't say I wasn't schizoid, I said I didn't feel schizoid, huge diff] I talked to his mum. She sounds like a zombie. I know my pain, cannot begin to imagine hers. I am actually now praying she won’t be home whenever I ring (too bloody often) so I don’t have to talk to her. Because there’s no conversation to be had really. Regarding grief, I fully know it doesn't matter what I do or try to do, it will catch up w me, it has its own timing and I cannot do a thing to control it. Again, all I can hope for is that I have a respite from it till exams are over. It would majorly piss me off if I flunked bcs he died.

Speaking of pissed off, I am also starting to be v annoyed w him. For preferring fucking Asia to Portugal. Could never stand Asia, don’t care how beautiful and heavenly (HA!) the fucking beaches are, who in their right mind goes to places w the death penalty??? Also, I didn’t need to have this space tainted. I didn’t need to lose my sense of humour, my sleep, my linking, my appetite, most of all my words, I don't KNOW myself when I'm not writing, it's like not breathing, I drown in all that fucking silence, and my wanting to read. I have bought 115 books. I have been home for 3 days and have not read a single one of them. Not one. Do you realise how abnormal that is? I DO NOT FEEL LIKE WRITING OR READING AND IT’S ALL HIS FAULT! I have 4 exams between the 24th and the 28th and then some, and have not been able to even contemplate opening a fucking book. I DO NOT NEED THIS! But more than that, how dare he be killed by a fucking tsunami??? Anything BUT that! He lived in Israel for fuck’s sake, couldn’t he have just died in a bombing? How hard would that be??? IT’S FUCKING ISRAEL, just pick your fucking corner! For this I sat on the ground w him outside our room and helped him clean his gun during miluim??? For this he survive the army? I told you before tsunamis are my one real phobia. Were a phobia, are now a very legitimate fear, as it turns out, and I don’t think people will mock me anymore. A movie came on while I was still on the kibbutz, called Tsunami or Tidal Wave or some other equally terrifying thing [with Tea Leoni, if you never watched it, DON’T]. I decided it might be a good idea to watch it as therapy. One big mistake it was. I was shuddering the whole time - and Uzi just made fun of me [which is funny in more than one way bcs we went to see The 6th Sense together and I was so happy he was so big (1,87, close to 6’2’’) bcs of the illusion of protection and we both screamed and jumped at the same time whenever the dead appeared and the bleeding idiot actually latched onto my arm during one scene, I ask you] At some point, by the end of the movie, you see 2 little figures ON A FUCKING BEACH, say the size of a pinky nail, and a huge wave abt the size of a very big hand approaching. That was too much for me and I literally fled shaking from the room (kibbutz rooms open right onto the outside). Well, Uzi made fun of me for days. Days. He added “tsunami” to his “eggs” repertoire and kept saying it at random moments, making me jump and flinch, bcs “you just look so cute”, the bloody asshole. He only stopped when I started hitting him and actually hurting him. He was full of bruises by the time I finished kicking his shins. So yes, very funny, downright hilarious, I am extremely appreciative of the fact that my worst fear comes true in the shape of my best friend being swallowed alive by I don’t know how many tonnes of water.

Also, I absolutely did not need to go from daily longing to be in Israel again to never wanting to set foot in that fucking country again. Oh I am half mad, yes. And apparently it’s a media frenzy, relatives on the telly, newspaper articles, people who never met him saying how beautiful he was, what the fuck??? This is Uzi we’re talking abt, not a fucking circus monkey, he wouldn’t like that AT ALL, this is the man who was a genius and refused to go to special classes bcs he didn’t want to stand out! He’d find the whole thing ridiculous and very disturbing. I am grateful I am at least spared that.

More so, and brace yourselves for some real weirdness but guess what, I don’t fucking care, I sometimes dream of things that then happen the exact way I dreamt them. I sometimes know things I cannot possibly know. I have the best antennae in the world and they have never let me down re people, not once. Just so you can properly freak out, I’ll let you know I've often dreamt of things I couldn't possibly know and yet I do. I cannot believe he could be dead and NOT FUCKING LET ME KNOW, what the hell is he thinking! And yes, I am serious, deal w it.

I am also not crying, which would be worrying me if I could be bothered to worry abt anything but guess again? Yes, I still don't fucking care.

Finally, to all of you who keep commenting and sending emails, I cannot promise I will answer them right away, I cannot promise I'll keep writing, I can only think this is turning into a blog i wouldn't want to read, or not often anyway bcs who needs all this, I wish I had a way to tell you how much you are helping me, I went on a thank-you rampage on the blogosphere today using pretty much the same words every time [my words ARE gone, I mean I still use them but they taste like dust], I cannot believe how much it helps, even from those I never heard from before, you seem to care about me and most importantly, you care so much about Uzi, whom you've never met [you've never met me either but you know what I mean], and he is SO worthy of you, if only you could have known, if only you truyly knew what an unbearable waste it all is if he is dead. I have no words other than Thank You to offer and they don't seem like much but truly, every comment heals some little bit even as another breaks away. I feel like you keep re-weaving me and preventing me from ending splattered all over the place, I don't even know how you do it, I just know that you unfailingly do. You do have my back and I will forever be grateful to all of you for it.