Humiliation, Party of One

Posted on 4/1/2008 by alianora

Once, when I was but a wee lass, I had a birthday party.

I must have been seven or eight, I suppose, and I was enthroned on a chair in front of my guests, both girls and boys.

Their shining faces looked eagerly at me as I ripped colored paper from packages and flung ribbons to the floor in my haste to open things meant for my enjoyment.

Many things were discovered! Rejoiced over! My Little Pony! Strawberry Shortcake! Care….

Wait, WHAT?

Mind racing, I jammed a small package underneath something else, and thanked the giver, a young boy whose mother obviously did the gift shopping.

“What’s that, ally?” Screams my beloved mother in a voice loud enough to be heard three states away. “Oh, look, everybody! CARE BEAR UNDERWEAR!!”

From thence onward, I insisted on single gendered birthday parties. Where I could walk around in a tshirt and my cute care bear undies all I wanted.

Posted in geek | 3 Comments

That Thing You Do

Posted on 3/31/2008 by alianora

Recently, I’ve been watching a tv show. Im not outing it, as Im rather embarrassed about it, but it’s one where the male lead is COMPLETELY in love with the female lead, and she has no freaking clue about it.

That makes me crazy. How can she NOT KNOW?

I made this huge face and whined at my computer screen about it until Brandus began to laugh at me.

“Weren’t YOU that girl?”

Err. Well. Maybe. Once.

For over a year…

Um.

See, I entered high school, and got moved from my normal French class to a independent study French class with another classmate – while at the same time, an independent study from another level was also using the same room. One of the guys from the upper level class and I got to be really good friends.

We passed notes! We called each other and talked all the time! He took me to prom! HE HELD MY HAND ROLLER SKATING SO I WOULDN’T FALL DOWN and at this point every single one of you reading this are going WHAT ARE YOU STUPID?

and the answer is: YES. Yes, I was stupid! Honestly, it never even occurred to me that he liked me. It.never.crossed.my.mind.

I dont know why. Maybe because I didnt want it to.

We stayed friends for a while, then we drifted apart some. Then he graduated, and I saw him a couple of times after that.

And last year, more than ten years after high school, it hit me one day while I was complaining over Lorelai Gilmore continuously overlooking the hotness of Luke Danes:

HE.TOTALLY.LIKED.ME.

So, on behalf of all those people on tv who make you absolutely crazy when they ignore the friend who’s in love with them, And, especially, to Gary, who was such an awesome guy to a complete airhead: I AM SO INCREDIBLY SORRY.

Posted in geek | 4 Comments

LYLAS

Posted on 3/25/2008 by alianora

Dear Babysitter-of-the-week,

I realize we have had some communication mishaps! Perhaps we should go and examine each misunderstanding!

For example, when I said, The baby can have one container of babyfood a day, and some of these neat finger food crackers with a baby on the front of the package,

I did NOT mean, Please stuff my baby full of this yummy allergen-risky peanut butter!

And, when I said, You can’t take the baby to your house,

or even, The baby needs to stay here,

or EVEN I understand that you took him to your house today, thank you for telling me. Please don’t take him, again.

I did NOT, in fact, mean, Please take my child out into the cold weather OF ALASKA in god-knows-what clothes for god-knows-how-long to get to YOUR HOUSE, where my husband and I have never even seen.

I understand your confusion! These things could happen to anybody!

I mean, after all, I know you know that it’s not ok to let OTHER PEOPLE’S KIDS into our house “to play” or “to visit” before school starts after we’ve left! I mean, WHO WOULD DO SOMETHING LIKE THAT?

But, there is ONE MORE TINY misunderstanding we need to clear up.

When we welcomed you into our house to babysit, and told you Feel free to use the television. Here are all of our movies. Adjust the temperature to your comfort level!,

at no point EVER did I mean OR say, Feel free to use my computer.

Nor did I say, Be sure to let the child rip off some of the keys! He LOVES that game!,

and I FOR DAMN SURE never said, After the child has ripped off the keys, be sure and close the keyboard and pretend it never happened! Don’t feel the need to tell me!

Because there is NOTHING I like more than coming home, opening my laptop and noticing that FIVE KEYS HAVE SPONTANEOUSLY DISAPPEARED.

Now, we’ve got those silly little misunderstandings taken care of! Let’s go over one more thing, ok?

When I say, We’re going to hire our old babysitter back,

I mean, The girl who stays with an abusive jackass at least knows how to follow our rules and respect our stuff.

Is that clear enough? I can draw you a picture, if that will help.

Please, let me know. By which I mean, WHAT THE FUCK, LADY.

Sincerely,
alianora

Posted in rant, voldemort, Year of Yup'ik | Tagged | 4 Comments

Tragedy Aplenty

Posted on 3/20/2008 by alianora

The past couple of months in the village have been a little tense.

In February, right about the time the kid and I were headed back into the village from town after my kidney stone mishap (and, incidentally, after I took my babysitter to the airport to flee from her boyfriend who hit her AND THEIR BABY with a beer bottle), one drunk kid took a gun to the head of another drunk young man.

The village was stunned. The school was full of grieving kids and people and teachers.

The kid who was killed was my aide’s son.

A few weeks go by, and things are lightening up. We have potlatch, people joke and laugh. The village starts to heal.

Last week, another young man shot himself.

He was my aide’s nephew.

He had 3 kids, including one who is barely two weeks old.

The village, again, is devastated – but this time, there’s an edge to it.

“Oh, this again? This family again? Why must they make such a fuss about things?”

The kids talk about cleaning up the blood, and what both bodies looked like.

Last night, my babysitter called. She’s back in the village, and isnt it great that she and this guy who’s hit her 4 times before that I know of are going to work things out. And do we still need a babysitter?

Today, unbeknownst to me, one of my students tried to commit suicide. The timeline and the method are both still unknown, as he was at school at least part of the day, but we do know he’s ok, and going to town tomorrow for evaluation.

Winter out here is hard – harder in many ways than winter in the lower 48. Many of the men dont work, because they mostly fish and hunt, and there isnt much they can do in winter besides drink. February tends to being out the worst in everyone. Maybe its the lack of a break between Christmas and Easter. Maybe its just that it’s been too dark for too long.

We’re well into March, now.

Can it be over now, please?

Posted in Year of Yup'ik | 4 Comments

Duh Moments

Posted on 3/18/2008 by alianora

Does anyone else have those kinds of “duh” moments, where something you’ve been thinking about and trying to find a way to do suddenly becomes amazingly clear and you realize that you’re just kind of a moron sometimes?

Ive been having those lately.

The first one was about walking.

Not the kid’s. Mine. I like to go for a walk everyday, if I can manage it. It’s less exercise than brain saving for me, and at the beginning of the year, I was really struggling. I go home a little bit early (in truth, Im on a really late lunch break), and by the time brandus got home, it was normally 4 o’clock, at the basketball team or the NYO team were already in the gym, working out. And I prefer to talk a walk without having to worry about being brained by a basketball or a basketball player. I struggled to get over to the school at 7:30 – one because our babysitter is ALWAYS late, and two because there are team practices in the mornings half of the year, too.

I was starting to become a little unglued.

Then, another teacher, while trying to set up a meeting with me during the day, said something about walking around the gym during her plan time.

Oh. Duh.

I now walk pretty much every morning from 8 (when I have to be at work) til 8:30 (when the kids are allowed in to the gym for morning gym).

Yesterday, it was about wipes.

Now, we have cloth wipes and paper wipes, and we use both. I was using cloth wipes exclusively except for traveling – I have a little tupperware container and lid that several of my wipes fit into, and I was wetting my wipes and putting them in there. And then, something happened, and the lid completely disappeared. Ive been stomping around desperately trying to find the lid so I can go back to using my cloth, which are easier to use, in my opinion, with no luck whatsoever. So, we’ve been using paper wipes, and just sticking them inside the diapers. Which means I usually end up having to pick out all the paper wipes from the washer before I dry inserts and fitteds.

Yesterday, I remembered I have one of those little hard sided portable wipes cases.

Oh. Duh.

So, my cloth wipes are back in use – even though I can only fit 4 wipes in the case at a time.

What’s your latest duh moment?

Posted in *poke*, voldemort | Tagged , | 1 Comment