Snippy

Recently, I've had suffered a series of unfortunate events. My computer died. My car died. There are some not-delightful things going on with my lungs. And, I'm the sort of person who tries to deal with things as rationally as possible. For me, X happens. I come up with a series of steps to deal with X. And, that's just how it goes.

That being said, I'm still an incredibly emotional human being and while I may do my best to rein my emotions in, it does not always work. and, whether or not my "try to deal with things as rationally as possible" is a healthy strategy or not, it is my strategy and I tend to do a pretty good job of it.

Except, when many things break at once. Like right now. Times like these, I'm much more likely to punch a b*$%# in the face (see, even my language goes). Or, I just get really snippy. In particular, I get snippy with people who keep asking me how things are going. For example:

Colleague: So, your car still in the shop?
Me: It sure is. Since you're the one who has been giving me a ride to work, don't you think you'd be one of the first people I'd tell when it isn't?
Colleague: I was just asking.

And, then I apologize. I know people are just asking but I also know that part of me is working really hard to not explode or cry or punch someone to deal with the massive amounts of frustration and having the things I'd relegated to the "can't work on until X is resolved" brought back up just adds to my frustration.

Maybe I need a new strategy. :/ Or, maybe I really should make meditation one of my health month rules next month.

Gym Incentives

I'm convinced my body is falling apart (and I'm only 31).

My joints hurt all the time (all the time and anything from my neck down). If I go to the doctor, worried that taking my creaky self to the gym will make something worse, I'm told the joint pain is because I'm overweight.

Thank you, Captain Obvious. I'm so glad I paid my co-pay for you to tell me something I already know and while we're on the topic of being overweight I am not so morbidly obese that mere walking will cause arthritis. I'm fat because I have enough joint pain to make a trip to the gym worrisome (at least worrisome for me, I'm a worry-wart).

I haven't been dancing this semester because the department was getting audited - in retrospect probably a good thing because my back turned into one giant problem back in February - so my activity has been limited to stretching on days when I can actually reach my toes.

In short - I need to remember to get my worry-wart, achy, creaking, too-lazy butt to the gym (I'm not a wuss, really, but I'd like to avoid any and all joint replacements in the future so I'm a little paranoid).

As incentive, I bought new running shoes today. Buying shoes (as much as I like pretty heels and kicky sneaks to the max) is problematic for me. Bunions, tendonitis, high arches, and a poopy right ankle make me overly picky about what goes on my feet. I tend to buy Nikes almost exclusively because they have enough toe room and arch support without the shoe getting too big in the heel (I really prefer Shox, which protect my knees on heel strike, but they're too expensive and almost never on sale). I bought Triax+ after trying on a boat-load of shoes* - as an added incentive I decided to splurge and get the Nike+ chip for my iPod. It will add up my running time and distance so it's a little more fun than just plain, old running shoes.

So shoes plus chip/iPod adapter was about $120 - maybe I'll try them out this evening once my knees stop screaming at me for making them carry full Rubbermaid tubs up and down the stairs multiple times today.

*Scheel's was pretty busy today with a lot of people in buying shoes...but I was the only one to take a couple of light jumps and running steps to test out each pair for fit/performance. The pair I wound up buying I actually tried and tested three times. Everyone else would put a pair of shoes on, stand up, sit down, and decide "yes" or "no" that way. How do you people do that? What if the shoes slip when you walk? You wouldn't want running shoes to slip! Or rub or pinch your toes. Blows my mind.

Fictional Eaters

Time, she can creep by without any call to notice her.


But, that's not what I wanted to write about. Part of my Pop Culture Homework Assignment for the summer was to watch The Gilmore Girls. (What a Pop Culture Homework Assignment is and the fact that its not been the summer for ages will not be things I discuss in this post. ;) ) Its a good show; its funny. The Gilmore Girls is that tale of a single Mother and her teenage daughter and it chronicles the lives of the ladies from the last two years of high school for the daughter through her college years. The show is full of rapid-fire, clever dialogue and this is likely part of its appeal. And, that's all fine. But, there was at least one thing I found troubling about the show: the amount of food the two main characters eat.


They make a joke about how they are famous eaters and often show them ordering large amounts of crazy things. You'll see Lorelai (the mother played by Lauren Graham) leave the local grocers with a huge nachos and a slurpee or Rory (the daughter played by Alexis Bledel) and her boyfriend will joke about the look on the waiter's face when she's ordered 14 different high calorie things at a restaurant and finished them all. In the show, they are shown sitting on a squash court having a chat and Lorelai once uses an old gym membership card to pick a lock ("Did you ever go?" "No, I'd just had Rory and I was embarrassed by the baby fat.") and there is an episode where Lorelai rides her bike to work because her car has died. Aside from that, these women are never seen exercising or going to or coming from a gym or eating a vegetable.

Now, this confuses me. Since they never had a story arc about someone over-exercising or having anorexia, it doesn't surprise me that their diets/lifestyle choices weren't something that was really discussed or shown. But, it seemed in the show that their eating was something that was portrayed as a quirk of the characters, or a cute character trait that was utterly adorable and that any man would find attractive. The message seemed to be, "Skinny girls can eat whatever they want, and its adorable." Which, I don't think was the intent of the writers, but it still makes me uncomfortable. Its interesting to me that a show that has many feminist leanings would be so blatant in its reinforcing of this one stereotype.

...and, then life happens.

This is the last week before school starts for me. I'm super excited about this coming semester. I'm going to learn Perl! But, of course, since its the last week before school, its not my last free week before school. We had a Welcome Party for the incoming graduate students (I made peach pie). There was a teaching conference (where we were served pizza for lunch every day.)


And, I've not written a damn thing down I've eaten since Breakfast on Tuesday. *sigh* I was on such a roll.


Here's the funny thing about this: writing everything down made me feel a little like I had some sort of disorder; that I was sliding down the slippery slope towards ED. Not writing things down makes me feel a little chaotic and out of control. (Also, I feel like I've lost three days because I don't have dated journal entries for them.) I don't know if this is a good thing, like I'm getting used to the notion of keeping track of things as part of my life or if its a bad thing. I suppose only time will tell. So, I'm back on the wagon again this morning (it was a morning of bacon and tea. Lots of tea.) . I suppose it will be easier once classes actually start as I will be bringing my own lunch. Which reminds me, I need to pick up some bread and lunch meat.

I'm just on a roll

So, I'm sitting on my couch, thinking about getting up and taking a shower, drinking tea with white honey while listening to Joni Mitchell on Last.fm. And, this morning instead of the cereal that I bought new milk to pour over last night, I had one of Kellogg's new Cinnabon snack bars.

Yes, that's right. Its my ass and I'll add cinnamon roll snack bar to it if I want.

I've been thinking lately, and, yes, I'll get back to focusing on the dieting but right now I'm going to go off on another body issues and society rant.

I've been many weights and I will be honest with you, one of the things that off-putting about really committing to going from being a bigger woman to being a smaller woman is this:

Some men do not seem to know how to express their appreciation for the female form without being skeezy, leering, creepy and/or weird.

Now, I illustrate with examples. The last time I got down to smoking hot, I had more than one guy friend that had only ever known me at the higher weight walk up to me, put his arm around me, give me the visual once-over and then say something like, "Well, you're looking really good."

Now, these experiences admittedly probably freaked me out more than they would freak out the average bear because I'm very protective of my personal space. I just don't particularly care for a lot of people in my space. And, by a lot of people, I mean that if we don't have a hugging relationship I don't feel you should ever touch me for any reason and if we do have a hugging relationship, you should probably already have my attention or have me otherwise engaged before initiating physical contact. Also, I don't have many hugging relationships with men. (I can think of three off the top of my head of my head who aren't my father who get a hug *every time* I see them.)

So, here's the thing: I understand that these men just wanted to show their appreciation for something that obviously had required a lot of time and effort. They thought I looked nice and they wanted me to know that they appreciated that fact. But, I didn't come away from those experiences feeling appreciated, I ended up feeling cheap and as if I'd been stripped of my agency. I felt like I'd spent all this time and effort and that the pay off was that men who had known me for years and were (likely)* well aware of my protectiveness of my own space now felt it was appropriate to invite themselves into it. But, it doesn't matter what size I am, if I don't offer you a hug, I don't want you in my space.

I just think there has to be a better way to show your appreciation for how someone looks and the (possibly) obvious effort they put into looking like that.

*I say likely here because, while its unlikely that they were never told that I don't like being touched, it is possible that they never realized I was being serious. And, I say its unlikely because I used to wear a button on my name tag that said, "You are too close." Also, I say, "Oh, no touching." frequently. You know the mice in The Hitchhiker's guide posited that they could just replace Arthur's brain with a machine that repeated stock phrases like, "Cuppa tea?" My machine-brain would say, "Oh, No touching," "True Story," and "Well, that's less than ideal." Seriously. True Story.

Off Hand Remarks

You know when I said this was probably going to turn into a place where I come to rant about body issues and society? Well, folks, today is that.


I recently exchanged comments with someone (whom I respect and admire. It would not go too far to say that I may have a little fangirl crush on this person and that I hope to one day be where this person is) on a social networking site about a woman on who owned H.P. Lovecraft on Mastermind. Someone quoted this guy, further joking ensued. A great time was had by all.


Except for about an hour afterward, I felt uncomfortable and a little odd. Then, I figured out what was bothering me. Here was a woman that I identified with. I watched that video and I thought, "She's my people." And, when I contributed to the exchange, I used gender neutral words. I thought I was setting an explicit boundary that said, "This is a person and this is how I want to see her." The invocation of her sexuality (and, I do not know her and so could not say. It is perhaps true that Lovecraft really, really turns her on) was shocking to me. She was not doing anything that was an explicit performance of sexuality. Everyone views things differently; I don't have a problem with people seeing things that turn them on. I don't even have a problem with people expressing that. My problem is that it seems like feminine sexuality invites commentary. I have an intellectual relationship with the person on the other half of the exchange. We don't hang out. We don't exchange birthday greetings. I don't know if this person has siblings or if they have pets. Its just not part of our relationship. So, I didn't expect to be joking about how smart women are hotter in bikinis. And, as a smart woman who never wears a bikini, I was a little freaked out.


Now, I'm pretty sure that part of this has to do with losing weight. I'm back on the path to hotness and as I know from previous attempts this always brings up questions for me about identity, what is attractive, and where I fit in the world, and how to best perform my sexual identity so that I'm the one that is getting something from it. These are complicated issues because I grew in an era where Kate Moss reigned supreme and every model from Seventeen to Cosmo (the real Cosmo, I'm too old to have read Cosmo Girl) looked like she was about one accident with a needle away from being a drug statistic. My notion of myself and my notion of what is attractive do not often have large overlaps. And, when they do, I've found myself the recipient of much unwanted attention. So, how do we deal with these things? How do we deal with being smart and sexy? How do you successfully express ownership of a sexual identity that has been objectified and work it to your advantage? I'm at a loss about this.

What do you ask the skinny people?

I love dumb questions (not).

Why is it that when I (a somewhat-overweight-but-not-even-remotely-in-need-of-stomach-stapling 30 year old) get a more-or-less healthy lunch (lasanga rolls, veggies, diet soda) some joker has to go "Oh, eating healthy today?"

What? Considering I avoid anything fried like the plague, try to eat veggies at least once a day, and am attempting to cut down on my pastry consumption, that's pretty out-of-line. Actually, that's just out-of-line in general. Would you say "Oh, eating shitty today?" to the skinny person behind me getting a cheeseburger on white bun with some really hideous looking onion rings, two cookies, and a large regular soda? Would you say it to the extremely morbidly obese person ahead of me (and when I say extreme I could eaily fit inside one pantleg and I'm not little) who has bought enough food for a family and is now sitting down to eat by themselves?

Thanks, dude. And for the record...there's a scone in my knitting bag.