Child vs. Adult

I was a child this weekend.  I went with Hannah and my cousin to Silverwood Theme Park.  It's basically a throwback to the 1800's (it's part Old West and part Victorian) with train adventure, candy shoppes, carnival games, a Magic show, and a ton of amusement rides.  First off, I have to say, I used to go to this place almost every summer when I was younger but it has been well over a decade since I stepped foot there.  Until this past weekend that is.  And I was sort of taken aback by how much it's changed and also by how much has remained the same.  Something that is the same is the wonderful Victorian architecture of the stores and shoppes and archways, and the elegant and colorful landscaping throughout the whole park.  Just gorgeous.  One of the first comments from Hannah, "Can I just live here?"  It was right up her alley with the color schemes and gardens.  And there's a Victorian Coffee House that was closed while we were there but, just so you all know, that's totally our house.

It was such a great day.  It was the first time that Hannah and I have gotten to do something so silly and fun together and the only reason we were able to go at all is because mom and dad lent us some food money and their car and my cousin has a Gold Pass which allows her and two guests to get in for free.  She was a lot of fun - she's a young woman (almost 18) with specialized needs but she was one awesome and energetic guide taking us this way and that way through the park.  First we rode the train and enjoyed the little robbery show despite the actors' caveats: 'jist so's ya'll know this aint a real hold up and these here aint real a gun neither.'  When I was a kid there was a glorious moment when I really wondered if those guns were real and I cheered and cheered when the deputy finally saved the day.  It was a comedy show back then with a hint of danger - now it's just a comedy show.  A good one, sure, but I can definitely tell the p's and q's of political correctness are firmly fixed in our little corner of the world, even during a damn train robbery.  

After the train, the day was filled with a whirl wind of rides: the tilt-a-whirl (and, yes, ICP's song ran through my head the whole time), the antique cars, the super round up, the cork-screw, the timber terror, the carousel, and the log flume.  We did several of these twice and also took a nice break for pizza and a magic show.  The magician was adorable.  He was everything you could want in a magician, tall, lanky, funny, personable, good with kids, and he even dropped a table on Hannah's head.  I'm not kidding about that last bit.  One of his tricks is a levitating lamp table and at one point while performing the illusion he got up on some steps near where Hannah and I were sitting and levitated the little table so that the feet were inches from my girlfriend's head.  She was all smiles during it though.  We kind of thought about asking the magician to donate some sperm our way, yeah, he was just that damn cute!  

There was a place along the path where cool water half misted/half sprayed passersby and I took off my glasses and went in to cool my face.  Unfortunately I dropped my glasses and my lovely girlfriend - who had the same thought as I did - was right behind me and stepped on them.  She only broke off one of the bows so it wasn't a huge deal but it did put a little crimp in our fun for a moment.  The rest of the day at the park I was blind.  Honestly it added to the excitement.  We stayed until the lights came on in the park.  One last ride: the carousel.  Hannah and I cuddled together on a sleigh while my cousin rode the horse in front of us.  It was named Candy.  On the way home from the park we sang to the play list on the MP3 player.  Even my little cousin sang with us and if she didn't know the song, she'd fake it and 'aaah' along in time.  A perfect end to a child-like day.

On Monday, however, I was an adult.  I called Vizio for the whatever-hundredth time.  A young lady assisted me, listened to my lengthy tale of woe, and then told me someone named Maynard would be calling me back later that day.  I took this to mean that a very long time would pass during which they would discuss what a problem child I am and laugh about how I would have to eat five hundred bucks then call me back and say 'well, let's give this repair thing another shot.'  However, about five minutes later, Maynard called and not only apologized for all the crap that has gone on with the computer but finally okay'd giving me a replacement.  My new computer will be here shortly.  I have to send the old one back and as soon as it's in their hands, they'll send the new one.  He was great.  Thanks Maynard.

With that taken care of, I then had to call and get the payment date for my loan moved back two days to coincide with my paycheck.  That's fun.  I will be getting 'theoretical' money since the second I'm paid almost all of it will be gone to bills.  Yay, adulthood!  On top of all of that, I spent most of Monday blind while my father and I soldered, hammered, and glued my glasses back into some kind of useful shape.  I also called work that day because I had been out of town and otherwise engaged with my cousin all weekend and had been unable to cover for one of my coworkers whose father was passing away.  I suppose I should feel like shit because if it was my father passing away I would hope someone would cover for me (and I guess my boss got a little huffy because I didn't returns texts and calls right away as I was fucking busy and didn't even have my phone on!) but then I learned someone HAD offered to cover and that she still went to work.  So she made her choice.  I don't feel bad and honestly, I'm not the only person who can cover for people.  I think they all forget that sometimes. Anyway that was nice and awkward.  I'm happy that the awkwardness ended with the phone calls - at work today everything seemed just fine.  The only shitty thing is that I'm applying for Third Key and so is this particular co-worker and now that everyone is pissed that I couldn't cover for her... yeah I figure Third Key isn't really going to happen now.  Which brings me to my next point.

Hannah and I want to live in Spokane or Spokane Valley which means that I need a better paying and more consistent job.  Tonight I've been online applying and saving jobs.  The one I'm really wanting right now is bookseller at Barnes & Noble.  I don't even care if the pay isn't that much more - I will work more hours.  I will take a second job.  I fucking want to work with books!  It would be a step in the right direction I think, even though it's retail.  So, as I wrap this up, I'm sending off an application to B&N to each location in the Spokane area.  I'll be crossing my fingers.  If I have to be an adult as least let me work in a place where my inner child can really shine.  

Renewed Passion for Death Man

It's true that much of my best work is done under the pressure of a deadline when it gets right down to the wire.  Today I had some major breakthroughs with the novel I've been playing with for the past almost two years now.  It has become my MFA thesis and today, while engaged in a very long conversation with my father about how one might go about seeking justice and how patience is a virtue when planning an assassination, I realized the problem with one of my characters was age and geography.  

I'm going to just go for it like a race horse on steroids because whatever isn't working, my mentor will tell me, and whatever is working... well, my mentor will tell me.  I'm just going to throw it all at her and see what she thinks because I feel like this novel turned over a whole new leaf today.  I was stressed and struggling and now I have a sweet little character who may or may not live and if he does live, well, hell, I might just give him a sequel!

So far I've accomplished a pretty good portion of what needs to be done for this packet.  I'm really sad because I won't have a fresh amount of pages for her since I'm redoing some of it - that means she will be getting a pinch of older material to go along with the new stuff.  I think if I can edit like a mother fucker we might be in the clear.  But that is for Monday.  All day Monday!  And then I have some more time to work on Tuesday in the back room at work.  I have to be there at 8:30 for an hour long store meeting and then I am just going to stay put until 12:45 when I have to work my five hour shift.  Usually, when this happens, I use that time to read but this time around it's gonna be a revise and edit day for the entire Simon chapter.  Also I might shorten the chapters and push the pace a little.  I can always slow things down - honestly I find it's harder to speed them up, so lets push it now and create less of a problem later.  

Giggles

Earlier today Hannah and I laid down on the bed and cuddled.  I petted and massaged her neck and scalp because she had a killer headache and that seemed to be helping.  Well I started to doze off and entered that strange place between awake and asleep where odd strange  images pop into my head and strange words leak out of my mouth.  It's like a stream of conscience acid trip.  Today I had two images.  The first image was of a shelf in a thrift store.  On this shelf was a variety of knickknacks one of them being a really pretty bronze hued owl bracelet with green and pink stones set in the eyes and along the wings.  For some reason this made me giggle. And so I tried to tell Hannah about the bracelet I'd just seen when another image popped into my head.  

This time I saw kitties.  But they were doing that wacky Frankenstein's Monster creeper walk where they hunch up their backs and bolt away on their hind legs.  And this time the giggle in my throat came out as a laugh.  I often laugh in my sleep.  The sound of it is apparently so disturbing it wakes Hannah up, which is a feat in and of itself, and frightens her enough that she usually squishes a pillow on my face to either silence me or kill me (anything to make the laughter stop).  Today I laughed and laughed until I just about choked.  I laughed until I couldn't breathe and then I trembled and sobbed.  Hannah told me that my sobbing is quite pathetic and imitated my face which just made me laugh all over again, which then led to more sobbing.  Just when I was almost finished with the cycle and coming down so that I could breathe normally, Hannah curled up next to me and said cutely, "You're so weird."  

I love her.  Because she puts up with this insanity.  This isn't the first time I've giggle-looped into tears and it certainly won't be the last, but this was a particularly draining episode and I had to do a round of 'cool down' snickering and sniffling before I was finally able to get up and function for the day.  And that's just one of many strange behaviors and mood swings that Hannah has to put up with on a daily basis.  I would pity her if I didn't also know she has the best lover this side of the Mississippi giving her orgasms whenever she demands them.  Yep.  I might be overselling myself a little.  But I don't think so.  

A Surprise Visit and a Few Good Books

Today at work one of my Solstice MFA fellows came by the store!  Geographically this is very cool.  He's from Oregon but is driving through to Montana and stopped at Post Falls to hug and squeeze none other than me!  K introduced me to his wife and four kids (aged: baby, 2, 4, and 6).  Apparently when they were driving up, his wife said, "Do you guys wanna meet one of Daddy's friends?" To which their replied, "yes."  But when I rushed out of the store to come and greet them, the eldest, a daughter, cried, "But she's a girl!"  I thought that was pretty cute.  Yes.  Daddy's can in fact have friends that are girls.

But not only was my sex a surprise, I was also of great interest to the second eldest, a son, who asked what my medal was for.  I was wearing a pretty cameo necklace that I had borrowed from Hannah.  It was strung on a pretty white ribbon about my neck and I guess the shape of it reminded him of award medals.  Because when I cocked my head, he asked again, "What did you win that medal for?"  I wasn't sure what to say but I told him I won it by wrestling it away from Hannah, ergo it was a wrestling medal.  To which he was pretty impressed.  

They weren't able to stay long but it really did make my day!  Aside from K's surprise visit to the store my day was filled with helping pre-teens and teens find starter bars.  I swear today must have been drag your daughter to get fitted day, alternately known as "Please, honey, you can't wear shitty sports bras the rest of your life!"  I fitted three girls - there was a fourth but she didn't let me fit her and she was an absolute sour puss and hated all of our bras (what she really wanted was a Victoria's Secret bra to push up her knockers and ours were just too practical for her).  A couple of the girls I fitted though were a real delight to work with and they went home with a good selection of cute but supportive bras and some matching panties!  

After work I came home and ate all the things.  I ate several slices of a crumb cake that our friend, C, left here as well as a very good sized portion of biscuits and gravy.  I don't even know how I fit it all in there.  I'll chalk it up to period binge and try to eat with greater balance tomorrow.  Speaking of tomorrow, I need to get it over with because I really need a day to just work on homework.  Apparently Monday (my day off) is going to be filled with Kroc exercise, plasma donation, and getting new tags for the car.  This translates into a long ass day.  I also have to go to the library for a while on Monday and pick up some new books and drop off an old one - that book being Zombie.  

E told me not to read Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates, so of course I immediately went off and read it.  I actually really liked it.  There was one part that made me a little sick (the very graphic description and visual aide of lobotomy) but other than that I found the gore and sexual violence to be just disturbing enough to make the point but not over the top.  Overall it was just a heartbreaking novel and written well enough that I found myself empathizing with the killer as well as his victims, his zombies.  I actually really want to own this book.  There's one line in it that I almost want tattooed on me: "If you had a heart, that is how it would be broken." Now that I've read a book that wasn't actually on my reading list, I suppose it's time to get down to business with the ones that are.  Currently I'm reading Structuring Your Novel by Meredith.  And it's kind of amazing.  I'm doing all the exercises in it to map out my Death Man novel and I'm already excited to use it to map out my other novels, too.