Frog and Goat

Once again, I’m embarrassed to be a Virginian.

Virginia Commonwealth University received a letter from Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli requesting that the Commonwealth’s public universities and colleges rescind policies that ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

The University’s senior leadership team and I are examining the issue closely. Provost Gottfredson is planning forums to provide students, faculty and staff an opportunity to discuss the implications of the Attorney General’s request.

It’s still 2010, isn’t it? We didn’t just jump back in time to 1955, did we?

Let’s just let the “lady” thing in the title slide, shall we? I realize I’m no lady, I’m his wife.*

I’m tele-working today and what that means is I got all my work done hours ago and have been sitting at my desk looking busy to no one in particular. The guilt and an occasional email keeps me in my chair.

The better-half worked from home today too and since the cupboard was bare we went to the neighborhood pizza buffet** (no, not CiCi’s–actual pizza) which in our case is about 15 minutes away. Let me tell you that place attracts old people with various physical limitations. And, it doesn’t matter how long it takes to limp, hop and crouch their way to the buffet, they are getting their $6.99 worth of pizza. The buffet line was pretty well bereft of pizza when we got there. The better-half had to wait about 5 minutes to get his first slice. At least it was very hot.

By the time we left, office workers and contractors were filling up the seats. The old farts were nursing their teas and coffees.

I asked the better-half on the ride home what’s going to be our oddity when we get old. Will we have walking problems, will I obsess about my purse, will we have to holler because we can’t hear each other? I think my problem will be pushing young whippersnappers out of my way at the pizza buffet.

---

*Apologies to Lyle Lovett.
**Aside from a salad bar at the grocery store, this is the only buffet I like. Others creep me out.

I love baroque music.

We’re going to see Gil Shaham in April. I’m so excited. I just can’t hide it.

There is shit on a toilet seat here at the office. What is the matter with people?

It’s been quiet around here because the crap pot has been stirred. Let’s start with work. Again, with the impending wonder of will we have funding after June 30th? How much funding will we have? Will we have to cut staff? Will I have to continue to do a manager’s job (she of the purple velour pants) because she’s incompetent? Yes. But, at least I’ve officially been given permission to go ahead and take care of this part of her job. Now I can blaze through the tasks and get them done for the good of the organization or for great justice!

Personal life was also a pile of crap beginning with last weekend. My parents went to see my sister and brother-in-law in Florida. First time they’ve all laid eyes on each other in 4 ½ years. You’d think everyone could freaking behave for 24 hours, but alas. Screaming, tears and drama. A phone call from my sister and her husband that, in retrospect, seems a little less than genuine. My sister and I have worked through that and we’re OK now. Pathetic emails from my mother about how disastrous things have been. I’m sure they were pretty terrible. But, fuck that disastrous shit. Disastrous shit has been going on for 8 years with me because I’ve been excommunicated by my father. All those thoughts and feelings got stirred up by the screaming, tears and drama. I emailed her and said that I was not interested in talking to her about her disastrous stuff because frankly I’m tired of being in this windstorm of family drama and I’m going to support my sister and take care of myself.

It doesn’t help that my mother has basically sided with my father (really, she has to live with him so I get it—what I don’t get follows) and then expects me to listen to her talk about him all the freaking time. Whatever. I try to be polite but it’s hard. It’s hard when I remember that a few years ago I get an email from her saying she’s celebrating Independence Day by being free of the problem with my father and me. In the email, she totally missed the point that I’ve attempted to be nice to him and have invited him to things at our house and still have him stare right at me and not speak. There’s only so much of that one person can take and so he doesn’t get invited to our house. We avoid him and when forced to see him, treat him like that crazy uncle everyone seems to have…smile, be polite, carefully walk backwards so the animal doesn’t attack.

Then last year, I told her she could come to my graduation but he wasn’t invited—mostly because he has never once spoken to me about going back to school and has ignored me for what was then 7 years. I may as well of invited the neighbor four doors down or the wine lady I talked to at Kroger today. She tells me she can’t come without him because she’s already asked him if he would go. Really? Could the rose-colored glasses come off? There is no relationship anymore and she wants him to go to my graduation? It was my freaking day. Is it so terribly hard to remember that? Yes, clearly, still bitter that I’m just expected to take this shit and be OK with it.

Anyway, the screaming, drama and tears brought all of that back from wherever I’ve been storing it and I really don’t want to have to go back to that place again. For crying out loud, I didn’t eat dinner one night this week and I never miss a meal. Last night was the first time all week that I’ve felt better (dinner with friends; celebrating someone’s good fortune). Today has been pretty good. Just need to figure out a way to tell my mother to let some time pass. That I’m sick of it and can’t keep falling back into the years of conversation about who isn’t talking to whom and why and what do you think is going on? I’m tired and really can’t care so deeply anymore.

Right after I got out of college a friend of mine was living in the Church Hill area of Richmond. The duplex he lived in was in the nicer part of that area but some of the other parts were a little rough. A little down on the heels.

He told me about one hot summer day going to the local grocery store and seeing an incredibly large woman in a house dress patrolling the aisles with her children. Suddenly a ham fell out of her dress and as she stood over the ham like she’d just given birth to it, she said, “Who put that ham there?”

I have laughed about that story for over 15 years. I now wonder if it was true. It’s still funny even if the story has been turned into a kicking new song:

I picked Lil Elvis up from pre-school yesterday and she asked me about the dog. I asked her which dog and she said the one with the big collar at my house. Little kids have an odd sense of time because she was asking me about a hunting dog she saw back in early December or November or some long ago time as far as my addled brain was concerned. I remembered the dog had a big 3 painted on his haunch and then Lil Elvis and I talked about that and how big the dog was.

When we got to her house, we played a very quick game of checkers that really ended up in the board being flipped over after I told her I was probably not going to let her win. Because I’m the evil aunt who likes to whip small children in games. She gave me the cartoon blink, blink (you know the move, when you can’t believe someone just said that) and then decided that doing something else was a good idea. So we taught ourselves to juggle flaming chainsaws.

The better-half came over as I was being attacked and beaten into submission. That kid has some wrestling moves. It also helps that she knows I’m not really going to fight back, but that I’m good for making exaggerated dying noises and asking occasional questions about whether the fart bomb was just released on me (I lost count on those).

After my sister got home, the better-half and I went to Carini’s in the East End. We’ve known about it for years but had never been before. It popped into the better-half’s head last night and so off we went. Delicious, family-oriented Sicilian-Italian restaurant. The parking lot smelled good. People were walking out with pizza boxes and the inside smelled even better. My leftovers made for a delicious lunch today. We’ll definitely go back. The analog to that restaurant in our “official” town was maybe that good when I was 15 but they’ve been losing ground ever since. It’s nice to know where to go for affordable, comfort Italian food within 20 minutes of our house.

Last night we had some friends over for dinner. It’s always great seeing them and we all end up staying up too late. I’m not sure which couple has the better deal when it comes to getting to bed. We live about 30 minutes from each other and so depending on the clean up the hosts must do, I wonder who gets tucked in first. We stuffed the dishwasher full and then rinsed everything that wouldn’t fit and ran another load this morning. It’s impressive how many plates, glasses, dishes and pots four people can dirty up.

Last night we made three sauces and two different kinds of pasta. The better-half and I made one of the sauces the night before (simple tomato and white wine with garlic) and my girl friend and I made two sauces while the fellas made the pasta. We put together a chard and sausage sauce and a ham, cream and pea sauce that ended up in the broiler for a little while to melt the cheese. The guys rolled out and cut a wide noodle and spaghetti.

We served Caesar salad with the better-half’s amazing, super-delicious anchovy and garlic dressing. We had crema catalana for dessert (a Mediterranean version of creme brulee).

Somehow Toss Across came up in conversation, so I went into the attic and found the better-half’s game (still in the original box) and we played a couple of rounds. It was more exciting when we were all eight.