From Thrusday On

*sigh*

This has been a very, very long few days. So long in fact, this is the first time I've been on the Internet since last Thursday, which, while being a nice break is kinda weird still...

So, I went to see Pirates last Thursday, which was totally awesome and turned me polytheistic. ^_^ I'll do my big review of the movie after I see it again. But it was awesome, and fun, and brilliant, and I feel like all the money I spent on merchandise was well spent.

And Dad came into town Thursday too! He was having some dental work done in Florida, and he got a layover for here, and it was the first time I'd seen him since Spring Break... I used to go see him for the whole summer, and alternating Holidays, which was great, it just... I guess when your parents are divorced you always want things to be some other way. Like not-divorced, or at least have your Dad living in the same town so you can see him on weekends and some weekday nights, like I remember other kids seeing their parents. In the last few years with work and school, I've seen him a lot less. The longest gap was about three years. It was great seeing him, and we had lunch before the movie, and went out afterwards. We had breakfast at IKEA Friday morning, poked around Atlanta a bit... Just basically spent time together, no really big events or anything. We did have dinner at Pappadeaux Saturday night, which was really great. I had raw steak, and Dad had Shrimp Etouffee, and we asked our waitress a lot of inane questions about where do they get the Alligators from for the appetizers.

And sadly, he had to leave Sunday. About five minutes after he left I felt completely miserable, and I wanted him to come back, or move here (which I keep pestering him about all weekend. When I was little the thought never really crossed my mind because he'd almost always lived somewhere else).

And Sunday night was the big Atlanta area Script Frenzy Meet Up event. Which is held at the Java Monkey, which while being a very cute coffee shop with a lot of soul is located somewhere past Atlanta in such a way that every time I drive there I get lost. It's small, cozy, they serve hummus (and it's so good!!), AND NO ONE SHOWED UP, NOT EVEN THE ATLANTA ML. This is the kinda thing that pisses people off pretty bad. Gas is more than three dollars a gallon, and I live in Kennesaw, and when I've talked to the people in Atlanta about moving the meetings (they use the same place for the NaNo meet up every year) to some place like the Varsity, which is a million times closer to 75, they say that's "too far to drive". They live in Atlanta. Seriously.

Granted, I don't have to go to the meeting since I'm in charge of my own little area, but a lot of people who are from outlying areas who have no ML or don't know other writers show up to the Atlanta Meet Up. That's why I like to go. There's lots of other people there, and you can meet them, and talk to other writers, which sometimes is pretty hard to do since writing is so solitary.

So, I drove all the way down there, ate hummus all by myself, worked on some story notes, and left. Sort of a waste, except for the hummus.

Then... Mom wanted to visit Uncle Gary, who lives in... Ranger, Georgia. Basically one of those places you're never going to hear about unless you have to drive there. And yes, you do have to turn off onto a dirt road to get to his house. I really like my Uncle, but I was very, very tired when I got there and I just sort of passed out on his couch. I had a lot of fun seeing him and his dog, Sadie. The next day we all had lunch together which was Lamb and grilled onions (for me) and Lamb and a lot of vegetables for everyone else (Mom, Fred, Gary). Bailey probably got some lamb too.

Mom, Fred, and Gary all have siblings, which in my experience makes them much better than me at teasing people. It's something I never really got the hang of (or see the purpose of). Basically they all sort of teasingly insult each other. "You could have cooked this lamb better... Oh wait, you're just some Italian!! Hahaha!" and they all laugh, because they're not really being racist (it was just the only jibe I could remember). Or "Your dog barks too much, you must have taught her that!!" and everyone laughs.

Everyone says I'm too sensitive about things like that, but I never find it funny, and once it starts I just kinda keep my head down and try to be invisible. One of the last times I was up there I made coffee and Gary said something about it, and I told him he could make it himself if he didn't like it, which didn't go over all that well. I suppose I'm not funny like that.

Anyway, Gary is the one who bought Mom and I the gift cards to go get our eyes read. He really liked it and (evidently) everything the lady said to him was true, and he took all the stuff she sold him and it lowered his cholesterol and saved his liver (he never told me before that he had liver problems). She was "dead on" and gave him "goose bumps" and Gary said Mom had told him that I didn't believe in it.

Which put me in a really awkward place, since he paid for it as a gift. I told him I had fun and I really enjoyed it, but that when I tried to learn more about it- About here Mom shot me this sort of smugly amused face and I told Gary I didn't really want to talk about it, because last time Mom and I discussed it she called me a Doubting Thomas.

Mom quickly exploded into a flurry of denial over that, and told Gary that I refused to believe even though everything the lady said about me was true.

I tried to explain what a cold reading was, and that every time the lady said something vague Mom would quickly fill in the blanks for her. Everyone refused to understand what a cold reading was, and we got sidetracked into John Edwards, and how he "really talks to the dead".

Evidently there's absolutely no way that you can make some kind of vastly general comment and have it chime with someone. Saying someone had a fight with a female relative on their mother's side isn't vast and general, and neither is saying someone had a male relative in the military.

It makes me feel like the last sane person on earth, sometimes, when I'm surrounded by my family.

Back to the eye reading. The lady told me that when she "reads" something in my eye it could be one of three things; 1) something that is really, actually wrong with me physically, 2) something that I have the genetics for (and possibly someone else in my family has it), 3) something metaphoric.

So, if she tells you that you have something "wrong" with your heart, it could be a valve issue for you, a heart attack for your relatives, or a bad break up in your past.

I recognized this for what it was, and said nothing when the lady told me what my eyes said. There was "something" around my lower lungs (Mom chimed in with the fact that I have asthma, allergies, and get bronchitis in the winter), and the lady agreed, then began to tell me of the evils of my inhaler. She said she saw something around my pancreas and mentioned cutting back sugar in my diet (which I've already done a lot of in the last few years, and statistically is a problem for pretty much everyone in the united states). Oh, and something (I don't recall what) told her I was angry at "a female". Grand. There's a lot of them, in case you haven't noticed, and I'm not angry at all of them. What she didn't mention to me is the fact that I'm legally blind or have bad knees, or any of a dozen other things, all of which (when trying to argue this with a believer in it) fall under this vast umbrella of "things iridology can't tell you".

When it was Mom's turn every time the lady mentioned something Mom filled in the blanks as quick as possible. "I see something around your heart." prompted that Mom has a valve issue, her father died of a heart attack, and she's still heartbroken over her sister's death.

This finally ended with Gary asking if I went on John Edwards and if he told me something no one else could ever possibly know, would I believe in what John Edwards does? (which in my opinion is a very strange way to settle a discussion about iridology)

We went home, I went to work, then I slept in my own bed, which I hadn't slept in since Wednesday night. Oh man, I'm tired of sleeping on couches.

And, I finally managed to find Sea Monkeys at the store. I've always wanted some.