I have ...

Only Belgian dark chocolate ice cream to eat in my apartment.

And I packed all my spoons.

I have only Belgian dark chocolate ice cream to eat in my apartment.

And I've packed all my spoons.

If There Is One Good Decision I Have Made in My Life...

It is this:


I never joined the Army.

Day Four: Cold Is the Real Enemy

I have no strength in my hands. I can't handle a Beretta to save my life. Well, actually, I can to save my life, but I will probably be mildly dangerous to everyone else in the process.

Also, you should never have to shoot when it's only 30 degrees outside. There should be a law somewhere.

Day Three: I Am Really Dangerous Now

I qualified on an M4 this afternoon with a 273 score (250 is passing, 300 is perfect)!

Also, my arms are so sore I'm not going to be able to move them in the morning, but whatever. That's what a hot tub is for, isn't it?

Day Two: More Defensive Driving on Steroids

Or: How to Skid/Never Use the Breaks.

Also, off-roading! New adventures!

I don't know if this week is so much about preparing for a war zone so much as playing.

Cue Creepy Music

Okay this is now almost an hour after the fact, so I think I can write about it without shaking.

I've already made the comparisons to Blair Witch and every other creepy movie with the place I'm staying in the middle of nowhere. No lights, tons of woods, no cell phone coverage. No street signs, and in many places, no paved roads.

I naturally miss my turn for the racetrack after dinner and a mile or so down the tiny, paved, unlit road realize my mistake. I try to turn around -- a three-point turn -- and misjudge the side of the road (did I mention I really can't see a thing around here at night? No lights!) My car plunges into a previously-unseen ditch. Forward, reverse, forward, reverse, nothing doing. I finally get out of my car and brave the creepy dark night around me, and realize my left rear wheel is spinning a foot above the pavement. So much for rear wheel drive.

About this time I've decided it must be my fate, after the last few days, to end up as a) a dead hitchhiker, b) a woman found frozen to death in her car by the police the next morning, or c) the woman who was raped and killed on this portion of Pointer Road. In any of the above cases I figured I would be stuck as a ghost haunting this portion of useless and unused road for the rest of my days until some cute boy from Supernatural decided to put me to rest. As lovely as Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki are, I really had no desire to be stuck with this portion of pavement any longer than absolutely necessary.

As it turns out, the white sign I thought was atop a cross was actually a mailbox at the mouth of "road" -- one of those unpaved dirt roads that drowns when it rains. (Did I mention it's been raining for the last twenty four hours here? And that it's like 32 degrees outside?) So I trod in my sneakers down the unlit mud puddle by the mere light of my cell phone -- the only use it has down here, apparently -- and listening to the rush of a stream nearby, hoping I do not end up in it (dead or otherwise -- the water would be very cold).

At long last I come to a single ramshackle cabin that is lit inside and out. In fact, I think that was the first light I had seen in fifteen minutes or more. After five minutes of knocking, the large, powerful but friendly man I was hoping would appear does not; instead, it's a little old lady who is obviously living alone and suspicious of muddy, cold, and wet young women arriving on her doorstep at 730 at night. She lets me borrow her phone; fortunately I had left the registration information in my purse, with a phone number to the lodge. No one answers. However, the answering machine gives me the emergency number for the guards at the front gate (the one I missed) and I get ahold of Don and Mike. My favorite people in the world. Mike rescues me, brings me back to the guard post (it has to be manned 24 hours a day -- tonight, for half an hour, by me!) and he and Don go back to remove my car from the ditch.

Zot looks to be in one piece. She managed to get all the way back on her own steam, so I hope she's all right. Fortunately I'm staying at a place where people look after cars professionally, so I can probably get an opinion or two on her health before I head back to DC.

Again, Zot is not an all-terrain vehicle.

Sidenote: I really have only two responsibilities as an adult, other than my job: taking care of my kitty and taking care of my vehicle. In the last three days I've been failing miserably at both.

Day One: Defensive Driving on Steroids

Yeah, you heard it.

Me, slaloming around four other moving cars. Me, rearending other cars on purpose. Me, pushing the bad guys' cars out of the way.

This could have serious, detrimental effects on my driving skillz.

Day Zero

Things I Have Actually Said Out Loud Tonight:

1. "I love that stop sign!"

2. "I'm naming my first kid Milton" (after the street with the stop sign).

3. "Where's civilization? Yes, Danville, please."

4. "I will kill for a CVS."

5. "It's kind of like camping ... at a racetrack."

6. "This reminds me of Blair Witch, Kevin. It's so creepy" .... click.

7. "Zot is not an all-terrain vehicle ... unfortunately."

My Little Druggie

Is very, very sick. But they gave her more morphine so she's very, very happy.

At least for now.

And in the meantime I'm heading off to a racetrack for a week.

Poltergeist Kitty

I am the world's worst mother. At this rate, I deserve never to have children.

Elsie gets sick. I panic and take her to the vet. The vet gives her morphine.

Elsie happy.

Three days later, morphine runs out. Elsie unhappy. Elsie sick.

Vet does not work Sundays. I go out and buy her catnip toys.

Elsie happy. Elsie stoned out of her skull.

Elsie so thrilled with toys she's flipping around and accidentally turns on the TV (to static). Stares at static for at least ten minutes with paw raised to the screen. Seriously, all she needed to do was say, "They're here" ... or just meow.

I give my cat drugs and then laugh when she acts like a character in a movie. Seriously bad mommy.

Please, DIA, make this week worse...

Because I really want to know if it's possible. Because I started out this week wondering if I could start a petition to have MFA programs accept students for January enrollment. Because I'm starting to question how a war zone can be much worse than this, even with shootings and bombings and IEDs every day. And I don't like that thought.

Drowning my work sorrows....

in novel-writing. (Yeah, not sure that metaphor works, either, but ... I have a novel to write, stop bugging me!) It's either that or die of boredom at work, as nothing happens on the Arabian Peninsula because we don't have any psycho-Islamofascist-terrorist presidents running around.

(That last was supposed to refer to Iran, for those of you confused.)

Ugh

I'm officially an antique.

Double-checked and ...

Yep, grass def. not greener over there. Good to know I can trust my instincts. That's two for two this week.

Yeah, and if you have no clue what I'm talking about ... don't worry I think most of this week has been an internal monologue anyway.