OK. Let me explain.
First off, real life has been getting in my bloody way. Near the end of January, I was hit with one of my terrible sinus infections. You know it's bad when the doctor shines a light on the back of your throat, then reels away with a look of disgust on their face. I was on a strong dose of antibiotics when we left for San Antonio in the first week of February, which didn't work. I was switched to a different medicine, which I was on when we went to see The Who. To be honest, those antibiotics didn't work, either; however, I am a Buford, and I can tough it out with the best of them. Things were starting to get back to normal, and everything was fine. I had outlines for posts planned, and everything was peachy.
Then, March happened. On the 8th, my heart was struck by a profound loss; my beautiful boy, Nigel, died incredibly suddenly of a heart attack. I was with him when it happened, and I know that the last thing he heard was my voice. Though that fact is something I have had a difficult time living with, I will carry that burden if it helped my boy. See, I love Nigel as if he were a dog; we have had that bond from the moment I saw him, and I know our lives were supposed to be shared. Hell, we've had dogs I never loved as much as my Nigel. Without him, there is a giant hole in our home. I never thought I wouldn't like to hear the radio uninterrupted, but now, it feels almost wrong. I refuse to listen to The Redwalls. I almost cried listening to the new Plain White T's EP because I knew he would have absolutely loved "Haven't Told Her", yet he wasn't there to sing to it -- he always responded to pronounced drums, and layered vocals. Now, I don't have anyone to share all of the marvelous new albums I have yet to discover with. For his headstone, I gave him my Woodstock mosaic -- it's so very Nigel.
That same day, we were roped into doing a major garage sale with my dad's mother. The only problem was, it had to be ready in two weeks. So, from March 9th to the 29th, we were sorting through storage sheds, garages, and heaven knows what else. At first, I was glad to have a distraction from what was going on; the longer it went, though, the more apparent it became that I should have gone back to see my doctor when the antibiotics didn't work that second time. One thing that may not be apparent about the Bufords, though, is that we're stubborn to our detriment. Instead of doing what I knew I should, I simply, well, didn't. Maybe some of my feeling sick has been dealing with losing Nigel, I don't know. This all came to a head on Monday night, when, during a high stress event, I damn near passed out. Almost fell flat on my face, and I was the only one home at the time. What home appraiser calls at 7:30 in the evening, and tells you he'll stop by at 11:30 the next day? The kind that doesn't know the lady of the house is out of town for the next two days, and the master can't even be relied upon to relay the message for another hour and a half. It was up to me, then, to finish clearing away the remnants of the garage sale madness, as well as deep-clean the house before said appraiser got there the next day. Wouldn't you have passed out, too? And, I should point out, I'm also in college. All of these activities were going on in addition to my actual job of trying to get a bloody degree. Not to mention dealing with some administrative bollocks from the living embodiment of Greendale.
These are even their bloody colors.
My headspace has been clearing up the last few days, and I seem to be getting back my stamina. Which is a good thing, since I've got finals looming on the horizon, as well as some real life odds and ends.
Somehow, I still hear a voice in the back of my mind saying "surely you've been doing stuff! Having some kind of an adventure in between all of this stupid muddle. Yes?"
In a way, yes.
Sometime in February, I got a call from my sister. I usually know something is wrong when she actually wants to talk to me on the telephone, since, you know, we rarely speak at all. Rather like our communal blog, our efforts toward maintaining constant contact faded out long ago -- even when I held out, and waited for her to come back of her own accord. At any rate, call she did.
This is a paraphrased account of what happened.
Seester: I'm at Walmart, and there are two guys here that look like your type.
Me: I didn't know I had a type.
Seester: Well, one of them looks like a mod, and he's got a weird jacket with some weird buttons on it, and he's kind of weird.
Me: Yeah.
Seester: And there's another one here, that's, like, his friend.
Me: And.
Seester: Well, I wanted to know if you'd be mad if I gave them your blog URL.
Me: You want to what?
Seester: And, you know, they can, like, look it up if they want.
I have to admit, I loved the idea of her walking up to two total strangers, husband and two incredibly young children in tow, and trying to explain her purpose for disturbing them. I pictured her conversation with these two young men in my mind, and was convinced she was doing it on a dare from her husband. With that thought in mind, I told her to do whatever she wanted, and went back to doing whatever it was I was doing. A few minutes later, I got a call from her telling me to keep my cellphone nearby, as she had also included my personal telephone number. Part of me wonders if she actually did it, or if she was merely talking the talk. The other part of me was simply amused; after all, remember the guy I dared to do the Freddie? We all know I'm up for people doing stupid things, myself included. Just like Mr. Freddie, nothing ever came of her tiny burst of extrovertedness. The thought, I suppose, counts for something: the thought being, of course, that she doesn't think I can get a guy myself. She denies this ever happened, but, Thanksgiving 2009, she told me she thought I was going to be a lonely old cat woman. And that was her phrase, not mine. Maybe if she hadn't refused to listen to my Vegas '06 stories -- something else she denied happened -- she would know I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself.
I was fourteen and stupid, don't judge me.
As I mentioned, we also went to San Antonio for a glorious week. I took lots of pictures, but, unfortunately, lost the outline of that post somewhere along the line. I do use spiral paper like it's going out of fashion. We did some lovely things, though. The Japanese Tea Garden...
Found some kind of time machine to the 1920's...
And were given free cookies at the Emily Morgan, and told to roam the place at our leisure...
That, and, you know, cool stuff: note the train.
Last week, my dad burst through the front door and said "I've got a surprise for you".
"I don't usually like surprises, let's get this over with," I told him.
Seeing that this could get ugly, my mother interjected, "don't be mad at him, he didn't pay for these."
And with that, he handed over a ticket envelope. Apparently, a friend of his was unable to go to the Elvis tribute act that was in town that night, and gave the tickets to my dad; and, being entirely honest, my dad doesn't like concerts (I know, how am I his daughter?). So, my mother and I had a fun time watching four fake Elvis impersonators from our free seats -- especially since the price on the tickets was $43 each. Fake Elvis Four took a crowd photograph, see if you can spot the two of us.
If it helps, I couldn't find us, and I am us!
You may remember from the defunct communal blog that I spent an afternoon watching the Plain White T's "Meet Me In California" documentary. In it, they talked about how they'd been gusts on a show called "Greek". As I sat there in my little blanket fort, I realized that I hadn't ever actually seen them in the show. Let me tell you, though, the clips are few and far between. Someone edited together some of them, but not all of them; don't we all know me well enough by now to know that I needed to see it all? Yes. Little clips just weren't enough.
The problem I had, though, was that I just kept watching the stupid show. Until there weren't any more episodes to watch. Don't judge me. Mind you, half the time I was watching, I kept wondering if Scott Michael Foster -- the guy you watched in that clip -- had some kind of band background; he had that vibe about him all through the show, but I had absolutely no evidence. And all that wondering and watching is pretty much where my spare time went from the end of February to about four days ago.
And so, another edition of blog casserole has come to it's natural conclusion. What have we learned?
*Next time my antibiotics don't work, I'm going back to have a chat with my doctor.
*With no help from my sister, I will not be an old cat lady.
*My mother really enjoyed the little choo-choo.
*I'm getting far too good at guessing if guys are in bands. What do I win?
*I have decided that the plural of Elvis is Elvisces, pronounced like appendices.
