I am actually leaving the house tomorrow. WTF.

So tomorrow (Tuesday) I’m actually leaving the house and driving to Austin to be “IN CONVERSATION WITH” Samantha Irby (aka BitchesGottaEat).  I never do “IN CONVERSATIONS WITH” because I hate small talk and “IN CONVERSATIONS WITH” = small talk but multiplied with microphones and people watching me not be able to remember the word for that feeling you get when you know there’s a word for something you can’t remember the word for.  But I’m making an exception because I fucking love Samantha Irby, and her book (WE ARE NEVER MEETING IN REAL LIFE) is fabulous and the title seems like a dare.  Also we have the same unfiltered, dark sense of humor so I suspect we’ll skip small talk and go straight to the terrible and fascinating things that normal people never get to until they are very drunk.  Or maybe we’ll have a dance party or sing old commercial jingles or just have an awkward staring contest and do tequila shots until the time is up.  Hard to tell.  But you should come if you can.  It’s at BookPeople in Austin at 7pm.

Also, BookPeople always takes orders for my books and I personalize them when I stop in, so if you want to order some just click here and they’ll ship it off to you. Just write whatever you want me to write in your book on the order form.  Perfect for introverts.

Also, this isn’t a real post so to make up for it I’m giving you a seductive otter:

Rowr.

Well, shit.

In the ongoing of saga of my-body-is-trying-to-kill-me I got my results back from my endoscopy/colonoscopy but instead of a call I got an email with my results, and the subject was “FU CALL”:

Phrasing.

Which is apparently shorthand for “follow-up call” but it’s still concerning.  Also, an email isn’t a call.   Just saying.  But the biopsy results were best expressed in this gif:

Mostly because it was filled with scary words that I didn’t understand but then I talked to the doctor and he was like,

Because there’s some crappy stuff like “chronic gastritis” and “intestinal metaplasia” but nothing that says, “THIS IS WHERE ALL YOUR MISSING BLOOD IS GOING.”  Also, the results were confusing but as I understand it there are four stages of your stomach and the first is “I AM IMMORTAL” and the second is “Ew” and the third is “Well that’s not good” and the fourth is “YOU’VE GOT CANCER” and I’m on the third, but apparently lots of people stay on the third stage forever so I guess it’s not as scary as it sounds?

And I was like,

But then my doctor was like, “We gotta do more tests” BECAUSE OF COURSE THEY DO so he wanted to check me for parasites and bacteria and the nurse handed me a cup and said, “We’re going to need you to bring us a sample” but I needed more details because I wasn’t sure exactly what she wanted so I was like, “Do I…shit in this?” because it would suck to hand someone a jar of poop they didn’t ask for and she nodded like I was crazy and gave me a brown bag filled with gloves and a hat and I was like, “This seems like a very formal dress code for pooping in a cup.”

…and she was like, “That’s a toilet hat” which was even more confusing because why does my toilet need a hat?  I don’t even have matching towels.  But turns out it’s like a plastic hat that you put on the toilet seat so you can shit in it and then transfer the poo into a jar.  (WTF.)

Which seems like a lot of work, but it gets even more complicated because then you have to freeze it into a poopsicle before you turn it into the lab and Victor was like, “NOOPE.  YOU ARE NOT PUTTING HUMAN FECES IN THE SAME DRAWER AS THE HOT POCKETS” but I explained that it was fine because there was a hat and gloves involved so it was super fancy and I put the hat on and did a small dance but then he was like, “LADY, THAT’S A TOILET HAT” and I was both impressed and concerned that he knew that, but I agreed to write “DO NOT EAT SHIT” on the bag in the freezer so that no one would touch it, and actually that works out well because from now on I’m going to put all of the ice cream drum sticks in a brown bag that says “DO NOT EAT SHIT” to make everyone else not eat them and finally there’s a bright side to this bullshit.

Toilet hat. Like a clear Smokey Bear hat that you can also use as a very large measuring cup. But not if you use it on the toilet. Gross.  That probably goes without saying

Anyway, if my poop doesn’t have all the answers (there’s a phrase I never thought I’d write) then I move on to swallowing the camera pill that takes a terrible torso ride, which I can only assume will give me even more confusing non-answers that help nothing.

Just a guess, but this is what I assume will be the next gif I use to explain my medical stuff:

To be continued.

Well that’s accurate.

There’s a thing going on Facebook right now where you type keepgif.com/yourname into the comments and it automatically posts a gif related to your name and I was a little worried about doing that because what if I accidentally post something horribly offensive, but then I decided to just do it and this is the gif for my name:

So fucking accurate, y’all.

Unrelated:  Ten years ago I found a child’s dress in a thrift shop that was a bit ripped but lovely.  It was too big for Hailey at the time but she adored it so I used safety pins to make it fit and she wore it until it frayed.  It gave me one of my favorite pictures of her when she was just a few years old.

I kept the dress but somehow missed the window when the dress would actually fit her, so a few days ago when I stumbled across it in the closet Hailey and I decided to cut it so that it would fit her and use it to take pictures underwater.

Hailey doesn’t like to open her eyes underwater so I ended up with a ton of half-face pictures, but they looked awesome so it was totally worth it.  And a bunch of you asked how I did it so I’ll give you my secret: Put your phone in a waterproof bag and instead of taking photos just take video.  Then go through the video in slow motion and screenshot the best images from the video. Photoshop the bathing suit straps and pool vents out. Add a black and white filter to make it look artsy. Don’t drown.

And the images looked strange and muffled and fairy-like and surreal.  Almost as surreal as the idea that it’s been 10 years since Hailey first wore that dress.  It’s all going by far too quickly.  It’s a bittersweet realization that I can only suspend time in my photos and my memory.

 

MAGIC!

So yesterday Victor was like, “Hey, take some xanax because we’re going out tonight.  And by ‘tonight’ I mean ‘5pm’,” and I was like, “That seems very late for me and also ‘no,'” but he was like, “You’ll like it.  It’s a magic show in a hotdog castle that used to be a church,” and I was like, “Those words don’t go together.  Have you had a stroke?” and he sighed, “And it’s haunted,” and so I took my xanax but I didn’t know what to wear and Victor was like, “It’s a magic show.  Wear a sequined cravat obviously.  Don’t embarrass me.”  But I didn’t have one so I wore a red dress with a plastic belt that looks almost like diamonds if you have never seen diamonds.  And I would probably be perfectly dressed for a magic show but I forgot to compensate for “hotdog castle” so basically I was totally overdressed and glaring at Victor.

I don’t know why people call it a “hotdog castle” though. Maybe it’s heresy to call it a hotdog church?

And then we went up to the middle floor where the magic show was and it was GORGEOUS and covered with stained glass and I was in love for five seconds until I saw that it was communal bench seating so I had to eat my fancy hotdog with strangers which is my idea of hell.  Making smalltalk with strangers, I mean.  Not eating hotdogs.  I like hotdogs.  And when the strangers were like, “Where are you from?” and I was like, “I’m from Stop-Asking-Me-Questions” Victor coughed to cover it up and Hailey joyfully took over all of the conversations because she loves strangers and might be adopted.

The magic show was quite good but people didn’t seem to understand that when a magic trick is done you need to clap.  Or whoop.  Something.  Personally when a trick is done I often shout “WHAT.”  Or if it’s really good I point and yell “WITCHCRAFT“, but in a somewhat complimentary way rather than a “J’ACCUSE” sort of thing.  This seems a bit over the top but Victor is a magic geek and I’ve been to a shit ton of magic shows so I think I know what I’m doing.  Also, I’m usually very drunk, which makes me a great audience because I’m easily impressed. Plus I have ADD so I can never remember what the card was I was supposed to remember so no matter what happens I assume it’s magic.  Like, if a magician puts a rabbit in a hat and then pulled out the same rabbit a minute later I’m like, “YOU’VE SIGNED A PACT WITH THE DEVIL” and Victor has to remind me that that’s not the trick at all.

Scott Pepper doing magic. Not a good picture. Sorry.

I had an end to this but I forgot what it was.  I blame the ADD.

MAGIC!

*******

And now…time for the weekly wrap-up!

 

Shit I made in my shop (Named “EIGHT POUNDS OF UNCUT COCAINE” so that your credit card bill will be more interesting.):

Shit-you-may-or-may-not-want-to-see:

This week’s wrap-up is brought to you by StoryWorth Books, which I’m actually a big fan of.  From them: Still looking for a meaningful Father’s Day gift? StoryWorth is the perfect last minute gift. Each week, we’ll email him a question about his life – asking him about his favorite memory of his grandparents, or whether he’s ever pulled any great pranks. All he has to do is reply with a story, which is forwarded to you and any other family members you invite. At the end of the year, his stories are bound in a beautiful keepsake book your family will cherish!”  You can check it out here.

 

Coloring. But less stressful. (Yes, I am aware how ridiculous this sounds.)

Two unrelated things:

First:

This morning I got bit on the eye by an ant.  And that was concerning, but more baffling was the fact that the ant managed to crawl all the way up to my eye before attacking.  That’s, like, so much work for I-don’t-even-know-what-the-payoff-is.

I can’t decide whether to be offended or impressed.

Second:

This is for all of the people who bought my coloring book but didn’t color it because even though coloring is supposed to help stress it’s actually super stressful for people who are afraid to making mistakes and I’m the same way which is why I normally just draw the pictures rather than color them because what if I spend an hour coloring something and then pick the wrong color and fuck it all up AND NOW I CAN’T EVEN FUCKING COLOR RIGHT.

But then people told me about this Recolor app where you can photograph your drawings and color them with your finger tips until you find the color combinations you like AND IT IS AWESOME.  And I’ve been taking pictures of my drawing from You Are Here and testing different colors before actually coloring them and it makes me really happy and (yes) also incredibly anal.

So today I’m sharing a drawing I finished last night and you can download it and color it if you want.  I did my own with lots of experimenting and several filters and it was ridiculously entertaining.  These took about 10 minutes to color:

Here’s my original black and white one if you want to do one yourself:

Have fun, y’all.

PS. Someone stop me:

PPS. I have bad handwriting so here’s what my drawings say in case you can’t read them.  “EVEN THE MOST FRAGILE THINGS FIND IMMORTALITY IN MEMORY.”  “HER GIFT WAS LEAVING SPACE FOR OTHERS.”  “WHEN THINGS GET BAD, JUST REMEMBER…YOU DON’T HAVE TO TAKE THIS BULLSHIT.  YOU ARE PORTABLE.”

PPPS. Spellcheck is telling me that I definitely can’t mean that I was bit in the eye by an ant and I get that it’s weird but the suggestion they’re giving me is weirder:

How is this more realistic?  Don’t go to Spellcheck’s family reunions.

MYSTERY OF THE LOST-AND-FOUND TOMBSTONE: SOLVED!

If you’ve been reading here for the last week or so you know that I’ve been obsessed with a tombstone I found at a thrift shop and felt bad about leaving in case it was stolen and also felt bad about buying in case it was stolen.  So then I started investigating and after several ridiculous blog posts THE MYSTERY HAS BEEN SOLVED.

One of the many people I pestered was Clayton, who owns Sahra’s Find-a-Grave memorial and he went on a hunt and found a cousin who confirmed that the old stone tombstones were replaced after one was broken and that Sahra’s seems to have been salvaged and ended up in a thrift store.  So..NOT STOLEN.  Whoop!

He also had a great picture of Sahra and her husband and I think we also just solved the mystery of why Sahra’s husband doesn’t have a death date on his tombstone.  It’s because he’s still alive and is currently Kurt Russell:

Rowr.

So, that means that it’s totally acceptable for me to buy the tombstone since it wasn’t stolen.  Except that Victor says it means that I don’t need to buy the tombstone because it wasn’t stolen so it doesn’t need to be rescued.

So instead I’m just going to wait until the next time we go to that shop and if it’s still there it’s a sign that it needs to be adopted.  And if it’s not there it’s a sign that Victor called ahead and asked them to hide it.

I am the Sherlock Holmes of mysteries that aren’t actually mysteries.  The end.

FOUND: One tombstone. (Part 2)

So a week ago I found a used tombstone in a resale shop and started searching to see who it belonged to and after a lot of research I’ve solved nothing.  Well, not nothing because I now know that this is her and she looks like she’s judging me:

“My *what* is at a thrift shop?”

No response from all the people I’ve contacted through find-a-grave or ancestry or genealogy places or anything else, but I did have a break in the case when I found a funeral home that recently buried someone in the same cemetery a few years ago and so I contacted them (because there isn’t a way to contact the cemetery) and they put me in touch with the caretaker of the cemetery.  But the caretaker didn’t have email so I had to actually call him on the phone but my anxiety disorder makes it incredibly difficult to call people, to the point where if Victor tells me to call and order a pizza I’m like, “No thanks.  I’ll just starved to death instead”.  But now I had to call and ask a stranger about a different dead stranger whose gravestone I found. But I needed an answer so I took a xanax and called and the caretaker was very confused at first and there were a lot of awkward pauses  but then he was very sweet when I explained it properly.  He’s been the caretaker for over 30 years and he wasn’t aware of her tombstone being vandalized or stolen but he said he’d look into the records and see what he could find.  So, closer.  Although now I’m worried that someone will buy the tombstone while we’re waiting to hear back so I’m thinking I should buy it but Victor is glaring at me as I’m typing this because he already thinks I’m a hoarder of weird stuff even before I start bringing home used tombstones.

To be continued…

*******

And now…time for the weekly wrap-up!

 

Shit I made in my shop (Named “EIGHT POUNDS OF UNCUT COCAINE” so that your credit card bill will be more interesting.):

Shit-you-may-or-may-not-want-to-see:

This week’s wrap-up is brought to you by StoryWorth Books, which is a pretty awesome Father’s Day gift that you get to enjoy too.  From them: “Give Dad a StoryWorth Book to preserve his stories. Each week, we’ll email him a question about his life – asking him about his favorite memory of his grandparents, or whether he’s ever pulled any great pranks. All he has to do is reply with a story, which is forwarded to you and any other family members you invite. At the end of the year, his stories are bound in a beautiful keepsake book your family will cherish!”  You can check it out here.

 

I appreciate your help but you’re wrong and you look like an asshole, spellcheck.

So I was writing a professional letter and spellcheck was like, “Nope.  You spelled ‘fucking’ wrong” and I was like, “Yeah, I’m pretty fucking sure I didn’t, spellcheck” but I’m open-minded so I looked at their reasoning and spellcheck was like, “You’re using the wrong subject-verb agreement, asshole.  This is how you conjugate verbs, yo.”

“And I fuck love margaritas”?  That cannot *possibly* be right.

And spellcheck has a point except that I was using “fucking” as an adjective, not a verb and it’s weird that I even have to explain this to a computer.

Frankly, I feel like I’m back in French class except with slightly more cursing and no French.

PS. I just did spellcheck on this post and got this:

I’m getting mixed messages here, spellcheck.  Or maybe it’s learning?  Let’s go with that one.  I need to feel like I accomplished something today.

Found a tombstone. Now I have a mystery to solve.

This weekend I continued my streak of finding bizarre #bafflingthriftfinds with one of the weirdest ones even for me.  An actual, used tombstone.  I shared it online because this is what I do and because my twitter friends are incredibly entertaining:

 

It felt weird leaving a tombstone in a resale shop but it also felt weird buying a tombstone that might have been stolen.  A quick look on find-a-grave shows that Sahra has a new (if slightly boring) tombstone as of 2007 but I’m not sure if it was replaced because it was stolen or because it was broken.  So I decided to see if I could solve this weird mystery and I contacted some of her family members on Ancestry.com but so far none have responded to my “I found your great-great-great granny’s tombstone in a store if you want it” emails.  Then I emailed someone from the local tombstone historical society and they have not responded to my “Are you missing a tombstone because I think I know where it is” email, which I assume will be met with a restraining order.

This post doesn’t have an end.

Yet.

 

Things I wrote while high. (Not much different than what I wrote while sober if I’m being honest.)

This week when I was still high from the anesthesia I apparently wrote myself a series of notes on my phone.  A lot of them were literally gibberish but there were a few that made me go: “WTF?” and also, “I mean, yeah, maybe” at the same time.

This was one of them:

I think God must be an animal hoarder because he keeps making dogs that he knows he’s just gonna get back when they die and he only lets them live for like 10 years, which is not nearly long enough.  Like, how many dogs do you need, God?  Can we keep some?  And God’s like, “NO.  THESE DOGS ARE MINE.  YOU CAN BORROW THEM FOR LIKE…SEVEN TO TEN YEARS.”  And then I’d be like, “I don’t understand your end game, sir.  We need dogs to last longer” and then God would be like, “NOOOPE.  DON’T GET ATTACHED.  MY DOGS, YO.”  And this is why people become atheists.

Also, when I wrote this originally I was still high and it had even more typos than normal and the note had God yelling “THESE DONGS ARE MINE” and I was like, “Huh?” but then I figured it all out.  Probably going to hell for posting this on Sunday but in my defense, I’m not the one murdering dogs.

*******

And now…time for the weekly wrap-up!

 

Shit I made in my shop (Named “EIGHT POUNDS OF UNCUT COCAINE” so that your credit card bill will be more interesting.):

Shit-you-may-or-may-not-want-to-see:

This week’s wrap-up is brought to you by Terrifyingly Beautiful, a witty podcast about living with anxiety. Join Kevin O’Connell and David Robert, self-proclaimed anxiety experts, as they pop open a bottle of cheap wine and share hilarious stories about the stuff that keeps them up at night. (Spoiler alert: It’s everything.) Topics thus far include salad bars, creepy dolls, germy gas pumps and dead nuns under the bed. The podcast definitely falls under the wonderful categories of “freak me out” and “make me laugh.” Check it out here.