Thanksgiving is one of three days during the entire year when I can say with complete certainty that I can stay home.
Do whatever I want.
Sleep for as long I want.
Easter and Remembrance Day are the other two days.
How come such bliss is only afforded to me for three days a year?
Because.
Because nothing is open, there is no place where driving, in particular mine, is required.
There isn't anyone I have to visit, because all the visiting is done.
No meals to cook because cooking for two days straight means I am allowed the pleasure of no cooking without feeling any guilt.
I savour these days.
Covet them.
And usually spend them sleeping.
Which consequently screws up my sleeping for the next couple of days.
But because these days are so rare, I rarely remember that my sleep is screwed up until I am lying awake all night because I can't sleep because I slept too much during the day.
Which makes the day after, in this case Tuesday, as in yesterday, a major pain in the ass.
Why?
Because I was tired.
Cranky.
Not feeling the love for much of anything.
Not even back-to-back episodes of Bill the Exterminator, plus seemingly unlimited adoration from the dogs were enough to keep my butt planted on the love seat.
Grabbing my copy of Empire of Scrounge: Inside the Urban Underground of Dumpster Diving, Trash Picking and Street Scavenging, and my neon yellow highlighter, I made my way upstairs to my warm, comfortable, beckoning bed, where I planned on spending the couple of hours before sleep wisked me away to Land of Nod, reading and highlighting my book.
What actually happened, as far as I can tell because no one has confirmed any of my speculation, is that I fell asleep long before the end of the couple of hours, with book and hightlighter in hand, and glasses still on my face.
I supposed I should be thankful that I didn't wake up with highlighter all over my face.
Actually, I'm kinda surprised that didn't happen.
Goblet was on the bed.
She does not like me.
She is smart.
She could have colored my face a neon yellow that would have only been rivaled by the bright lights of Las Vegas.
I could have been my own kleig light, shooting beams of neon yellow into the night sky, perhaps even confusing a plane or two into thinking my front yard was actually a landing strip.
But she didn't.
This time.
However, I am neither stupid enough, or trusting enough, to assume that she will, in some way, reinforce my belief that she doesn't like me by doing something.
The fact that she can put me to sleep by sucking my earlobes is very disconcerting.
It means she has power over me.
Not a safe thing in a cat.
Yes, I am paranoid, but you haven't seen how she looks at me.
Paranoia is completely justified.
I often fall asleep while reading.
In fact, if I didn't read, I'd never get to sleep.
I can't turn my brain off, no matter how hard I try, so the only option is to distract it long enough for me to relax.
Hence, I read a lot.
Because it can often take a long time for me to relax enough to fall asleep.
Right now, in addition to reading Empire of Scrounge I am reading John Steinbeck's East of Eden.
And Amphibian by Carla Gunn
And Steig Larsson's The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.
And Katherine Howe's The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane.
And Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin.
And Sidewalk by Mitchell Duneier.
I'm never sure what I want to read during my pre-sleeping period, and I like to keep my options open.
So, I never read just one book at a time.And I am always looking for books to read.
In fact, if there is a book you really like, and you think I would like, please let me know.
I have pile in my small corner of the bedroom.
Occassionally books will rest in either of the bathrooms.
I always have books in my purse because you never know what will happen that will require you wait for an indeterminate amount of time.
And I detest not having something to do while I wait.
I may forget to put underwear on, but I would never forget to pack a book, or five, in my purse.
My seminar class, Ethnography and Crime, which has 4 students (you have NO idea how happy this makes me) is reading Empire of Scrounge.
It's a fascinating book by Jeff Ferrell, a cultural criminologist, based on his own experiences as an urban scrounger and about people who survive on what other people throw out. . .people who literally dig through garbage bags, Dumpsters, who pick things up from the street, woods, trails, sidewalks, etc. for the sole purpose of using them, or, giving them away to other people who can use them.
I can relate to this book.
I keep everything.
Or at least I try to keep everything.
And this book provides me with the justification I need to keep everything because you never know when you'll be able to use something.
This drives my cleaning obsessed husband crazy.
I suspect the only thing between me becoming a hoarder, and me just liking to keep everything because it has a purpose, is my husband.
Because I know, when I'm not home, or I'm not paying attention, he is throwing things out.
I think its what the people in this book find that upsets me the most. . .that people will throw out completely useful, fine, things because they don't want them anymore.
Or because a new, improved version has hit the market.
Cell phones, for example. Or computers. You buy one, and, just like cars, they depreciate as soon as you take them out of the box.
It makes me crazy.
We have in our basement a microwave.
I LOVE this microwave. The new microwaves are no where near as big as the microwave sitting in my basement.
So how come I'm not using it?
How come there is a shiny, new, stainless steel, smaller microwave gracing the counter of my kitchen?
How come my nice, large, able to hold almost anything microwave is taking up floor space in my basement?
Stephen.
How come the nice, large microwave that can hold almost anything is even in my basement at all?
Me.
Stephen and I are engaged in a battle of wills over this microwave.
I can't let it go. There is nothing wrong with it. There is no logical reason for it being in the basement, unused, and until I can figure out a way to ensure that it will be used, I refuse to let it go anywhere.
Really, there is nothing wrong with it.
Okay, well, a *couple* of times, while people were defrosting something, or warming a snack, or heating something up, a few, and I mean few, very few, almost inconsquential blue sparks may have, on the rarest of occasions, appeared.
You know, the kind of sparks you get when you accidentally put tinfoil in the microwave.
They appeared in the midst of a sort of prolonged "bzzzztzz" sound; sort of like a hive of bees has inhabited the microwave for a few short seconds.
Nonetheless, these rarely occurring incidences had repercussions that lead to the banishing of the perfectly fine microwave to the basement.
Emily was convinced that the microwave hated her. She became quiet dramatic over it really, in a way only a 16-but-really-closer-to-17-year-old-girl can get.
And Stephen that he was being irradiated.
But Stephen can *sometimes* overreact, so I'm not convinced there is a problem.
And Keith worried that he may be rendered sterile.
I'm not touching that.
I could, but I won't
*I* think they were all over-reacting, but I was outvoted.
So the microwave rests forlornly in the basement, waiting for the time when I can overthrow the dictatorial naysayers in my house and return the perfectly fine microwave to its rightful place on the kitchen counter.
Until then, it must wait with all of the other things in the basement I refuse to part with.
And if you see me digging through your trash, humour me.
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