Indigo Incarnates

Yay! Doug and I are headed to New York today to see a musical on Broadway today. We're seeing "A Little Nght Music". It's got Angela Lansbury in the play. 

Doug scrounged some really cheap bus tickets to get up there. For $26/each, we got round-trip tickets on a doble-decker bus. It's also got power outlets, which means I can bring my notebook computer  next time. 

It's mostly sunny today. It's been a long, hard winter and i have missed the sun. 

Thanks to the five feet of snow we had last week, I think I have fallen on the sidewalk at least a dozen times. My hip really hurts today. Hopefully it will stop hurting if I can go a few days without falling on my rear end. 

So... The people on this bus are pretty annoying. One person is listening to rap music so loudly on her headphones that I'm surprised it hasn't split her skull open. I can actually hear the lyrics three seats away. Another couple are talking so loudly that you'd think they were the only ones here. ::sigh:: It's going to be a long ride. 

We were running late this morning so I used the Insight's "sports car" mode instead of "ecological" mode. If you don't mind getting crummy gas mileage, the "sports car" mode lives up to the description. It accelerated to 85 MPH very quickly and the throttle/braking response was a lot tighter. The ecology gauge switched from green to an angry shade of electric blue. It was like driving a completely different car! When we got near the bus stop, I put the car back into "ecology" mode and the power levels seemed to drop by more than half and the ecology gauge went back to green. It's really neat. 

I'll upload some New York photos soon :)

Indigo Incarnates

The ritual service at Turning Circle was pretty nice last night. Pheonix led the ritual and she put a lot of work into it. We didn't have as many members as we usually do since the secondary roads are still partially buried, thanks to two snow storms back to back. 

The person I call "fake friend" was in attendance. This person still isn't talking to me (my offense, two weeks ago, was making a disparaging remark about Obama). Well, life has it's irritations. So be it. I don't give "fake friend" so much power over me that I can't have an enjoyable worship service. 

I'm excited that Doug is leading a service in April. I'm also glad that he's found spiritual fulfullment in Wicca. He had previously tried Buddhism and Christianity and found those religions to not be spiritually fulfilling for him. I'm glad Wicca works for him. 

Indigo Incarnates

Lemme tell ya… this has got to be one of the most boring weeks that I have ever encountered. The courthouse has been closed the entire week, so I was unable to actually do any actual work. I am bored out of my skull.

I’m trying really hard to not get on Doug’s nerves. He has the patience of a saint. It’s hard to spend quality time with someone with a dissociative disorder on a good day. He has actually somehow put up with me 24/7 for six days straight. I am really lucky to have Doug.

Of course, one of the side effects of being totally snowed in is that I got a whole lot of exercise this week. For me to go anywhere, I’ve had to walk. This is good, since without the 4 miles per day I’ve been getting, I’d have gone stark, raving mad. I also shoveled a whole lot of snow. A huge amount of snow. Egads.

I hope the roads clear soon so things will go back to normal. I’m feeling kinda cranky. I find a lot of comfort in a daily routine, and this blizzard has totally derailed my routine for a week.

Indigo Incarnates

So… it snowed about 3’ in Baltimore. Some of the snow drifts are 6’ high. I can’t find the Accord. Seriously! The street in which I parked is mostly buried in a 4’ drift and all the cars on the street look like amorphous white dunes. I literally cannot tell which car is mine. Fortunately, Doug parked his Scion behind the house. Now, a Scion is a “B” size car, meaning that it belongs to the smallest category of vehicle that isn’t a Smart Car (which is an “A” size car). “B” cars aren’t known for being good off-road vehicles, har har. So that means that I’ve had to shovel a trench behind the car that extends down an alleyway so that we can drive to work tomorrow – a 100’ alleyway! The snow behind the house was waist-high. I feel like I have had sufficient exercise today.

For better or worse, I was only able to shovel the first 70’ of alley. The last 30’ isn’t snow, but rather slush. It was pretty heavy and my feet were on the verge of frostbite. Fortunately, the slushy part is only 6” high instead of 40” high, so even a tiny car like the Scion has enough ground clearance to roll over it tomorrow. It might be less than 6” by the end of the day, since we have full sunlight today.

Of course, the direct sunlight helped us out today too. A regular human would not have been able to shovel a 7’x70’ trench through 4’ snow continuously. But, being a changeling, I have superhuman endurance so long as Thistle and I have access to sunlight. We did today, so the high endurance was possible. It’s also how I’m able to do those 40-mile bike rides in the summer.

Hopefully the city authority will get a move on the plowing. A few of the main streets have been cleared, but most of the side streets have not. I wouldn’t mind getting my Accord back someday, har har.

Oh, speaking of the Accord… I went to the Kelley Blue Book website and got a ballpark estimate of the trade-in value of the Accord. It’s been in six accidents, has serious cosmetic damage, moderate mechanical problems (it needs bout $2,500 worth of repairs than I cannot afford), and 105,000 miles. The response from KBB was “Your car has no trade-in value”. Ha ha ha ha! That also tells me that I’m not going to sink $2,500 into the car either. Thanks to the utterly depressed economy, the Honda website has a whole lot of recently repossessed cars with under 30,000 miles for less than $15,000. Whenever the Accord dies, I will probably get one of those.

halo incarnates

having racing thoughts. don’t like it. hard for mind to be quiet. don’t want to be crushed. don’t want bad things to happen. not cutting. feel like we have to. but am not. am not. am not. hate feeling like we have to cut. hate feeling like it’s needed. hate how our skin feels numb. sometimes we can feel. sometimes skin is numb. better to feel. hate how body doesn’t work right. am supposed to cut. can tell. skin is numb so it wouldn’t hurt. but not cutting. am being good. am not evil. not evil. not evil. am being good. hate having racing thoughts. hate feeling like we will be trapped. hate feeling like we will be hurt. not a coward. am not a coward. not a coward. was called a coward by evil hateful bad father. am not that. not what he said we were. not stupid. not a coward. not stupid. hate racing thoughts. mind will not be quiet. am not cutting. need to cut we will resist. have resisted. will resist. am stronger now. not like before.

Indigo Incarnates

One of the things that is a real drag is when I discover that someone I think is a friend is really someone who only likes being liked by others. There’s a HUGE difference between the two. I got “defriended” by this friend over an incredibly trivial political disagreement (this person didn’t like the fact that I think Obama is a bad president). So I am “defriended”. Now, this is not the first time this person has done this to me. On two prior occasions, this “friend” drove a wedge at me for trivial reasons (so trivial, in fact, that I can’t remember what the incidents were about).

And yet, this person says crap like “But I don’t want you to feel offended”, and “I don’t want you to take it personally”. Yeah, how am I not supposed to take it personally?

Anyway, I forgave this person on two prior occasions, but there shall not be a third. This is a person for whom I occasionally must deal with (about twice each month). I can be courteous to this person, since I am actually a mature adult. But I am aware of the difference between “real friend” and “fake friend”.

Selfish, Histrionic Flake!

Indigo Incarnates

I found out from my brother last night that my selfish, histrionic flake of a sister decided to move back to Tennessee without any forewarning or prior notice. She *had* been helping to take care of mom (who has a terminal illness). Jenny *had* been living less than five miles away. Andy l(my brother) lives 40 miles away, and I live 210 miles away. So it had been REALLY helpful that Jenny could so easily look in on mom to make sure she was eating and taking her meds.

Well, Jenny has about as much depth as a piece of paper. Since it’s actually stressful to help care for someone who is terminal, Jenny decided to take the easy way out and just abandon mom in a time of need. Apparently, according to Andy, Jenny’s plan is to try to make amends with her husband in Tennessee. Good luck. Jenny came to Pennsylvania in the first place because she was conducting an adulterous affair with a man nearly 20 years younger than her husband. She’s a slut who has sex with any man in town who *isn’t* her husband, and she has shamed him every chance she ever got. So, with that said, I predict her reception in Tennessee will be a tad chilly.

I won’t call her a “whore”, however. See, whores get paid for what they do; Jenny is promiscuous for free.

Of, she stole some of her boyfriend’s money to make the trip to Tennessee and then ditched her cell phone. Typical.

When Mom dies, there will be no way of notifying my sister. This is really going to suck.

Indigo Incarnates

Imbolc Stuff: First, I wanted to say that the Imbolc service at Turning Circle was very enjoyable. Since it's the Friday closest to Imbolc, the service honored Bridget, the Celtic goddess of blacksmithing, fire, poetry, and healing.


As usual, we had difficulties with the cigarette lighters. I was smart this time, however, since I brought my own. It was a gift from Doug. It runs on propane instead of regular lighter fluid, so it sounds like an itty-bitty welding torch, hee hee. :)

I'm leading a rites in February and March. They are going to be a full moon ritual, but I'm writing it in such a way that it could be used for Imbolc (February) or as a general winter ritual and Ostara (March) or as a general spring ritual.

Moving on to the "soul freezing" part: Yes, it is nine degrees outside. We live in Baltimore, so we’re just not supposed to get single-digit temperatures – even in winter. Tomorrow is Imbolc, so winter is supposed to be halfway over, but you’d never know it. The furnace is running 24/7 but the house is still cold. I really need some favorable weather.

On the bright side, Turning Circle rarely holds outdoor rituals.

I’m almost finished writing the ritual for February. It’s a luck ritual, and I can’t think of anyone who couldn’t use a bit of luck these days. Certainly the economy isn’t doing anyone any favors, that’s for sure.

Rant #1: The iPad. So, I was cracking up as Steve Jobs & Co. were extolling the virtues of the ever-blessed iPad computer. Lemme tell ya: “iPad” sounds like a feminine hygiene product for starters. The device costs between $500-$800 but has some *serious* limitations. For instance, although it has a touch screen, it cannot do handwriting recognition or signature capture (so the shipping companies won’t be using it). It’s lacking an IR sensor or any kind of optical device (so it’s useless for scanning/managing inventory). It doesn’t run Windows or Mac OS/X, so you can forget about word processing, spreadsheet, etc. Thus, Corporate America is going to take a pass on this gadget. For personal use, it’s also crippled. With it3lacking a USB port, you won’t be able to watch movies via portable DVD drive. The proprietary operating system also cannot support Flash content, so you won’t be able to watch Netflix or other types of animated, multimedia entertainment. It doesn’t have a SD card slot, so the only way to transfer files from one iPad to another device is to email the file. And that, of course, brings me to Apple’s unholy marriage to AT&T. With an iPad, your ONLY choice in 3G internet is AT&T. While they are not the worst service provider, they fall way behind Verizon for coverage. An iPad on the AT&T network will be operating at EDGE speed, not 3G speed, much more often than AT&T would like to admit. (The latter is four times faster than the former). Oh, and the iPad cannot multitask. So you have to close the current application before opening a new application. Uh… computers have had multitasking capabilities since 1988. That was 22 years ago, Stevie! Finally, for laying out $500, you get a whopping 32 GB storage space. Whoooopie! Even a bare-bones Netbook has 160 Gb of storage, two USB ports, multitasking capabilities, and a card slot – usually for $349.

Rant #2: Obama: Oh… so I noticed that Obama has been in office for a whole year and NOTHING has improved. I guess we should have seen that, since Obama is a lazy, lying Chicago politician. Other than formulating a bad healthcare bill and buying his daughter a dog, he broke EVERY promise he made in 2008. The *real* unemployment rate (the U-6 figure, not just people collecting unemployment) is now 17% – basically it doubled since Obama took office. He spent $1.2 trillion in one year that was nothing but fat, padded pork for the megacorporations. He stabbed the GLBT community squarely between the shoulder blades when he backed DOMA and DATA, as well as removing from his website any reference that he had ever supported gay rights. He also then compared homosexuality to incest. He won’t close Gitmo. He won’t end the war. He won’t revoke the Patriot Act. He won’t end earmarks and lobbying. And if the closed-door meetings concerning the healthcare bill are any indicator, he certainly isn’t interested in “transparency in government”. Yeah, I guess by 2012, we’ll probably get stuck with a super-majority of hard-core rightwing Republican bigots in the House and Senate thanks to Obama’s gross incompetence. I wish he’d do the honorable thing and resign.

Indigo incarnates

I'm pretty excited about leading three worship services this year at Turning Circle. I'm leading an esbit service (a Full Moon rite) at the end of February. I'm doing a Spring Rite in March, and I'm officiating over Samhain in October. I've written two of the three rituals so far and I'm working on the third. 

One of Doug's friends is planning on offering training for 2nd and 3rd degree initiates. Obama looking forward to that since I am a 1st degree initiate right now. 

The great thing about Wicca is that it's a participatory religion. Unlike many religions where the congregation just sits in a pew, Witches of all degrees of initiation get to participate in the construction and leading of worship. 

I've been taking some online Wiccan studies too. The interesting thing about the faith is that it's a really new religion and a very old religion at the same time. Wicca came out of the "broom closet" in the 1950s when the practice of witchcraft ceased being illegal. But the roots of Wicca predate Christianity. Some of the Christian holidays are really just repackaged pagan holidays. Even the birth of Christ was moved from April to December so match Yule, which celebrates the birth of the sun god. 

So, hopefully it will take less than a decade to become a 3rd degree initate. 

Indigo Incarnates

I am happy to say that, after four months of scrounging, I finally saved up enough money to buy a new computer. Yay! It's a cute little 13" Toshiba. So it's bigger than a netbook but smaller than a regular laptop. It's also got an "ecology" mode that makes the computer draw as little as ten watts. Very awesome!

I haven't been visiting many blogs lately since my iPhone has been my primary access to the Internet. It's a nice phone, but it's sorta hard to make posts because my eyes get tired looking at such a tiny screen. I will be better at visiting the blogs -- especially Phos, Carol, and Java. 

I joined the handbell choir located at the Unitrian fellowship in Columbia, Maryland. My Wicca fellowship is associated with the Unitarians. They are pretty nice folk. We play handbells at the 9:00am service this morning. It should be pretty cool. It looks like a Unitarian worship service is pretty positive and life affirming, and is also sort of "generic deity" as opposed to being explicitly Christian. That outlook works for our system since I'm Wiccan and Thistle is Christian. This format seems like a workable compromise. 

There's a brass quintet playing this morning too. That should be really cool!

I talked to mom. Her health is getting pretty bad, pretty quickly. I will visit her next weekend since I don't think she has a lot of time left. I worry about what will happen when she dies. I have about $2,000 that I could easily access, but that's about it. My sister is a spendthrift who never has two nickels to rub together. My uncle is a millionaire but already indicated that he won't part with a penny. I don't know how I will be able to afford her funeral. She also won't talk about these things, so I have no idea whether she would prefer a Christian or Wiccan funeral service -- she's been more Pagan in recent years but never became an actual initiate. I do know that I will do everything in my power to exclude Uncle Jimmy from the funeral.

It sucks being the one furthest away. My sister just completely flips out when the subject of mom's looming death gets brought up. My brother never answea his phone, so I haven't talked to him very much at all. He's 25 but his emotional outlook is closer to 15. It's going to be really bad when mom dies.