Like a disgusting earwig that refuses to die no matter HOW many times you stomp on it....I'm still here.

I convinced my mother to let her laptop hang out on my kitchen table for a few more days. It wasn't hard to do. My Internet will be gone before long and she doesn't use her computer for all that much. And she loves me.

Of course, what I didn't tell her is that I have a tendency to sit my ass down at said kitchen table in front of this thing and try my hardest to find pictures of Dr. Smith or some other clue as to what Julian and I will be faced with come Tuesday. No, I didn't tell her that. Nor did I tell her that I also have a tendency to sit here for *way* too long and chat with people I really shouldn't be chatting with on facebook. Nope. Left that part out, too. Truth is, if it wasn't for the the damn "history" button, I would probably be filling my boots with creepy Internet porn.

Anyway, the point is, you might want to go and take a quick power nap before you start reading this. If it's going to be my last post, I at least want to make it worth my while! And yours, too! Come to think of it, since I won't be around for a while, you could probably come back over and over again to this post. Break it up a bit. Nice little portions to get you through my absence. "My goodness," you'll think, "that Janet sure does know how to babble!"

So, skip the nap.

It has been a day and a half, let me tell you. And I don't say that casually, believe me. But today was one of those days that feel like two. You know the kind...they're so crammed full that it feels impossible that only twelve hours have elapsed.

Today was one of those days that warrants a "what the fuck?!" to whoever is in charge up there.

(Now I have that spoken word Ani Difranco piece in my head...)

I don't think it's fair to divide folks into "believers" and "non believers" only because there are just so many things to "believe" in and believers tend to get lumped together with "Christian" and that's not fair. But for the sake of argument, suffice it say that I am what you might call a believer. A believer in that I don't think I could get up in the morning and do what I do all day every day if I knew it was all meaningless. Wait. That's a good question. How does a non believer get up in the morning knowing it's all meaningless?

But I digress. You should be used to that by now.

Right. So I believe in a lot of things. A mish mash of spirituality, if you will, with very little tradition or ritual and absolutely no list of rights and wrongs, no rules to abide by. A Creator? Yeah. Probably. But more like a never ending energy that lives in all of us, the good people and the bad people, and meaning in everything that happens.

So, again, today this belief warranted a big, "what the fuck was that?!"

I'm not even going to bother going into details about what the day held, per se. I'll just tell you that it involved a trip to the emergency room (yes, everyone is fine), a whole lot of snow, a whole lot of errands and some weirdness from the ghosts of relationships past.

And what got to me more than the literally back hurting work of the day and the exhaustion that took over hours ago as I bathed three children and gave one a Ventolin treatment was the way a single incident could suddenly take precendence over everything else. Suddenly, it was all about that trip to the ER (no, it wasn't one of the kids) and for the first time in literally weeks, I was not thinking of Tuesday and was not consumed by thoughts of faxes and interviews and panic and fear and was not living and breathing Kingston.

Hm.

Is it possible that I just answered my own, "what the fuck?"

I'd like to sit here and tap out the whole story because the truth is that I haven't given you the most accurate picture of Julian's journey so far and this is why it's hard for people to understand why Kingston is so incredibly important. But I'd be here all night, swear to Dog. The story, so far, is four years long and there are so many twists and turns that it renders workers who have been at their jobs for over thirty years speechless. And as I was saying in the comments section on the previous article, that is what my challenge seems to be.

I'm not good at heading into the unknown, you know?

Nor am I that good at "trusting". Trusting the Universe or God or whatever. No, I'm definitely more of a "give me that fucking steering wheel, you're doing it wrong" kinda gal.

Strength and trusting and leading and believing...

Shit.

Let's talk about something else.

I lost it this afternoon.

And by lost it, I mean I freaked out and screamed and scared all three of my children. It's not often that I actually break like that. But there was just something about today that proved to the straw that broke Mother's sanity.

Meh.

Enough about that, too. Let's talk about something fun.

Did I mention that we now have a pet cat? So much for practical and responsible, eh?

It was a carefully weighed decision. Troy ended up giving the cat to the kids for Christmas. He took them to his grandmother's house and let them pick and take home one of her outdoor, farm cats. His name is Foster. Now you might be thinking, "That's a stupid fucking name for a cat" and you'd be right in that thinking.

What adds insult to injury is that I picked that lousy name. Yep. Shocking but true.

It was an accident, really. The cat's original name was Buzz after Toy Story's Buzz Lightyear. Only this cat is not very Buzz like. It's either really lazy or inbred. I'm leaning toward inbred but that's neither here nor there. The name Buzz just didn't fit this cat who wasn't even interested in the back yard, let alone infinity and beyond.

I started calling it Foster Cat because it reminded me of a foster child who had been bounced around the system for a while and had been in some less than stellar homes who finally finds themself in a warm and caring environment with regular meals and people who actually like them. The cat pretty much just sat sit on chairs almost as if to say, "Please don't notice me and send me away! If I just sit very quietly, maybe they won't notice. Don't rock the boat. There's food and heat and no competition."

So Buzz became Foster Cat and that turned into Foster and now I have a pet.

I also have a weasel.

Yes, you read that right. A weasel. He lives in the garage.

Julian spotted it the other day when I was putting him in the car. He thought the weasel was a mouse. That, of course, scared the shit out of me. But when I saw what he was screaming at (he's not that good at pointing), I realized that this was no mouse. Far too long and it's face wasn't rat-like. It's face was actually pretty cute.

So, I called my Dad to confirm my weasel suspicions and Dad assured me that the weasel was my friend, that he was eating mice in the garage (and this saved Foster's ass since my condition on getting that cat was that it would spend a lot of time outside HUNTING and so far, Foster hasn't hunted anything besides my raggedy shoes. Inbred. My money is on inbred) and it wouldn't bother me if I didn't bother it.

I love that weasel.

I loved that weasel even before my friend Melodie sent me this:

Weasel Symbolism
The silent and graceful weasel imparts the ability go unseen and unheard into places to be able to observe what is happening, then discern what’s important. Native Americans believed their scouts had Weasel Medicine and sought blessings from her when they went into battle.

Weasel symbolizes quick movement, justice achieved, retribution, stealth, warrior energy, fierceness, curiosity, discernment, tenacity and cunning. She helps people to gain deeper intuition and is a guide to the Underworld. One of her lessons is that small size isn’t a barrier to achievement. She gives people the ability to use one’s intuition to see the intent behind words and acts and not to underestimate others.

Read more at Suite101: Weasel - Pagan Symbolism: Furred Kin: Symbol of Stealth, Fierceness, Tenacity https://www.suite101.com/content/weasel-pagan-symbolism-a60113#ixzz1B2hTK000

Um, goosebumpies, anyone?

Between the warrior Runes and the mysterious dry erase board arrow and the weasel in my garage (for the record, I have lived here almost eight years now and Buzz is the first weasel I've laid eyes on), methinks that big guy is trying to tell me something.

On a completely unrelated note...well, not completely unrelated, I supposed...shit, I'm digressing again...

You know who I feel badly for?

Jenny McCarthy, that's who.

Not that the whole vaccinations causes Autism thing has been more or less blown out of the water, she's sort of fucked. And scrambling. From what I read, anyway. And I feel badly for her.

I never really enjoyed her and never agreed with her (and now I'm mentally trying to figure out if anyone who reads this blog has ever sent me one of her books...I have four or five in total...hmm...nope, think I'm safe). In fact, she pretty much drove me fucking batty and every time I saw her on TV, I would say a little "please God, please God, let Autism awareness find a new poster girl" but I never judged her, either. I mean, to each their own or whatever.

And so while I definitely didn't like her, I also wasn't doing a happy dance to see her defeated on television and on the Internet, either. I feel badly for her. It's easier to fool yourself into believing you've accepted something or someone when you're busy blaming someone else for it. Staying angry and feeling cheated is easier, sometimes, than truly accepting your child's difference and beginning to work with it. Because acceptance means acknowledging that it is forever. Things can get better. Much, much better. But it's still forever. There is no cure.

And there's nobody to blame.

And that's really, really tough.

With much of her "science" now being debunked, I can't help but wonder what will be next for her. If the key to a cure doesn't exist and the search was, in fact, futile, then all I can see is an acceptance of what maybe she doesn't want to believe.

It's not my place and yet, it is my blog.

And I haven't gone into opinions on the subject and have just stuck to my own experiences but tonight...well, what the hell, right?

So...

Does America have a version of the show "One Girl, Five Gays" on MTV? It's playing right now on MTV Canada and it's really, really funny. Definitely worth checking out if you're so inclined.

Hm. What else can I yak about before my time is up?

Fine. You twisted my arm.

Two more sleeps.

Eek.