was there a big game or something?

this weekend flew by entirely too fast. saturday morning, the allens three plus fury hiked the pinnacle gulch trail in bodega which was an easy mile trek down to the beach. we got to explore the tide pools on a relatively deserted section of the coast, poke at anemones, and even scored some beach glass! fury found herself a waterlogged piece of driftwood that she was none too happy to leave behind. look at her! that sucker was heavy too!

she's the best! definitely a success!

also to be filed under success: a virtual hangout with my some of my dearest friends, terrance and tracy. a certain mayonegg was supposed to be in on the chat but she napped her way through it which was both impressive and irritating because bruh, we only been planning it for weeks. and when i say we, i mean terrance cause he did all the leg work and good thing he did because it's a pandemic and i ain't trying to be social, even if it's good for me. it was actually quite a lovely reunion of people i've lived with at some point over the last 17 years. and if you had told me 17 years ago that half of us would have kids or own homes or resemble something like adults, i woulda told you to shut up and pour another shot. but yet, here we are, exhausted and requesting more coffee please. terrance has a six year old daughter as well and it was comforting to know that the slovenly approach to household chores and teenage-level surliness are normal for that age. unpleasant, but normal. home life, with offspring or no, is grueling and we all took a moment to daydream about living alone. some of us lingered there longer than others. some of us may still be dreaming about it. the quiet. the cleanliness. the autonomy. the calm. *car screeches as i drive off*

just kidding. i wouldn't do that, even if the impluse is there sometimes. kids are cataclysmic but definitely worth it. watching abby's brain work is such an exquisite treat. the way she can piece some concepts together (santa's not real) while completely failing to grasp others (monsters are real) is just fascinating. witnessing her emotional lability is at once heart-wrenching and triggering. it has forced me to grow in ways i wasn't prepared for but i am trying. loving her is a fearful thing and i feel much too exposed most of the time; get back in my chest where you belong, child! but in typical fashion, she continues to disobey me. also, she's left her toys out again and nothing will sap adulation and goodwill faster than stepping barefoot on a lego. gat dammit, child! go to bed! sigh. she lucky she cute.

with that i leave you your found item of the day:

12 for growth

january 21st was national hug day. if you missed it, i suggest dropping what you are doing and go make up for lost time (in a COVID safe way, that is). a family therapist once said, we need 4 hugs a day for survival, 8 for maintenance and 12 for growth. i am not near the correct threshold but consider myself lucky regarding the caliber of huggers i've encountered in my lifetime. next to my mom and my child who are both naturally gifted in this area, i list (in no particular order) my beloved geener, my beloved lizzie, my beloved uncle megan, my beloved trashley, my beloved kellie, my beloved tracy, my beloved annie, my beloved brigit, my beloved josh, my beloved kenny, the list goes on and on, really. thinking about this got me thinking about just the quality of friendships i have had from all different walks of life, enthusiastic hugger or avoidant hugger alike and just damn, i was born under a lucky star.

then all this loving positivity got me thinking about my own friendship with myself and well, insert record scratch here. yeaaaaahhhhh...gonna need some work there. never mind, let me just download a bunch of memes instead. alright fine. i'll work on myself. it is the year of the great selenie after all. truthfully, i've been in therapy for a long time because mama is an anxious, tightly wound, flighty little bird. but this week, we're kicking it up a notch by starting EMDR. EMDR stands for eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing and is useful in managing PTSD. really it's just a fancy way of saying, i'm retraining my brain and body to respond to stress in a healthy way, instead of crying excessively in the shower which is apparently frowned upon and also getting expensive. as part of my preparation for this next step, i was tasked to come up with 4 resource team members to recall when the emotions become too much: a peaceful place, a wisdom figure, a protective figure, and a nurturing figure. and while my dog fury checks all the boxes for the last three resources, i think i will just imagine myself hugging my friends and that should get me through it.

you know what else will get me through it? music. oh man, i love music so much. i know spotify has its issues but i'm going to be a good little capitalist right now and ignore those issues to say how much i appreciate and am mystified by their predictive algorithms. they predicted i would enjoy a random japanese jazz band named jizue. and holy smokes, i do. then, after listening to jizue obsessively for the past two days, another japanese band was suggested and now i've been listening to them pretty much non-stop since midnight last night. they have an unfortunate name, toe. that's it. just, toe. but one of their album titles is fire: the book about my idle plot on a vague anxiety. incredible, right? my kind of people. it just makes me wish i could read japanese to know the other titles. but their drummer, kashikura takashi, might be inching his way into my top 10, maybe even top 5. and i am more motivated than ever to practice my drumming - on muted practice pads, of course. we have a small house, there's not room to set up my actual kit. but someday we will miraculously make space and then, hoo boy. watch me (please don't, i have incredible stage fright. avert your eyes, I SAID AVERT!)

with that i leave you a song,





and your found item of the day:

well, i feel attacked.

nothing, and no.

that was the answer one of my most favorite teachers ever gave in response to "what have you learned in 2020 and count your blessings". nothing and no. it is a response i am embracing fully because 2020 was hot garbage and i'm still feeling salty about it in this, the year of our lord, 2021. if i had an angel on my shoulder, it would be emperor palpatine encouraging me to let the hate flow through. don't mind if i do.

i missed festivus this year, but i'm not going to let that stop me from airing some grievances. the first is a doozy. i miscarried at 9 weeks in march of 2020. it was right at the start of covid so i was alone in the doctor's office, facetiming nick while three separate practitioners tried and failed to find a heartbeat. it was heartbreaking and humiliating. i bore that shame alone while my coworker nurtured and brought to term a healthy boy, her sixth child. i do not begrudge her happiness but the universe's cruelty was not lost on me. strike one, 2020.

strike two - covid itself. the ultimate thief of joy. teddy roosevelt claimed it was comparison, not so. roosevelt never met covid. i don't have to lay out the ways it affected us - your life has no doubt been equally impacted. pero like, what the everliving fuck, universe? is this because i went to that nickleback concert like 20 years ago? because i was a different person then and it doesn't seem fair to hold a grudge like that. just saying.

strike three, the seahawks. christ almighty, just a thundering cloud of mediocrity. i know, i know. a 12-4 season, divisional champs, what more could i ask for. greatness that's what. another super bowl championship thats what. an mvp caliber qb who straight up collapsed 6 games into the season. couldn't move the ball downfield if his life depended on it. i could dink and dunk better than him and i only partially know what that phrase means. it was probably the most frustrating season i've experienced as a fan because this team was STACKED. *it coulda been a contenda* le sigh. when's seattle's hockey team starting up? i can fall in love with them and they can disappoint me in a different way than the hawks or mariners. it'll be great.

i have other grievances, primarily political, but i don't want to delve too deep into my venomous disgust with the trump administration because that is a cavernous trench from which we may never resurface. so in keeping with a belated festivus, we'll move on to feats of strength. which shant take long because i have become incredibly deconditioned since like, june. but i intend to funnel all this rage into getting fit this year because though i'll probably regret claiming this later on, i declare 2021 the year of selena. yeah. i said it. a year of my life robbed of a whole heckin' lot and i'm not fallin for that shit again. i am reclaiming my time a la maxine waters and y'all better watch out.

with that i leave you your found item of the day:

s'good advice.

where to even start?

hello reader, welcome back. may i offer you a cup of tea? a scone? biscotti? no? you are too shaken up realizing this blog still exists? me too, dear reader. me too. i feel very much like frankenstein (fronkensteeeeeen), resurrecting this monster from the dead. at some point we'll have to contend with the literary horrors this blog will undoubtedly unleash, but that's like at least 10 minutes from now, so i think we can spare some time. which is good because hoo boy, i got a lot to cover.

since the last oh, seven years or so since i last wrote, there's been a few small changes in my life. got married to nick, birthed a child, changed jobs, discovered i don't hate capers as much as i thought, survived a pandemic, survived a fascist coup attempt, got a puppy, you know, just little life blips, really. okay, fine. i am a transformed little butterfly now. though with the quarantine nineteen, i more likely resemble heimlich. who IS indeed a beautiful butterfly and the happiest bug, so it's fitting.

see? happy.

nick and i got married in june 2014 and five months, 33 hours of labor and an emergency c-section later we got to meet our sweet girl, abigail. her difficult entrance into the world was thankfully not a harbinger of her personality as she truly is so loving and thoughtful. parenting has been a wild ride and has challenged nick and i in ways i won't get into now, but it has been a wondrous thing to be someone's mama, especially her mama. she's six and so bright and curious and fun and i feel so lucky to be there to see her grow and learn. i just hope i do a good enough job getting her through life and that she doesn't talk about me excessively in therapy as an adult.

speaking of being an adult: i now work at a native clinic as a medical assistant/scribe, and it's pretty great. i have been there for 5 years which is the longest i've ever been at any job. i attribute this to well, liking going to work. it doesn't feel like work and i love the friends i have made there. that said, my most favorite friend/arch nemesis will be leaving me forever in a week's time and you'll forgive me if i'm inconsolable for 15-20 minutes or so. i may or may not take a vow of silence too. i haven't decided yet. on one hand, i don't think my heart can open up like that again. on the other, i can't keep my yap shut for very long. so we shall see which instinct wins out.

last but not least, since i've kept you far too long, here, please gaze upon my pup:

isn't she the cutest? her name is furiosa, fury for short. we think she's a catahoula mix even though we were told shepard by the animal rescue. in any case we are smitten, even if the cats are less than thrilled to share their home (yes, we still have toby and pippin!). she is 7 months, incredibly spoiled, and gets way too many treats for her own good, as do the cats. but the animals are worth it because, good lord, this year was hard to be human and there's nothing quite like cute animal cuddles to take the stress away. i hope you all find some way to tamper that cortisol - if you need a pupper to hug, i'm happy to share. you have after all, made it this far through my incoherent ramblings. in keeping with my tradition of overpromising, i will aim to write at least one blog post a week and barring that, once a month, and if not that, then quarterly or on the summer solstice. make that winter.

with that, here's your found item of the day:

let's go seahawks! clap! clap! clap, clap, clap!!!

well you certainly took forever to get here, friday. no, no, by all means, take your time. it's not like i have a dream weekend coming up with a once (or possibly twice) in a lifetime chance to see my favorite sports franchise win a national championship or anything. no, no let's do what YOU want to do, FRIDAY.

well, since you're here, i might as well enjoy it. and enjoy it i shall. i didn't have appointments today, so that means i am spending all day finishing paperwork while watching spongebob in one of my seventy seahawks shirts and my tattered sleep pants that would be better suited on a pirate. i'm not kidding. one pant leg is torn up to the knee. how it happened, i'm not sure. but je suis une pirate. or not. i don't know. i'm only on level two of french on duolingo. which is ah-mah-zing, guys. if you haven't downloaded this app, i suggest you do so at once. then we can follow each other and i can feel inadequate when you lap my ass in learning. good times.

you know what else is good times? going to seattle to watch the seahawks play in super bowl xlviii for the weekend! i told you! i done told you this was our year! woo-hoo bitches! and yes, i know the game is not actually in seattle. but the bulk of diehard fans are going to be and it's going to be nuts and i'm going to see my friends and drink beer and watch my team crush the hopes and dreams of my sister's team! it's going to be glorious! and even if they lose (which they won't) it'll still be a welcome respite from work which has been INSANE lately and from santa rosa which has been too dry for my taste.

this weekend will also serve as a last hurrah for my diet which has been delightfully, deliciously, atrocious. i don't know if you've seen me lately, but it's gotten pretty bad. i am giving jabba the hut a run for his (her? its?) money. it is increasingly clear that i'm addicted to sugar, you guys. and admitting it is the first step. step two is going cold turkey. well, that's my step two anyway. when i return from seattle, i'll have a detox week with no sugars or dairy or wheat of any kind. and then over the next 60 days i'll slowly integrate healthy carbs back into the mix. with any luck, i'll be on my way to a lighter, healthier, less ear infection-y me. so here's to new year's resolutions! and to starting them a month late! i'll keep you posted here, if ye be interested in updates. and if you have a moment, say a prayer or some secular blessing for my beloved nick, who may or may not bear the brunt of my sugar withdrawals. here's hoping we both make it through.

with that, i leave you your found item of the day:



for the record, nick does not shave his legs. and this caitlyn chick is a total B.

you're still here?

it's been well over a year since i last wrote. which kinda blows my mind considering how much has changed in that flash of a year. clearly i will never get my shit together enough to write that novel i've been talking about for quite some time now. oh well, ya win some, ya lose some. anyway, for those who aren't paid to stalk me, here is a recap:

-i fell in love. i know, i know, gross. but you try being around the kindest, smartest, handsomest, smiley-est, quirkiest (read: nerdiest) person you know and see if you don't fall victim to his or her charms. nicholas had me at "let's have a lord of the rings marathon". i'm only human, you know.

-as a result of said love, i left my other love, seattle. it was a difficult decision but long distance relationships suck even more than the niners. and so, we packed up my belongings in a comically oversized truck that i then forced nick to drive the entire way back to rosa. where we now reside. quite happily, i might add. sure, there's more laundry and less space than i originally bargained for but waking up next to the love of my life more than makes up for it. (aw....barf.)

-we became parents. kitten parents that is. as a result, i have become THAT person, who treats their pets like they would their own offspring. toby and pippin have got to be the most spoiled kittens ever. nick really should ban me from pet stores because i clearly have no self control - each trip i leave with like 60 bucks worth of toys or cat shelfs or cat costumes or supplements or whatever new fangled best thing for kittens there is! to top it off we got a meat grinder to make homemade cat food (though i daresay nick is more stoked to pick up yet another hobby in charcuterie). like i said, spoiled ass kittens. but they give pretty damn good cuddles, so i guess it's worth it.

-my mom gave breast cancer an ass whopping. not to say it didn't give her a couple of good knocks - chemotherapy is a bitch and a half and there were a couple of close calls but as my sister and i learned early on, one does not simply trifle with lucy wimmer; cancer is no exception. thankfully, she is thriving and now that i live closer to her, it's nice to be able to visit more often (and for fun and not health reasons).

-i got a job working for the cancer prevention institute of california. it's similar to what i was doing at the hutch - collecting samples for research - but this time i work from home. it's weird and kind of lonely not going into an office everyday. but if i feel like staying in my jammies while leaving sports center on in the background all day, i can. i could even have a beer if i wanted to. i don't want to of course. but i could. if i did. which i don't. want. to. (slams a beer.)

-and finally, the seattle seahawks won the super bowl. ok, well it hasn't happened yet. but this is our year. i thought it might have been last year but apparently the universe got the birds mixed up, mistook the ravens for hawks. that's ok, we've had a chat and everyone can relax, the universe knows what's up now. see you in new york in february! (yes, once a seahawk always a seahawk, even though i now live in enemy territory.)

there's a bit more to tell, but if you've made it thus far, well, you actually need to find something better to do. seriously, it's a nice day out; don't let me waste it.

with that i leave you your found item of the day:



i give it two months.

who AM i?

i'm acting like a teenager again. even though i just turned thirty-two. i wouldn't say it's necessarily a mid life crisis. on the contrary, these past few months i've been just about the happiest i've ever been. but i have been acting like a love-sick fool prone to excessive sighing, declarations of a certain boy's dreaminess, and the repetitious blaring of mopey music. absolutely ridiculous. i should be ashamed of myself, i know. but the great selenie is twitterpated and there is simply nothing that can be done, so i suggest we all just move along. go back inside your homes; nothing to see here, people.

in other news, i have become a reading fiend. i mean, i have always had a voracious appetite for books but Nick, the same sweet boy responsible for turning me into that pathetic, sappy mess mentioned above, also made the crucial mistake of buying me a nook for my birthday and now it's so much worse. in truth, my heart had longed for such a device, but i feared buying one for turning into some novel-obsessed beast. and now look at me. i crave it. i need it. i bring it with me wherever i go, reading whatever i damn well please. and because no one can tell what i'm reading, i've picked up the notebook because curiosity got the better of me. the notebook for crying out loud!!!! I'M A MONSTER!!! (cue buster bluth slashing down the "welcome home buster" banner)

ahem.

move along, people. move along.

in my defense, i'm just finishing up book three of the dragon tattoo series, and that's some heavy stuff, man. a little light-hearted mush fest is a welcome reprieve from all the stabby stabby with the axe-y axe-y that goes on with those crazy swedes. but it is a good series once you get into it. which i am. and which i am now going to return to. have yourself a lovely weekend.

here's your found item of the day: