Lesbian vampire girls in corsets suck face, blood, hickeys and drinks

Ahh yes, it was uplifted breasts and desire. Like I said I can do an hour a week or so, and this week, it is corsets and getting dressed up, going out on the town and spreading my wings, literally. Of course, with a recent medical report of anemia I needed to get a transfusion. Who says that it has to be painful? First I put Linda in a thrall of desire. Then I went for the blood and the velvet covered boobies. Linda is doing her, “Nice but I hope you finish this before the drinks get here..” not quite going with the whole moment...yet.

You can see an elderly couple behind us. One can only wonder what they were thinking, luckily I overheard what they were saying (remember I had a fever, and not just blood fever, so I may be a wee off).

Guy: “What IS that girl doing to the other in public?”

Woman: “Oh don’t notice them, those are just a couple of lesbian vampires. Or is it one vampire and her lesbian lover, I can never get that straight.”

Guy: “(Huff) Well, I never, I thought this was a respectable establishment.”

Women: “Oh Bill, get with the Millenium, I mean you didn’t mind the apartment Edith and I kept on the side.”

Guy raising his chin and getting stiff: “Well that was different, I mean it was the war and all…..Oh my twisted druthers, what are they doing now.”

Woman: “Stop staring Bill, is it just a little blood sucking, I don’t see how that is much different than the transfusions I get on Wednesday. They are obviously having a nice night out, just get back to your appetizer and let them have some fun before returning to the coffin."

Earlier I had gotten dressed up including using MAKE UP (Yes, I went lipstick lesbian, want to make an issue of it? On the bed? The floor? How about the in the whirlpool?), giving me the hopefully ‘cherry cordial chocolate kiss’ (nice on the outside but better to lick to the center) look.

But by this time our drinks had arrived. We found this place near us which has rockin’ drinks, big margaritas. They have a Hawaiian margarita (Cheryl had it) which tastes likes the Big Island tastes, the heat giving wafts of sweet pineapple and mango, the sweet honey, and the blue of the tide pools. Yum.

I have to admit that the lust was upon me, lesbian vampire that I am. I mean, earlier I was here, this poster girl for Big Sisters, I mean you would let this nice woman with her necklace of Morticia on Ivory, and black wings take your tween and teen out to an nice uplifting nighttime playtime? We could go walking in cemeteries, or if they were old enough we could watch films like...The Hunger (with David Bowie). But later, overcome with blood and unnamed lusts I have transformed. Not exactly the poster child for Big Sister now.

Linda and I came here earlier, notice the different corset and lace shrug.
We then found about the monster drinks on the weekend and destiny was created. Yes, I happen to be one of those people who find certain drinks to be aphrodisiacs, in a major way. I finally won Linda over to the moment, probably by saying something wildly inappropriate. I have always wanted to do that whole arm sweep to clear the table top and then leaping atop Linda, YUM. What? That is supposed to be done at home? Oh. Well I guess that is why I see it in movies and not often in restaurants. But Linda was giving me a glow. Yes, sex IS in the mind, and the partner, and booze, lots o booze helps too, who needs feeling below the sternum, right?

I think it best we finish with a nice innocent picture. See, this is me just being nice and cute. I do want to point out that for women, with the stress of Xmas and hosting, that masturbation is known to help with migraines, insomnia and stress. So PLEASE do yourself a favor and masturbate this Xmas season. That ends the public service announcement.

The last boxing class was this week until the new year. I have been having problems where I gain weight even though I eat one meal a day and work out like crazy, burn, literally with fever, and have a heart rate which indicates I am jogging. It is driving me crazy. But the lab results from this week might show some of the problem which is that I progressed some more in my anemia, lower Hemocrit, Red Blood Cells as well Hemoglobin PLUS even though on synthroid it looks at least part of me is dead. My free T4, which is what is used to turn food in the blood into energy instead of just storing it as fat, is below the limits, making me functionally hypothyroidism, so we are increasing the synthroid and seeing a doctor.

Beyond drinking alcohol and giving Linda hickeys, we also did postcards. Linda, Cheryl and I got together and got some postcards matched, stickered, stamped and finished, more than I thought as 48 finished postcards have already been posted. So the 38 from last week was even more, though it exhausted us a bit (a lot).

We had some nice donations, like these postcards. And here are pictures of HELL, yes, that is the gateway to Hell, or perhaps some OTHER ancient and famous institution, I can’t remember, but either way that is pretty goth. Also many vampires in this place, except like zombies, they feed on brains.

Also, after I sold the manga on ebay I was able to get some of the pictures and postcards I had found in Hawaii (I got them in the Thanksgiving sale - free shipping!), that includes this picture of the woman doing ‘the dance of the turtle’ – whew, fan me down, I am having that heat issue again. Or as Linda says, “She looks very…uh…fit and LIMBER.” Oh yeah!

“Are you LIMBER?” I asked Linda since she takes all these fitness courses at work and can do these positions with odd names like ‘the plank’ or ‘the seal’ and I thought it time to have a home work out, as it were. Um, yes, postcards, keep the focus! So here is the arctic fox and the dance of the turtle. We also did themes of books and asia/Japan, sometimes we did they together. Without Linda and Cheryl there is no way I would be able to do all the matching, stamping and stickering I do; there wouldn’t be a postcard project. Yes, I do a lot, and I write each one, source, buy and organize postcards, stickers and the rest but also we get great gifts from around the world to the postcard project (I am not the postcard project, I am the horny vampire – so gifts to the postcard project are ones I sort and use but are separate to me). Right now the project is at about 3,480 or so (2000 for the year about).

I had ordered a month or so ago some new year cards from Japan, as during new year people send each other new year greetings in postcards. And the postcards are all stamped with numbers and then on New Year’s Day the TV station reads which numbers wins gifts, from toasters and cell phones, to Playstations, Rice Cookers, and Cars. So not only does it pay to send lots of postcards (and GET lots of postcards) because then someone among you and your friends will win a prize (this is after coming back from a shrine to put in money, clap two/three times and make a prayer, then write a wish on paper and tie it to the nearby tree - New Years Visit). I wish I could do the same (the prizes, feel free to write wishes and tie them to trees), but I am not a national government. But I was able to send out about 18-20 new year postcards, most for this year directly from Japan. However, because they are not ‘franked’ (stamped) by the Japanese Postal System, you can’t win a prize beyond the postcard. Sorry.

And that was my weekend. Cool, yeah?

Lonely. Pushing to breathe, but afraid. And a cat visit.

My heart erratic and with difficulty breathing, I gasped to the worker, “I…come...back…don’t….911”

Then I passed out and stopped breathing. I came to for less then a second and passed out again. When I came to the second time, I was breathing shallow and couldn’t move. A couple of minutes gone.

The worker was holding my head upright. This isn’t what she saw in her job. “You can pass out at will?” she asked, amazed.

“No.” I breathed and waited for enough force in my diaphragm to speak, “I can always pass out. Use the will power to stay conscious.”

Yeah, I use will power to get out of bed, to stay conscious, to stay upright, to blog, to email to do anything despite the pain, the erratic heart, the purple fingers, the purple arm. And when I fail in will power, then I lie there until found. And the next day, I gather my will again. If I do not do this, then "I", the Elizabeth is gone, and I am only the disease. But sometimes, I need to rest, just for a bit, so if someone is there to call 911 if things go wrong, I let go inside and let my body fall, my consciousness sliding away in images of green.

How is that possible? Because I am ‘special’? No. Maybe because I am desperate. I am desperate to grow as a human being. Some days I feel that I have no gender, no name, that everything is stolen from me, as my disease determines everything from sleeping and what I eat, to what I do and when, and how much energy I have. I am death, one kind of death on and under the skin.

I am also driven, desperate and driven by the ghosts. I have lived a lonely life. I still live a lonely life, an extremely lonely life. Why? I don’t know. But I learned that no matter what happened to me, or what I did. That my body could be hit until I sobbed, that I could be hungry that I hoard until the hoards were found and I was punished again. And I learned that there are people who look for the fear, the fear of the knife, is what I had, to be tied or restrained while the knife traveled around my skin, up and down, waiting to bed. I learned to be laughed at, or be in a position where if someone says to lick a foot then I licked the foot. Because I knew something they didn’t. That in the breaking of me, and I was broken, that in the dominating of me, and I was dominated, or treated as an object by so many, so many who wanted control, absolute control of me, body and mind. And so they broke me, and ordered me: parents, siblings, pedophiles (I guess that is what they are called), abusers. And I shook with fear.

But I knew inside I was still free. I learned that what the body does is what the body does, as is what happens to the body. I learned young that even if I decided to NOT be broken, that I would be ‘broken and disciplined’ in the name of God, and yet the next day, pop up again. When, in just one of the dozens of ways I could be punished as a child (8 or 9), I was punished for speaking any single negative statement by being forced to eat jalapenos, one for each word/statement, without water.

So I went and spent all my money on jalapenos in secret. And I kept eating them. And crying. And I was punished and broken 22 days but on day 23 the jalapenos didn’t work any more. Not because I wanted to say, “You are a big fat head!” to my brother. No. Because I wanted to be free, and no matter how many times I was treated like an object owned in body and mind, I needed to be free. But I was so alone. So alone.

I could be licking clean a shoe, but in my mind, I was thinking about the food I had left out for a stray cat. What happened to the body was not who I was, it did not diminish me. It does not diminish me. Only I can diminish me by failing others, by failing myself in not being a person who grows. Because a person who does not grow, does not learn is already dead. A person who does not want to become a better person, because it has risk or might hurt, that person has gagged that part of them which can be MORE, who wants to cover themselves in a living death rather than try. But I will attempt to wake them. It is my call, my vocation.

I am scared that I am not growing. Scared that in forcing myself to breathe though it hurts so bad, to do postcards, to do this blog, to do emails, that I am not growing, but just forcing myself to keep up to a person who is gone. The EFM of before is gone, I cannot do what she did, I cannot be who she was. Yes, I go to badminton, and will tomorrow, and I have a 5K or maybe 10K on Sunday (though the bike shop said the front wheel may or may not make 5K – but I have wheeled on blown wheels before). For me, to do something that threatens my life is like lying down in a bed of soft moss, there is no loss. What is hard is staying, and finding ways to care about ME, about now. And I am trying, very hard, trying to find a way to be excited about now and not just the light so easy to fall into.
But I do the postcards, and this weekend, after I woke from the semi-coma and was so dizzy I hit and fell over a great deal, I spent the rest of the time on postcards. Because what if one of those postcards is to me at age 8 or age 14 or age 24 or age 30? What if one of those postcards tells someone ready to stop fighting, ready to give up that they are not alone. Because they aren’t. And I have to remind them of that. I know that makes me sound like a nutter. I get the postcards in, and I send them out, the best postcards, the ones I like the most I send out the fastest, like this bi-plane, because if I think about it I might want it and that is not my job (to collect). My job is to care about others and stand as a place where anyone can email me about anything and I will try to be there for them. What communication occurs between us is protected. And I do receive abuse. Daily. Because it is a public place standing up and saying, “I care. please, trust me that I care about your health. I care about your loneliness. I want to show that dying, like living, can be more.” So yes, I get abuse everu day: Emails, comments, stating I am a thief, a liar, a scam, or just people hurt so bad that they lash out in pain at anyone. It hurts. To give choices, to show people that there are choices and that taking risks, on themselves, on others is worth it, even if it doesn’t work, is why I stay conscious. So I bear it.

I will never know if a life is changed, or a day is changed. I’m not raising money for cancer, or my disease, but I am raising myself, failures and attempts, up to show any person that maybe what they believed was impossible is not, that the greatest limitations we have are those we put on ourselves because we are scared of being hurt…again. We are scared of being hurt for good reason, and I show that I get hurt, and I get up, and sometimes, it takes people to hold me up. These days, to get out of bed, to breathe with oxygen is about my limit, and yet I do badminton. How? Because if I can wheel to the door, can I wheel to the elevator? And if I can wheel to the elevator can I wheel to the sidewalk? And that is how I do it. And sometimes I just dream, and then people, the real heroes in my life, figure out how to do it. I wanted to go to Hawaii, and in a month, I am going to Hawaii. I am going to the Honolulu and the Big Island, to see lava flow, to see rare beaches with dolphins and sea turtles. I will see the stars, I will see the ocean, and I am so ill that I have not seen the outside, or even the window in days. I am so ill that I could, if I chose go to a hospital, go to an assisted home. Go to be assisted until I die. But I am going to Hawaii instead. Carried by my partner, my sister and a few others.

So this weekend, we did 71 postcards, and last weekend we did 40+ postcards, I don’t know how many. So the ghosts of the me, hounded and almost broken, are quiet again. I want to be here for everyone, and yet I can’t. I’m still so lonely. I’m still working on not breaking, or breaking under the pain, and yet coming back. It is hard but I am not alone, not all the time: a friend who talks manga, a partner who likes to eat and thinks I should, even after I can’t taste, and a plushie, a stuffie. Sometimes plushies aren’t enough.

I also went to see the cats. To photograph the cats.

I will write a full blog about visiting the cats but again, all the cats shown last time were gone. Including the serious faced black and orange cat named Carmen which rode with me in my wheelchair. I know where one of the cats, now renamed and lovingly homed now lives. I thought I would be alone but I had a new young cat named ‘Smurf’ rode around with me (seriously who does the naming?).

Smurf looked like a slightly older version of one of the kittens (a few new ones had arrived) I called Scamp. Scamp may have been tiny but he liked to go everywhere, here is TRYING to get up into the chair, but his climbing skills are not quite up to it, so a bit stuck mid-way (yes, he finally made it up). Linda said she wanted to adopt him and smuggle him into our apartment that day!

Lulu, who I want to show a lot of later, is a cat who is a few years old but doesn’t want treats, or string to play with but LOVE. This is the most affectionate cat I have ever come across. Lulu simply loved and enjoyed being loved in return.

Elmo was a cat a could relate to, having been only 2 years old and used to small dogs but the owners were moving and so there was no place for Elmo. Elmo came with his own bed, a last remnant of home and besides coming out to find out, ‘are you going to take me home’, Elmo retreated back into the bed, remembering and waiting. I know what that feels like.

Vicky was a one year old cat who was a bit shy but still very intellegent and observant. She just didn’t want to risk coming down, that didn’t stop her from trying to find out about this person down there in a wheelchair, and hey, what are you doing down there?
I will do a cat blog soon but Linda has come to check on me. With the risk to her job gone she is back at work for the government, but what she does exactly I can’t tell, seriously, I can be charged for “Treason to the Queen” for talking about it. So to the bed for me and the construction across the street, going on despite rain or anything else. Starting at 7:00 a.m. and going for another 400+ days.

Later!

Three new posts, a cat visit and a NEW postcard record!

92 Postcards! Can you say it with me, NINTY-TWO! Oh yeah, bring it down……90, 91 and 92! That is right, with Linda and Cheryl, I did 92 postcards this weekend (even though I had food poisoning!), posted Sunday evening - already heading out to YOU. AND I went on a cat visit. Ha! 92! Yes, I will admit I am a little proud after being sick for so long, to have a new record. Which means 250 postcards this month I hope. I hope.

What happened was that I was ill AGAIN, in fact I was ill every day this week and the only time I wasn’t was when I wrote that blog. Bowel Impaction, fevers, chills, overheating, shock – all the fun stuff. So I started after three days of trying, I started on Friday to match some postcards of people we hadn’t done in a while. And after the nap Linda helped me, and she goes, “Now you aren’t slipping in an extra page are you!”

Innocent look.

So we did four pages out of the 19 pages we now have and then we started to sticker. And Cheryl came and we stickered. And it was fun, we used up so many sticker and dover books of Japanese stickers, we were out of whole sections of stickers. The previous week we had done kids, 25 kids, but his week we did stickers and after the stickers Linda counted them (why?), I thought she would say 56 or 64. But no, it was NINTY TWO.

So we split them up and started stamping. And it didn’t take as long as we thought, just kept stamping, and stopped for dinner and stamped some more. I had a mini stroke and so if you get a postcard with the right side barely there or gone, that was me as I had no feeling or power on the right side. But I stamped some more and then they were all done. And I started writing.

I have a new post over on the The Postcard Project. I hope with the new cool in the weather I will energy to put posts up there every 10 to 14 days instead of once a month. But I am telling people to spread the news that you do not have to be in dire straits to get a postcard, all you need is to want something other than bills and junk mail coming in your mail box (or something nice for your kids). It is your choice. Personally, I like postcards now and then. So tell people to email me with the title Postcard and if you know anyone overseas or on ships, in active duty, or back here, or a vet who is just back, let me know and I will send a postcard, and another. I am nearing 2,500 postcards.

There is also a new post over at A Girl’s gotta Fly, which is asking people to let us know if you are still where you were (I mean, some addresses we got over a year ago, has anything changed)? We are asking because we are getting returns, and after spending so much effort, to have it returned when it COULD go to your new address is a bummer. Also, the way Linda words the blog, it gives the chance to be noble and go, “Oh, I don’t NEED a postcard like others and so you can take me off the list.” – that’s what I would say from the way she worded it. Well, here is the answer: NO! It is not like I am flying off to get my Noble Prize so I am too busy or doing my paid tour of Japan for BBC. I like doing postcards. I like sending YOU a postcard. If you don’t like the postcards I send you, tell me so I can send you ones you like. If you really don’t want post, then yeah, I’ll take you off the list. But please, let me choose how I use my energy. When I am ready to work full time on a book, the postcards will slow to a trickle for a while, and I will let you know. Until then; we have a summer, a fall and a start of winter, and the more it rains, and the more snow is threatened, the better it is to get a lifeline of fun from the outside world. Because that is what all this pain and isolation has stolen from me: FUN. And whismy, and shots of me in my panties. So I am going to get that back.

I had only 10 postcards left to write with over two hours left and so we went for the last 30 minutes at the Victoria RSPCA animal shelter (I did 92!). It was dark (they had turned off the lights) and it was HOT. These cats had fur and were hot, really hot. I mean, Jasmine would not even PLAY with me, but was sitting all prim and proper like it was adoption day and wanted to look her best (I guess it was). But for heat sitting very still works for me, and works for cats too.

We met up with some new cats, one of which was called Miracle and like HIGH places, so Linda went over and played with this gray cat. She said that’s what we need in our life, a little miracle.

I on the other hand started playing with a one to two year old white cat with ‘melt me like butter’ blue eyes. Yes, I know white cats CAN become deaf later in life but my parents have a perfectly white cat and it is not deaf or blind, just likes to eat and chase things. I found out it was called Angel. Hmmm.....is there a theme going on.

I also went to the outside area where I met some of the cats from last week, and while one was on my lap, Jasper was already trying to climb up my wheelchair. Linda says that I am ‘Snow White’ or ‘Sleeping Beauty’ the way all the animals seem to come to me. Errr…okay.

I did find Rose from last week, the one year old who liked to watch the play with Jasmine and I. I gave her some treats we brought this time and she stayed most of my visit in my lap. Not just as I rolled around, but also as I did the two inch drop backwards in my chair to get back inside. She gripped a little but never moved. Rose would be a perfect cat if you like a cat to go with you on your bike or maybe in your car, or on your wheelchair. She like the mobile and ‘up here’ view, and this time, as there were no other visitors, as she likes being petted, I could hear her purr. Very soft but steady, her purr goes on and on. To be honest, I was surprised that Rose had not been adopted. Why?

So FAR every time we come, we talk about four cats, and every time we come back, be it one week or two, half of the cats we talk about have been adopted, like Elizabeth was, and Murray and Betsie. So we went to look for that cute grey and peachy cat from last time, the one I showed to illustrate how people can’t tell the difference in black cats. Adopted. But that was it. Rose was still here! So I was at 25% for this week. What is going on?

Well, it seems that the shelter now has kittens, a whole pile of them, and I mean LITERALLY, we could see in the room but not go in as the kittens were piling over each other and walking around and exploring. I saw the RSPCA officer and asked her about the kittens and she went, “Ug, KITTENS!” in a ‘oh great!’ voice.

‘You don’t like kittens?’ I asked because it is sort of odd for someone to work for RSPCA and not like kittens.

She said, ‘Most people never get past that room, (the kitten room is closer to the front desk, you have to pass it to go to the cat area) and when you know 50% or more are coming back, when they could be giving homes to cats instead….’

I got it. I mean, after a while seeing the same people who instead of taking a cute 1 year old, or 2 year old who has been there 5 months, and giving it a home. They take a kitten, they come back and now the RSPCA has ANOTHER adult cat to find a home for. The cute cat I showed in last week’s blog that got adopted....it had been there eight months. Wow.

A lot of cats end which up in the Victoria RSPCA who are literally perfect pets and have been, like this cute cat, she was left here when the owners decided to move. Now she has to compete against kittens. And yet, a lovely, gentle two year old cat who is ready to go home.

Well with Jasmine not playing I looked for Harley but the cage was open and we figured that Harley had either bloodied another person or got in a fight and was in the recovery area. So no playing 'catch the finger and bite off the top' today.

Here is Linda playing with Miracle, who is very friendly and seems to be attracted to boobs. I was watching Miracle and thinking, a) I want to be a cat and b) can I share? Miracle had found a shady spot up top and wasn’t giving it up. I think this is a cat you would have to looking atop bookcases for. Here he is giving Linda a ‘cat kiss’ of a nose to nose.
As for me, I had gone back and was playing with Angel, who liked to play with a little mouse I had brought with me but more so liked to be stroked right on the jaw line, and on the cheeks (I don't know why I play with the cats in cages, maybe because I can identify, but I wish I could stroke her, but we make do). Angel is not only beautiful but very affectionate and about 2 years old, lively but in a sort of sedately regal way. Will play catch, or chase the mouse, once she has determined that is what you want. But after getting stroked on the jaw, Angel was in some sort of cat bliss.
Thomas, the black cat and Jasmine played the domination game for ‘who will sit under the wheelchair’ and Thomas won again. He looks so rigorous like some stern professor when he pushes the other cats to show he is in charge. I wanted to know…..now that you own the string, do you want to play? So I started twitching it and soon Thomas was showing a completely different side. Jumping and leaping, and standing on the back legs to get up at that evil twitchy string!

Well, the half hour was up and with Rose on my lap I rolled over to see Jasmine, who was still sitting in the ‘perfect poise’ position. I tempted with fingers, and finally twitched the camera strap and that did it. Jasmine was down my end of the cage with some mock play of catch and release. I took away the strap and used my fingers and she caught them too, after some licking. Here she is at the end of play time, my finger firmly caught, she can lay back, relax and cool back down.
As for Harley...we asked at the front as we were leaving and they say, “Yeah, he got adopted.” ADOPTED? HARLEY? Apparently he had been left in the shelter because he had a extreme habit of beheading all the birds of the surrounding area. So I was right. And I found it odd that the same cat that liked to ‘play rough’ got adopted in the week. But yes, turns out that 2 of the four from last week were adopted, the cute pink kitty and …HARLEY. So I am still at 50% adoption per visit. I can’t explain it but I am going to keep visiting. We figured some guy who likes motorcycles came by who likes a cat with ‘spunk’ as the front counter said, and didn’t mind a cat who could take care of himself (or take over the neighborhood), a MAN’s cat! Harley. Good luck in your new home. And good luck to all small animals around as well.

Please remember to click the links for Postcard Project and A Girl’s Gotta Fly for the new posts there and I hope you had a fun weekend (92! I did 92! Woo Hoo!).

Weekend of passion & colour: Soap, Stoneware, Jewelry, Postcards

It seems that when disabled, and in pain (a LOT of pain) then the pleasure is found in the small spaces: actions between the uncertainty. I was woken by the sound of three trucks and two to three jackhammers today as the “three day” demolition job (according to the project manager) goes into its third week. So better to think on the nicer things that happened this weekend, amongst and around the unpleasant.

On Saturday it was overcast. Overcast means I can go outside! So Linda said that if I could make it out of bed we could go to the James Bay Market (instead of the Moss Street one – our city is blessed with Markets). By “make it out of bed” she meant, if I could move my limbs, as I could not the night before, and I think even Cheryl was having to help me move my head. But as a friend with Lupus told me, “the more you move, the more the pain starts to go into the background…” (the rest of that is, “….and after about four hours of moving slow, then a bit more, you are ready to go.”). I had to be ready to go in 30-40 minutes, and made it out the door with some help from my friends.

I was wearing sweats and had no money with me, and Linda soon ran out of money so it was more of a ‘lets see what is possible’ event than a spending spree (though if there is something you are love with, please speak up as we will definitely be going back). The first thing I saw were the skull pot warmers. I mean, what says goth but using skull warmers to take out the Tuna Casserole. But then I started to think, “how will guests feel about my Borsch as it sits on the skull and crossbones, universal sign of danger and death?”

I rolled on, over grass (it was held on a field) to Mystic Glass Creations. Tyler, the owner and crafter, blows his own glass, though some of the images are etched with laser and then the glass blown around them. Most items were in the $15-20 range, like this necklace which changes colour as the light reflects off of it from different angles. I liked that one. We have at least one reader who is into mushrooms and they were a steal at I think $10 for your own personalized mushroom necklace – what perfect accessory for your next meeting (confuse them to bits!).
Tyler also does scenes of West Coast Tide Pools, which were made entirely of blown glass. They are complete with anemone, starfish, sea cucumber and the rest. He creates them by blowing glass and then shaping it down into a disc shape before doing something called ‘imploding’ which sounds pretty neat and is what brings all the colour up into the shapes. Everything in these tide pools is made out of glass. Cheryl and I thought this one would be perfect for Linda. She REALLY likes the tide pools necklaces but the one with orange she wouldn’t wear and the one with the blue and purple I thought was perfect for her. But she said she probably wouldn’t wear it. Well, today she tells people at the office and they think it is really NEAT, so where is it? So now she is thinking that if she DID get it, she would wear it. However, like I said, if I like something it is expensive, while the rest is $15, the tide pools are $60 due to the extensive labor in glass blowing.

From there I went a few stalls over to Katy Adams at Living Earth Pottery. She makes stoneware and other pottery and much of the red pottery is again in the $15-20 range. This bowl is one of the few blue ones she has left. It is microwave and dishwasher safe and hardy due to being stoneware but also barely a few ounces, certainly not a pound. Both Cheryl and I, used to the weight of pottery were impressed by the light weight. The bowl, was of course, $35 (if I like it, just double the prices you see on other items and that is what the item I want will cost). The problem was it was too big for me to use as a bowl, just a little too large, as the liquid inside is too much for me to control or hold, even on my lap. Then I saw THE PLATE. I loved the plate, it was a beautiful dark blue with black etching. The black comes from wax which is used to decorate the plate after the stone ware is ‘thrown’ on the wheel and put on the batik overlay, then in the kiln, during the glazing process, the wax melts, leaving a shadow of itself behind, the black decoration. Of course, I like THIS so as you can see, it is $55. Sigh. Oh well. She does do commissions but told me she is booked up until July 2010. Did I want to put myself down for a color and a commission? Sorry, not quite that optimistic, not when the hospital results say I’m medically malnourished.

Linda was returning from Whimsical Preserves with her jar of Peach Nectarine for the morning toast. Each jar was $5 and .25 if you return the jar. I was impressed with her delightful diabetes safe jam, which was not just ONE, in raspberry as you see in this picture but was a total of three rows, of which only two rows are in the pictures. I was also impressed simply by the experimentation and delightful colors and ideas, like this Fire and Ice wine Jelly, I mean where else does one go to get your ice wine (second ingredient) in your jelly?

There was another passionate soap lady name Shelia Adams, who sold not only the regular array of multicolored soaps you can see behind me, but also soaps specifically for men for shaving. Not your average soap, which came in Sandalwood. I asked if it was real Sandalwood, as I have heard that is very expensive and she said no it is a synthetic compound (the regular soaps were $4 each, the Sandalwood lathering soap was $10 – or about 6 pounds). The soap is specifically made to reduce the drag on the razor by using Fullers Earth Clay and then Shea butter and Goats Milk to reduce any irritation.

I loved the swirls in her soap, particularly the ones in Olive Oil, though I couldn’t stop thinking of Popeye. The woman was very dedicated and had bits of soap for people to rub for the smell. For example in her Slice of Citrus, she not only had orange, grapefruit and lemon grass but would take the peels, and shred them up and then add them as zests for exfoliate.

Linda picked up her favorite, Lavender. When we went up island, a gift of Lavender Massage oil was spilled (onto her clothes) though it was sealed but enough was left for us to give each other Lavender Massages (I recommend it, particularly IN a two person hot tub with jets). So she picked up a bar at $4 to keep the memory and go to work smelling Lavender fresh.

Of course, what west coast market is complete without the tie-dyed clothes. There used to be a woman selling lots of tie-dyed clothes at Moss Street Market but she moved to Australia (long commute). Another woman was selling here. I liked these baby clothes in tie-dye. I had bought several things as gives for my unseen nieces and nephews when Linda went to visit last time, like hats or a tie-dyed purse for the 7-8 year old girl (she loved it). The children of the conservative father, I sent only tie-dyed sun hat for the little girl and socks for the boy. Apparently they were NOT used, possibly because he did not want to expose his 2 year old and 4 year old to this kind of drug culture clothing. Errrrr……what?

By this time I had talked myself blue. It is funny how these expressions must have come from people with my conditions because I CAN talk myself until my lips and fingertips turn blue. So it was back into the van and air conditioning and then back home.

I took an hour at home to take pictures from the art books which I had marked with post-it notes for pictures. The weekend is the only time I have enough people to help me hold open the book and take the pictures for the blogs of the coming weeks and months.

Regarding postcards and Stickers, FINALLY, this last week I had sorted out the corner behind me thanks to Linda. She gave me a three drawer plastic cabinet and I gave two drawers for stickers, one for kids and one for adults and then sorting within those drawers, and one for postcard books.

What I wanted from this time on was for me to spend more time on each person, which meant more time on each postcard. Time spent in selection and time spent stickering (which has been neglected lately) and deliberate stamping. I wanted to improve. But I didn't want to make the postcards more flashy or crammed with more on them, indeed I wanted more open space to write. But I wanted to refine what was on them in order to make them better, closer to greatness. So that is what we did. It took longer to sticker and the table was full, first of all the children’s stickers and the adults. After that, we went into stamping, having a good idea of the theme in mind.

To give you an example, in the top postcard I made a linear link of colour stampings of the history of the cat starting with Semet, the Egyptian cat god (in purple). Then a stamp of the wild cats before the stickers of the domestic cats (I didn’t quite have enough room for a color rubber stamp of that). The one below it combines the colors of the kimono with the flower sticker and the sticker which is one of the ancient family crests of Japan, which is reflected in the colours of the Japanese Fan color stamp. It took longer to do, it took overnight to dry.

Function and pain-wise, I was having a bad weekend and at points could not use my hands, or, due to pain, was not understanding what was going on, or even where I was, only the pain. So, when lucid, I estimated the maximum number of postcards we could do was 35 based on the time left and how much time I had to write the postcards, which I placed at six to ten I could write an hour if there were no breaks, four to four and a half hours straight. It turned out that I had miscounted and 37 postcards were done and have already been posted a couple days ago.

Though I have many postcards (like several hundred) I am in desperate need of great quality postcards. The problem is that, as we say, 'we get them in, and then we send them out.' So if someone has a very specific request or style, then the regular postcard isn’t going to do (many, many requests for postcards of the moon). I can’t send diners, or just any old scenery, or even any old cat photo, I have to send postcards that are ‘more.’ Some come from Oxford. But they are going (any postcards of illuminated manuscripts would be greatly appreciated - seriously, along with clear, large and colorful ones of the animals specific to your area of the world – something that would appeal to cognative disability programs or children, particularly those in the autism spectrum). I am hoping you understand? I can't do this alone, and I want to give EVERY person the best.

To give you an example, I bought a set of 12 Lamento Postcards online, and sent them out, catboys in anime. That set is now going for $100 (just 12 postcards). I finished a postcard set of Hawaii, it had good detail, excellent colour, and a map of Hawaii on the back; I thought I should go get another. Except now it is a rarity and selling for $50. Some postcards I bought from Amazon in German in order to get a particular photographer. We are almost out of Escher, and Ansel Adams, and Frank Llyod Wright and graveyards in black and white……. I am desperate to find the highest quality postcards, many do come in, from all over the globe, and many which I have purchased from all over the globe but they go out just as fast!

This week I cleaned out a limited edition box set (perfect size and quality for stamping, excellent colour and variety) which went out, now out of print, with special limted edition stickers on it from an anime series showing adults both straight and same sex couples in love. Those stickers? Turns out I bought the last box when I asked the supplier in Japan for another (out for 2-3 years). It was $55 and shipping for the box of 40 stickers and yet, the quality of the stickers was ‘more.’ To be honest, a lot of the best of our stickers and some of our postcards come from readers; the Dr. Suess stickers – what fun we had with those. Postcards, sometimes just three or four and immediately we put names on the back, recognizing how this will make person 431 happy or person 67 content or person 274 simply not able to believe we found one. I have to take the credit because of confidentiality but thank you to those who sent in the postcards which were ‘more’, the stickers which were ‘more’, which were gothic and sassy, which were perfect for kids, which were Japanese monsters, that postcard made of a giant rubber squid.

So that was the weekend, Saturday and into Sunday and I’m not sure why I went on so much about the postcards except for two reasons: 1) I am only a single human being and cannot actually GO places, plus I have a limited viewpoint – other people CAN go places and have lots of viewpoints (like if you know where to get Edgar Allen Poe or Edward Gorey postcards or postcards showing the 17th Century? I'm serious and those are just one small subsection, about 10%-14% of the 40 we send out a week). And 2) I wanted those people who get the postcards and anyone who has ever participated by seeking out the 'more' postcards and stickers, or sending in from an extra stamp to a sheet of them to know that every week what they did mattered. But also, because of THEM, and for me, I try HARDER. I try to make it so that each postcard is the best it can be, that each postcard is amazing or the RIGHT postcard for that person, even if I could use it for 40 OTHER people but it would not be just the RIGHT fit as that one person, and I will never see that postcard again. And I may have just taken it out of an envelope from someone who sent it to help less than a day before. You also never get to hear what happens to your postcard, like a solo played in the night, you never find out who heard you, and what it meant to them, what difference it made. But YOUR postage stamp is on that chosen postcard, and it wouldn’t be possible without you.

I wanted people who get the postcards and have gotten them to know, that I am human, and I fail but I do try, with all my mental powers that I have that week and my ability, indeed beyond my ability, to make sure each postcard is correct and the best one for you. That is my goal, and sometimes I succeed and sometimes I fail, and without Linda, and Cheryl and other unnamed and sometimes unseen hands that would not be possible.

As I learned in the ER; caring with full concentration on what the OTHER person wants or needs is what makes the difference.

There are times that Linda HATES the postcards, the project, the ‘surprise gifts’ because she sees the pain that I receive, over and over again. She hates the fact that I can send out 50 postcards, that took me four or five days of late nights making them and the last two nights I was working straight through, and she KNOWS that I will never hear from any of those people. I KNOW.

Cheryl will bring over for another week nothing but postcards from a single individual, sometimes a letter from the same individual and then the supplies I have bought myself. Sometimes it is week after week, like that, and week after week, I pour myself out like a fountain. Linda told me that she does not ‘believe.’ I go on day and day, week and week. Today I showed you the postcards in hopes that you liked them, it is true. But I will go on for a week, for two, not having received a postcard, an email, for three weeks, for four, no packages, for five, for six, for seven. I go on, hundreds of postcards sent out and as I completely open myself, committing myself to loving someone in the way that is needed to think only of what the other person needs for hours then I will get hurt. I will hurt very badly, attacked, isolated, alone, simple, childlike, crying. But I go on because I believe. I believe that if I do it right, if I do it often, if I do my best, that some of them will intersect with unexpected results. To break solitude, to help foster joy, to simply be there when needed, and in many ways I do not know.

Linda cannot stand the sight of me unable to sit up straight, half my face smiling as I had a TIA (mini-stoke) because I am finally done. She gets angry, she says when I am lying down, after the painkillers and the moaning and shrieks, with tears running down my face into pools in the pillow in order to keep my face straight, to keep myself from groaning in pain. My body, broken to serve.

Send a card to Linda, because she cleans up the pain, she holds me while I sob a broken heart and then start again. She wants to scream in frustration but then sits down and helps me sort postcards. If you cannot write to me, then write to her because I do believe. Somewhere out there, something has happened, is happening that makes the fusing of work and agony worth it; because I do not see it, because I do not hear it does not make it less true.

That was my weekend.