December 14 prompt: Appreciate. What is the one thing you have come to appreciate most in the past year? How do express gratitude for it? -Victoria Klein
December 15 prompt: 5 minutes. Imagine you will completely lose your memory of 2010 in 5 minutes. Set the alarm for 5 minutes and capture the things you most want to remember about 2010? -Patti Digh
I once again have been having health problems, so I am combining some prompts, and may do so in a couple of days again.
I received the Dec. 14 prompt, and I was beginning to feel like I was being asked essentially the same thing over and over. What did you like best about X? What was the best thing you did? Where did you have the most fun? I know it isn't quite that simplistic, or overly gooey sweet. I understand it must be hard to come up with prompts. But I wonder if the authors aren't becoming too engrossed in making their prompt as "deep" as possible. I can keep only mining that single, "deep" vein for so long. I thought about skipping the prompt outright.
But then I received the December 15 prompt. These kind of timed exercises have always helped me; as I have said, I do best with a line in the sand. Plus, I felt like if I just started spewing memories, the things I appreciate might naturally rise to the surface. So I set my smart phone's timer for 5 minutes, and these are the memories that "pushed through"
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Oregon Country Fair-Avocado Dream Boats-The Ritz-spinach and cheese turnovers-glitter-Mount Shasta, the halfway point to Veneta-Driving near Corning for olives-Trip to Lassen Volcanic National Park-Mud Pots-Almost brain surgery-More and more seizures-More and more migraines-Violet and the root canal-mixed episode-hypo manic episode-Foot Surgery-Life on a scooter-DH gets new job-Quitting daycare-S, J and H-Emptying our savings-We end the year in the black-Making it through the tough times-growing closer-planning for our 10th anniversary-Job interview at a dispensary-coloring books-shopping for jewelry-Eni-thing-It's a Girl Thing-thrift shop hunting-starting to read again-learning cribbage-Happy 9th Anniversary-DH turns 40-Niece turns 3-"Sister3" turned 40-Oaksterdam University-Medical Cannabis-activism-Violet in the yard-riding a bike-car breakdowns-Crazyboards, and blogging-Blogger, and blogging-Told my mother to back off-My mother aged significantly-My father is sick
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Now, I did corrects some spelling, and re-organize the list so it was a little more coherent to me. Out of the 49 I quickly counted (which means the actual count could be anywhere between 47 and 51), 16 (about a third) of the memories I came up with had to do with my husband's and my health and finances.
You can see by the things I italicized what was going on in our personal lives: Fears about health and money, surgeries, disappointment, and just overall stress. I know a lot of marriages are pulled apart by money and health problems. I have watched it happen to friends and enemies alike. Maybe it is because we have both spent our lives since puberty struggling with illness. Maybe it is because we both know what it is like to have negative worth, and that it is survivable: At one point right before I met DH, my finances were so bad, the FDIC wouldn't allow me to have a bank account. He had almost as bad a history. We have worked hard to build up our savings in our marriage, because we are both late to the land of "financially responsible adulthood."
For 11 months, we watched our savings dwindle. We actually were starting to think of selling parts of our 401k. I hate money. Hate. it.
So when my husband was suddenly hired at the end of August, literally days before he was scheduled to have brain surgery, it blew a hole in our plans, and I hate when there is a change of plan. Suddenly, there was not going to be brain surgery, but there was going to be income.
Much to my shock, I was torn. I had spent the entire month of August being tended to my psychiatrist, preparing myself for my husband's surgery. I wasn't intentionally trying to make it "all about me," but I just fell apart at the idea of something going wrong.
Yet when the surgery was postponed so he could take the job, I was angry at him for not doing the surgery instead. Since then, the threat of surgery has reappeared, but I have come to accept I cannot make this decision for DH. He will have it within the next year, it is just a matter of whether it is sooner or later.
So all of this depressing stuff has ironically made me appreciate my husband and my marriage more than ever. I am bad at expressing gooey emotions towards my husband. But we have had so much time together in 2010, that we were able to talk about our relationship and our marriage a lot, and no matter how difficult or thorny the topic. It never seemed to take a negative turn.
So this is not exactly riveting, but I show my appreciation for my husband and my marriage by keeping the lines of communication open, and trying to be brave enough to say things I am nervous about saying. So far, it is working.
Showing posts with label oaksterdam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label oaksterdam. Show all posts
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Thursday, December 2, 2010
One Word: Fraught to Healing #reverb10
When I first saw this challenge on nakedjen's blog, before I even finished the sentence, the word "Fraught" popped into my mind. It seems that in each decade of my life, there has been one year that is awful, stressful, disastrous. My decennial Annus Horribilis to steal a phrase from Elizabeth II. This appears to be the Annus Horribilus of my 40s.
This is indeed a year that has been fraught with drama and difficulties, as well as illness for my DH and me. In January of 2010, my DH was entering his 3rd month of unemployment, and I had just quit my job working with dogs to have surgery to reconstruct my foot. January 13th, I had the surgery. In early 2011, I will have surgery to remove the metal installed in the first operation.
DH was housebound while I recovered, because of his epilepsy (i.e., I am the sole driver in the family). My recovery was slow, painful, and depressing. Throughout the year, my husband and I suffered from worsening of our respective neurological illnesses. I also had several mood swings, which were particularly "fraught" with concern at the time, as I tend to spend money when my mood changes, and we had no income other than unemployment insurance, and our savings.
Our car broke down and needed major repairs twice within two months. We dedicated a credit card to the care of the car, and have been paying off big chunks every month, but we had always paid off our credit cards each month,
DH had a job in May for 3 weeks that was a disaster, and which he quit. His boss lied to the Unemployment Insurance dept, and said DH had been fired for cause, thus making sure my husband could not collect unemployment benefits. DH was too late getting his personnel records, which demonstrated otherwise, to file an appeal. At that point, we were living on savings alone.
As the summer progressed, DH's seizures became so severe, that we came to the decision that he was going to go ahead with a new surgical procedure that has a 50/50 chance of stopping or improving his seizures. Yes, he is at the point that those odds actually look good. The surgery was scheduled for late August. I began to fall apart, as my bipolar illness makes stress extremely difficult for me to handle.
Literally 6 days before the surgery was scheduled, my DH received an offer that was more than equivalent to his last job: It has better hours, clearer expectations, and better benefits than his previous job. It was such a relief. We spent the next couple of weeks purchasing items and paying bills we had been stalling on until we had an income again. The job was not willing to delay his start date for a few months so that he could have surgery, so he went for it.
So far this fall, he has had two seizures at work, both resulting in hospitalizations. I can't even remember how many hospitalizations he has had this year, and he goes in only for a tiny percentage of his seizures. His neurosurgeon has insisted that DH cannot wait until next fall to have his surgery. He will probably have it in early 2011.
As I have said, my neurological condition, migraine, and my bipolar illness have both been flaring this year, making it very difficult for me to even look for work. One more stone was that we had very expensive dental work done right before DH was hired. Even our French Bulldog, Violet has had to have a root canal.
And as the final insult, Friday, I was bitten by a Black Widow Spider. While not deadly to the average adult, the venom in the bite is a neurotoxin, and provides quite a wallop to the system. Headache, tremor, vomiting, heavy sweating, cramping, dizziness, diarrhea,
We have had at least 40 doctor visits between the two of us this year. Easily. I have had days with multiple appointments several times this year. The very fortunate part of all of this for us was that we were able to afford COBRA payments for our health insurance, a Cadillac Plan that included vision and dental. Still, copays for medications and doctors' visits add up.
But even in this terrible year, there were moments of contentment and joy that auger well for 2011. With both of us in the house 24 hours a day, we could have driven each other off the deep end. Instead, my husband and I became closer than we have ever been. This has been a year that has proofed our marriage. Oddly, we have never been happier.
In July I had the joy of experiencing my second Oregon Country Fair with one of my closest friends, nakedjen. It is hard to really describe the OCF to people, because so much of what makes it wonderful is the ambiance, which cannot be translated into words. But if you consider yourself a dirty hippie, a faerie, or a fan of yummy food, original performers, soul-refreshing encounters, and glitter, you should definitely take a look into the Fair. I can't wait until next July.
But it will come as a surprise to no one, that the word I hope to be using to describe the year of 2011 next December is "Healing." Not only from our many surgeries, but also emotionally from the stress and traumas of this year. At times it seemed the blows would never end. Also, more concretely, financially, as we used up our savings. We are fortunate to have saved so much, we needed every penny.
Healing is also a direction I may be pursuing professionally. I have attended a course at Oaksterdam University and intend to attend more, with an eye towards getting into the medical cannabis industry. As readers of this blog are well aware, I have benefitted from medical cannabis, and have recently become more active in the medical and recreational legalization movements. I don't know what I would do, yet. I liked growing it, but I don't know how I would get a job doing that. I would like to learn to cook with cannabis, and I could see working in a commercial kitchen. I also could see bud tending, which is being familiar with the different properties of each strain of cannabis, so as to help patients choose ones that target their conditions. But I have to choose one of them, I think. The weekend session I went to this past October was really fun, but unfortunately, I had a migraine for a cooking class I was registered for. I plan on taking another weekend session in January. A good start to the new year.
While not related to healing, there are more good things to look forward to: My French Bulldog turns 7 on New Year's Day. I plan to return to the Fair in July. But perhaps most importantly, July 21, 2011 is my DH and my 10th anniversary.
It is funny how one of the years of my life most fraught with disaster, is probably one of the happiest years of my life.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
"Welcome to the Fellowship of Educated Men and Women"
This was written over a few days, so I am sorry if some things are muddled. I am obviously gloriously hypo (this is the mood I get into that pisses Dianthus, one of the moderators on CrazyBoards, for those of you who may lurk there: My p-doc would like to keep me right at this spot forever, but a little more than half the time, I tip into a mixed episode, and there is an argument about whether hypo-manias contribute to kindling. Mixed episodes definitely do. So either my p-doc or Dianthus could have a point
As you can imagine, Harvard graduation is a pretty ritualized and pompous affair. One of the things that is a tradition is that they have a set phrase to confer a degree, en masse, to each particular school. The sentence that conferred my A.B., and all the A.B.s in recent memory (I can't find a start date, but my dad, uncles, and cousins all had the same phrase): "Welcome to the Fellowship of Educated Men and Women." Snotty, no? But once again, I have entered another educational fellowship. Snarf.
Well Friday started off with a bang. I didn't sleep. at. all. Then at 5:45, half an hour before his alarm, DH had a short but violent seizure. I forbade his leaving the house, so he telecommuted. That was good, he was able to get some work done, but also nap a lot. After a seizure, all the energy is just sucked out of him.
I have to "come out" and admit that I am on a spending jag, as if you couldn't tell. The amounts per item have gone up. I really shouldn't seek out and enjoy this kind of "high," but it is really hard to self-report when you feel really good, even if you know that you should be really careful. DH usually says something if he thinks things are getting out of control, and he isn't thrilled with my spending at the moment. I am admittedly a very indulged wife, and I feel less guilty about it than I should, because it makes DH happy to indulge me. I think I am pushing it. I have a bunch of stuff that was "approved" by him still coming, so hopefully, anticipation of those items (BEDDING! WHOOHOOO!) that will help me keep from spending, I hope.
I also have purchased Sister2's birthday present, which was the regular "birthday amount," so while I am early, I thought she would really like what I got her I went to Eni-Thing's Fall Festival, which is like Etsy on wheels. I bought too much. I bought a hooded scarf for Sister2. She lives in Dallas, which gets chilly, but not freezing. She is quite fashionable (she is in the buying dept. for Neiman-Marcus, so duh), and I think she will like it, she likes to be different. I have been good at guessing for her in the past, even though I suck at choosing clothes personally.:
BUT, from the same woman who made the hooded scarf, I bought a gorgeous, unusual scarf, which is very heavy, intricate grey lace on one side, lined with brown silk on the other; there is a slot in the silk through which you slip the other end of the scarf, and you can wear it that way, or pull it through again, so you have more of a tie knot. I wore it Sunday, more on that in a bit. It cost the most I have ever paid for that kind of accessory, like lower end Anthropologie. But so pretty, it would have cost much more at Anthropologie if they sold it. I bought a pad for dollar, so that was okay. I bought a sympathy card for the Kass family, now I have to think of what to write. I think I will get a breast cancer stamp in her honor. There were two other things I really had to combat myself over. One was an Alice painting I knew DH would hate, and would refuse to hang. The other was this purse, which while inexpensive for a purse, was nonetheless too much money. Jen, I think you would like this, the leather is much nicer than the picture looks, and the closure is something like Lucite not cheapo plastic.
I bought a sparkly bracelet and earrings because they were shiiineee. Sometimes I really don't like that organic brain syndromes are so uniform. Shiiineeee. I wore both of them Saturday, and they looked cute with the Calla Lilly pendant that I bought at the OCF. Sorry, I am afraid this picture is huge:
I also bought a necklace I have been coveting, and to which I already have a matching pair of earrings, all by Kerfuffle (can't find a website). I bought the center one; the chain is in three parts, one that is like coins, one that is just chain, and one that is crystals (the crystals are hidden by the far right one. The pendant has a rose, I am very into roses at the moment.
That isn't all. I bought a pair of hairpins, one has the Mad Hatter hat, and the other the Cheshire cat. I mean come on, I HAD to buy them, I'll wear them, as well as my ceramic Alice pendant when we stay at the Jabberwock Inn in Monterey. Hey, in case you didn't know, I made reservations to celebrate our 10th anniversary at the B&B at which we stayed for our honeymoon, and then our first anniversary as well, but more on that later.
Okay, I am editing, and I just read "I HAD to buy them..." I am just scary manic-y right now. I don't get really full blown manias, but I can get mild ones. I am blowing off adrenaline, ugh (blowing out air, kind of like a canine adrenaline shake). BAD.
I am still going. I also bought a pair of little turtle earrings, but I bought them because they were pretty stones that really didn't look much like turtles (if they had been OBVIOUS I wouldn't have liked them).
And Ladies, she also plans expenditures into the future: We celebrate our 10th anniversary July 21, 2011. We had a super short (2 days), but super luxurious honeymoon, and we stayed at the Jabberwock Inn, which fit in with our Mad Hatter's Tea Party wedding theme, perfectly. Then my parents gave us two nights the next year at the same place as a first anniversary gift. Although they had helped pay for the wedding, that was kind of our official wedding gift from them. July seems far off, but I was alarmed to see that July was already filling up; the weekends before and after our anniversary were full. BUT, if I had us stay the night before and the night of our anniversary, we could stay in any room we wanted. Both times we have stayed in the past, we have stayed in the Toves, and of course, I chose that room again.
Here I am in the room's "Secret Garden," on our honeymoon:
Not that I am looking forward to it or anything. Fortunately, it doesn't need to be paid until we check out, and DH wanted to do this too, so we are budgeting for it. We had wanted to go to Hawaii for our 5th, then I had knee surgery instead. We then planned to do it the 10th, but we didn't expect DH to get laid off. We also talked about Australia. Right now, we are shooting for Australia for my 50th birthday. Less than 3 years away. Faint.
Okay, so this weekend was totally a blast. I really had to drag myself out of bed on Saturday morning, because I had just taken a 2 hour nap for all of Friday, and then I got about 5 hours on Saturday morning. I wanted to leave the house to give myself time to get good and lost. DH had set the Nuvi to "gas saving," which meant I took a meandering, hour and 15 minute drive to downtown Oakland. It was interesting, but it took forever. I was still there before check-in started, because I am always early to everything, no matter how lost I get, because I leave so much time to get thoroughly lost. Over-planning. I hate it, but my p-doc doesn't feel it is a pathology. NJ pointed out it is my coping mechanism, and it clearly is. but it is very anxiety inducing, because my mind is always running through contingencies. I catch myself planning magically, sometimes, "If I do this, then that good event will surely follow, so that I can do/have this desired thing." My p-doc says I need to be really mindful of that kind of thinking, using the word "mindful" in a very specific, OCD context.
Augh, tangents much? But this is both my natural style, and exacerbated by the hypo. Anyway, I was early, but the school bookstore was one block over, and I went there to buy our required books. Which we did not touch, the entire weekend. But I know I will use them. I also bought a "Yes on Prop 19" t-shirt in green on black, with a CA bear in silhouette, Fuck Medicann, they really are drumming up fear needlessly, I support the proposition. I was relieved to find out that the position of the school is to support 19. I support Medicann's overall mission, but I think their politics reeks of profit motive. Ha, reek is an apt term for the Cannabis debate.
We checked in starting at about 9:20, and they gave us a binder for class, a DVD, a CD or DVD (don't know which yet), in addition to the temporary student ID, which gave us access to the school and the Student Union. More on the Student Union in a bit. Then they sent us upstairs, to poke around the grow room while they were setting up our classroom. There were plants at all stages of development, including vegetative plants, grown purely for clones, and that never flower because they aren't really allowed to. I noticed they watered the plants less than we had, or at any rate, they let the leaves wilt a bit, which I learned about later.
I won't go into detail, because I really want to, which I know would be deadly. The Saturday syllabus started with politic & history, which I mostly knew. Then legal, with a really good criminal defense attorney. I learned a ton, and most of the people there therefore learned more than they could absorb. I was the only attorney, I found out, so if I was learning stuff, a lot of stuff flew right over peoples' heads (and I could tell from questions, a lot of it did). I asked a question about conspiracy, because apparently, I could be charged with conspiracy for being a member of a collective: I wanted to know what the "act in furtherance" of committing a crime would be, and he said the DA never got further than charges (i.e., they don't meet all the elements for "criminal conspiracy.") it is pure harassment.
I have to remember to email him about Terry Stops.
Then lunch. I ate in the little school cafe, had half a B.L.A.T. sandwich, put the other half in my trunk (it was chilly). Then I went upstairs, and looked over my notes, because I am the nerdiest nerd of the nerdlets. I was told about the student union, but I for some reason didn't head over on Saturday. I was the only person there that "looked over my notes," I was the only one geeky enough to think to do something like that. Law school, it has beaten me into submission. I may have sucked at exams, but boy did I study. I knew I could medicate at the Student Union, but I didn't feel like it, and I was afraid I would get too sleepy, which happened even without pot, just from eating. Some of the people from out of state were totally wowed by the fact that people were openly using. I found out the next day it was something like a "Buyers Club," San Francisco style, which we do not have in the South Bay at. all.
Anyway, then we had a half hour of Civics. A really shitty half hour, where we didn't learn anything remotely having to do with Civics. I have no idea what they think the word "Civics" mean, they seemed to think it had to do with personal conduct. We actually had covered some Civics in the Politics segment, but geez. I actually liked the woman who taught that when she taught a different segment, but that was awful. And I truly adore Civics. I fucking taught Civics. Then for the next three hours, we had horticulture lecture and horticulture lab. I have tons of information from both sessions, but it was VERY dry. That was when it was hard to stay awake.
That was it for the day, and I over-ruled the GPS receiver, and found 880S as fast as I could. It was still heavier traffic than I expected from a Saturday evening, but it was SO much faster. So I had DH reprogram the Nuvi to go "fastest route." I realized that the Prius actually conserved gas better driving the opposite way of the standard engine, so it was actually using less gas to drive on the freeway all the way. Anyway, DH was still feeling wonky from the previous day's seizure, so I just had the other half of my BLAT and some oatmeal (I now always have a pot of steel cut oats in the fridge, since I found that overnight method. I am eating oatmeal 4 or 5 times a week, I figure that can't be that unhealthy. And it is very filling.
I was energized and exhausted at the same time. As little sleep as I have gotten in the previous 72 hours, I am still having trouble settling down. Of course, that is partially my mood, but I also know this feeling from previous activism trainings. God, I love grassroots activism, I had TOTALLY forgotten how amazing it feels.
So I forgot to take pictures of my clothes either day this weekend, and I have pictures of earlier things to post, but that can be a later jumping-off point. Saturday, I wore my new green mandarin-collared 3/4 sleeve cotton under a very simple but very nice black long sleeved cotton sweater, with those rolled sleeve ends and neck. I wore my black boots with the buckles that actually fit my calves, my sparkly bracelet and earrings, and my calla lily pendant. And jeans. Even with a sweater, it was COLD in th classroom, so today I wore a white LL Bean (!!) mandarin color placket front long-sleeved blouse (I was goin' Old Skool Prep). and an ancient Royal Silk raw silk tweedy coat, that is really warm. It got soaked in the rain today, so off to the dry cleaner it goes, bleah. I also wore my new lace and satin scarf/tie. The predominant color in the blazer was brown, and it was nubby, and has flecks of lots of colors, so the scarf looked really nice with it, if I do say so myself. And jeans. Oh, and my brown pull on boots, with the velvet and tweed trim. Earrings, Silver Tudor Roses, Navajo stone inlay and silver pendant necklace, funky geometric charm bracelet. I looked MAH-velous.
So Things I Learned on Day One: Sit at the end of the row, so you don't have to climb over others when you have to pee every 7.5 minutes. Don't sit next to woman from Florida who wants to talk about real estate. Adults are often shitty students.
Oh, and this was interesting: a classmate started making an Admission Against Interest to a a lawyer as all three of us stood around talking about some legal niceties of the size of grows. The lawyer knew I was a lawyer, and gave me a panicked look, and quickly said, "Well, you really shouldn't talk about this type of information in a public place, you need to call me so we can talk confidentially. And the guy said, "Okay," and then continued to make further admissions. The lawyer gave me another look, and I told him I would email my question, and I got the hell out of there.
Sunday started with methods of ingestion, which was AMAZING. I know that sounds insane, but I learned tons of different ways to prepare cannabis for people with different medical prohibitions. People who can't smoke, can't keep food down, allergic to nuts (lots of nuts in pot cooking), tincture, gel caps.... We learned how to make hash a couple of different ways, as well as keef. I mean, it takes some equipment, but not as much as you would think, and even I could construct some of the equipment myself to make keef, and I am a klutz. The drawback, of course, is you need to start out with large quantities of plant material. Sometimes the buds, sometimes the rest of the plant, but a LOT of it. I think if you are an alum, you pretty much have access to any remains of harvests that they don't want to use, on a first come first serve, but there were several cross-communications during the weekend, so I could have misunderstood that.
Then after a 10 minute break, we had "Cooking with Aunt Sandy." More awesomeness. I actually had already signed up for a class of hers in two weeks, I had already heard great things about her not only from Oaksterdam students, but people at dispensaries who sell her stuff. Cannabinoids are fat soluble, so to release them you need to heat them in butter, or really unhealthy vegetable oil (the fattier, the better). She was hilarious, too. She crowed about how fucked up she had gotten some of her customers, and apparently Cannabis is a staple in her home-cooking. For instance, when she makes bread, right before she sets it to rise, she entirely coats it in ground plant matter (it is like flour), then lets it rise. Then serve with cannabutter. We also talked about ratios and dosages. When she makes cannabutter, at the end there is water that has separated from the chilled butter, and she cooks kraft macaroni in it, and makes mac&cheese with cannabutter. The class I am taking I will be learning how to make cannabutter, how to infuse a turkey with butter, and how to make a kick-ass stuffing. FUN! I decided not to enroll in the second part, Advanced Basic, until next year. My take home test from this weekend is due the Monday after that weekend, and I was TIRED after classes each day, so I decided I would do something more fun, but still useful.
I am surprised at how much edibles interested me. I would never ever be able to cook in my kitchen, the health department would have to set the house on fire to help bring it in compliance with health standards. But they *just* are opening a commercial kitchen on the 3rd floor (this is their new building: First floor, admin, second floor, grow room and classroom, third floor commercial kitchen, and either another classroom or another grow room. I am going to guess grow room, they have other classroom options. But that is something I might want to pursue, since I am assuming I would be working in a regulated kitchen, not my own. I want to be involved in a grow, just to go through the paces. I am pretty sure if cloning is as easy as I think, I should learn that.
So after cooking class, we went to lunch at the Student Union. I am not even sure I am going to go into all that was going on, but basically: A room, you need a student ID, or to be accompanied by a student, and pay 5 dollars, to enter. It is pretty big, divided into pool and foosball, a flatscreen with tables to sit at, eat, and watch, more cocktail-y tables for people who wanted to socialize. And of course, there was cannabis. First of all, they sell it there, and at a slight discount with student id (slight, but I am not complaining). Not in huge quantities, just a few strains, some edibles, and they also sell one strain of hash (a pretty good one, though). Because it was very crowded when I got there, I didn't get the whole picture, but later, we ended up having some classes there (more to come), and I saw the layout: Each table has two community bags of bud (I would guess 3 or 4 grams a bag). Also, two grinders, a water pipe, a hand held vaporizer, a pipe, a Volcano vaporizer bag, lighters, ashtrays, and rolling papers. People just leave little piles of roaches and bowls of pot that they decided they didn't want. I bought a little for the novelty of smoking so socially (in a public place), a White Widow (Indica) /Train Wreck (Sativa) hybrid, hybrids work best for me, and this was lighter than the pure indicas which are for heavy pain.
Anyway, I bought a few grams, and went over to one of the shelves they have for you to "work" on assembling whatever method you use. They use guitar picks as a drug tool, it is funny what people end up commandeering as paraphenalia, So just as I was grinding some up, a man next to me said, "Oh, I'm leaving, and I don't want to take that small an amount, you take it. So that was a bowl. I used a water pipe, which I don't like, but the vaporizers were swamped, because everyone wanted to try a Volcano (a super expensive, but highly coveted model; we would love one someday). I borrowed a lighter. I usually only use them for hash, so I was overwhelmed for a second by the sheer quantity of smoke that came up (do you know smoking a joint is better for your lungs than through a water pipe? You filter cancer fighting cannabinoids with the water!
But my instinct when all the smoke started pouring out was to draw too hard, and water flew up the pipe, a bit got into my mouth, and SOME SPILLED ON MY BEAUTIFUL NEW SCARF! I ran to the bathroom and rinsed it, silk is pretty durable, and I just had to pray about the lace, because I couldn't wear a bong-water scented piece of clothing. Fortunately, it came out, because I got it literally within a minute, it didn't really even have time to saturate. So I looked very suave.
There was a member there who was basically strapped to a wheelchair with a plastic molded frame tied to the back of his chair to keep him upright. He is paralyzed from the chest down (motorcycle accident), and his mother picked them up and moved them to California so he could get Medical Cannabis for his pain and neuropathy, not to mention PTSD. So as a thank you to the Oaksterdam community, she makes a lunch every Sunday, to go with whatever sporting event is on the flat screen. Today it was football, and we had wings and potato salad. So I had one more bowl, and then headed back to class. As I was walking back, I passed a horrible accident: I am not sure how the cars ended up in the positions the did, but one was facing in the wrong direction on the one way street, with it's left bumper deep into a parked car's rear driver side, and another car was dragged into it, and slammed a transformer. So all the power went out, and we weren't allowed to go back to our classroom because of fire codes.
So they quickly divided the Student Union in two, and we had class on one side. Our books, the slides, our notebooks, were al in the other building. So we got pads to take notes on. I was annoyed, I don't like notes from one class scattered. So I literally came home and taped the pages rom the pad into my notebook, in order.
It was weird being in class as people passed joints and paraphenalia back and forth in front of you (we couldn't have done this in the classroom building). I couldn't even smell any pot anymore, and we were warned to take a few minutes after class to make sure we hadn't gotten a little high just from being in the room.
The kicker? You want to smoke a cigarette? Outside with you, that's disgusting. :)
So then we had the "science" class, which was a Dr. (he said what field, I have zoned) who is the US specialist on cannabis, used in court, involved in studies in 5 countries, blah di blah. He taught me a lot about how the FDA works, and how that handicaps cannabis. One of the discussions was the LD50 rate: An LD50 is a dose of a medication that would be lethal in 50% of the population. so of course, you want your LD50 to be a huge number, and as he said, "They finally found the lethal dose for a rat was dropping a 25 Kilo bale of pot on it from a height of several feet." I knew this. Then one guy started in on the psychosis/cannabis connection. Cannabis finds schizophrenia and bipolar illness by precipitating first psychoses in people who would almost certainly have had another psychotic within a few years. This consensus is held WIDELY among p-docs, There are lots of reasons they may not want their patient using cannabis, but MJ doesn't create psychoses in an otherwise neurotypical person.
This man insisted that his friends had been very heavy smokers, quit to lower their tolerance (to save money), and then when they started smoking again a few months later, they became psychotic, and it had to be the pot, and his mother was a p-doc in the NV prison system, so she knows. A prison psychiatrist, how prestigious (oh, I am a bitch). So *I* said, "My dad is a psychopharmacologist, and he finds that a lot of his schizophrenic and bipolar patients self medicate with pot. AS WITH ANY PSYCHIATRIC DRUG, stopping and starting it can ruin its effectiveness, or even cause paradoxical reactions. This is not uncommon. The Dr. lecturing agreed with me, but the other guy was like, "Well, that's not what my mother says." I get all snotty and bitchy internally, and want to say things like, "Okay, lets get my Harvard and Yale educated, world renowned research, clinician, and forensic psychiatrist, and have him debate your mom, who works in Nevada's prison system. Please. In the meantime, I'll sell tickets.
After the science discussion, we had a brief fund-raising and advocacy class. My problem is that I only feel comfortable asking for money for a cause face to face with the person, I don't like phone calls or mailings. But I've done it, I'll do it again.
I feel so energized and excited. I feel the way I did after every HIV education training clinic, every political strategy discussion, oh my god, what have I been doing for the last 10 years? Well, 9, to be totally fair.
I am sure there is more, but I am starting to tire, it will take me years to proof this, before I post it. So I am wrapping up.
As you can imagine, Harvard graduation is a pretty ritualized and pompous affair. One of the things that is a tradition is that they have a set phrase to confer a degree, en masse, to each particular school. The sentence that conferred my A.B., and all the A.B.s in recent memory (I can't find a start date, but my dad, uncles, and cousins all had the same phrase): "Welcome to the Fellowship of Educated Men and Women." Snotty, no? But once again, I have entered another educational fellowship. Snarf.
Well Friday started off with a bang. I didn't sleep. at. all. Then at 5:45, half an hour before his alarm, DH had a short but violent seizure. I forbade his leaving the house, so he telecommuted. That was good, he was able to get some work done, but also nap a lot. After a seizure, all the energy is just sucked out of him.
I have to "come out" and admit that I am on a spending jag, as if you couldn't tell. The amounts per item have gone up. I really shouldn't seek out and enjoy this kind of "high," but it is really hard to self-report when you feel really good, even if you know that you should be really careful. DH usually says something if he thinks things are getting out of control, and he isn't thrilled with my spending at the moment. I am admittedly a very indulged wife, and I feel less guilty about it than I should, because it makes DH happy to indulge me. I think I am pushing it. I have a bunch of stuff that was "approved" by him still coming, so hopefully, anticipation of those items (BEDDING! WHOOHOOO!) that will help me keep from spending, I hope.
I also have purchased Sister2's birthday present, which was the regular "birthday amount," so while I am early, I thought she would really like what I got her I went to Eni-Thing's Fall Festival, which is like Etsy on wheels. I bought too much. I bought a hooded scarf for Sister2. She lives in Dallas, which gets chilly, but not freezing. She is quite fashionable (she is in the buying dept. for Neiman-Marcus, so duh), and I think she will like it, she likes to be different. I have been good at guessing for her in the past, even though I suck at choosing clothes personally.:
BUT, from the same woman who made the hooded scarf, I bought a gorgeous, unusual scarf, which is very heavy, intricate grey lace on one side, lined with brown silk on the other; there is a slot in the silk through which you slip the other end of the scarf, and you can wear it that way, or pull it through again, so you have more of a tie knot. I wore it Sunday, more on that in a bit. It cost the most I have ever paid for that kind of accessory, like lower end Anthropologie. But so pretty, it would have cost much more at Anthropologie if they sold it. I bought a pad for dollar, so that was okay. I bought a sympathy card for the Kass family, now I have to think of what to write. I think I will get a breast cancer stamp in her honor. There were two other things I really had to combat myself over. One was an Alice painting I knew DH would hate, and would refuse to hang. The other was this purse, which while inexpensive for a purse, was nonetheless too much money. Jen, I think you would like this, the leather is much nicer than the picture looks, and the closure is something like Lucite not cheapo plastic.
I bought a sparkly bracelet and earrings because they were shiiineee. Sometimes I really don't like that organic brain syndromes are so uniform. Shiiineeee. I wore both of them Saturday, and they looked cute with the Calla Lilly pendant that I bought at the OCF. Sorry, I am afraid this picture is huge:
I also bought a necklace I have been coveting, and to which I already have a matching pair of earrings, all by Kerfuffle (can't find a website). I bought the center one; the chain is in three parts, one that is like coins, one that is just chain, and one that is crystals (the crystals are hidden by the far right one. The pendant has a rose, I am very into roses at the moment.
That isn't all. I bought a pair of hairpins, one has the Mad Hatter hat, and the other the Cheshire cat. I mean come on, I HAD to buy them, I'll wear them, as well as my ceramic Alice pendant when we stay at the Jabberwock Inn in Monterey. Hey, in case you didn't know, I made reservations to celebrate our 10th anniversary at the B&B at which we stayed for our honeymoon, and then our first anniversary as well, but more on that later.
Okay, I am editing, and I just read "I HAD to buy them..." I am just scary manic-y right now. I don't get really full blown manias, but I can get mild ones. I am blowing off adrenaline, ugh (blowing out air, kind of like a canine adrenaline shake). BAD.
I am still going. I also bought a pair of little turtle earrings, but I bought them because they were pretty stones that really didn't look much like turtles (if they had been OBVIOUS I wouldn't have liked them).
And Ladies, she also plans expenditures into the future: We celebrate our 10th anniversary July 21, 2011. We had a super short (2 days), but super luxurious honeymoon, and we stayed at the Jabberwock Inn, which fit in with our Mad Hatter's Tea Party wedding theme, perfectly. Then my parents gave us two nights the next year at the same place as a first anniversary gift. Although they had helped pay for the wedding, that was kind of our official wedding gift from them. July seems far off, but I was alarmed to see that July was already filling up; the weekends before and after our anniversary were full. BUT, if I had us stay the night before and the night of our anniversary, we could stay in any room we wanted. Both times we have stayed in the past, we have stayed in the Toves, and of course, I chose that room again.
Here I am in the room's "Secret Garden," on our honeymoon:
Not that I am looking forward to it or anything. Fortunately, it doesn't need to be paid until we check out, and DH wanted to do this too, so we are budgeting for it. We had wanted to go to Hawaii for our 5th, then I had knee surgery instead. We then planned to do it the 10th, but we didn't expect DH to get laid off. We also talked about Australia. Right now, we are shooting for Australia for my 50th birthday. Less than 3 years away. Faint.
Okay, so this weekend was totally a blast. I really had to drag myself out of bed on Saturday morning, because I had just taken a 2 hour nap for all of Friday, and then I got about 5 hours on Saturday morning. I wanted to leave the house to give myself time to get good and lost. DH had set the Nuvi to "gas saving," which meant I took a meandering, hour and 15 minute drive to downtown Oakland. It was interesting, but it took forever. I was still there before check-in started, because I am always early to everything, no matter how lost I get, because I leave so much time to get thoroughly lost. Over-planning. I hate it, but my p-doc doesn't feel it is a pathology. NJ pointed out it is my coping mechanism, and it clearly is. but it is very anxiety inducing, because my mind is always running through contingencies. I catch myself planning magically, sometimes, "If I do this, then that good event will surely follow, so that I can do/have this desired thing." My p-doc says I need to be really mindful of that kind of thinking, using the word "mindful" in a very specific, OCD context.
Augh, tangents much? But this is both my natural style, and exacerbated by the hypo. Anyway, I was early, but the school bookstore was one block over, and I went there to buy our required books. Which we did not touch, the entire weekend. But I know I will use them. I also bought a "Yes on Prop 19" t-shirt in green on black, with a CA bear in silhouette, Fuck Medicann, they really are drumming up fear needlessly, I support the proposition. I was relieved to find out that the position of the school is to support 19. I support Medicann's overall mission, but I think their politics reeks of profit motive. Ha, reek is an apt term for the Cannabis debate.
We checked in starting at about 9:20, and they gave us a binder for class, a DVD, a CD or DVD (don't know which yet), in addition to the temporary student ID, which gave us access to the school and the Student Union. More on the Student Union in a bit. Then they sent us upstairs, to poke around the grow room while they were setting up our classroom. There were plants at all stages of development, including vegetative plants, grown purely for clones, and that never flower because they aren't really allowed to. I noticed they watered the plants less than we had, or at any rate, they let the leaves wilt a bit, which I learned about later.
I won't go into detail, because I really want to, which I know would be deadly. The Saturday syllabus started with politic & history, which I mostly knew. Then legal, with a really good criminal defense attorney. I learned a ton, and most of the people there therefore learned more than they could absorb. I was the only attorney, I found out, so if I was learning stuff, a lot of stuff flew right over peoples' heads (and I could tell from questions, a lot of it did). I asked a question about conspiracy, because apparently, I could be charged with conspiracy for being a member of a collective: I wanted to know what the "act in furtherance" of committing a crime would be, and he said the DA never got further than charges (i.e., they don't meet all the elements for "criminal conspiracy.") it is pure harassment.
I have to remember to email him about Terry Stops.
Then lunch. I ate in the little school cafe, had half a B.L.A.T. sandwich, put the other half in my trunk (it was chilly). Then I went upstairs, and looked over my notes, because I am the nerdiest nerd of the nerdlets. I was told about the student union, but I for some reason didn't head over on Saturday. I was the only person there that "looked over my notes," I was the only one geeky enough to think to do something like that. Law school, it has beaten me into submission. I may have sucked at exams, but boy did I study. I knew I could medicate at the Student Union, but I didn't feel like it, and I was afraid I would get too sleepy, which happened even without pot, just from eating. Some of the people from out of state were totally wowed by the fact that people were openly using. I found out the next day it was something like a "Buyers Club," San Francisco style, which we do not have in the South Bay at. all.
Anyway, then we had a half hour of Civics. A really shitty half hour, where we didn't learn anything remotely having to do with Civics. I have no idea what they think the word "Civics" mean, they seemed to think it had to do with personal conduct. We actually had covered some Civics in the Politics segment, but geez. I actually liked the woman who taught that when she taught a different segment, but that was awful. And I truly adore Civics. I fucking taught Civics. Then for the next three hours, we had horticulture lecture and horticulture lab. I have tons of information from both sessions, but it was VERY dry. That was when it was hard to stay awake.
That was it for the day, and I over-ruled the GPS receiver, and found 880S as fast as I could. It was still heavier traffic than I expected from a Saturday evening, but it was SO much faster. So I had DH reprogram the Nuvi to go "fastest route." I realized that the Prius actually conserved gas better driving the opposite way of the standard engine, so it was actually using less gas to drive on the freeway all the way. Anyway, DH was still feeling wonky from the previous day's seizure, so I just had the other half of my BLAT and some oatmeal (I now always have a pot of steel cut oats in the fridge, since I found that overnight method. I am eating oatmeal 4 or 5 times a week, I figure that can't be that unhealthy. And it is very filling.
I was energized and exhausted at the same time. As little sleep as I have gotten in the previous 72 hours, I am still having trouble settling down. Of course, that is partially my mood, but I also know this feeling from previous activism trainings. God, I love grassroots activism, I had TOTALLY forgotten how amazing it feels.
So I forgot to take pictures of my clothes either day this weekend, and I have pictures of earlier things to post, but that can be a later jumping-off point. Saturday, I wore my new green mandarin-collared 3/4 sleeve cotton under a very simple but very nice black long sleeved cotton sweater, with those rolled sleeve ends and neck. I wore my black boots with the buckles that actually fit my calves, my sparkly bracelet and earrings, and my calla lily pendant. And jeans. Even with a sweater, it was COLD in th classroom, so today I wore a white LL Bean (!!) mandarin color placket front long-sleeved blouse (I was goin' Old Skool Prep). and an ancient Royal Silk raw silk tweedy coat, that is really warm. It got soaked in the rain today, so off to the dry cleaner it goes, bleah. I also wore my new lace and satin scarf/tie. The predominant color in the blazer was brown, and it was nubby, and has flecks of lots of colors, so the scarf looked really nice with it, if I do say so myself. And jeans. Oh, and my brown pull on boots, with the velvet and tweed trim. Earrings, Silver Tudor Roses, Navajo stone inlay and silver pendant necklace, funky geometric charm bracelet. I looked MAH-velous.
So Things I Learned on Day One: Sit at the end of the row, so you don't have to climb over others when you have to pee every 7.5 minutes. Don't sit next to woman from Florida who wants to talk about real estate. Adults are often shitty students.
Oh, and this was interesting: a classmate started making an Admission Against Interest to a a lawyer as all three of us stood around talking about some legal niceties of the size of grows. The lawyer knew I was a lawyer, and gave me a panicked look, and quickly said, "Well, you really shouldn't talk about this type of information in a public place, you need to call me so we can talk confidentially. And the guy said, "Okay," and then continued to make further admissions. The lawyer gave me another look, and I told him I would email my question, and I got the hell out of there.
Sunday started with methods of ingestion, which was AMAZING. I know that sounds insane, but I learned tons of different ways to prepare cannabis for people with different medical prohibitions. People who can't smoke, can't keep food down, allergic to nuts (lots of nuts in pot cooking), tincture, gel caps.... We learned how to make hash a couple of different ways, as well as keef. I mean, it takes some equipment, but not as much as you would think, and even I could construct some of the equipment myself to make keef, and I am a klutz. The drawback, of course, is you need to start out with large quantities of plant material. Sometimes the buds, sometimes the rest of the plant, but a LOT of it. I think if you are an alum, you pretty much have access to any remains of harvests that they don't want to use, on a first come first serve, but there were several cross-communications during the weekend, so I could have misunderstood that.
Then after a 10 minute break, we had "Cooking with Aunt Sandy." More awesomeness. I actually had already signed up for a class of hers in two weeks, I had already heard great things about her not only from Oaksterdam students, but people at dispensaries who sell her stuff. Cannabinoids are fat soluble, so to release them you need to heat them in butter, or really unhealthy vegetable oil (the fattier, the better). She was hilarious, too. She crowed about how fucked up she had gotten some of her customers, and apparently Cannabis is a staple in her home-cooking. For instance, when she makes bread, right before she sets it to rise, she entirely coats it in ground plant matter (it is like flour), then lets it rise. Then serve with cannabutter. We also talked about ratios and dosages. When she makes cannabutter, at the end there is water that has separated from the chilled butter, and she cooks kraft macaroni in it, and makes mac&cheese with cannabutter. The class I am taking I will be learning how to make cannabutter, how to infuse a turkey with butter, and how to make a kick-ass stuffing. FUN! I decided not to enroll in the second part, Advanced Basic, until next year. My take home test from this weekend is due the Monday after that weekend, and I was TIRED after classes each day, so I decided I would do something more fun, but still useful.
I am surprised at how much edibles interested me. I would never ever be able to cook in my kitchen, the health department would have to set the house on fire to help bring it in compliance with health standards. But they *just* are opening a commercial kitchen on the 3rd floor (this is their new building: First floor, admin, second floor, grow room and classroom, third floor commercial kitchen, and either another classroom or another grow room. I am going to guess grow room, they have other classroom options. But that is something I might want to pursue, since I am assuming I would be working in a regulated kitchen, not my own. I want to be involved in a grow, just to go through the paces. I am pretty sure if cloning is as easy as I think, I should learn that.
So after cooking class, we went to lunch at the Student Union. I am not even sure I am going to go into all that was going on, but basically: A room, you need a student ID, or to be accompanied by a student, and pay 5 dollars, to enter. It is pretty big, divided into pool and foosball, a flatscreen with tables to sit at, eat, and watch, more cocktail-y tables for people who wanted to socialize. And of course, there was cannabis. First of all, they sell it there, and at a slight discount with student id (slight, but I am not complaining). Not in huge quantities, just a few strains, some edibles, and they also sell one strain of hash (a pretty good one, though). Because it was very crowded when I got there, I didn't get the whole picture, but later, we ended up having some classes there (more to come), and I saw the layout: Each table has two community bags of bud (I would guess 3 or 4 grams a bag). Also, two grinders, a water pipe, a hand held vaporizer, a pipe, a Volcano vaporizer bag, lighters, ashtrays, and rolling papers. People just leave little piles of roaches and bowls of pot that they decided they didn't want. I bought a little for the novelty of smoking so socially (in a public place), a White Widow (Indica) /Train Wreck (Sativa) hybrid, hybrids work best for me, and this was lighter than the pure indicas which are for heavy pain.
Anyway, I bought a few grams, and went over to one of the shelves they have for you to "work" on assembling whatever method you use. They use guitar picks as a drug tool, it is funny what people end up commandeering as paraphenalia, So just as I was grinding some up, a man next to me said, "Oh, I'm leaving, and I don't want to take that small an amount, you take it. So that was a bowl. I used a water pipe, which I don't like, but the vaporizers were swamped, because everyone wanted to try a Volcano (a super expensive, but highly coveted model; we would love one someday). I borrowed a lighter. I usually only use them for hash, so I was overwhelmed for a second by the sheer quantity of smoke that came up (do you know smoking a joint is better for your lungs than through a water pipe? You filter cancer fighting cannabinoids with the water!
But my instinct when all the smoke started pouring out was to draw too hard, and water flew up the pipe, a bit got into my mouth, and SOME SPILLED ON MY BEAUTIFUL NEW SCARF! I ran to the bathroom and rinsed it, silk is pretty durable, and I just had to pray about the lace, because I couldn't wear a bong-water scented piece of clothing. Fortunately, it came out, because I got it literally within a minute, it didn't really even have time to saturate. So I looked very suave.
There was a member there who was basically strapped to a wheelchair with a plastic molded frame tied to the back of his chair to keep him upright. He is paralyzed from the chest down (motorcycle accident), and his mother picked them up and moved them to California so he could get Medical Cannabis for his pain and neuropathy, not to mention PTSD. So as a thank you to the Oaksterdam community, she makes a lunch every Sunday, to go with whatever sporting event is on the flat screen. Today it was football, and we had wings and potato salad. So I had one more bowl, and then headed back to class. As I was walking back, I passed a horrible accident: I am not sure how the cars ended up in the positions the did, but one was facing in the wrong direction on the one way street, with it's left bumper deep into a parked car's rear driver side, and another car was dragged into it, and slammed a transformer. So all the power went out, and we weren't allowed to go back to our classroom because of fire codes.
So they quickly divided the Student Union in two, and we had class on one side. Our books, the slides, our notebooks, were al in the other building. So we got pads to take notes on. I was annoyed, I don't like notes from one class scattered. So I literally came home and taped the pages rom the pad into my notebook, in order.
It was weird being in class as people passed joints and paraphenalia back and forth in front of you (we couldn't have done this in the classroom building). I couldn't even smell any pot anymore, and we were warned to take a few minutes after class to make sure we hadn't gotten a little high just from being in the room.
The kicker? You want to smoke a cigarette? Outside with you, that's disgusting. :)
So then we had the "science" class, which was a Dr. (he said what field, I have zoned) who is the US specialist on cannabis, used in court, involved in studies in 5 countries, blah di blah. He taught me a lot about how the FDA works, and how that handicaps cannabis. One of the discussions was the LD50 rate: An LD50 is a dose of a medication that would be lethal in 50% of the population. so of course, you want your LD50 to be a huge number, and as he said, "They finally found the lethal dose for a rat was dropping a 25 Kilo bale of pot on it from a height of several feet." I knew this. Then one guy started in on the psychosis/cannabis connection. Cannabis finds schizophrenia and bipolar illness by precipitating first psychoses in people who would almost certainly have had another psychotic within a few years. This consensus is held WIDELY among p-docs, There are lots of reasons they may not want their patient using cannabis, but MJ doesn't create psychoses in an otherwise neurotypical person.
This man insisted that his friends had been very heavy smokers, quit to lower their tolerance (to save money), and then when they started smoking again a few months later, they became psychotic, and it had to be the pot, and his mother was a p-doc in the NV prison system, so she knows. A prison psychiatrist, how prestigious (oh, I am a bitch). So *I* said, "My dad is a psychopharmacologist, and he finds that a lot of his schizophrenic and bipolar patients self medicate with pot. AS WITH ANY PSYCHIATRIC DRUG, stopping and starting it can ruin its effectiveness, or even cause paradoxical reactions. This is not uncommon. The Dr. lecturing agreed with me, but the other guy was like, "Well, that's not what my mother says." I get all snotty and bitchy internally, and want to say things like, "Okay, lets get my Harvard and Yale educated, world renowned research, clinician, and forensic psychiatrist, and have him debate your mom, who works in Nevada's prison system. Please. In the meantime, I'll sell tickets.
After the science discussion, we had a brief fund-raising and advocacy class. My problem is that I only feel comfortable asking for money for a cause face to face with the person, I don't like phone calls or mailings. But I've done it, I'll do it again.
I feel so energized and excited. I feel the way I did after every HIV education training clinic, every political strategy discussion, oh my god, what have I been doing for the last 10 years? Well, 9, to be totally fair.
I am sure there is more, but I am starting to tire, it will take me years to proof this, before I post it. So I am wrapping up.
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