the blogspot is here to stay

Yesterday I purchased a custom domain.  Or so I thought.  I swear I went all through the process of purchasing www.nearnormalcy.com.  So I could be like a real blogger, a serious professional blogger with a real website instead of a blogspot like all the teenagers blogging about Justin Beiber or whatever.  (No offense to any of my readers who are authors of Justin Beiber blogs.  I LOVE you guys.)

But it didn't work, and my blog got all wonky and weird, and I had to enlist the technical assistance of my husband, and he discovered that there is no evidence whatsoever that I actually purchased any domain yesterday, and I am an idiot.  So we're back publishing at blogspot.nearnormalcy.com. [EDIT: no we're not. We're at nearnormalcy.blogspot.com, ok?  Thanks, Mom, for pointing that out.]

You would think that I would just go and purchase my domain correctly this time and try again, right?  Well, if you were thinking that, it's because you've never met my husband, tHe Original Guido, who upon discovering that I had blown (or failed to blow) a mind-boggling $10 on a custom domain, forbade me from repurchasing it because "nobody even reads this thing yet besides your mom anyway" and "it's the exact same thing, who cares if it says blogspot" and "you're paying $10 for nothing" and "remember www.cakesbyalyssa.com?  yeah?  what happened to that?" and "you've only had this blog a week, how many other writing projects have you started and never finished?" and a number of other totally unfounded and irrational and generally unsupportive* arguments.

So, what I took from this conversation is that I can buy www.nearnormalcy.com as soon as I have an established reader base of people I don't know in real life.  What I'm saying is, subscribe to this blog, and tell your friends, especially if you/they don't know me in real life, so tHe O.G. will have to crawl at my feet and beg forgiveness for not believing in me.

Also:  Please do not purchase my domain of choice in the interim, ok?  That would be way harsh, you guys.  Just don't.

*Even though he's unsupportive and mean and hates my blog and wants me to fail and secretly plots my creative and professional demise in his free time, he has his redeeming qualities, ok?  I mean, don't like, hate him on my behalf or anything.  I'll write about all his good qualities some other time.  If they're funny and entertaining. Mostly it's the bad qualities that are entertaining though, right?  Yeah.  So, grain of salt, people.

Owling. Planking.

Yesterday The Bloggess tweeted the following:

I don't understand the allure of "owling". We're doing deep knee bends in the name of whimsy? Shenanigans. 

Next up, fanciful lunges and capricious squat-thrusts. And probably something involving chin-ups. Whimsical chin-ups.

I read it six times trying to figure out what she was talking about, then actually had to google "owling."  Owling??  What is that??  Google informed me that "owling is the new planking."  Planking??  What on earth?  I don't even know what the old planking is!  And there's already a new planking?

So then I tweeted that I'd had to google these things and I felt old and out of touch.

Then THIS happened:

my MOTHER:  "I knew what owling and planking were before you did."

me: "Oh thanks. Now I'm infinitely more pathetic than originally suspected."

mom:  "It was on the news."

So.  I'm not young or cool enough to just know what these things are, and I'm not grownup enough to watch the news on a regular basis.


Sidenote:  Who watches the news?  Isn't that why we have the Internet, so we can read the news when we're supposed to be working and spend our valuable TV time watching Tosh.0 and random airings of Encino Man?


Side-sidenote:  Yes, as a matter of fact I am watching Encino Man right now.  Don't judge.  It's a classic.  You know it is.

So I'm neither young nor grownup, I'm just stuck in this middle grey area, where I'm aware of nothing.  Kind of like a coma.  A pop culture coma.

The good news is, next month I'll be 30, and then I'll be firmly in grownup territory, right??  I mean, won't my TV just automatically set itself to The O'Reilly Factor or Diane Sawyer at that point?  I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

not a post so much as a poll

I've noticed a few people stumbling over the word "normalcy" in the title of my blog.  Maybe it's not quite as clean and easy on the tongue as say, "nearly normal," but that one is taken, folks.  Besides, I like that "normalcy" is a noun, a state of being.  It fits the tagline..."and staying there one Zoloft at a time."  I like that "normalcy" is a "place" you can stay "near."

But who cares what I like?  This is about you, and the tens of thousands of people just like you who are just looking for a blog just like this.  So what do you think?  Does my title need a revamp?

Labels

Blogging for Dummies says I need to label my posts.  With, like, clever categories.  Well, it just says categories, I'm the one insisting they be clever.  Because I care.  Because I'm an overachiever.  Because I place importance on excelling at trivial things in order to distract from all the major failures in my life.

But so far the only category I can think of is "random blog posts that I for one found amusing."

I'll work on it, ok?  Stop pressuring me.

Stay posted.

What I'm reading.

See, folks? This is serious business. I bought a book, so you know I mean it! Actually I buy a book every chance I get so maybe it doesn't really prove anything. Well, trust me, ok? I want to blog for you for a long, long time. And I'm a dummy. I mean that.

Random Blog Prompt Friday

I found myself, after one entire week of blogging, stumped.  So I Googled "blog prompts" and copied and pasted a number of prompts generated by a random blog prompt generator.  And now I'm going to mock answer them.

“If you could change one thing about your blog, what would that one thing be?”
     Lots and lots and lots more people just like you would be reading it.  Also, I would receive a sizable check in the mail each month for writing it.  I'm not clear on where this check would come from, but that's not important.  It's a writing prompt, ok?  I'm just trying to be honest here.

“If you were a doughnut, what kind of doughnut would you be?”
     Wait, seriously?  Do people write entire posts based on this question?!  Dude.  I'm feeling a little betrayed, random blog prompt generator.  I mean, is this all you have for me?
      Chocolate.  Obviously.  With sprinkles.

“How important are spelling and grammar in the world of blogging? Is it the thought that really counts, or does lack of formality destroy the message?”
     Are you kidding me?  If you have to ask, I am never, ever going to read your blog.  Ever.

“Advertising - modern art or brain washing?” 
     Who cares?  Somebody hand me my credit card, I need that.

“How do you feel about paid blogging sites like PayPerPost and Blogitive?”
     Wait.  There paid blogging sites?  And I'm doing this for you people for free?

“I dare you to refresh this page and write about the next shown prompt.” 
     Isn't that what I'm doing here?  I'm refreshing the page, and I'm answering the questions.  I mean, honestly.  If this "I dare you" "prompt" wasn't here, I would be looking at the next prompt right now, and writing about it already.  I would be done writing about it.  So thanks for wasting my time, buddy.  Real nice.

“How has your approach at blogging changed since you first started your blog?” 
     Well, a week ago I didn't have to go to random prompt generators for content.  The bloom is off the rose.

“Are there honest ways to earn money on the internet, or does the real revenue come from "playing expert" and teaching others how to try and make money on the internet?”
     Um....did you get burned by some kind of internet scam?  I'm sorry.

“Why do you write your blog?”
     I haven't figured out how to trick somebody else into writing it for me.  Hey-o!

“List things you are curious about. ”
     Jeggings.  Just...why?
     Why does my hair do that thing in the back that I can't ever fix?
     Do people really think "Love You Forever" is an appropriate book for children?  Really?
     Is anybody still reading this post?  If so, why?

“Did you know that the Arts and Crafts movement is experiencing a comeback in our modern times of rampant consumerism and impersonal craftsmanship?”
     I did not.

 “Remember limericks? Cuplets? Sonnets? Haiku? Choose a form of poetry and write a poem in that form about the day's events.”
     Spent all day at work
     My life ain't haiku-worthy
     Forget it, I'm done

New Tweeter here, Tweeting at a Twitter near you.

I never thought I'd say it, but I'm on Twitter.  I'm Tweeting.  I'm a Tweeter.  Good grief.

Just check me out, would you?  If you're already a member of the tweeting population.  Don't join just for me.  Seriously.  I don't even know what I'm doing.  On the other hand you might find that amusing.  In which case, go right ahead and join just for me.  And laugh at my tweetering idiocy.

Meet the family. None of us has ever appeared on Jersey Shore.

I asked my husband yesterday if I should use his real name here, or a fake one.  Naturally he chose a fake one.  Then I asked him who he wanted to be, and he proceeded to fire off about 20 increasingly ridiculous names at me, starting with Chuck and ending somewhere around Franklin or Balt (?).

He's half-Italian; his real name is an Italian one.  My family has always called him Guido as a joke.  So I said I would call him Guido, except then people were liable to picture him as some Jersey Shore character, which he is not.  (He doesn't have the hair for it.)  So he instructed me to call him...The Original Guido.  The O.G. for short.  Actually, when I asked him, facetiously, if the "The" needed to be capitalized, he specified that it should be lowercase t, capital H, lowercase e.

Oh.  And the entire thing should be italicized.  So meet my husband:  tHe Original Guido.

Yes.  I married this man, and I live with him every day, so you don't have to.  You're welcome.

Then we asked our 5-year-old daughter: "If you could be named something else, what would you choose?"  She looked at us like we were complete idiots, rolled her eyes, and ignored the question.

Meet my daughter:  The Princess.  The best thing about this name is that I can use it ironically, and she won't get it.  So everybody's happy.

Throughout this conversation, our 10-month-old son was chewing frantically on my shoulder with his sharp puppy teeth and growling at me.  He does this.  So he shall be known as the Monster.  Trust me.  It fits.

We also have two dogs, who shall be referred to by their real names, because if you want to stalk my dogs, go right ahead, weirdo: my dog India, who looks like Toto but cuter; and tHe O.G.'s dog Sam, a largely useless chihuahua.

Oh.  And the Princess has a hamster.  Named Giselle.  Giselle the Hamster.  Giselle's main purpose in life is to run loudly on her plastic wheel after the kids have finally gone to bed and tHe O.G. and I are trying to watch a movie in peace for once in our lives and why won't that thing be quiet?!

We don't own any cats, which I realize is unheard of for a blogger.  I'm hoping nobody revokes my right to blog due to lack of cats.  Because I'm simply not getting a cat.  And that's final.

You totally love me.

In news today: we've surpassed 500 total pageviews!  I'm so popular!  Most of you are viewing this page on a Windows machine, using Firefox, though many of you are on your phones.  Yes.  I know all about you.

Also, I have a fan in Australia (Hi, Angela!) and one single solitary pageview from Germany.  I can only assume my German fan tried desperately to read the blog he or she had been hearing so much about, then left devastated that it was unavailable in his or her native tongue.  I'll get right on that, German fan.  Not really.  I don't write German or know anybody who will translate my entire blog for free.  Also, there's only one of you, so frankly, it's not worth the trouble.  Sorry.  Thanks for trying.

But look!  I have pretty heavy traffic coming out of Alaska:

See all that dark green up there??  Who are you, Alaskan reader?  Say hi!  My husband believes you are a "bot," here to "spam" my increasingly popular blog.  Prove him wrong and introduce yourself already.  Unless you are a bot, in which case, please go away.  Nobody here wants to visit your dating site or buy any Viagra.

Wait.  I literally just realized that graphic does not in fact mean anybody from Alaska is reading this.  It's just a graphic showing traffic coming from the United States as a whole, including Alaska only because it's a state.  Obviously.  I mean it's not like I have readers from each and every one of the 48 contiguous states (yet), and those are all green.  I get it now.  Shut up.

Well.  Now I'm bummed.  Why do Alaskans hate me?

As for the rest of you: if you're lurking, please go ahead and subscribe.  It'll make me feel better about myself as a person.  You want me to have self-esteem, don't you?  Don't you?

And please: if you know anybody in Alaska, have them drop by and say hello, and explain to me why their entire state has a personal vendetta against me.  I really don't know what I ever did to them.

In which I overanalyze Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II

Um, spoiler alert, people. (Actually if you don't know how Harry Potter ends, just go away now.  I don't think I want you here.  I have standards.)

Oh, also:  nerd alert.  You've been warned.

So, I keep reading that people had a problem with the way Voldemort just believed Narcissa Malfoy when she told him Harry was dead, and never checked for himself.  This bothers people, because really, you've failed to kill this kid how many times, wouldn't you make sure?  I guess.  I can believe, though, that Voldemort's general, all-around hubris would lead him to believe that none of his henchpersons would dare lie to him, especially a Malfoy since they're so pathetic; really what reason would he have to suspect a sniveling terror-stricken Malfoy of having the guts to lie to his face about such a thing?  So I'll buy that one.

My problem (you knew I had one, right?) is with an earlier death: Snape.  Voldemort believes Snape is the true owner of the Elder Wand.  And says as long as Snape lives, the wand won't be his.  But doesn't he mean that he must be the one to kill Snape, to effectively disarm him and thus claim his wand?  I mean, if Snape fell off a cliff, it's not like his wand would just jump into the service of whoever picked it up, would it?  Don't you have to win the wand?

That certainly seems to be Harry's assertion later, when he explains that the wand belongs to him because he disarmed Draco.  Not even killed: disarmed, and not even while Draco was using the Elder Wand!  So apparently all it takes is a well-placed expelliarmus charm to transfer full ownership of a wand from one wizard to another; clearly it's the disarming, not the death, that matters.  [Totally not the point but wouldn't there just be like, random and chaotic wand-loyalty-transference happening all over the place? These kids have been practicing disarming spells since Year 1!].

Granted, Voldemort didn't know all this, about the disarming being enough.  He's focused on the death.  But still, I would think he would grasp the concept that whatever is done to capture the wand from another wizard, if he wants the wand to be his, he should probably do it personally.  Right?  I mean, just to be extra safe?  Right?

So why not just toss a quick and dirty Avada Kedavra Snape's way and have done with it?  Pretty much every other murder he doles out throughout the entire series is committed this way, isn't it?  Voldemort is the king of Avada Kedavra.  It's like his number one hobby.  So why is this death, which is so deliberate and important at this point in the story, different?   

Voldemort doesn't kill Snape at all.  He slits his throat, all sloppy, and then sics the snake on him and saunters away oozing nonchalance:  Eh, he'll die soon enough, I'm sure, and then the wand will most likely be mine, and then, you know, if it all works out, I can continue to carry out the plan I've been obsessing over for 17 years. I mean even in the best-case scenario at this point, Voldy, you didn't kill Snape!  The snake did!  And if that wasn't convenient enough for our heroes, Nagini had a big lunch and wasn't even hungry, because he, too, slithered off with his job half done, opening the door for Harry to slip in, watch Snape die slowly and dramatically, and gather his shiny memory tears which hold the key to the entire series.

No.  I'm sorry, Jo.  I love you tremendously.  But...no.

Seriously, Though: An Introduction

Hi.

This blog is never going to be a serious blog.  It's not going to be motivational, inspirational, moving, thought-provoking, helpful, instructive, or otherwise worthwhile.  It's always going to be silly and rather pointless.  Except for right now, for just a teeny tiny minute, ok?  This is important.  And it's likely the only important thing I'll ever tell you, so just suck it up and read it.

A word about clinical depression:
  
This blog is not about clinical depression.  It's not about anything, really.  It's barely even a blog.  But it is written by me, and I am a person who has been diagnosed with clinical depression, and who has been dealing with depression for all of my adult life.

I was diagnosed around the age of 24, but that was only because I had finally reached what felt like rock bottom, and my husband and I were thinking about starting a family, and this combination of factors forced me to recognize that I needed to get help.  It's clear now that I had been suffering from undiagnosed depression for many, many years prior to this, as far back as adolescence.

Getting help was the best decision I could have made.

Since that time I have had many hours of talk therapy and have taken and benefited from a number of antidepressant medications.  These years have not always been easy.  Depression and its far-reaching effects have caused deep and lasting pain and heartache to me and to many of my loved ones.  So let me say this now:  Depression is not a joke. 

My belief is not that depression is funny, but that life is funny, and life should be funny, even when you're depressed.  Especially when you're depressed.  Because if anybody needs a good laugh, it's us.

If you're reading this and you even suspect that you might be suffering from depression, please get help.  You can feel better.  You can't do it alone.  Look, here's a link to get you started:

http://www.webmd.com/depression/guide/depression-resources

No, seriously.  Click the link.  Read the info.  We'll wait.

Then come join the party.  Ain't no party like a clinically depressed party, because a clinically depressed party...well, it can dissolve into tears at any moment.  And that's ok.

Forgive the cliche:  I've found that when you've spent some time overwhelmed by the dark, you learn to appreciate the light that much more.  And maybe that's what this blog is about.  Or maybe it's just about a really neurotic, self-absorbed woman who likes to hear herself talk.  Or both!  I guess we'll find out together, if you stick with me.

I hope you will, because I'm trying to get rich and famous here, remember?

Welcome.

Alyssa

Now Providing Tech Support

People keep asking me how to subscribe.  So I'm here to help!  Please direct your eyeballs to the right side of the screen.  Slightly higher than this post, probably.  No, your other right.  There.  Right there.  See the button that looks like this?

No, don't try to click the one above, that's just an image.  I just pasted it here as an example.  Go back to the right side of the page.  Click the button over there that looks just like the above button.  Then follow the instructions.

Voila!  That's it.  I think.  At least, it is if you have a Google account.  If you don't, I can't help you, except to say, who doesn't have a Google account?  Just get one, ok?  For goodness sake.

Special Offer

Today only!  Everybody who subscribes to my blog today (and, ok, the 5 of you who subscribed yesterday...you're welcome) will receive one limited edition promise from me to remember* you when I'm rich and famous!

*By remember I don't mean I'll like, take care of you financially, or send you presents (even on your birthday), or mention you on my household-name blog, or acknowledge you in public.  I just mean, quite literally, I promise to remember who you are.  Possibly this will require my assistant to keep some kind of roster, or make flash cards or something.  Actually it's starting to sound like a lot of trouble.  But I'm willing to do it for you, loyal readers, because you were here for me before I made the big time, and I love you, and many of you are related to me by blood, and one of you is my mother.

Toying with the Mentally Unstable

First of all, not all my posts will be about antidepressants.  Probably.  Really it depends on how well they're working, to be honest.  So just quit whining about it.  Nobody's making you read this stuff, ok?

Yesterday was what we call a Bad Day.  By Bad I mean sort of hilarious, if you're not me, but I am me, so Bad.  I'm going to tell you a story about my healthcare provider but I'm not going to name the healthcare provider in question, mostly because I'm going to drop so many unsubtle hints that you'll know exactly who I'm talking about, but pretend you don't just because.

So I chose to use the "mail-order" prescription refill option to refill my Zoloft rather than driving myself to the pharmacy and picking it up in person because I do not enjoy standing in line at pharmacies with my children and I do enjoy receiving drugs in the mail, and I didn't do the math to figure out how many days this would take vs. how many pills I had left, because math isn't really my thing, and the end result of all this was that I ran out of pills long before the new ones were due to arrive.  I blame math.

Really all I wanted to do was reroute my prescription, since it hadn't even been mailed yet, to the pharmacy so I could pick it up in person.  First I called my healthcare provider's advice line.  This is always step 1 with them because it's basically the only phone number they'll give you, ever, even if you're dying.  So I called them and explained that I refilled it last week and their website says it's still "being processed."  And I've now been without for 4 days and hello, I am mentally unstable, people! I could be balanced precariously on a ledge right now. 

And the advice line lady is like, "Well...what doctor prescribes it?"  And this is a trick question because the website shows that the medication was prescribed by one "Barbara Tate," a person I have never met or heard of.  So that's what I say and the lady is like, "Well, do you want me to call Barbara Tate?"

And I'm like, "Isn't it your job to know who to call? I don't know. My doctor is Enrique Young.  Call him."

"But he didn't prescribe the medication."

"But I don't know Barbara Tate!  Shouldn't you know who Barbara Tate is?  Maybe she's a nurse in his office.  Or a nurse from the hospital because somebody prescribed this for me while I was there giving birth."

"So who do you want me to call?" 

Then I banged my head against my desk a few times and then I said, "Who do you want to call?  Who can get me a bottle of pills today?"  And she said, "Dr. Young is out of the office.  Do you see Dr. Garrison?"

"Yes.  Dr. Garrison used to be my ob/gyn until she switched offices but whatever, if you can call her and she'll send me my meds, by all means, call her."

"Well, you need to make up your mind, because once I put the request into our system it cannot be undone and you can't change your mind about which doctor you want to handle your request."

"Again...this is not my decision.  I don't care who you call.  Call somebody who can fill my prescription today."

"I'll put in the request to Dr. Garrison.  She'll call you today or tomorrow."

Then I hung up and screamed, and then I went online and attempted to email Dr. Young, only to find he's on vacation (I think advice line lady might have mentioned this, I'm not sure anymore).

Then I emailed Dr. Garrison and just for good measure, Sue Banyon, a nurse in the ob/gyn department who is also on my list of people I'm allowed to email.  I sent all 3 of these people identical emails explaining the urgency of the situation.  Depressed patient...no meds.  Yes, it's my own fault (or math's fault), but at this point can we all just work together to fix it so nobody gets hurt?  My friend Ashley texted me: "Tell them you're not THRIVING."

Then I found another phone number hidden in the depths of the website so I called it, and got an operator, and explained the entire situation, and she said "Couldn't your doctor's office help you?" and I said "IF YOU HAVE THEIR PHONE NUMBER BY ALL MEANS GIVE IT TO ME AND I WILL CALL THEM!" and she said "I'm just an operator.  Who's your doctor?"  and I said "Dr. Young" and she said "Oh, he has a call center.  Hang on, I'll connect you" and she transferred me to...THE ADVICE LINE.  So I hung up.  And texted Ashley, "This would be funny if I wasn't so shaky and sweaty and paranoid that life is out to get me."

Then I got an email from Dr. Garrison saying she had called it in and it would be at the pharmacy today.  Then ten minutes later I got a phone call from Dr. Young's office (they have a phone!  I knew it!) saying that since he's on vacation Dr. Somebody Else read my email (confidentiality breach?) and called it in and it'll be at the pharmacy today.  So at this point I'm thinking I have at least 2 bottles waiting at the pharmacy, maybe 3 if Sue Banyon comes through, and maybe one in the mail.  So I figure I'm stocking up.  For the zombie apocalypse.  Or for the next time math tries to destroy me.

But I guess I'm on my own come the apocalypse because when I finally made it, shaking and dizzy, to the pharmacy at 9:30 p.m., how many bottles of Zoloft do you think were there waiting for me?  If you guessed any, you guessed wrong!  In spite of both doctors' offices assuring me they had called their respective prescriptions in to this pharmacy, the pharmacist tells me it was sent to the other pharmacy across town, the one that closed 3 hours ago.  Of course it was. 

You'll be happy to hear that I looked just crazy enough last night to move the pharmacist to swift action, and he managed the heroic feat of putting 30 pills into a bottle and selling it to me even though the computer told him not to, so I am officially medicated once more.  Bring on the zombies.

Warnings

1. I have a blog now.
2. I'm generally pretty well medicated but I do have my moments. 
3. If I have ever written anything even vaguely smart/funny/interesting/not sucky to you, at you, or near you it will most likely be recycled on this blog because you're the only person who knows it's been used before and I know you would never sell me out because we're tight like that.
4. If you don't know me, disregard #3.  It never happened.

Privacy Policy

Here's some legal gibberish I'm required to post because I use Google Adsense.  It's standard stuff:


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