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I fell and broke my arm yesterday. On my birthday.

*sigh*

It was stupid how it happened. I was walking down the three stairs between our bathroom/closet area and the bedroom. Still in my pj’s, getting ready to take a shower. Slipped, lost my balance, went airborne. I landed hard on my ass, and would have been sore but OK. But instead, my left arm was flung backwards and struck the edge of the stair at my wrist. I heard the crack and knew it was broken right away.

“Oh shit, some birthday this is gonna be,” I thought.

In agony, I called my insurance company to get approval for a trip to the ER. I was denied. Instead, my hubz had to drive me to our local doctor’s office, where they could only look at it and say, “Yep, that’s broken.” THEN we had to drive 40 miles to a different center where I could get x-rays and see the orthopedist on call. We spent the whole damn day driving and waiting: in traffic, in lobbies, in lines.

I ended up with a purple cast from my palm to above my elbow, and a much-needed scrip for vicoden. One of the bones in my forearm is shattered at the wrist, but if kept very stable, will heal without surgery – hence the giant cast. In three weeks I can hopefully get it removed and replaced with a smaller, forearm-only model. Unfortunately, I’m having to learn how to eat, dress, do my hair/makeup, etc. with one hand, and the wrong hand at that. Writing is out of the question, typing is agonizingly slow, and driving is possible but terrifying.

Let’s not even talk about showering with a garbage bag taped over my arm! Luckily, I found and ordered this, and some of this stuff too. Hilariously, based on those purchases, Amazon decided to show me some other items they think I’d be interested in, including this (slightly NSFW). Um, thanks but no thanks, Amazon.

Where are my drugs?

Sometimes The Bean says stuff that’s just so out there, you have to laugh. Well, I have to laugh, anyway.

Sunday afternoon, I went and got my nails done and then hit the gym. When I got home, Bean wanted me to paint her toenails, so we headed up to my room to take care of that. While she was picking out the right shade of pink polish, I decided to change my t-shirt, because I was kind of a stinky mess. So I took it off, threw it in the hamper, and started looking for a clean one.

Bean looked at me and said, “Oh, Mommy. Are you gonna get all nakey?”

The way she said it, in a Very Serious Tone, just cracked me up. Laughing, I told her I was just putting on a clean one, then did so and painted her toenails.

I kind of wish I could ask her some follow-up questions, now that I’ve had time to think about it. Like, “What if I was getting nakey? Would that bother you? Did you want to get nakey too? Shouldn’t we all just get nakey?” LOL. Unfortunately, I’m sure she doesn’t even remember it now, her little three-year-old brain is too full of Disney princesses and race cars and chocolate chip cookies and other important matters.

Kids. They’re strange.

Quick thoughts that aren’t enough to be their own blog post…

- Have you ever read a blog or feed that just made you feel bad about yourself? What if that blog belonged to a friend? A friend of mine from way back has a tumblr that I was subscribing to for a while. Every day, he re-posts photos he’s seen on other blogs, photos he finds intriguing or attractive, I guess. Some of them are pretty cool. Unfortunately, about 95% of them are pictures of gorgeous, incredibly thin women. After looking at the 20th picture of an impossibly cool-looking and nearly anorexic woman this morning, I hit the unsubscribe button. I love my friend, but his tumblr depresses me.

- Speaking of body image, guess what? I’m fat. I’m fat fat fat fat fat. I don’t care who knows it. Now, to be honest, if you saw me you’d probably say “Oh come on, you’re not FAT!” because I do carry it reasonably well. I don’t look like the typical fat person, I guess. But I’m big…I’m 5′9″ and anywhere from a size 16 to an 18 (if I’ve been enjoying myself). And I refuse to feel bad about that anymore. Yes, I have varicose veins on my legs (I’ve had them since I was a skinny size 12 in my 20s, by the way)! Yes, I have slightly flabby arms that jiggle a little bit when I wave them around! Yes, I have a pot belly the flops over my caesarean scar! Yes, I have thighs that rub together! And you know what? I DON’T CARE! Why should I? When I think about all the time I’ve spent in my life dieting, obsessing over food, and just worrying about how big my ass is – wow. I wish I could have that time back. I’d sure find some other productive use for it. So there it is – I’m 41, I’m a mom, and I’m fat. And I’m OK with that (even though lots of pictures of skinny women still kind of depress me – but it’s more in a meta, cultural sense).

- Speaking of depression, have you heard about these ding-dongs who want to keep their kids home from school on September 8, because the President of the United States will be delivering a televised message to kids that day? The gist of which is, “Stay in school, work hard, set goals, and do your best?” OK listen, is it just me, or have Republicans in this country gone completely bat-shit fucking insane??? Please, if you’re a reasonable Republican who has not completely lost his or her shit, reassure me that you still exist. PLEASE.

- Speaking of politics, have you ever really disagreed with someone politically, someone that you really love? I’m thinking of my father. To be fair, he’s 79 years old, and I can forgive a little bit of his close-mindedness. A little. But when he comes to visit, any time politics comes up in any way, he says some really disparaging things about the President (and, more disturbingly, the First Lady). As much as I love and respect and adore my father, I am forced to admit that what underlies a lot of these comments is racism. That just makes me more upset and depressed than anything, and I have no idea what to do about it – except to keep changing the subject.

- Speaking of people behaving in ways you can’t understand, I’m always amazed when I hook up with old friends on Facebook and a small percentage of them turn out to be really weird now. Especially people I grew up with! I just reconnected with someone the other day, someone I haven’t talked to in almost 20 years, and I was really psyched about it. Until I started reading her profile. And realized that she’s become some kind of born-again, fundamentalist, right-wing, frothing-at-the-mouth, homophobic, anti-feminist loon. How long is a suitable period to wait before quietly and carefully un-friending someone?

Real subject lines from my spam folder:

- Now you don’t need a crane to lift your tool up.

- With our watches boring time will go faster.

- Fill rod with energy!

- wtf?

- We got medicine to cure any disease you suffer from.

- Are you aware of news?

These are all pretty awesome, but I have to say, “wtf?” is my favorite. It’s so…universally applicable. Wtf?

About once or twice a week, I look in the spam folder of my Gmail and delete everything. I was about to do that last night, but I paused. Some of the subject lines were just…hilarious! Here’s some highlights of my spam folder from this week:

- Your difficult situation

- Bring photos, please

- Open it or get constipation

- Have Joe’s number?

- I’m ill, won’t come, sorry

See? You could put them together and make a haiku, or something…