the stiff neck..........

evening ............

i was walking to the dumpster taking the garbage out, and, and on the way asked myself, did you take the "stupid” pill for the pain in your neck? along with the fistful, did you take it? (see fistful, left). you might wonder why i’d ask that, but I’m buzzed……oh. a vodka on the rocks, (or two), and a fabulous dinner. (i’ll talk about that later, along with my ritual…….a fistful of pills in the morning, and a bigger fistful at night…….the vitamins, you know). So I took the evening fistful, and a few minutes later, buzzed, I can’t remember if i included the stupid pill.

wait. i'm rambling......

I guess I should start with…….I HAVE A STIFF NECK!

oh, I know what you’re thinking…what’s with the capital letters? what’s the big deal?

but this is a kind of i have spinal meningitis stiff neck. a kind of emergency room stiff neck. i can’t stand, i can’t lie down (without a heating pad) i can’t sit at the computer and type, (ok, i am, but i’m in pain). can’t even sit at the kitchen table and read the Times, without moving it from left to right rather than move my neck. (hey, if i hold the newspaper and move it from right to left to read it, does that make me a republican or a democrat? food for thought). i’m not sure what’s causing the neck, although, truth be told, I did take a flu shot and a pneumonia shot this weekend. could be related….maybe not. anyway, i’m thinking that a long knitting needle jabbed through my right eye would take my mind off of the neck.

back to the pill. i hate the pain pill. vico…something. or oxy…moron….something.

oh, don’t get me wrong. in my day, (see, i told you i was old, because young people don’t begin sentences with in my day), but, ahem, in my day, i could do a quaalude with the best of them, and walk and talk, albeit, sloppily, and dance lilke the wind, (or elaine benis) and drive (before Mothers Against…….ya know)…and have a good old time. but now, in my dotage, and perhaps senility, i hate the pain pill. it makes me stupid and sludgy the next day. so i really don’t want to take it, but as i said, there’s that or the knitting needle. so i contemplate taking it.

back to the dinner. (i did promise after all)

i’ve just begun weight watchers. i’m not fat, but i’m not quite as svelte as i’d like to be.
husband, being supportive, has agreed to jump in. so we bought weight watcher cookbooks and we take turns making fabulous recipes while we count our points. tonight was a spicy stir-fry pork thing with veggies and cellophane noodles. delish. honestly.

well, truth be told, it’s not a lot of food, and it doesn’t really absorb the martinis, and hence, buzzed was i, taking the garbage out to the dumpster, so that through the night, while we were sleeping and unsuspecting, the cats couldn’t explore the table-top can on the granite island in the kitchen, that we use for trash as we cook, to find untold treasure table scraps, pull them out and perform the ritual happy cat dance. and my neck, which should be in a collar, with me on a traction table somewhere, is screaming, and so i asked myself…again, for the umpteenth time.…….did you take the stupid goddamn pain pill? and as i write this missive, my neck is a tad eased, and i think perhaps, i did.

off to bed………….
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morning......

um , it’s a good morning, sludgy, but good. i slept well. i definitely took the stupid pill and slept like a viking. (i’m guessing about the viking part, not ever having been a viking...... or even having known a viking...... or even having run great distances with a sword in my hand........ or even having been a jock in a sports venue. but my guess is, at the end of a viking's day, he sleeps well. and this was a manly sleep, thanks, of course to the oxy something.) ok, truth be told, i’m not some guy that takes things without knowing. it was a soma and a vicodin combo. there i said it. and i told you it makes me stupid. i got them from my doctor some time ago when my back once did what my neck was doing last night. and he warned me about the sludge. but sleep i did, and my neck is a little better. good doctor. good pills. oh dear. my grammar is all bullshit here, and i pride myself on being a good gramma. ok kidding. grammarian. but i’m working on a style here. and i finally understand the great writers (and i am not comparing myself to them, in any way), but e.e. cummings, t.s .elliot, and that bunch, they didn’t use capital letters and i know why. just a bunch of lazy, shiftless, bastards too tired to hit the shift key. (shift---less........get it?) i don’t need caps, because i too am lazy, and shifting is hard work, or at least more work than necessary. so with your indulgence i’ll forego the shifting to CAPS and just go with the smalls. and i can use the queen’s grammar, because i am, after all, a queen. there are wildly successful authors using grammar that is far less perfect than my own. so if i am to spin these yarns, and turn them into woven stories, grammar be damned, style be created, and of course, inhibitions checked at the door.

let the tale begin.

(not surprisingly, the next line is not….i was born in a trunk in the princess theater, in pocatella, idaho.)

ok, i’m gay. very gay ,( although i’m not sure gay takes a modifier. kind of like pregnant. you either are or you are not), but i’m gay enough to know a star is born, and the line in that song has been used and used.

so let me begin another way……..

i was born in a hospital in Jersey City, to a mother who ate her young……… (wow, same cadence as the star is born ditty…..how cool is that?).

to be continued.........