Going postal

So it looks as though the US Postal Service has a clever new scheme going: tell people you’re hiring, then when they go to your website to apply, don’t let them do so unless they fork over $29.95, in return for which some helpful people will send you a “well written Guide with NO MEMORIZATION required”, including test-taking strategies and tips from “subject matter experts”.

What’s particularly cool about these people is that they don’t expect you to waste time waiting for snail mail – because, as it’s important to understand if you’re going to apply for a job at the post office, actually physically posting anything is pretty old hat. No one who has a clue does that any more. So they will provide a link to a 98-page PDF document that you can download within three seconds of making payment, and print out using your very own personal printer ink and paper.

Alternatively, for only $10 more you can get essentially the same thing from another source, only what they promise to send is a “Postal Exam Package” containing exam registration materials, “eCareer Profile Creation Tutorials”, a bunch of practice tests, and a “Postal Interview Recommendation”.

It’s not entirely clear how they send this, but to me the word “package” denotes physical substance – something with heft. I imagine brown paper and string, the knots liberally coated with sealing wax … Dang, those were the days! I remember helping my mother make up parcels like that! Sometimes she’d let me hold the stick of sealing wax. I remember the smell of burning string and hot wax, and how quickly the drops of wax hardened, and how satisfying it was to scratch the hard accidental drips off the paper, and how important it was not to put my face so close to the flame that I burned off my eyebrows.

Searching for this illustration made me feel so old! Everything I found was essentially an artistically staged picture. Take this one – what’s the relevance of the man wallet? I also found a still life in shades of brown, featuring a stamped seal, a watch on a chain and a cigar, arranged like relics of a forgotten era. Also, there are lots of pictures of scrolls, apparently made of papyrus, tied with hemp, and sealed with a perfect dab of red wax. Seriously, Adobe, WTF? Real people living today actually used this stuff, you know – and it had a purpose. It wasn’t just bloody decorative, okay? It was messy and it dripped and blobbed, and if you let your kid do it they probably illustrated the package with artistic extra drips and blobs, but – and this was important – YOU DRIPPED THE WAX ONTO THE KNOT IN THE STRING, okay? It was there to discourage postal workers from opening your parcel, because that was back in the day when it was reasonable to expect the South African Post Office to deliver parcels rather than dumping them in a ditch, losing them, or selling them to the highest bidder. Because, of course, back then we hadn’t invented scissors yet, so sealed and unbroken string was impenetrable.

Well, I digress … A modern parcel would have tape, not string, and it would likely come in one of those standard red, white and blue USPS boxes. Unless they sent it UPS or Fedex, those being the faster and more reliable options since the Pony Express closed down. But either way, there wouldn’t be string.

Sorry, that was another digression, because in fact I resisted the temptation to order a Postal Exam Success Guide. The only reason I was googling post office jobs was a sudden panic over money, for crying out loud! If I was going to spend $39.95 on something, it wouldn’t be on an unartistically presented package, which I wouldn’t receive because we don’t get mail delivery at our house due to an argument over post box location with our local post office about eight years ago, which culminated in the Hubbit declaring his independence from delivery services by renting a PO box (from USPS) instead. (That’s a whole blog post in its own right, but not one I feel like writing today.) Anyway, the $39.95 option didn’t include space for a PO box address, so I couldn’t choose it. As for the other option, the convenience of receiving a PDF document is offset by the fact that I still haven’t figured out how to get our wireless printer to connect to my computer, and I am fundamentally fed up with having to forward every bloody thing to the Hubbit for printing. In any case, if I had random bits of money to be scattering to the four winds I wouldn’t be contemplating a job at the post office, now would I?

Sometimes I feel as though my life is spiraling out of control. There are too many damn buttons to push, and you have to push them in the right order, and … GAH! It’s just too  complicated.

I couldn’t help wondering what my $29.95 would get me – I mean, in the sense of what career opportunities would open up if I accepted their Success Guide. So I went back and took another look at what popped up when I googled USPS jobs, and I realized that the sites I’d found the first time I tried this weren’t actually part of the official US Postal Service. They’re very cleverly dressed up to look that way, complete with bald eagles and flags, but if you click on the actual USPS website you can go straight to the online job application, easy-peasy.

Turns out they have a new stamp design, called “summer harvest”. Click on the picture on the USPS website, and it’ll take you to a fantastic array of gorgeous stamps. Some of them are so pretty I just want to rush out and … I don’t know … start mailing letters again? Probably not – back in the day (before email) I was notorious for writing long, wonderful, newsy letters, putting them in an envelope, sticking on the prettiest stamps I could find … and then forgetting to put them in the mailbox. Actually physically going to a post office to post a letter was one of those things I invariably put off, so letters would go onto the pile of un-dealt-with paperwork I have kept on every desk I’ve ever owned, and there they would slowly sift to the bottom, to be found years later when I packed up to move house.

So anyway … I looked, and apparently the main post office in our area is looking for rural mail carriers. Only to get hired you have to pass a test, which takes about two hours to complete. I don’t have two hours right now, having already invested a substantial portion of today in writing this post. Also, I really hate writing tests, because failure, rejection, feelings of inferiority – AAHHHHH! I mean, how would I feel if I failed a test that was directed specifically at school leavers and other people with no prior experience, skills or training? Plus, apparently the test includes a section called “Summary of Accomplishments”, and the advice to applicants is  to “write about how your skill set, education and training matches the posting”. Seriously, should someone who can’t mail letters be responsible for delivering same?

Still, I have to admit I’m tempted. The thought of working in a post office, dealing with the Great Unwashed every day, fills me with dismay. Yes, I know, you don’t actually have to be nice to anyone – that’s one of the perks of working for the post office. But … ugh … you’re perpetually at the end of a queue, and every single day is just one piece of mail after another. Could that get monotonous, do you think?

Driving around delivering letters, on the other hand … now that could be fun. Lots of time to think, and – thanks to the invention of GPS – I wouldn’t get lost. Probably wouldn’t. Not very lost, anyway, and probably not permanently. It would be different if they were still using ponies – I like ponies way too much to sit on one – but these days you get to ride around in one of those cute little vans with the driver on the sidewalk side. You know, I can see myself doing that, while simultaneously dictating a Great Work (or, at least, a blog post) into a little hand-held recorder thingummy. I already have one of those. I just need to figure out how it works.

So what’s your dream job? What do you do when you suddenly realize you’re down to your last $50 and there’s still a week to go to the end of the month?

 

 

Voluptuous, vivacious and versatile – that’s me!

My first taste of internet sex was back in the Nineties, when the World Wide Web was a flimsy new creation draped over the moldering corpses of newly extinguished dinosaurs. My business partner and I heard about it (the web, that is; we had no clue about its pornographic potential) and decided we needed to get connected. Boffins installed a modem, did mysterious things to our computers, told us many things that we wrote down and hoped one day to understand, and left us to unravel the mysteries of email and web surfing.

Those boffins were mischievous young men. In the course of getting me set up they signed me onto an online dating site, so when I finally figured out how to open my email I found it awash in penises. There were startling measurements, intriguing claims, invitations to conduct a personal inspection at a time and place of my choosing, and even photographs.

Surprise! (Source)

Nowadays, of course, we can find exactly the same stuff on Craigslist, but back then it made me blink a bit. There were a few penis-free emails (well, not totally penis-free, but the penis was implied rather than being central to the message) and I responded to some of those and it was all rather entertaining, except that it bothered me that all these hopeful young men clearly had expectations based on an ad that didn’t necessarily my reflect my personal inclinations. I eventually got one of my cyber-swains to send a link to the ad and, yeah, it was pretty much as expected. So I deleted it … and replaced it with my own creation, headed: “Voluptuous, Vivacious and Versatile Sweetheart”. Something along those lines, anyway.

And, well, apparently this description still applies, since I have just lately been honored with a Versatile Blogger Award AND a Liebster Award. (Liebster means “sweetheart”, according to Herr Professor Google.)

I have a rule when it comes to awards, which is that their rules don’t apply. My blog, my rules – okay? On the other hand, I do appreciate the compliment, and I welcome the excuse to introduce bloggers I enjoy to bloggers (and others) who enjoy me. (My writing, I mean. Let’s not get carried away here – the penis story is over, folks!)

So here is Jamila, whose blog Thisizapen is a fun read. She’s bright and articulate, and she has a zest for life and an eye for the absurd that bubbles out in her writing. Hop on over and enjoy. And Jamila, thanks for the Liebster. You now have five reasons why I think you’re epic, and maybe I’ll answer more of your questions … one day.

Also, I’d like to introduce My Perfect Breakdown, who writes mainly about the challenges of recurrent pregnancy loss and cross-border adoption. This is a world so far from my experience that I honestly don’t know how I stumbled upon her blog, but she writes with such honesty and so much feeling that I find myself compelled to stick around. I’d encourage you to pay her a visit. And Ms MPB, thanks for the Versatile Blogger Award! Some random facts about me coming up!

Okay, now I’m supposed to nominate a total of 26 bloggers, but that’s just silly, so I’m just going to pick three for each award.

First, the Liebster, which is for bloggers with fewer than 200 followers. Not all these bloggers reveal their numbers, but they’re all new to the blogiverse so I’m taking a crazy chance and nominating them anyway.
Living Between Breaths is by a mom who lost her teenage son last year to a brain aneurysm. Her courage takes my breath away.
Tim at Party of One, Meal for Two is a young gay man who writes with heart and humor about his search for a life partner.
Absynthe Minded’s Fairy Dust is all sorts of this and that – something very new by a talented blogger.

Next, for the Versatile Blogger Award I’d like to nominate:
Fiona’s Favourites, mainly because it’s fun but a little because she’s a fellow South African. Also, her recipes are wonderful!
The Tempest and the Teapot, which is every bit as amusingly random as the name implies.
Exile on Pain Street, who has been writing entertaining, sometimes thought-provoking vignettes about his life for the past quarter century or so – and I know this because, in addition to commenting on life today, he periodically publishes a post from one of his old journals. It’s good stuff!

Right, and now I get to talk some more about me… and … umm, no, I simply can’t bring myself to answer a list of questions-about-myself per the award rules. I don’t read lists like that posted by other people either. Sorry, not trying to be rude, and I really do appreciate the vote of confidence, but trust me on this – my list of answers would be very, very boring.

So … instead of lists, here are some odds and ends I found in my “potential blog posts” pile, for your reading entertainment.

Search terms

Sooner or later, every blogger writes a post about the search terms used to find their blog, and when I read these posts I’m consumed with envy because having bizarre and creepy search terms is second only to having a dedicated troll. They let you know you’ve arrived in the blogiverse. Well, things are going a little slowly here … Since December, the search term that most commonly brings anyone to my blog is “bookworm costume”. Really, Google? Yes, my parents did indeed perpetrate a bookworm costume upon my person – but there is so much more to me than that!

Things did look up a little last month, when someone found me by searching for “2015 hot fat sugar granny who want to…” hmm, yes, I’ll leave the rest of that one to your imaginations. Suffice to say that this site must have been quite the disappointment. But it raises a concern. If I want to be noticed (and yes, to be honest, I do, a little bit, anyway), and if I don’t want to be perceived merely as an unreliable authority on Really Terrible Fancy Dress Ideas For Dweebs, do I have to write more about bodily functions? Because I can do that – but if I do, will you still respect me in the morning?

So a parrot walks into a bar…

Not really. It was a restaurant, and I didn’t see the parrot walk in because it was already there when we arrived. I saw it sitting on a big hunk of tree branch, and I got all excited because it was an African grey, and – as everyone knows – they are really smart and interesting and, in every possible way, evidence that African is better. Since this happened during Himself’s first visit to South Africa, I was eager to embrace any opportunity to demonstrate the fundamental and broad-ranging superiority of all things African to him.

So I rushed over to the parrot to get acquainted, and he crooned in a friendly sort of way. A passing waitperson warned me, “Be careful – he bites!” … and the parrot cocked his head and did a little dance on the end of the branch closest to me. I sidled closer, and he leaned, and he crooned, and I murmured sweet nothings, and boop-de-boop he hopped onto my arm and scuttled up to my shoulder.

Awww… ain’t that cute! (If you ignore the depraved look in his eye.) (Source)

“Oh boy … he likes you,” commented another waitperson in tones of gloom. Feeling rather smug, I pranced around the restaurant a bit, enjoying the other patrons’ looks of envy. The parrot nibbled my ear and crooned a bit more. I sat down to eat, and he shared my salad. He snuggled up really close to me, and sort of cuddled. It was so sweet!

“That bird is humping your shoulder,” commented my adoring spouse.

“Oh rubbish!” I said, and offered the parrot another nibble of something tasty. The parrot sort of shuddered, ruffled all his feathers, crooned again, and commenced to hump my ear.

I raised my hand in an attempt at gentle discouragement and – YIKES! “They told you he bites,” remarked Himself, dispassionately.

I became aware that the other patrons were not, in fact, looking envious … although they certainly were looking, and they seemed to be enjoying the show. In fact, I had the feeling that some were regulars who had seen this show before, and would continue to enjoy it for as long as there were tourists to keep it running. It was time to dislodge Humpty Parrot. My head held high, I walked the length of the restaurant and nudged my shoulder against his branch in an encouraging, get-the-hell-offa-me way.

He scuttled to my other shoulder, clamped my ear with his beak and, with a glazed expression in his beady parrot eye, commenced frottage upon my pony tail. It took the manager and two waitpersons, armed with large towels, to get the bloody bird off me.

And I have to say, I think the applause, as I walked back to my seat, was entirely unnecessary.

While on the subject of body parts…

… in the context of the fact that South Africa just is better, did you see what our boys have done now?

Seriously, I’ve always enjoyed opportunities to brag about us pioneering heart transplants. And I think it says a lot about our values as a nation that we started with the heart. But this? It just makes a girl proud!

Awww … ain’t that cute! (Source)

So … your turn. Have you ever found true love/had sex online? And has this ever involved a parrot? Did you find this blog by googling “lonely African grey needs love”?

Still reaching for that elusive high

Ketosis continues to elude me, It was so easy the first time I tried the ketogenic approach to eating, shortly after Thanksgiving last year. I wasn’t concerned when Christmas derailed me – I figured that was to be expected – although it was annoying still to be derailed several weeks into the new year. But I figured okay, I’ll just get back into the whole low carb / medium protein / high fat thing, and in no time I’ll be buzzing along on a high, burning up flab and feeling fabulous.

Not so.

Instead, it seems, my vile body is on high alert, making every carb do double duty, hammering me with headaches, cravings and mood swings, rationing out my energy in tiny little packets that take me nowhere. After two weeks of faithfully consuming plenty of fat, not too horribly much protein, and lots and lots of dark green leaves, I needed some encouragement so I stepped on the scale … and the number was UP. It was up a whole damn pound!

Is it normal to feel that I’m at war with my own body? I’m ambushed by Easter eggs and bludgeoned by depression and that thing our mothers told us (not mine specifically, but mothers in general) – that “you have to suffer to be beautiful” – well, according to all the messages my crocodile brain is sending me, that’s just propaganda. I have suffered mightily, and I have brought suffering upon Himself, and I’ve even not been especially nice to the dogs, and I’m still bulging.

So what to do? Do I admit defeat, embrace despair, accept that I’m doomed to a (probably drastically shortened) life of being in pain, uncomfortable inside my own skin, never to accomplish any but the most banal, foundational items on my bucket list? Do I shrug off the hours I’ve spent researching this, and pretend that the fantastic sense of YES I experienced just before Christmas was a silly illusion? Do I, in a word … quit?

Completely off topic, but I have to insert a brief aside here. I’ve mentioned before how much I love modern technology. Do you know you can find literally anything on Google? Here I was, bashing out this post, and it occurred to me that I didn’t actually want to write the word “fuck” – I mean, not that I don’t say it when sufficiently deeply moved, but it makes for lazy and sloppy writing. On the other hand, no other phrase said what I wanted to say as well.

Clearly, this was a good outsourcing opportunity. So off I went to Google, and I typed in “fuck that”, and next thing I knew I was listening to this audio by someone called Skrillex. (Why??? I mean, why be called Skrillex? And also, why would anyone choose to listen to this? Either way, fuck me if I know.) So anyway, that wasn’t good, but then I remembered that I recently acquired new headphones and subscribed to Spotify (technology! Yeah!) and so I’m now reformatting my synapses with Mozart’s horn concertos – yes, all four of them. (And for some reason I felt it was necessary to google “ear synapses” and … my goodness. Amazing! No – come back – you can go look at it later. And everything else on Google. It’ll still be there when you’re done reading here!)

After plugging a Mozartian horn into each ear I went back to Google for another go at the “fuck that” question, and contemplating the answers kept me happily googling for almost long enough to forget this post entirely. Then I found the GIFs, and oh how I hate when bloggers plaster their posts with these beastly things that jiggle about and distract me from the words – but aren’t they just nifty? Take this one, for example … It lacks the succinctness I was looking for, which is why I decided not to use it, but I know exactly how the ferret feels, and also how does one resist the cuteness factor? There’s not a lot of cuteness happening on this blog, and maybe that’s an area that needs work.

I was hung up for a bit deciding whether to let Snooki or Dave Grohl say “fuck that” on my behalf, but after I’d googled Dave I decided – without in any way being tempted to switch from Mozart to Nirvana – that I’d rather be represented by him than by some skinny bint on a “reality” show that I have no intention of ever watching. Apart from anything else, he looks more like me – not quite as pudgy but still with not a lot in the way of cheekbones. And the beard is yummy – on him, anyway; I tend to give my own chin hairs short shrift. Ha ha – you think I’m joking, younger-female-followers-of-this-blog? Just wait – menopause will get you too!

Which brings me back to my original point: the war between Me and My Bod. Thus endeth this aside…

Nope, I am not quitting. Rather, I am reviewing my options, revising my strategies, and reinforcing my range of tools.

First, the strategy …

Number 1: Love Myself. This is hard! Maybe I’ll settle for just not hating myself… and forgiving me my trespasses…

In a spirit of Moving On, I am forgiving myself for this most recent failure, especially as  it didn’t even taste good, and it left me feeling sick, although I’m not sure whether that was due to changes wrought by weeks of cutting carbs, or by my awakened conscience.

I also betook myself to Catherine’s yesterday and restocked my wardrobe … for the first time in about two years. Yes, it’s been two years since I bought clothes – because every time I think of doing so I think, “Well, but I can’t stand to keep buying things in that huge size! So I’ll lose weight and then I can go shopping.” Comes a point, however, when your underwear is disintegrating and the seats of your jeans have worn through and the holes in your tee-shirts are too large and too numerous to ignore (what causes those stupid holes? Moths? Fabric-chewing planned-obsolescence nanobots?) and you just have to say stuff it and go back to the damn Fat Lady Shop (because all appearances to the contrary I am SO NOT a Wal-Mart Person) and try stuff on and look at yourself in a three-way mirror and buy at least three of whatever fits so long as it’s on sale because you really don’t want to have to come back again too soon. And actually I found out that I had dropped a size – yah boo thumb-my-nose at the bathroom scale! Which meant that this morning, when I was getting dressed, I didn’t have to put on any of the scary new doesn’t-feel-like-me stuff sitting in shopping bags in my closet; instead I could fit into a pair of shabby-and-bleach-stained-but-not-actually-disintegrating jeans that I hadn’t tried on for a while. And then I hung up the new stuff, mixing it in with the older stuff so that I could get used to seeing it there and forget that it’s new.

So much for nurturing a sense of self-worth … Let’s focus on food.

Apparently I am exceptionally sensitive to carbs – so I’m cutting them out altogether, except for celery. Even my imagination isn’t wild enough to conceive of a situation where celery can be fattening. But I read a comment on a ketogenic lifestyle blog recently from someone who said she was, and I quote, “kicked out of ketosis by kale”, and here I’ve been glomming the stuff down in bunches. So I’m cutting out vegetables entirely, even avocado and the dark green leafy ones. I’m not doing this forever, of course; just for as long as it takes to get into ketosis – at which point I’ll gradually start reintroducing vegetables to see just how much carbohydrate I can tolerate. I’m also cutting out nuts, milk (alackaday – no more lattes!), and the delicious gravy Himself wraps around stews and pot roasts. (Yes, girls – I’m married to a King Of The Kitchen! It took me a while to get over my indignation at his contempt for my own kitchenly efforts, or to acknowledge how very much I dislike cooking – but I can now confess that I’m greatly blessed among wifekind!)

I am gritting my teeth, ignoring years of anti-fat programming, and keeping my fat intake high. Jimmy Moore’s book Keto Clarity contains several recipes for high fat treats … so, ugh, I guess that means I’ll be pulling kitchen duty after all. The benefit is that it doesn’t take a lot of high-fat snacking to leave one feeling quite satisfied – compared with sugary snacks that invariably seem to trigger a craving for more.

I’m also cutting back on protein, big time. No more protein in snacks, only two protein meals a day, and I’ll weigh the damn stuff if necessary to ensure I don’t take more than 30 grams at a time. Apparently if you eat more protein than your body needs it turns into sugar – and the amount you need is directly related to the amount you exercise. Because my overloaded feet and ankles hurt and my energy is still lacking, I’m not exercising a whole lot.

So that’s also got to change – which brings me to …

Second, the tools …

I really didn’t want to spend a lot of money, mainly because we don’t have it, but when I realized that getting into ketosis was going to be a challenge for me I bought the tool that everyone recommends: a meter to track my ketone production. There are three ways to measure ketones.

• Ketostix pee strips measure the ketones in urine. By all accounts these are pretty useless, because they measure only the ketones you eliminate as waste. As your body adapts to running on ketones rather than sugar, you stop eliminating them – so the more keto-adapted you are, the less they have to measure, leading to a false negative.
• Blood ketone meters are highly accurate, but they’re expensive and the strips cost around $5 apiece for the Precision Xtra meter, which is the one that gives readings at a level that are relevant to nutritional ketosis
• Breath ketone meters are new technology, but several experts, including Jimmy Moore, say Ketonix is accurate and reliable. That’s the option I chose, because although the meter cost a little over $100, it’s a once-off investment – no expensive disposable strips. I bought mine on Amazon but have just learned that it’s no longer listed there. A word of warning: delivery is SLOW. I ordered mine on February 21 and I could wait until mid-April for it to arrive – presumably because the developer is battling to keep up with demand. But the reviews were good, so it seemed worthwhile.

And then there is exercise equipment. Given that it’s too cold to swim, it hurts too much to run/jog/skip/jump/walk, and my horse will either break or kill me if I heave my bulk onto his ancient and saggy back, I’ve decided to focus on muscle-building exercises. Apparently muscles burn more calories (i.e., fat) than flab, even when you’re not using them. Also, supposedly, if you have muscles you have more energy. To this end I have bought a yoga mat and an exercise ball … and we have resistance bands from the time I needed physical therapy – I just need to dig them out of wherever they’re hiding. I have a sneaking suspicion that I’ll have to do more than pile this stuff up in our bedroom to see any benefit. Argh. Well, I’ll keep you posted … maybe.

Third, just quickly, supplements …

Although my experience may not encourage you to try the ketogenic lifestyle, just in case you do, you will probably need supplements at least while you’re adjusting to the new way of nourishing your body. I found this link helpful.

• Extra salt is key. You can add it to your food, but comes a point that just doesn’t taste good and I’m not sure it’s healthy. I take one Thermotab every morning – because if I forget, I feel washed out and weak by noon. It’s cheap and readily available, but there are side-effects so do your research. Most importantly, you must drink plenty of water when you take one.
• Green tea capsules seem to improve my energy levels. I’ve been buying them from Costco but it looks like they’re a lot cheaper online. I’m not sure whether it would be better just to drink green tea – haven’t had time to research this – but for the time being I’m taking two every morning.
• I take a daily multivitamin, although in time I hope to meet my needs from actual food.
• Potassium and magnesium are two essential minerals, and if you run short of them you’re likely to feel spacey, tired and ill. I’m taking supplements while I restrict my intake of vegetables.

And, of course, drink water. Just glug it down – it improves your energy, mental acuity and general bodily processes.

So is anyone else out there struggling to love and nurture themselves into a state of good health? Does your body repeatedly sabotage you? What works for you? Also, do you think I need to inject more cuteness into this blog?