A Twist of Things to Come

Working my way through the Hands On Training manual for Premiere Pro 2 made me lose track of time, so by 3pm I was ravenous.

I grabbed the nearest, easiest thing, which was one of those wee microwavable bowls of lasagna. You know, the kind with the ring and the peel-back lid tat you put a vented plastic top onto and then cook it in the microwave? Just a bite of pasta to quell the hungries and still not spoil my dinner.

Well, the ring came off, so I had to use a can opener to get it the rest of the way open. But he can opener cut a tiny string of metal off the rim, just beside where it should have opened with the ring. Not thinking, I grabbed this tiny filament to tear it off.

It cut three of my fingers. Ouch.

So, I curse and put my fingers under running water, marveling at the straight little lines cut across my flesh. One corner bled a tiny bit, was all, but my Beloved had come running when I cried out. I thought I was cut pretty badly, because it was a bit of metal the width of a hair, and I hadn't broken it.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I just cut my fingers good, being an idiot." I was giggling about it.

"Why is your hand blue?" He said. "Especially your thumb. Look at that."

"Maybe the color rubbed off my new jeans." I grabbed the nob to turn off the water, and realized there was something wrong with the angle between my body and the counter top. "Oh! catch me!"

I really said that. "Oh! Catch me!" Heh. My Beloved did, in fact, catch me, and eased me down to the floor and propped my feet in a chair. All my fingers and the thumb portion of my palm were blue-gray. It was like the zombie hand in that movie, only not trying to kill me.

He cooked my snack and had me hold the cup in my ever-bluer hand, then helped me up and started looking it up on the Internet. When it didn't get better after a bit, I called my BFF (who is a physician). She was quite kind. Basically, my arteries were doing that thing they do when there is severe blood loss -- they just kind of close up to prevent you from bleeding to death, even though I hadn't bled more than a drop. Evidently, pain receptors can trigger it, too. It's a form of Raynaud's phenomenon, apparently.

So... Today I got a case of Blue Hand and nearly passed out from what amounted to a Really Ouchie Paper Cut.

How was YOUR day?

... and other songs guaranteed to annoy literal-mind folk like Wee Boy and me.

So, Wee Boy had been complaining for weeks about how much he hated the last song his chorus was supposed to sing for their Christmas performance. "I hate it! It's so stupid! It makes no sense at all!"

We told him he could just mouth it if it bothered him that much, but we weren't letting him out of his commitment to the chorus just because he didn't like one song. Then, my Beloved told him we could go to the toy store and he could buy this Bakugan set he'd been eying, if he did well in the performance.

So, when it came time to sing that last song, we watched. As soon as I heard what they were singing, I got the giggles. Because it really is incredibly annoying, lyrics-wise - just the sort of thing that would have driven me nuts as a kid.

Where are you Christmas
Why can't I find you
Why have you gone away
Where is the laughter... etc.

Can you not see why a literal-minded child would find this risible? Christmas is December 25th, it hasn't gone anywhere. Why should anyone be looking for it when it's the same place it has always been? No wonder he hated it. It takes itself so seriously! I nearly did myself harm trying to be quiet. Listening to that song, hearing the lyrics through my son's literal, logical, wee ears... it was just too funny. Poor baby.

He came up to us afterward, looking serious and pale, and said, "I sang every word." Sigh. "May I please go to Toys R Us now?"

My sweet little stoic. *chortle* The things he would endure for Bakugan! (Not any Bakugan, but a specific set. We were exceedingly lucky that they had just the one he wanted, let me tell you.)

So, in relating this story to my friend Sara, she mentioned the "Rainbow Song" from her childhood. It lists the colors of the rainbow as "red, yellow, pink and green, orange and purple and blue." She got in trouble for "fixing" it by singing the colors of the visible spectrum in their proper order with their proper names.

Now, I totally get poetic license. I really do. I never had a problem with "Do you hear what I hear?" despite the fact that stars don't really have voices and lambs don't really speak English, or whatever. Extended metaphors are beautiful things, and anthropomorphism can be fun. I get that. I know that "Where are you, Christmas?" is meant to be a more emotional thing, to tap into the common enough feeling that the joy of the season can be elusive. But the idea is crammed so uncomfortably into those words that I'm sure it has blisters by the end of the song.

Makes me want to run it a hot bath and remind it that this will all be over soon. Poor little "Feeling Lonely and Adrift at Christmas," you should not have to suffer such abuse.