The Cyan Pepper

Hard at Work

“Mom, I need you to come into my office for a minute.”

She says, as she puts away the toy cell phone she’s been talking into for the past five minutes.

“I need to show you my new office.”

So I go in her room….

“This is my office… Here’s my computer. This is my printer, so I can print out stuff. Over here is where all of my papers go… I know.. it kind of looks like a bedroom, because, well, there’s my bed. It’s a home office.”

The computer and printer were cardboard boxes she’d painted. Never mind that she has a real computer out here, she’s got a whole office in there.

Me: What do you do in your office?
Kiera: Work.
Me: What kind of work?
Kiera: Hard work.
Me: Does it pay well?
Kiera: Not bad.

Plans

Tonight, I’m going out for a bit by myself. I know, you’re all going “so?” but when you can’t drive and don’t live in the middle of town, this is difficult to do because other people have to take you places.

I am looking forward to it.

I’m going to wander around and look at things I’d like to buy, then I will sit some place quiet and drink something while I people watch.

Then I will splurge and treat myself to one or two small things from the stuff I looked at earlier.

I will either spend next to no money or I will spend more than I intended to, but I will come back feeling relaxed and energized again.

Then I will put the kid to bed and I will write and enjoy an evening of not working.

Random Kiera Musings

Kiera quite often pulls things out of nowhere and will tell me something that has nothing to do with anything that may be going on around us. It makes me wonder what goes on inside that head of hers.

Today’s gem occured during the ride home:

Kiera: “Mom, did you know that [her SLP] has a giant head in his office?”

Me: “A giant head? Like… plastic?”

Kiera: “Actually, it’s stuffed.”

Me: “Oh, wow…”

Kiera: “Yeah, and it’s full of prizes. When you get one of your goals, you get to get a prize out of the big head.”

Me: “Oh, that sounds really cool.”

Kiera: “Yeah, but you have to pick its nose to get the prize out. It’s really gross!”

Two Dreams

So last night, I had not one, but two dreams with my friend Thea in them. We talk daily, but we haven’t visited each other in a couple years, so it was nice to “see” her again, even if it was just in my dream.

They’re both short, or at least, what I remember of them is short. It’s also further proof that I’m seriously messed up in the head.

Dream No. 1:

Thea and I are standing on the road in front of my house. I’ve got a can of spray paint, and I’m spray painting my name on the rode by my mailbox.

Thea: Kelli, why are you writing your name on the road?
Me: So people will know who it belongs to. What if it blows over into the next county? If there’s no name on it, whoever finds it won’t know where to return it to.
Thea: Uh… Kelli.. IT’S A ROAD!!!!!!


Dream No. 2

Thea and I are walking along in this palace-like place in the clouds, behind this  bald figure in deep crimson robes who generally looks all holy. The walls of the place are open, the ceiling supported by high columns. Around us, these giant creatures, who were very large (10ft or so wingspan) birds with brown fur instead of feathers, were swooping around lazily on the air currents.

Thea: Where are we?
Priest Dude: We’re in the temple of the Swoosh.
Thea: What’s the Swoosh?
Priest: These are the Swoosh *he gestures to the birds*
Me: What do you do here?
Priest: We celebrate and preserve the sanctity of the Swosh.
Me: Then why are there Swoosh-skin rugs all over the place? (because, indeed, at that moment, there were)
Priest: Ahh, we only create rugs from the Swooshes who have died of natural causes. We could never harm a Swoosh, but when one dies, we celebrate its life.
Thea: *dryly* By turning it into a rug.
Priest: Yes, or possibly a throw pillow.

Can you hear me now?

Kiera and I were cleaning her room earlier. This is normally a task she undertakes by herself, but every now and then I like to go through it with her, give it a thorough cleaning, check for contraban items, throw away all the little pieces of paper she’s shoved into every little nook and cranny, any broken toys, etc.

The whole time I was cleaning, I kept finding toy cell phones.

Me: Kiera, is this your cell phone, or is it one the boys left here?
Kiera: It’s mine.
Me: Wow, I didn’t realize you had so many cell phones.
Kiera: I really do have a lot, don’t I?
Me: You must have eight different calling plans. How do you pay for them all?
Kiera: I manage.
Me: I hope you’re not putting it on your credit card and running up a huge bill.
Kiera: No…. Oh, hey…. you found my white phone! I like that one the best.
Me: Better than the red flip phone? Why?
Kiera: It has roll-over minutes.

Anger Management

So last night, after dinner, I went outside to shoot some hoops and clear my head. After 20 minutes, it dawned on me that I hadn’t made a single shot and instead had simply been slamming the basketball off the backboard with much more force than was at all necessary.

It was then that I realized that perhaps I still had a touch of repressed anger over this whole Glaucoma thing and not being able to see the book I was trying to read earlier that day, the paperwork I was trying to fill out, the code I was trying to edit….

Granted, not every day is that, neither in terms of how well I can see nor how frustrated I get over it, but yesterday evidently was.

Today was nice and cloudy, and everything I needed to read was on a screen, in text that I could enlarge to do so. I’m getting used to that part. It’s when I pick up a sheet of paper, a book or a magazine that this all still gets to me.