Lost Friends, Deplorable Neighbors, and Cleaning Furiously.

Lately I've been so tired, disgusted and full of profane rage, yoga barely takes the edge off. And the "president" hasn't even been installed yet. Because it's not just that narcissistic man-baby Twitter addict and that bizarre non-press conference and the endless lies, lies, lies about things that JUST HAPPENED A FEW MONTHS AGO and ARE ON FUCKING VIDEO YOU LYING SACK OF SHIT, it is the unbelievable contrast between the class and dignity and warmth of President Obama with the horrific disaster that is Trump. The nightmarish contrast between the sublime we're losing and the utterly contemptible that is about to follow him is making me physically ill. It's also how the "election" of this ridiculous game show host/fraud has empowered people to be as ugly and stupid in normal human interactions as their Dear Leader.

It's not as simple as avoiding social media. It's in my real life, all around me. I've lost one of my oldest friends. We got together for wine and cheese and conversation shortly before the election. We were catching up on life when somehow the conversation turned to her neighbors, who left their trash cans beside their house instead of in the garage, and she had to deal with their "fried chicken and watermelon rinds and disgusting shit," then said "I'm a racist, okay? I don't like black people! I don't care, I'll say it, I don't like them! I'M A RACIST!" I've known this woman for over 15 years and have never heard anything remotely like this from her before.

I wish I could say I said something intelligent in response, but I just sort of stared at her with my mouth hanging open. She shrugged and changed the subject and our evening broke up about 15 minutes later. I walked her out, and as she was driving away she pointed at the strings of lights a neighbor has in their backyard, mocking them and calling it stupid - "Christmas lights year round!" as she drove away. Um, their backyard seating area is decorated with lights, something I would like to do on my balcony when I finally get around to properly decorating it. Again, bizarre and snotty about something that doesn't affect her, for no reason? I haven't heard from her since that night, nor have I felt any urge to reach out to her for another happy hour.

I've also lost a couple of Facebook friends, but the funny part is I am not sure who they were. I usually hide the feeds of people who bore or annoy me, so I'm assuming that, like my childhood friend who still shows up to say something stupid now and then, they hadn't hidden mine and have now unfriended me. No loss there, obviously. I'm hoping my childhood friend will follow suit shortly, but she's like the dumb dog that just wanders by to shit in the yard now and then.

Meanwhile, my downstairs neighbor sits outside with her cigarette wearing an "I'm a Deplorable" t-shirt. I've started wondering if she has more than one. My other neighbor's grown daughter wears her Trump/Pence shirt. I'm wondering if they'll still wear them now that intelligence reports about Russian manipulation of the election are coming out on an almost daily basis and it's looking like their hero's campaign was in on it. Of course, if they are getting their news from right wing media they have no idea they were stupidly complicit in the destruction of our democracy.

I have a lot more ranting in my head, but I think I'll save my rage at the Republicans for another day.

Anyway, I've been indulging in a lot of rage-cleaning. I clean when I'm nervous and clean when I'm pissed off, because somehow it feels satisfying to take a space that dissatisfies me and transform it into something serene and organized. I suppose it's because the rest of the world feels so out of control, but cleaning out my pantry felt really, really good.

When I remodeled the kitchen a few years ago I had lived without a functional kitchen for many weeks. When I finally got cabinets and a working sink, etc. I was eager to take stuff out of boxes and live semi-normally. In the years since I've never been quite satisfied with how I had things stored; some things I use every day weren't in the most convenient places, while things I use occasionally, like the blender, were taking up precious counter space. So yesterday I put on an excellent audiobook - In the Woods by Tana French - and launched a day of kitchen reorganization. I discovered along the way that I stopped baking sometime in early 2015, because baking powder, baking soda, and a lot of spices had expired around that time. There was a lot of forgotten ingredients in the back of the pantry, purchased for meals I never got around to making. I'm really working on changing that bad habit, and this reorganization will definitely help. I can see what I have on hand much more easily now.

As usual I'm a bad blogger who didn't take pictures of the before and after, and honestly, it's not like it went from utter chaos to minimalist perfection. I still have most of the same stuff, just put away neatly instead of taking up space. This has freed up a decent amount of counter space, and now I'm inspired to paint the backsplash area. It would be a quick afternoon's work. I can't paint the entire kitchen myself because the ceilings are so high. I don't own a ladder to get up there, and with my balance issues attempting it myself would be a supremely dumb idea, but I could do the area between countertop and upper cabinets. I'd like to go with a bold color there, I'm just not sure what color yet. I'm actually contemplating turquoise. It's one of my favorite colors and I think it would look great against the dark cabinets and browns of the countertop, but I'm not sure. Maybe I'll swatch it.

Yoga Revolution continues; I fell behind a couple of days, but I'll catch up. A daily 30 minutes is doing a world of good, and I am now a true yoga geek.

Today's mission: finish up a couple of details in the kitchen cleanup, and turn my efforts to my home office. Channel that nervous energy and rage into organization!