Sneaky Google Reader and an Award

OK so how lame am I that I do not have/use Google reader? Seriously...I know.

Which is why I didn't know that Google reader caches posts, even if they don't end up being published--or are published and then taken down. Which is what happened to a post I wrote titled "Prayer." Some of you saw it--pretty sneaky sis.

The gist of it was that all too often lately I have seen/heard people proclaim that good things happened to them (IUIs were successful, health was restored, surgeries were successful) because "prayers were answered!" And it hurt my feelings. I do not think God is a baby (or anything else) vending machine--you ask enough or put in enough coins you will get what you ask for. I don't claim to really know any answers on a spiritual religious front--someone who does makes me wary indeed. But I don't think it works that way, and so hearing someone proclaim that it does got under my skin, and thus the post. That's all I'll say about that I guess.

Last night I dreamed I stumbled upon some psuedo-high school reunion and went up to every.single.person and learned they all had biological kids. And I started sobbing and then one of them said "But we had infertility, we understand." To which I snapped: "But you have two kids! You are NOT the same as me, so don't say you are!" (by the way in the dream her 'infertility' meant she had been told she had a 15% lower chance of natural conception, whatever that heck that means). There's much more to this dream but it doesn't take a PhD to see I still have 'feelings' related to my infertility. And it is true...every.single.person I was friends with in high school has biological kids. The 'one in six' rule did not apply to my circle, not amongst old friends, not amongst new friends--which is why it has felt so damned lonely and isolating so much of the time.

OK so now on to the award.For this award, here’s what to do:

1. Thank whoever gave you the award.
2. Tell 7 things about yourself that readers may not know.
3. Pay it forward by nominating 10 bloggers you’ve recently discovered.

Thanks to Mel, at Broken Eggs, Broken Dreams for the award!

Seven things you might not know--well, some of you have been 'knowing' me for a damn long time (from old blog to this one) so this might be hard, and forgive me if you already know these things...

1) I love mid-century modern style. It's the way we've decorated our house...so anything 60s and mod we heart.

2) I wrote my first master's thesis on cord blood banking. It was 1995 (see how old I am?) and that was a relatively new procedure. Isn't it ironic that I won't be able to take advantage of something I do think has value (at the very least we should be banking cord blood in public banks) and spent many months researching in the tombs of medical school libraries (pre-easy internet research--remember when we had to look up journal articles in little green books that indexed them by subject??).

3) I grew up playing the piano. I took lessons for years. I was decent enough, but never played recitals after one where I completely blanked and sat on the bench, hunched over, sobbing until someone came and literally picked me up and carried me off the stage. Today if I sit down at a piano all I can do is crank a few bars of "In the Mood" and then I forget everything.

4) I took the Mister to my high school prom. He was in graduate school (yikes--that sounds so bad doesn't it??). He actually built some of the decorations, since I was on the decorations committee. I wore a prom dress that cost almost half as much as my wedding dress and to this day I cannot understand why my parents allowed us to spend that much. Totally not like them.

5) I let my car run out of gas one time in my life. It was my first car (A Jeep Wrangler Laredo hardtop at age 16--so I guess I was definitely spoiled--see #4). Luckily it ran out of gas at the end of my street. My Dad pushed it back to our house and then said two things: 1) That was an excellent work out! and 2) Only an idiot lets their car run out of gas. Two statements that definitely shaped my future.

6) One time my friend and I were driving back from a baby shower that was three hours away. She let her car run out of gas, despite it beeping and flashing at her (I will claim innocence that I didn't know what those sounds were on her car). We were gabbing away and then all of sudden her car just stopped on the highway. We had to trek a ways to find someone to charge us $10 for one gallon of gas. He said he gets 'at least one idiot per day' running out of gas on the highway so he always has his one gallon ready for sale.

7) I really aim to never, ever eat meat again. For the rest of my life. It's been 2+ years now and I can honestly say I do not miss it. I do consume soy products designed to taste like meat so it's not the taste, it's the idea of eating animal flesh. Are you grossed out now?

Oh sheesh, here's where I fall apart on awards. I'm usually so late to doing them that the award has been passed around to most of my bloggie peeps so I'm just going to chicken out and say if you feel like doing it--consider yourself awarded!