What I am up to

Literally thousands of my screaming fans have been begging to know about what I have been doing. Well, no…Literally dozens of my closest friends have been clamoring…no, not really accurate, either…Okay, my friend Jen suggested I link to my latest E2 articles and so forth and issue a little update so’s you can read some of my latest work, if you are of a mind.

http://www.everything2.com/node/1971803

A daylog (think: blog) post for E2. It’s an interesting historical parallel.

http://www.everything2.com/node/1973784

http://www.everything2.com/node/1973993

http://www.everything2.com/node/1976179

Three short articles I did for E2 based on the game Portal. These will make LESS sense if you aren’t familiar with the game.

http://www.everything2.com/node/1975801

A funny one from E2 about the word Gnarly. Like, totally!

http://www.everything2.com/node/1984333

A little article about a scary ghost from Guam. This is the kind of thing you learn about when you hang out with someone of Guamanian heritage. And did you know that the demonym of Guam is guamanian? Isnt that interesting?

Oh, and I have written a few in my blog:

http://junkill.blogspot.com/

but you know that, since you are here. Read! Enjoy!

And also I’ve been hard at work on my book…Encyclopedia of Beings, to be illustrated by my dear Suzi E. If the winds are blowing the right direction, and I can get it to output in the right format, I should be sending it to the printer by early next month!

and now, an utterly gratuitous picture of a slinky blonde!

Honour Among Squabbits

Ever since I was a little boy, I’ve enjoyed making up words. One of the first neologisms I ever invented was yuckleburpia. It was an interjection, a sort of ultimate form of “yuck,” as in “Yuckleburpia! Carrots aren’t supposed to be that colour!” It could also be used as a kind of clunky adjective, as in “Those fuzzy blue carrots look really yuckleburpia.” It wasn’t an elegant piece of word-making, but it worked well enough when I was five years old.

Suzi has such a talent for inventing words that I’ve made a Suziisms dictionary, complete with terms like apocaplectic (to be so angry as to bring about the end of all things), monkoidal (monkey-like in appearance), skullular (resembling a skull), onionated (containing onions), succention (an ascending succession), and (of course), weasicular (similar to a weasel, ferret or other small mustalid).

In my career as a massage therapist, I’ve worked at some pretty wacky places. One of the craziest was in the heart of downtown Garland, Texas. The gals there were sweet, funny, and exceptionally silly. One time, apparently, someone’s child saw a chinchilla on the television and asked what it was. One of my colleagues slammed the words “squirrel” and “rabbit” together in her odd brain and told the kiddo “it’s a squabbit.”

It caught on almost instantly. We started calling each other “squabbit” and the word took on the meaning of anyone cute and/or silly. It usually means a kid, but its meaning has expanded over the years to include adults too.

So that’s your vocabulary lesson for today…

Squabbit: (noun) 1. A small child, particularly one who is very cute or mischievous. “Sofia is getting to be a cute little squabbit these days.”
2. Any particularly cute, silly, or mischievous individual. “She is a real squabbit when she feels the mood come on.”

Variant forms: squabb, squabbonia, squabbitissimus, squabberella, squabbitizer

Squabbiticious: (adjective) 1. extremely silly and goofy. “I don’t know what was with Jake, he was in a really squabbiticious mood that weekend!”

I still love my made-up words…squabbit that I sometimes am. So long as I don’t sound too much like a norkasaurus* or say anything cringeworthy**, I’ll probably keep using my panopoly*** of them for the rest of my life!




* really dorky person

** causing one to cringe or recoil in disgust

*** a vast array, from “panoply” and “monopoly”

Doing what I love

I love my job. Back in my days of working 60+ hour weeks at the world's worst print service bureau, or faking it as a graphic artist, I never thought I'd be typing those words. At least, I never thought I would be saying them without sarcasm.

Massage therapy has been a very rewarding career for me. Not financially, well, I mean, I pay my bills on time and never lack for things, but I'm not making the big bucks by a long shot. In terms of personal satisfaction, however, it just can't be beaten! People come in to see me with soreness, tight muscles, tension headaches, insomnia, and a host of other problems. I work with them and they feel better. The praise I receive makes me feel like a hero, and knowing how effective massage makes me feel as though my job is actually making a difference.

Doing massage, even 20-30 hour weeks, is very taxing. Repetitive strain ruins backs, shoulders, elbows, and thumbs. We learn ways to keep ourselves safe, but so many of us ignore those tips and wind up sidelined. A commonly-cited figure holds that most therapists practice about three years before burning out (injuries are only one reason, among the others are low pay and dissatisfaction with the actual practice of massaging people).

The second day of April marked the seventh anniversary of my massage practice. If you count massage school, it's been nearly eight years...and I love my career more than ever.

Lately, however, there have been a few dark clouds looming on my horizon, so to speak. The deep joint of my thumb (the so-called 'saddle' or sellar joint) has been aching. My shoulders often hurt and sometimes there are fiery pains in my forearms. I recently heard that seven years is another peak for massage therapist burnout.

This is a little bit scary...or sobering at least. I really don't do anything else very well. (No, I don't. I'm not just being silly or self-effacing here...read on for explanation...) I'm one of those generalists who does a whole lot of things adequately and one or two very well. I've definitely never had a job I've feel such mastery of. Not to say that I couldn't be as good at something else, but it sure would be a long path to get there.

In my career, I've met a few exceptional massage therapists. One has been practicing for 28 years, several others for well over 10. One of our local clinics has a man in his 80s who is still massaging, and apparently does a heck of a good deep tissue massage.

So, I have resolved to be careful. I recently took a "Safe Hands" course that gave me tips on preventing injury and protecting my body for a nice long career. I have been putting ice on my shoulders and wrists, soaking in Epsom salt baths, resting, exercising...last week I got a (great) massage from my colleague, Kate. That helped a lot.

I dream that some day people will tell their friends: "You have got to go to Massage Envy Frisco...they have this 75-year-old therapist, and he does SUCH a great job!"