A day at home (and 'waking up in Dental Wonderland')

There's going to be a lot of ranting here. Whenever I visit my parents' house, I always come away really pissed off (usually for multiple reasons). I need to learn my lesson and not go there anymore. It never really was my home the first time around, and it's especially not my home now. (There's a small part at the end after all the ranting.)

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I slept at my parents' house last night for the first time since October 2004 to add to the convenience of seeing our family dentist this morning. (I thankfully didn't have any cavities---it's not like I have many teeth left that don't already have fillings!---and I last had a check-up a year and a half ago. I normally have check-ups every 6 months and was aware that I had skipped one. I hadn't realized I had actually skipped two, but thankfully I didn't screw myself over as a result. One of my friends recently had his first check-up in five years, and it looks like the inside of his mouth really is a Dental Wonderland, especially when the dentist gets to cash the check he's going to receive...)

My parents got a dog since I was last home. I knew about it but hadn't previously met it. I'm not particularly fond of animals (or people, really, but that's another story). My general opinion is that I want them to leave me alone. I won't drop-kick/punt them unless they bother me. (I've never actually drop-kicked or punted any animals, as my actions are typically much kinder than my comments.) The dog, named "Yoda", is a chihuahua, and is large for it's kind (that's a relative term of course). The name is cool, but sadly the dog didn't listen when I informed it that I was not the one it was looking for. (I need to work harder on my Jedi powers... either that, or I need to carry a light-saber around with me.) I was told it hates just about everybody (and that I should apparently get along with it as a result), and sure enough I go home and this thing comes up to me and barks madly and attempts to attack a couple times. (I was also warned the dog french-kisses people it likes, so clearly this battle can't be won.) I also found out that Yoda has apparently completed messed up one of my old stuffed animals (although I never actually saw what it currently looks like) which annoys me greatly, because I really like these particular remnants of childhood. I found out later that he's reached at least a couple of my other stuffed animals (although their bruises are much more minor---the fur on part of one isn't as smooth as it used to be, for example---when he followed my Mom into my old room. My parents give the dog the run of the house, but the old room that I shared with my sister was declared off limits after the dog went for the animals in there. I slept in there last night because apparently that's the only way to not have the dog share one's bed at some point during the night. In punishment, Yoda scratched and whined outside the door (you know, because of the enemy sleeping inside) for a long time, which made reading pretty hard. I didn't sleep well either (I love waking up in cold sweats! Those are the best nights!), but that's mostly because I have the flu right now. (The dog was apparently asleep.) Naturally, this means I wasn't in the best of moods even from the start. Whenever I would try to do something outside the door, I had to deal with the dog coming in to bark at me (and jump and bark at me) and he had to be restrained on several occasions (partly, I imagine, to prevent a promised drop-kick). I don't do well when I want to be left alone and I am not left alone. I get so stressed out when that happens, regardless of whether the thing doing it is something that can understand or something that can't. The resulting stress is there in both cases. The way I'm feeling right now, I don't want to go back to my parents' house unless the dog isn't there because I'm not going to have even a moment's peace if I do. (Not that I get much peace when I'm there anyway, but this just makes a bad problem even worse.) I also saw a couple paw prints amidst the dust on my Civil War chess set, which was actually pretty expensive when I got it back in the day. I didn't look carefully to see the scratches that I assume are now there, but this whole thing is just a nightmare for me. (Note, by the way, the references to Black & White and (especially!) Anchorman in this paragraph.)

In the morning, I noticed that a bunch of my stuff had been moved. This was stuff I had been asked to go through in years past, so this included, e.g., the old issues of The Tech that I wanted to keep (with copies of some of my articles, including several that I don't have saved by any electronic means) and many of the birthday cards from over the years that I had been keeping. Anyway, the point is that basically all of this stuff were things I was specifically keeping---not just a pile of random things I hadn't gone through where I would only want to keep some subset of it. Supposedly, my father put it into a box (he insists he didn't throw it away, but he's said that before concerning things he has ended up throwing away), which can potentially be ok except by parents' house is so messy that my chances of finding it in the next several years are remote. I doubt he labeled the box; it would constitute a never-before-seen phenomenon if he had. I'm unhappy enough about the stuff being boxed without there being a discussion (there is currently nothing in the place where it was before), although this isn't any sort of issue of rights because its my parents house and they can do what they want. However, I specifically keep stuff in very specific spots so that I know exactly where they are when I want to look through them, and I really get annoyed (and have historically gotten very annoyed) when my stuff gets moved without my being given knowledge of where the bloody thing was moved. (Naturally, another thing that soon has happened is that the mover forgets where he/she put the stuff.) The primary purpose of the discussion above would be so I can actually know where it is. Ugh. Anyway, it's not that this is unfair because it really isn't but it is something that pisses me off greatly and it's something that I have told my parents pisses me off greatly, so the main possibilities are that they are really, really dense (which is possible, as that can run in the family) or they don't care that it pisses me (or they want to piss me off, but I think don't care is far more likely). It's most likely denseness.

Of course, when my stuff is moved (and lost, with long transients) or the dog violates my stuff in some manner, I just find out gradually through questions or what I find. There is of course the stuff I haven't figured out yet because historically nobody ever just volunteers any of this information. So in contrast to the issue above about dealing with the dog, there is the matter of coming back to attempt to maximize the fidelity of my stuff and find some of the stuff that's now in random spots.

Eventually, I will have a more permanent job and perhaps a bigger apartment, and I have long-term plans to get my stuff out of my parents' place so that I can preserve it better because they simply can't be trusted. The dog having the run of the house also contributes here.

I can't really claim that any of this is unfair or that I am in the right in any sort of way here. I can just indicate how pissed off I am about all this without claiming that my feelings are justified according to any reasonable definition of the word. I hate it passionately when somebody fucks with the stuff that I treasure, whether that somebody in question is a dog or a person. The sooner I am in a better position to get my stuff out of there, the better. (Just unearthing it from all the junk in my parents' place is going to take a huge effort. To paraphrase George Carlin, "Move your shit! I don't have room for my stuff."

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There are also a couple random things from earlier today. After my dental appointment, I went to lunch with my mother at the Pasadena location of Houston's, where I hadn't eaten since I was an undergrad. The waiting staff were all wearing all black, so I think they're all actually ninjas. The dojo must be hidden somewhere behind the kitchen... I also found out (or was reminded) that someone my family (including me, for once) has known for a long time has been the manager at Aardvark's in Pasadena for around 10 years. My first thought was to be extremely glad that I wasn't among the purchasers when certain things (including ones pertaining to Bob Barker, I believe) were bought for certain Airband skits...