Varys writes a letter…

Today my Game of Thrones hero is Varys. The elusive eunuch is one of my favorite characters – is he good or bad or neither? He is wily but can be kind. Is he on anyone’s side except his own? If I was made a eunuch I might feel a little impotent – or is he??? Over the last few weeks I have been Varys-like – so many characters to chameleon in and so little time. I can’t be the only person that is driven CRAZY by the endless mail from charities at this time of year. My husband has a kinder heart than me (Jon Snow, perhaps) but I will keep address labels to use and shred everything. We already tithe a large proportion of our income to our favorite charities and sometimes they overdo it.

In the last couple of weeks we have packages from animal charities that I choose not to be involved with such as PETA and The Sierra Club (there is a website that tells you about good charities but I just use my instinct) – so they just go straight into the dungeon (shredding bag). Even the good ones sent too much stuff when you have already given them hundreds of dollars. So, with Varys in mind, I decided to manipulate the situation. You can’t send a check or put on an address label or they will hunt you down, like Arya.

If I like the charity and they have sent a few Christmas cards then I will put $5 in an envelope and wrap it in something weird like the instructions for my Xanax (to make them feel bad for taking money from a poor anxious woman). I wrapped the $5 for a Thanksgiving meal at a Jesus center in my estrogen cream directions. MD Anderson got their $5 (like they need it) in a Peta leaflet. Then on the address label I write something ridiculous like, ‘Have a Happy Halloween’ to religious groups or eet smakelijk which is Dutch for Bon Appetite.

A marketing organization has been subcontracted for this task and it’s a boring, soulless job so I might give them a little chuckle. It did occur to me that they might keep the $5 for themselves but I really don’t care – it’s just a token. THEY SHOULDN’T BE SENDING UNSOLICITED MAIL IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!!! It’s probably obvious by now but I am due to see my handsome psychiatrist this week. I used to fancy him much more but now I have known him for 10 years and we are appropriate ‘friends’. The appointment is a little overdue and it is the day before Halloween so I am going to dress completely in black with cobweb stockings. Maybe a bit too much black eyeliner and a dark lip and see how quickly he wants to up my anti-depressants. I am just messing with him a little…its psychiatric flirting, really.

On a final note, don’t assume that a charity is not working properly if a large proportion of their money goes on salaries. When I worked in mental health, the community project needed to employ appropriately qualified personnel to advocate; run courses; manage a day center or whatever else we did. Volunteers can’t do everything by themselves and it might be harmful to the clients if they did. So in that situation, all the money went on salaries and rent and 100% of the care went to our clients.

So that’s my Varys day – can eunuchs have sex? I had to research this, of course, for literary reasons… See this link – fascinating stuff! http://www.mtv.com/news/1836500/game-of-thrones-grey-worm-missandei-sex-eunuch/

What annoyed me this week…

Almost everything it seems. Today seemed to be the culmination of everything. Earlier in the week a customer, where I volunteer, asked one of my colleagues, “Why don’t you volunteer somewhere useful, like a hospital?” She was flabbergasted, especially since we sometimes deal with incredibly difficult issues on a regular basis. The customer had leopard printed crutches so we considered knocking her off them – I’m joking, sort of. That and some other issues culminated in me writing to the highest authority which will undoubtedly set the cat amongst the pigeons. Bring it on! I had been chatting with another blogger about being in Cersei mode (Game of Thrones) and somehow I can’t get back to nice Kerry.

A few weeks ago I was also in ‘get off my lawn’ mode when I made a complaint about nuisance barking to the apartments that are behind our reserve. I lived for 12 years in Scotland with endlessly barking yappy dogs and I refuse to pay extortionate taxes in Stepford and put up with the same. After the first complaint, the barking stopped for the most part but last night it was relentless. I got up this morning, put on my Cersei robe and long blonde hair, and composed the next letter (that has been copied to everyone).

To my surprise, there is a new manager who responded immediately and I hope I will not have to follow through with my threat. Dogs are not allowed to bark on the balconies of these apartments both because they are tiny and the noise reverberates everywhere. I have said that I will provide video evidence of barking on the balcony but to do that I will have to have two ladders, a video camera and some help to climb over an eight foot fence into the reserve, full of snakes, skunks, raccoons and then film from the top of the other fence as the apartments are in a gated community.

I am beginning to think that it sounds more like Arya and I will start reciting before bed, “The dog, the owner, the volunteer manager, our Association….” If you don’t watch Games of Thrones then I just sound like a crazy lady and that’s probably more accurate. My husband thinks I should be Daenerys and send in my dragons (three Egyptian feral cats) but that’s his sexual fantasy.