Phew, I'm back. Well, at least in body. In spirit, I'm still in Neverland trying to recover from a week of funeral, cleaning the old house (old men don't take very good care of their fridges), and dealing with my schizophrenic uncle. For some reason, I seem to be the only one in the family on the correct wave length to deal with schizophrenics - not sure why that is. Perhaps it has something to with the fact that I was the only one who laughed when, during my nonna's funeral in January, everyone was all silent and somber and it was pissing down rain and wind and we were outside under a wee tent waiting for them to awkwardly manoeuvre my nonna into the mausoleum, and Gig (my uncle) says really loud "Nice weather we're having, isn't it?" I envy his ability to say shit like that.

Oh, and in my seemingly eternal quest to educate people about schizophrenia

SCHIZOPHRENIA IS NOT MULTIPLE PERSONALITY DISORDER!!!!
(or dissociative personality disorder in psych speak)

Sweet Jesus, I feel like getting a t-shirt made sometimes. The most common elements of schizophrenia are hearing voices and having delusions, the most common delusions being those of grandeur and paranoia, my uncle having both (I'm so great everyone must be after me). As per usual Wiki does a pretty good job if you want more info.

Let's see if I can make the segue from schizophrenia to the book I just finished...well the character is a little odd, and in counseling, and on the outskirts of society, however she thinks she's crazier than she actually is. I just finished the newest book in the Alice series by Susan Juby. In an earlier post, I was complaining about how there were no good, non genred novels coming out today about women's lives that related to the non-conformist woman. Well in terms of teenage girls, there is a character out there and her name is Alice. She lives in Smithers, BC (that's right, small town Canada) and she's basically a female, Canadian Adrian Mole. I think they made a TV show out of the first book recently, but having no TV I don't know if it's any good.

The books are great. This last one, alice macleod, realist at last, is no exception. Alice is a girl raised by hippy parents who gets homeschooled until she's 14 because her parents allow her to wear a hobbit outfit to school to encourage her sense of uniqueness, not realizing that anyone unique in kindergarten gets beaten up constantly. The last book contains many amusing Buffy references and a scene in which her attempt to lose her virginity and is interrupted by an angry moose, followed by her speculating that this probably never happens to girls in L.A. or Toronto.

I'm both embarrassed by and in love with the fact that I find so much in common with Alice. Embarrassed because it's so honest about how she does something for one day, or reads half a book about something, and then spends the rest of the time fantasizing about becoming a star in the field, but never actually does anything to make it happen. I spend most of my days doing that.

Some tidbits to tempt you from the last book:

On her hippy mother's reaction to new boy:
"I suspect she's not going to like Evan. She wouldn't understand how sexy it is to be talked about like an inanimate object by a handsome man"

On her father's suggestion that she include some literary reference to Of Mice and Men in her screenplay Of Moose and Men:
"So I'm going to add some rabbits and make one of the minor characters mentally challenged and call him Lenny."

And finally, on a guy leaving her for someone else:
"I waved as he got in the car with the tanned girl and they drove off. And I was pretty ruined about it and everything. But not as bad as you might think. I mean, I didn't go all Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing and call out his name in a cracked voice or anything."

References to Buffy and Dirty Dancing? I'm staff choicing the hell out of this one.