Yay!!!!!!
I really did mean to post this weekend. But I had to weatherize my house, caulk and I had a NaNo meeting. SO I was uber busy.
I got to go see my mom's new house, which was interesting. She bought all new furniture. I don't know how. It kills me.
I did enjoy the NaNo meeting. I love going to them. Afterwords, we went to a local drinking estblishment and had a fine time.
I spent it talking with our ML, Mystery, and listening to her stories about her home town and when she was growing up. I absolutely adore her, she's very funny. She also understands my "thing" for Alan Rickman, which I love. No one else seems to get it. Anyway. I had a really nice time. It was fun.
Went home and took a loooong bath. It was great.
Looking forward to tick or treaters this evening. This is teh first year I will not be going out and dressing up, which makes me rather sad, but at the same time, I am glad not tohave to mess with it. I will probably rent a scary movie and watch it instead. Should be fun.
NaNo eve tonight as well, and I think I am going to be okay. I am going to get started this evening if I can stay up that late. If not, we are having a "write in" tomorrow evening. Then everyone is going to our local indie film place to watch "The Aristocrats" which I hear is quite vulgar and quite good. I haven't gone to see anything at this new place, so I am looking forward to it.
I think Beloved is glad I am getting out of the house more, and she made a comment last night that I seem happier with something to do.
Happy Halloween Hugs and Lots of Spooky Lovin'
AG
Monday, October 31, 2005
Friday, October 28, 2005
*Happy Dance*
Woohoo! I finally got the outline for my story done. I know I can do it now. I have a comprehensive beginning, middle and end to it. It doesn't suck too bad, so Iwon't feel like I need to edit the storyline a lot. That's Good. :)
Sunshine has become quite the character in the novel, I have to tell you. First I wrote her in as a cameo and then she just kept poping up! LOL. Now I am really going to owe her some royalty fees. I am even going to et a joke out of the fact that her name is Miss Sunshine, and that's her real name in the book. I am probably the only one who thinks that is funny, huh?
I see most everyone has jumped on the NaNo bandwagon. Hooray. Few more days until the suffering begins. I am such a massochist. I can't wait.
In other good news, I finally got Lil' Bit's constume done. I never thought I would finish.
And just in time, my mom signed forher house three days early and got it today, so I can crack into those pillows, blankets and comforters right away.
I am a glutton for punishment.
Hope everyone is having a happy day so far :)
AG
Sunshine has become quite the character in the novel, I have to tell you. First I wrote her in as a cameo and then she just kept poping up! LOL. Now I am really going to owe her some royalty fees. I am even going to et a joke out of the fact that her name is Miss Sunshine, and that's her real name in the book. I am probably the only one who thinks that is funny, huh?
I see most everyone has jumped on the NaNo bandwagon. Hooray. Few more days until the suffering begins. I am such a massochist. I can't wait.
In other good news, I finally got Lil' Bit's constume done. I never thought I would finish.
And just in time, my mom signed forher house three days early and got it today, so I can crack into those pillows, blankets and comforters right away.
I am a glutton for punishment.
Hope everyone is having a happy day so far :)
AG
Thursday, October 27, 2005
When I am Worried, and I Can't Sleep
Wow. Yesterday sucked. I hate being sick. I won’t go into the gory details, lets just say breakfast this morning was wonderful, since I haven’t eaten since noon on Tuesday.
I did get to indulge in one thing, though, that I always do when I am sick. I watched “White Christmas” last night. I can also chalk it up to research for my novel, I suppose. But I love that movie. It always puts me in a good mood. There’s something comforting about the classic beauty of Vera Ellen and Rosemary Clooney. There’s something that always brings a chill on my arms about Bing Crosby’s voice. Its nice.
Does anyone else have a sick day tradition?
I did get to indulge in one thing, though, that I always do when I am sick. I watched “White Christmas” last night. I can also chalk it up to research for my novel, I suppose. But I love that movie. It always puts me in a good mood. There’s something comforting about the classic beauty of Vera Ellen and Rosemary Clooney. There’s something that always brings a chill on my arms about Bing Crosby’s voice. Its nice.
Does anyone else have a sick day tradition?
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Alright. Its crazy post time. I do not know how many readers ( I am going to lay odds on one) do anything remotely witch-related, and I can't really call myself a witch, unless you use Spin's definition that I believe there is "magic" in the earth.
Anyway. Point.
I have dreams, like the ones I write about. But then I have otehrs that bother me. I think that people dream for a reason, and I have been having dreams lately of people from my past. People I would never normally think of in a days time. Last night I had one of someone I haven't thought baout in ages. But it bothers me.
Do you ever have dreams that came true? Or ones that made you know a certain thing was going to happen? When I was 13 I had a dream on the fourth of July that my brother was hurt in an accident. My mom chalked it up top my fear of fireworks. The next year it happened. Exactly as it happened inthe dream. It freaked me out. I have gotten a little more used to it, but it still bothers me sometimes.
I also read tarot, though hardly ever for myself (and NEVER for money). But today at lunch I had this overwhelming *feeling* that I should read for myself. Of course, I didn't have time to do it, sinceI was in teh car. But when I got back to work I pulled a card.
I got King of Pentacles. It means sucess in business ventures.
Anyway. Spin and Sunshine, I pulled one for you too. (Because you both immediately came to mind. So. I can tell you if you want.)
Anyway. Done freaking out. I just don't have a dream and get the *feeling* all in short succession very often.
Love-
AG
Anyway. Point.
I have dreams, like the ones I write about. But then I have otehrs that bother me. I think that people dream for a reason, and I have been having dreams lately of people from my past. People I would never normally think of in a days time. Last night I had one of someone I haven't thought baout in ages. But it bothers me.
Do you ever have dreams that came true? Or ones that made you know a certain thing was going to happen? When I was 13 I had a dream on the fourth of July that my brother was hurt in an accident. My mom chalked it up top my fear of fireworks. The next year it happened. Exactly as it happened inthe dream. It freaked me out. I have gotten a little more used to it, but it still bothers me sometimes.
I also read tarot, though hardly ever for myself (and NEVER for money). But today at lunch I had this overwhelming *feeling* that I should read for myself. Of course, I didn't have time to do it, sinceI was in teh car. But when I got back to work I pulled a card.
I got King of Pentacles. It means sucess in business ventures.
Anyway. Spin and Sunshine, I pulled one for you too. (Because you both immediately came to mind. So. I can tell you if you want.)
Anyway. Done freaking out. I just don't have a dream and get the *feeling* all in short succession very often.
Love-
AG
Drunk on the Roof
A Story. Okay. I can do this. How about a funny one?
Before I started seeing Beloved I dated a girl who lived in a little bitty town on the state line. I used to drive up to see her all the time. Um, I’ll call her Brain, because she was really book smart. Brain lived in this little bitty town, as I said, in a house that was all hers, because her mom had moved to her grandmother’s house, a few miles away. It was a beautiful house. It was a three story Victorian looking thing with gables and wrap around porches and servants entrances and all that. She had grown up in a room that was the attic before they moved in, and it had two gable windows.
At these gable windows, you could walk out on to a ledge and get on to the roof. Brain and I loved to sit on the roof and look at the stars, which you could see really well, because we were in the country.
Brain and I also liked to indulge in cigars and Scotch. I did not know I liked Scotch until I met Brain, but I do. One of the few things I learned from her.
One night Brain and I got the brilliant idea to crawl out on to the roof with a couple bottles of scotch and some cigars and chill out. Well, we drank until we couldn’t crawl back down into the house, and so we fell asleep on the roof.
We had forgot her mom was coming over for breakfast the next morning. Her poor mother pulls in the driveway and sees us, sprawled out on the roof spread eagle style, Scotch bottles in hand, stubs of cigars surrounding us. She promptly, and justifiably, freaks out. I am sure we looked like victims of some odd ritual killing. She woke us up with her screams, nearly causing us to tumble from the roof.
We managed to stumble inside, hung over as all hell (tip: do not drink scotch strait from the bottle with no chasers) and got the lecture of a lifetime.
Lesson: Drink inside the house, smoke inside the house, and don’t get caught by your prospective MIL.
Before I started seeing Beloved I dated a girl who lived in a little bitty town on the state line. I used to drive up to see her all the time. Um, I’ll call her Brain, because she was really book smart. Brain lived in this little bitty town, as I said, in a house that was all hers, because her mom had moved to her grandmother’s house, a few miles away. It was a beautiful house. It was a three story Victorian looking thing with gables and wrap around porches and servants entrances and all that. She had grown up in a room that was the attic before they moved in, and it had two gable windows.
At these gable windows, you could walk out on to a ledge and get on to the roof. Brain and I loved to sit on the roof and look at the stars, which you could see really well, because we were in the country.
Brain and I also liked to indulge in cigars and Scotch. I did not know I liked Scotch until I met Brain, but I do. One of the few things I learned from her.
One night Brain and I got the brilliant idea to crawl out on to the roof with a couple bottles of scotch and some cigars and chill out. Well, we drank until we couldn’t crawl back down into the house, and so we fell asleep on the roof.
We had forgot her mom was coming over for breakfast the next morning. Her poor mother pulls in the driveway and sees us, sprawled out on the roof spread eagle style, Scotch bottles in hand, stubs of cigars surrounding us. She promptly, and justifiably, freaks out. I am sure we looked like victims of some odd ritual killing. She woke us up with her screams, nearly causing us to tumble from the roof.
We managed to stumble inside, hung over as all hell (tip: do not drink scotch strait from the bottle with no chasers) and got the lecture of a lifetime.
Lesson: Drink inside the house, smoke inside the house, and don’t get caught by your prospective MIL.
Monday, October 24, 2005
A Lesbo Love Story
Yep. So I decided I would post this because it clarifies a lot of things. And I think its romantic, in a modern sort of way.
****
Once upon a time Alecya G. was a very sad, very lonely crackhead stripper, who worked at a gay bar in the midwest. Needless to say business was slow. Alecya was sad because she had traeled to The Great Windy City, and had gotten dumped by a hateful readhead vixen who also made her give away tickets to the greatest entertainer of the age, Ani D.
Upon return, she was at this particular place of employment when she became transfixed by a beautiful blonde woman with tall deadly looking spikes in her hair. Alecya immediately began to pursue this woman with an abandon previously only seen in her dancing, which was known throughout the land.
This woman, Sad Girl, was very lonely too. She lived in a two story astle not far away from where Alecya did, and so, Alecya began to visit Sad Girl when she could. Then Sad Girl became very ill and asked Alecya to take care of her. Nursing her through illness frightenend Alecya and so she ran away.
Once she was recovered, Alecya, undeservedly, sought out Sad Girl to apologize for her terrible behavior. In an attempt to make ammends, she brought Sad Girl the gift of Lavendar Roses, the only rose with out thorns, to try and cheer her up.
Sad Girl was afraid, and did not let Alecya in, but in time, she came to trust Alecya, and asked to to visit the caslte more often. One night, in a stupor brought on by too much crack and lots of alcohol, Alecya kissed Sad Girl. And then she knew she was in love with her.
In a further attempt to persuade Sad Girl of her love, she gave up all vices and sought gainful employment.
Sad Girl saw the love Alecya had for her, and rewarded her with a romantic ride through the counrty on horseback. At the end of the day, Sad Girl and Alecya cold not bear to be parted again.
They went to live in Sad Girl's castle, and she became the Beloved of Alecya.
They lived happily ever after that, and eventually built a castle of their own, had kittens and puppies and many wonderful dreams together.
The End
*************
And that is the fairy tale version of how Beloved got me cleaned up and we fell in love. And you now know all my horrible secrets....
Lovins'
AG
****
Once upon a time Alecya G. was a very sad, very lonely crackhead stripper, who worked at a gay bar in the midwest. Needless to say business was slow. Alecya was sad because she had traeled to The Great Windy City, and had gotten dumped by a hateful readhead vixen who also made her give away tickets to the greatest entertainer of the age, Ani D.
Upon return, she was at this particular place of employment when she became transfixed by a beautiful blonde woman with tall deadly looking spikes in her hair. Alecya immediately began to pursue this woman with an abandon previously only seen in her dancing, which was known throughout the land.
This woman, Sad Girl, was very lonely too. She lived in a two story astle not far away from where Alecya did, and so, Alecya began to visit Sad Girl when she could. Then Sad Girl became very ill and asked Alecya to take care of her. Nursing her through illness frightenend Alecya and so she ran away.
Once she was recovered, Alecya, undeservedly, sought out Sad Girl to apologize for her terrible behavior. In an attempt to make ammends, she brought Sad Girl the gift of Lavendar Roses, the only rose with out thorns, to try and cheer her up.
Sad Girl was afraid, and did not let Alecya in, but in time, she came to trust Alecya, and asked to to visit the caslte more often. One night, in a stupor brought on by too much crack and lots of alcohol, Alecya kissed Sad Girl. And then she knew she was in love with her.
In a further attempt to persuade Sad Girl of her love, she gave up all vices and sought gainful employment.
Sad Girl saw the love Alecya had for her, and rewarded her with a romantic ride through the counrty on horseback. At the end of the day, Sad Girl and Alecya cold not bear to be parted again.
They went to live in Sad Girl's castle, and she became the Beloved of Alecya.
They lived happily ever after that, and eventually built a castle of their own, had kittens and puppies and many wonderful dreams together.
The End
*************
And that is the fairy tale version of how Beloved got me cleaned up and we fell in love. And you now know all my horrible secrets....
Lovins'
AG
Sunday, October 23, 2005
Flying
I am so happy right now. I have had a fantastic weekend. i can't even believe how well it has gone.
I came home friday and Beloved had left flowers on the table for me (purple roses - may favorite) and she had picked up a bunch of movies and we spent the evening cuddled on the couch together watching the movies.
We got up on Saturday and drove out of town and spent the day together, and then ccame back to town, cuddled some more on the couch and watched more movies.
Today we went shopping and then I went to our first NANo meeting for our area. I had a great time.
I may not have mentioned this before, but I do not do well with friends, for some reason, I just can't pick them, and it always seems that Beloved's friends can't stand me. So. When I got there today and there were all these people that were like me that laughed at my jokes instead of giving me this glassy stare, I felt like a million bucks. I honestly felt like I was supposed to be there, which sounds pathetic, I know, but is a feeling I haven't exactly felt in a while. I even felt out-nerded, which I have missed so much. It seems like all the people around me have no clue what its like to want to be educated, or to want to read for fun, or create just for the beauty of reation.
I like that I can be around people who understand that. But I also like that they don't take themselves too seriously either. Yeah, its official, I feel like a complete loser for writing allt his.
But hey, that's what blogs are for, right?
So, this has been a pretty nice weekend. I and think the creative juices are flowing, because I have been feelign it more for my story lately. Which is good, because during November I have a feeling I am going to hate it. Which is fine. As long as I get through it.
So that is the story of my happy weekend. :)
I might get around to posting some writing pretty soon, because I atually feel like writing.
Oh! I also have to add, because it freaked me out. Did anyone see that ABC special about the little twins that looked like barbie's and sing (no pun intended I suppose) Nazi stuff. It frightened me. These kids said on camera that they didn't believe all those Jews were killed in the holocaust because there weren't 6 million Jews alive at the time. Is that crazy or what?
I mean, I am all about people being allowed to express themselves n any way they like. And I appreciate that the freedom they enjoy that allows them to think that also allows me to be a bleeding heart liberal dyke. However, I can't fathom the kind of people who teach, even encourage, hate so young in lidfe. It makes me sick to think that there are people so intolerant. I hate it. I could get started on the I wish rant of how tings could be so much better if we all loved eachother and were tolerant and understanding. But I think we all know that can't ever really happen. nd that really saddens me.
Wow. I am SUCH a downer.
So, er, have a good weekend. :{
eta. I tried to post this last night and blogger qas being stupid. So here it is now. But I wrote it yesterday.
I came home friday and Beloved had left flowers on the table for me (purple roses - may favorite) and she had picked up a bunch of movies and we spent the evening cuddled on the couch together watching the movies.
We got up on Saturday and drove out of town and spent the day together, and then ccame back to town, cuddled some more on the couch and watched more movies.
Today we went shopping and then I went to our first NANo meeting for our area. I had a great time.
I may not have mentioned this before, but I do not do well with friends, for some reason, I just can't pick them, and it always seems that Beloved's friends can't stand me. So. When I got there today and there were all these people that were like me that laughed at my jokes instead of giving me this glassy stare, I felt like a million bucks. I honestly felt like I was supposed to be there, which sounds pathetic, I know, but is a feeling I haven't exactly felt in a while. I even felt out-nerded, which I have missed so much. It seems like all the people around me have no clue what its like to want to be educated, or to want to read for fun, or create just for the beauty of reation.
I like that I can be around people who understand that. But I also like that they don't take themselves too seriously either. Yeah, its official, I feel like a complete loser for writing allt his.
But hey, that's what blogs are for, right?
So, this has been a pretty nice weekend. I and think the creative juices are flowing, because I have been feelign it more for my story lately. Which is good, because during November I have a feeling I am going to hate it. Which is fine. As long as I get through it.
So that is the story of my happy weekend. :)
I might get around to posting some writing pretty soon, because I atually feel like writing.
Oh! I also have to add, because it freaked me out. Did anyone see that ABC special about the little twins that looked like barbie's and sing (no pun intended I suppose) Nazi stuff. It frightened me. These kids said on camera that they didn't believe all those Jews were killed in the holocaust because there weren't 6 million Jews alive at the time. Is that crazy or what?
I mean, I am all about people being allowed to express themselves n any way they like. And I appreciate that the freedom they enjoy that allows them to think that also allows me to be a bleeding heart liberal dyke. However, I can't fathom the kind of people who teach, even encourage, hate so young in lidfe. It makes me sick to think that there are people so intolerant. I hate it. I could get started on the I wish rant of how tings could be so much better if we all loved eachother and were tolerant and understanding. But I think we all know that can't ever really happen. nd that really saddens me.
Wow. I am SUCH a downer.
So, er, have a good weekend. :{
eta. I tried to post this last night and blogger qas being stupid. So here it is now. But I wrote it yesterday.
Friday, October 21, 2005
Another Boring Story Update
Sunshine- I took your advice. I killed off an aunt. Technically, I killed off two, because one is dead in the story anyway. But you know what I mean. I’ve been outlining in all my spare time and I am getting a decent plot together.
I think I have also made the plot a little more clear, which is good. I have about 10 pages of outlining so far, and I am not done just yet. I think I am about halfway. I
Its really amazing how a plot can change and how you see you character’s moving.
I also took some of Spin’s advice and added some happy stuff in there, because all depression all the time won’t make for a bestseller either ;)
I think I also have a working title “Hang a Shining Star” which is part of a lyric from “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” I wanted something holiday-ish that still meant something to the plot.
Our group is going to meet this weekend at a Café in our area. I am looking forward to meeting all the different people. We have everything from a high school person to a Christian radio DJ (I have a feeling we’ll be really in tune with each other…haha) Actually, when I posted in out forum to ask if anyone else had any plot ideas, Mr. DJ told me that he doesn’t believe in even thinking about a plot idea before the 1st. I think he’s nuts. I told him I have to plan a little (okay, a lot) or I won’t get it done. I’m a planner.
On a totally unrelated note, you’ll notice I figured out how to link up. If I linked to you and you mind, let me know. Otherwise, hooray! I figured it out. About time too, I think.
Well, I am off to work. (Meaning, getting back to work, since I am already here.) I hope everyone is having a good morning so far.
Lovins’
AG
I think I have also made the plot a little more clear, which is good. I have about 10 pages of outlining so far, and I am not done just yet. I think I am about halfway. I
Its really amazing how a plot can change and how you see you character’s moving.
I also took some of Spin’s advice and added some happy stuff in there, because all depression all the time won’t make for a bestseller either ;)
I think I also have a working title “Hang a Shining Star” which is part of a lyric from “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” I wanted something holiday-ish that still meant something to the plot.
Our group is going to meet this weekend at a Café in our area. I am looking forward to meeting all the different people. We have everything from a high school person to a Christian radio DJ (I have a feeling we’ll be really in tune with each other…haha) Actually, when I posted in out forum to ask if anyone else had any plot ideas, Mr. DJ told me that he doesn’t believe in even thinking about a plot idea before the 1st. I think he’s nuts. I told him I have to plan a little (okay, a lot) or I won’t get it done. I’m a planner.
On a totally unrelated note, you’ll notice I figured out how to link up. If I linked to you and you mind, let me know. Otherwise, hooray! I figured it out. About time too, I think.
Well, I am off to work. (Meaning, getting back to work, since I am already here.) I hope everyone is having a good morning so far.
Lovins’
AG
Thursday, October 20, 2005
wandering
I am feelign really unmotivated today, and I think I am cranky with pre-girly time hormones.
Of course, it also might be that its getting ready to storm and I wish it would do it already.
I really want to be at home with my cats so...
Updates - Sweet avoided me this morning at breakfast, so I am letting it go. She must be annoyed I couldn't (wouldn't) go with her on Monday. Meh.
I had to rip out the seams of the princess dress again because I sewed them the wrong way. I am so sick of the color pink I hope I never see it again.
I am making good progress on the NaNo outline, and think I might actually make it, despite what Beloved says. She tells me not to get my hopes up, its a lot of writing.
And she's right. Plus Thanksgiving, her birthday, my grandmother's birthday and our anniversary are all in November as well. But I will get 50 K I am sure of it!!! Mwua hahahahah!
Gave Annie and Jolie (beagle and mastiff mix) a bath last night. Boy, it was fun. Annie is still missing fur on her rear from her allergies and she looks pathetic. I need to get them some new hay for the ban, but haven't gotten around to it yet. I want to go to a feed store and not Walmart, because they will leave their hay in the rain because its just for people who put it on their porch at Halloween.
Cats are still mad about their bath. Jack isn't as puffy as he was. That first day he looked like he had gotten into some fabric softener he was so fluffy.
I think s that s it, yeah.
AG
Of course, it also might be that its getting ready to storm and I wish it would do it already.
I really want to be at home with my cats so...
Updates - Sweet avoided me this morning at breakfast, so I am letting it go. She must be annoyed I couldn't (wouldn't) go with her on Monday. Meh.
I had to rip out the seams of the princess dress again because I sewed them the wrong way. I am so sick of the color pink I hope I never see it again.
I am making good progress on the NaNo outline, and think I might actually make it, despite what Beloved says. She tells me not to get my hopes up, its a lot of writing.
And she's right. Plus Thanksgiving, her birthday, my grandmother's birthday and our anniversary are all in November as well. But I will get 50 K I am sure of it!!! Mwua hahahahah!
Gave Annie and Jolie (beagle and mastiff mix) a bath last night. Boy, it was fun. Annie is still missing fur on her rear from her allergies and she looks pathetic. I need to get them some new hay for the ban, but haven't gotten around to it yet. I want to go to a feed store and not Walmart, because they will leave their hay in the rain because its just for people who put it on their porch at Halloween.
Cats are still mad about their bath. Jack isn't as puffy as he was. That first day he looked like he had gotten into some fabric softener he was so fluffy.
I think s that s it, yeah.
AG
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Much Better
I hate admitting it, but going back on my medicine now that i have nsurance coverage againi s better than I thought it would be.
I slept better than I had in ages last night.
Jack kept getting up against me though, and I think I squished him a few times.
I am still really pumped up for NaNo but I have a feeling my blog is going to suffer, and you'll be seeing a lot of input posting. My local area is having a get together this week, and I think I might go.
Work has been rough today, and I still have't finished out that constume yet. I worry I am going to be on it at the last minute. I need to exercise, but I am really not feeling it. Ah, well.
AG
I slept better than I had in ages last night.
Jack kept getting up against me though, and I think I squished him a few times.
I am still really pumped up for NaNo but I have a feeling my blog is going to suffer, and you'll be seeing a lot of input posting. My local area is having a get together this week, and I think I might go.
Work has been rough today, and I still have't finished out that constume yet. I worry I am going to be on it at the last minute. I need to exercise, but I am really not feeling it. Ah, well.
AG
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
Beautiful Snowflakes
I learned about snowflaking today, at NaNoWriMo. I have my story summary all ready.
So wanna read it, huh? Huh? Okay. Twisted my arm. Tell me how it sounds so far. *Ahem*
This Christmas, Barb's family Christmas party will reveal some painful insights. Her granmother's age is beginning to show. Her mother's knack for spreading discord is brought to a new level. The aunts she loved as a child are too consumed with greed and grief to be bothered with holiday cheer. The nieve hopes of her sister drive her to despair, but remind her that family may change, but her love for them won't.
No title yet. Sound Awful? Feedback! Please :)
Especially Sunshine who put me on to this one...j/k
So wanna read it, huh? Huh? Okay. Twisted my arm. Tell me how it sounds so far. *Ahem*
This Christmas, Barb's family Christmas party will reveal some painful insights. Her granmother's age is beginning to show. Her mother's knack for spreading discord is brought to a new level. The aunts she loved as a child are too consumed with greed and grief to be bothered with holiday cheer. The nieve hopes of her sister drive her to despair, but remind her that family may change, but her love for them won't.
No title yet. Sound Awful? Feedback! Please :)
Especially Sunshine who put me on to this one...j/k
TOP 5 - Restaurant Edition
Had lunch with Beloved today.
Top 5 Ways to Kill a Tip
5. Don't refil drinks. Ever.
4. When asked the time, Cross your eyes, say 'I don't know I don't carry a watch and walk off"
3. Don't give them the time. Ever.
2. Build up you clientele on how great a specific desert is. Tell them how good it is. Have them order it. Tell them it is not available that day.
1. Call your clientele "kids" Make it obvious you are younger than them.
Next time I am picking the restaurant.
Top 5 Ways to Kill a Tip
5. Don't refil drinks. Ever.
4. When asked the time, Cross your eyes, say 'I don't know I don't carry a watch and walk off"
3. Don't give them the time. Ever.
2. Build up you clientele on how great a specific desert is. Tell them how good it is. Have them order it. Tell them it is not available that day.
1. Call your clientele "kids" Make it obvious you are younger than them.
Next time I am picking the restaurant.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Best.Excuse.Ever.
Gladys, you were close. LOL.
So Sweet just called me at work to tell me how incredibly sorry she was that she didn't get back to me sooner.
Apparently, she spent Thursday evening with her parents, left her cell phone in their car, and they went on vacation to Illinois for the weekend, they just now returned her phone and she feels really, really bad. And she invited me to dinner.
PLUS. If this wasn't bad enough, because missing drinks with me, as you all are sure to know, is devastating, her car got broken into while she was in town on Friday night, so now she has to drive with no rear window.
Please tell me that this is so far fetched t has to be true, because otehrwise my intelligence has been insulted so badly I don't think I could recover.
Beloved also called to let me know she was calling (after I already talked to her) because she called our house to get my work number.
I don't know whether to laugh or vomit.
AG
So Sweet just called me at work to tell me how incredibly sorry she was that she didn't get back to me sooner.
Apparently, she spent Thursday evening with her parents, left her cell phone in their car, and they went on vacation to Illinois for the weekend, they just now returned her phone and she feels really, really bad. And she invited me to dinner.
PLUS. If this wasn't bad enough, because missing drinks with me, as you all are sure to know, is devastating, her car got broken into while she was in town on Friday night, so now she has to drive with no rear window.
Please tell me that this is so far fetched t has to be true, because otehrwise my intelligence has been insulted so badly I don't think I could recover.
Beloved also called to let me know she was calling (after I already talked to her) because she called our house to get my work number.
I don't know whether to laugh or vomit.
AG
NaNo ideas. Input welcome.
I have narrowed it down, I think to two.
Lesbian fiction is totally out. I think there is too much for me to tackle in one go. I want to let this idea simmer, and I want this to be something for later.
So.
Option 1 – Story about Christmas Dinner for a family. Narrator granddaughter. Mom has five sisters. Things have changed a lot. She reminisces about past Christmases and family changes with another family member, possibly her sister. Literary Fiction Piece. Mostly sad, with funny moments.
Option 2 – Story about female who is taking a friend to the fair for the first time. Story told in pictures of their trip. Chapter titles reflect life lessons learned at the fair. Mostly funny, sarcastic and light.
Which sounds better?
Lesbian fiction is totally out. I think there is too much for me to tackle in one go. I want to let this idea simmer, and I want this to be something for later.
So.
Option 1 – Story about Christmas Dinner for a family. Narrator granddaughter. Mom has five sisters. Things have changed a lot. She reminisces about past Christmases and family changes with another family member, possibly her sister. Literary Fiction Piece. Mostly sad, with funny moments.
Option 2 – Story about female who is taking a friend to the fair for the first time. Story told in pictures of their trip. Chapter titles reflect life lessons learned at the fair. Mostly funny, sarcastic and light.
Which sounds better?
Dreams
This is a dream I had a while back, the most vivid dream I have eer had. One I have had more than once, a little different every time. Like the other I wrote about.
I ahould add, I am more spiritual than I am religious, so for any diety to pop up in my dreams is...odd. To say the least.
Off we go. Nighty night kiddies.
***************************************************************************************
I am barefoot, and as I shuffle along this cold, hard floor I realize I can barely feel my toes. I look down and note that the floor is made of stone, like to bottom of a cave.
Am I in a cave, I wonder. Somewhere, far away, I can hear the slow steady drip, drip of water on the stone. But there is no ceiling that I can see. But no sky as well. Just dark above, and cold below, and a strange light I keep thinking I will find if I keep wandering long enough..
Gradually I approach this light, shining from behind a door that is not attached to any walls. I look behind it, there is nothing there. I touch it, it does nothing. Yet I cannot open it and there is no lock. I wander past it, with a shrug of my shoulders and an erie sense of foreboding.
The door stays in my mind as I cross a stone brindge, made of the same grainy, uncomfortable stone I have been walking on for an age, it seems. But there is ahead of me a railing that looks like the overlooks I saw when traveling cross country. There will be a bluff below it, and something new for me to look at.
And there is. A room, if it had walls and a ceiling, I would call it a room, full of cedar chests and shelves and drawers. In it, there are people, running back nd forth, opeining the drawers and pulling out various articles of clothing, inspecting them and placing them back. On occasion someone will take it with them, and as they try it on, they disappear from my sight. Not move away, as if they were finished, but vanish, into thin air, as if I imagined them all along.
I realize somewhere in my mind this must be a dream. These cold rooms with no ceilings and stone floors full of chests and vanishing people cannot be real. But shouldn’t I wake up? If Iknow? Why can’t I leave.
I keep walking, and breathe in the smell of the cedar. Down rough hewn stairs that put splinters into my feet and along the other floor, that I was watching from above. These people, I watch them from up close. They are young, old, funny or sad. All of them. One comes to me with a polka dot skirt.
“What do you think?” She asks me.
I tell her I do not like it. But she doesn’t seem to hear me. She gets angry and huffs off. I wonder why she can’t hear me. I try to open the drawer in front of me. Again, I cannot. I begin to feel frustrated, as one by one, I try the drawers, cabinets and chests. None of them open, save one. Whenit does, I feel as if all the air has been squeezed out of my lungs. Inside, there is a faded plaid cotton shirt. It is blue, and smells of my grandfather. I have this shirt. It is a t home, in my drawers. It is my most prized posession.
I start to cry. I am crying for real. I can feel it in my chest as I stager up the stairs, back to towards that door that won’t open, trying to get out of this hateful dream that isn’t.
But as I approach the door I see something that I never thought I would. Something that stills my crying and both gives me and steals my breath.
Shiva. The god of life. The one who danced on chaos to bring this world into existence (if you believe that sort of thing). Shiva is standing in front of me.
Pale blue skin. Eye like the light behinf that door, unearthly, golden and full of fire. Across his body are beautiful symbols I have never seen before. I cannot read them, I cannot understnd them. I each of his thin, elegant hands there is a roll of bread. There is one in his mouth. And on his neck is a key.
The key feels heavy on my neck as I take it from him, sure that it is what I am supposed to do.
My eyes are dazzled and I begin to see things I had not seen before.
There is a boy standing beside me, one I think I have seen many times. He looks Phillipino, or maybe Vietnemeese. He is 12 or 13 and his eyes are black, like polished onyx. I have always known him. I am more and more sure of it as he takes my hand in his and leads me through the door.
There is a boy and a man on the other side. Standing in a forest dense with trees and the songs of birds. The boy, dressed in white, hugs me. I feel his arms go through me, and I can more sense his smile and voice than I can see and hear it. He tells me he is happy. That he has never been better. He thinks I have been looking for him, and I am unsure who he is.
Next to him, Pappa. My grandfather, there, smiling as he always does, lookng like he never left me. I reach for him, choking, and suddenly everything is gone.
I have finally woken, and am laying in my bed, covered in tears. I am sweating, and moaning and trying desperately to understand.
But I do. I died that night.
I ahould add, I am more spiritual than I am religious, so for any diety to pop up in my dreams is...odd. To say the least.
Off we go. Nighty night kiddies.
***************************************************************************************
I am barefoot, and as I shuffle along this cold, hard floor I realize I can barely feel my toes. I look down and note that the floor is made of stone, like to bottom of a cave.
Am I in a cave, I wonder. Somewhere, far away, I can hear the slow steady drip, drip of water on the stone. But there is no ceiling that I can see. But no sky as well. Just dark above, and cold below, and a strange light I keep thinking I will find if I keep wandering long enough..
Gradually I approach this light, shining from behind a door that is not attached to any walls. I look behind it, there is nothing there. I touch it, it does nothing. Yet I cannot open it and there is no lock. I wander past it, with a shrug of my shoulders and an erie sense of foreboding.
The door stays in my mind as I cross a stone brindge, made of the same grainy, uncomfortable stone I have been walking on for an age, it seems. But there is ahead of me a railing that looks like the overlooks I saw when traveling cross country. There will be a bluff below it, and something new for me to look at.
And there is. A room, if it had walls and a ceiling, I would call it a room, full of cedar chests and shelves and drawers. In it, there are people, running back nd forth, opeining the drawers and pulling out various articles of clothing, inspecting them and placing them back. On occasion someone will take it with them, and as they try it on, they disappear from my sight. Not move away, as if they were finished, but vanish, into thin air, as if I imagined them all along.
I realize somewhere in my mind this must be a dream. These cold rooms with no ceilings and stone floors full of chests and vanishing people cannot be real. But shouldn’t I wake up? If Iknow? Why can’t I leave.
I keep walking, and breathe in the smell of the cedar. Down rough hewn stairs that put splinters into my feet and along the other floor, that I was watching from above. These people, I watch them from up close. They are young, old, funny or sad. All of them. One comes to me with a polka dot skirt.
“What do you think?” She asks me.
I tell her I do not like it. But she doesn’t seem to hear me. She gets angry and huffs off. I wonder why she can’t hear me. I try to open the drawer in front of me. Again, I cannot. I begin to feel frustrated, as one by one, I try the drawers, cabinets and chests. None of them open, save one. Whenit does, I feel as if all the air has been squeezed out of my lungs. Inside, there is a faded plaid cotton shirt. It is blue, and smells of my grandfather. I have this shirt. It is a t home, in my drawers. It is my most prized posession.
I start to cry. I am crying for real. I can feel it in my chest as I stager up the stairs, back to towards that door that won’t open, trying to get out of this hateful dream that isn’t.
But as I approach the door I see something that I never thought I would. Something that stills my crying and both gives me and steals my breath.
Shiva. The god of life. The one who danced on chaos to bring this world into existence (if you believe that sort of thing). Shiva is standing in front of me.
Pale blue skin. Eye like the light behinf that door, unearthly, golden and full of fire. Across his body are beautiful symbols I have never seen before. I cannot read them, I cannot understnd them. I each of his thin, elegant hands there is a roll of bread. There is one in his mouth. And on his neck is a key.
The key feels heavy on my neck as I take it from him, sure that it is what I am supposed to do.
My eyes are dazzled and I begin to see things I had not seen before.
There is a boy standing beside me, one I think I have seen many times. He looks Phillipino, or maybe Vietnemeese. He is 12 or 13 and his eyes are black, like polished onyx. I have always known him. I am more and more sure of it as he takes my hand in his and leads me through the door.
There is a boy and a man on the other side. Standing in a forest dense with trees and the songs of birds. The boy, dressed in white, hugs me. I feel his arms go through me, and I can more sense his smile and voice than I can see and hear it. He tells me he is happy. That he has never been better. He thinks I have been looking for him, and I am unsure who he is.
Next to him, Pappa. My grandfather, there, smiling as he always does, lookng like he never left me. I reach for him, choking, and suddenly everything is gone.
I have finally woken, and am laying in my bed, covered in tears. I am sweating, and moaning and trying desperately to understand.
But I do. I died that night.
Ack!
So I am going over ideas for NaNoWriMo and I have a few, but I am lost as to what I would like to do.
Both my ideas I like, but I have been bouncing ideas off of Beloved and she is poking holes in them with such speed and glee I feel my time as a potential writer is dying quickly. This is why I don't let her read my stuff.
One idea I had was to write a cick type novel, only for lesbians, since , you know, I am one and this is what I know about. But I cann't seem to find a way tobring my girls together that is satisfying. Beloved says being accidientlly hit in the head with a baseball is not probable, that spilling coffee is overdone (is it?) and that meeting in the feminine hygene isle is so pathetic and rediculous I would have to write a comedy.
The other idea I had was about the county fair. There seem to be so few people who have ever been to one, and I am of the firm opinion that you can learn every life lesson you need at the fair. But I wouldn't know how to write it.
I did have an idea to write a fiction based on a family of women (inspired by my mother's 5 sisters) and see how that went, but I know it would be sad. I am used to writing depressing stuff. I wanted to move away from that.
Help. Please?
Both my ideas I like, but I have been bouncing ideas off of Beloved and she is poking holes in them with such speed and glee I feel my time as a potential writer is dying quickly. This is why I don't let her read my stuff.
One idea I had was to write a cick type novel, only for lesbians, since , you know, I am one and this is what I know about. But I cann't seem to find a way tobring my girls together that is satisfying. Beloved says being accidientlly hit in the head with a baseball is not probable, that spilling coffee is overdone (is it?) and that meeting in the feminine hygene isle is so pathetic and rediculous I would have to write a comedy.
The other idea I had was about the county fair. There seem to be so few people who have ever been to one, and I am of the firm opinion that you can learn every life lesson you need at the fair. But I wouldn't know how to write it.
I did have an idea to write a fiction based on a family of women (inspired by my mother's 5 sisters) and see how that went, but I know it would be sad. I am used to writing depressing stuff. I wanted to move away from that.
Help. Please?
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Kitty Bath Time
Yep, its that time again.
I have two beautiful cats, which I think I talked about in one of my first posts. To save you the trouble of going back - Jack, a 2 y/o tuxedo cat who loves me almost as much as I love beloved and Roxie, a 3 y/o mancoon tabby who hates me as much as Jack loves me. She belongs toBeloved, really.
We went to the vet the other day and it turns out Roxie had fleas. How she got them I don't know, but she does and I purchased every flea killing method on the planet, including a carpet spray, the kitty version of K9 Advantix, and flea shampoo (and all for the bargain price of..well, lets say it was about a quarter of my paycheck. I about died)
So tonight the children got a bath.
Bath planning is very important. Firstm we have a specific order, Roxie first, Jack second. Jack likes Roxie and her fur, so its easier to get him into the tub if she's always been there. Plus Roxie won't fight as much as Jack and so we like to have a warm up round.
Next we have to pretend like nothiong is going on, scoop the cats up and run like hell to the bathroom.
Run the water while they get their yowling out of the way, strip (I get in to hold them) and start scrubing.
I'd like to mention that I am now sporting two matching, very lovely, red scratches that run down the length of my inner thigh, because that's where both of them like to scratch me, as if they know they can punish me by making my already slow sex life more painful than it already is by inflicting scratches ...well you get the point.
Jack, I need to mention, has apparently been trainign as a kick boxer on the side, because his back legs are so strong. He kicked me hard enough to send me tumbling backwards into the water. It makes me glad that he 1) doesn't have front claws and 2) that I have Beloved in there to help me.
So anyway. We're all done now, kitty Advantix applied and they are in their respective sulking places; Jack in the floor on my area rug and Roxie in Beloved's lap wimpering like I've beaten her. I can hear Beloved from here, cooing to her, "Its okay, mean momma won't do it anymore, I promise"
Mean momma. Ha. And she can promise all she wants. That cat still has fleas and I'll shave her bald if I have to.
Anyway. I am going to limp off to the sewing table now, I can do that with relative ease while I recover. Did I mention Lil' Bits constume was 8" too small. I am going to insist on a pattern next time.
Wet, smelly and bleeding-
AG
I have two beautiful cats, which I think I talked about in one of my first posts. To save you the trouble of going back - Jack, a 2 y/o tuxedo cat who loves me almost as much as I love beloved and Roxie, a 3 y/o mancoon tabby who hates me as much as Jack loves me. She belongs toBeloved, really.
We went to the vet the other day and it turns out Roxie had fleas. How she got them I don't know, but she does and I purchased every flea killing method on the planet, including a carpet spray, the kitty version of K9 Advantix, and flea shampoo (and all for the bargain price of..well, lets say it was about a quarter of my paycheck. I about died)
So tonight the children got a bath.
Bath planning is very important. Firstm we have a specific order, Roxie first, Jack second. Jack likes Roxie and her fur, so its easier to get him into the tub if she's always been there. Plus Roxie won't fight as much as Jack and so we like to have a warm up round.
Next we have to pretend like nothiong is going on, scoop the cats up and run like hell to the bathroom.
Run the water while they get their yowling out of the way, strip (I get in to hold them) and start scrubing.
I'd like to mention that I am now sporting two matching, very lovely, red scratches that run down the length of my inner thigh, because that's where both of them like to scratch me, as if they know they can punish me by making my already slow sex life more painful than it already is by inflicting scratches ...well you get the point.
Jack, I need to mention, has apparently been trainign as a kick boxer on the side, because his back legs are so strong. He kicked me hard enough to send me tumbling backwards into the water. It makes me glad that he 1) doesn't have front claws and 2) that I have Beloved in there to help me.
So anyway. We're all done now, kitty Advantix applied and they are in their respective sulking places; Jack in the floor on my area rug and Roxie in Beloved's lap wimpering like I've beaten her. I can hear Beloved from here, cooing to her, "Its okay, mean momma won't do it anymore, I promise"
Mean momma. Ha. And she can promise all she wants. That cat still has fleas and I'll shave her bald if I have to.
Anyway. I am going to limp off to the sewing table now, I can do that with relative ease while I recover. Did I mention Lil' Bits constume was 8" too small. I am going to insist on a pattern next time.
Wet, smelly and bleeding-
AG
Friday, October 14, 2005
NaNoWriMo
Yep. I am totally doing it. I think it is serindipitous that this happened at the same time I posted about wanting to be a novelist.
I am going to get a short up soon. Reviews would make me giggle.
I had to post something happy.
AG
I am going to get a short up soon. Reviews would make me giggle.
I had to post something happy.
AG
Stood Up
Should I even be suprised anymore? I don't think so. No phone call. No email. No anything. Lovely.
Well, there's a great example right there as to why I can't make friends. I can't even pick them.
On the up side, this does cure me of my friendly crush on Sweet.
Best part is, I spent the evening with Beloved watching romantic movies. Much better than getting drunk anyway, right?
Lovins'
AG
Well, there's a great example right there as to why I can't make friends. I can't even pick them.
On the up side, this does cure me of my friendly crush on Sweet.
Best part is, I spent the evening with Beloved watching romantic movies. Much better than getting drunk anyway, right?
Lovins'
AG
What I Always Wanted
Tonight is the big night. I am going out with Sweet. Beloved called a friend and they are going out together so I do not feel guilty. It makes me a lot happier to know she will behaving a nice evening as well.
I am really rather excited. I hope things go well. I am sure they are. I went in to see her this morning and she ws busy putting out bagels and she looked a little out of sorts. Then again, her bitchy boss was working too, so I would be out of sorts if I were her as well.
Speaking of her bitchy boss. I used to work for her at a tlelmarketing company when I was in high school I ended up getting fired because I had to be put in the hospital for my headaches. She told me that if I couldn’t learn to get my priorities strait that I would never amount to anything in life.
Its nice to know that she is now working in a bakery café as a manager and I am actually doing pretty close to what I wanted to do for a living. Not because I want her to be unhappy, but because I proved her wrong. I did make something of myself, and I still put my health first. Heck, maybe she lieks being a bakery manager. You never know.
I always wanted to be an author. Now, I suppose, I got what I wanted. I work in a different industry. But I still write books/manuals and they are my work. I am pretty proud of that. (Not to mention I haven’t finished college –yet. I will though.) Still, I do have a blog, and I get to write here, and I think that my writing is not too bad. You are my test audience and you can tell me how awful it is, or is not. And I can be personal, like the one below I did for Sunshine. (Sometimes you guys really inspire me.) One day I’ll get around to publishing, but in the mean tiem I am doing something I like for a job and somehing I love for a hobby.
That works out well, right?
This does bring me to another point. I have a friend who has finished college and got a degree in breative writing nad literature. He, like me, wants to be a novelist. See, the thing is, he is working in a department store, totally miserable, selling shoes and making no money because if he can’t get accepted to an Ivy League or publish a novel, no other work is good enough for him.
He is a decent writer, and he founded the first (wildly sucessful) literary magazine for his school, which was a pretty big, pretty good school. (As a side note, one of his co-editors his senior year saw some of my work on his desktop and insisted that it be published too.) He had sent me bits of a novel he was writing and asked me to edit it a few months ago. I asked him if he wanted me to really, or if he just wantedpositive feedback, because I know how he takes criticism.
Well, it was awful, and I didn’t put it that way, but I did make it clear that it wasn’t pubishable, or even close at that point and he needed to iron out a lot of wrinkles. His ego must have taken quite a blow. He hasn’t written or called since and we normally talked on the phone once a week and via email every day. I feel kinda bad. But I did the right thing, right? I saved him from submitting something badly written and with poor storyline to a publisher and ruining his chances of being taken seriously.
Well. I think that’s it for now. As a sid enote, I know I do not spell check, and I appreciate that you guys tolerate it and don’t make fun of me.
Lovins’
AG
PS- I also need to add a thank you to Sunshine and Spin for being so incredibly supportive lately. I appreciate the advice and love and ‘stuff’. Jay – I’d add you too, but since we are friends outside cyberspace, I think you already kow I appreciate you.
I am really rather excited. I hope things go well. I am sure they are. I went in to see her this morning and she ws busy putting out bagels and she looked a little out of sorts. Then again, her bitchy boss was working too, so I would be out of sorts if I were her as well.
Speaking of her bitchy boss. I used to work for her at a tlelmarketing company when I was in high school I ended up getting fired because I had to be put in the hospital for my headaches. She told me that if I couldn’t learn to get my priorities strait that I would never amount to anything in life.
Its nice to know that she is now working in a bakery café as a manager and I am actually doing pretty close to what I wanted to do for a living. Not because I want her to be unhappy, but because I proved her wrong. I did make something of myself, and I still put my health first. Heck, maybe she lieks being a bakery manager. You never know.
I always wanted to be an author. Now, I suppose, I got what I wanted. I work in a different industry. But I still write books/manuals and they are my work. I am pretty proud of that. (Not to mention I haven’t finished college –yet. I will though.) Still, I do have a blog, and I get to write here, and I think that my writing is not too bad. You are my test audience and you can tell me how awful it is, or is not. And I can be personal, like the one below I did for Sunshine. (Sometimes you guys really inspire me.) One day I’ll get around to publishing, but in the mean tiem I am doing something I like for a job and somehing I love for a hobby.
That works out well, right?
This does bring me to another point. I have a friend who has finished college and got a degree in breative writing nad literature. He, like me, wants to be a novelist. See, the thing is, he is working in a department store, totally miserable, selling shoes and making no money because if he can’t get accepted to an Ivy League or publish a novel, no other work is good enough for him.
He is a decent writer, and he founded the first (wildly sucessful) literary magazine for his school, which was a pretty big, pretty good school. (As a side note, one of his co-editors his senior year saw some of my work on his desktop and insisted that it be published too.) He had sent me bits of a novel he was writing and asked me to edit it a few months ago. I asked him if he wanted me to really, or if he just wantedpositive feedback, because I know how he takes criticism.
Well, it was awful, and I didn’t put it that way, but I did make it clear that it wasn’t pubishable, or even close at that point and he needed to iron out a lot of wrinkles. His ego must have taken quite a blow. He hasn’t written or called since and we normally talked on the phone once a week and via email every day. I feel kinda bad. But I did the right thing, right? I saved him from submitting something badly written and with poor storyline to a publisher and ruining his chances of being taken seriously.
Well. I think that’s it for now. As a sid enote, I know I do not spell check, and I appreciate that you guys tolerate it and don’t make fun of me.
Lovins’
AG
PS- I also need to add a thank you to Sunshine and Spin for being so incredibly supportive lately. I appreciate the advice and love and ‘stuff’. Jay – I’d add you too, but since we are friends outside cyberspace, I think you already kow I appreciate you.
Thursday, October 13, 2005
I Pod Fortune Teller
I saw it originally on Flsh’s blog. Then I saw Spin do it. I am a shameless follower.
IPod shuffle thingie: only I used a list of songs I was keeping to have Bobert put on a mix CD for me because I do not have an IPod….here goes.
1. What do you think of me?
SAVE ME – Shinedown
And please just save me if you can
From the blasphemy in my wasteland
I can help people feel better about themselves? I had a psychic tell me one time I would be like a “god” to the people in my life once I found my calling….
2. Will I have a happy life?
DROPS OF JUPITER – Train
Can you imagine no love, pride, deep-fried chicken
Your best friend always sticking up for you even when I know you’re wrong
Can you imagine no first dance, freeze dried romance five-hour phone
ConversationT
he best soy latte that you ever had . . . and me
I think that means yes
3. What do my friends really think of me?
FRESHMAN – The Verve Pipe
When I was young I knew everything
She a punk who rarely ever took advice
I am a smart ass. I agree.
4. What does my significant other think of me?
NO RAIN – Blind Melon
just want some one to say to me
I'll always be there when you wake
Ya know I'd like to keep my cheeks dry today
So stay with me and I'll have it made
She’s co-depended and will stay with me to feel safe. Depressing.
5. Do people secretly lust after me?
MR. BRIGHTSIDE – The Killers
I just can’t look its killing me
And taking control
Jealousy, turning saints into the seaS
wimming through sick lullabies
Choking on your alibis
Hooray. I have a stalker
6. How can I make myself happy?
COLLIDE – Howie Day
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the stars refuse to shine
Remember no one is perfect.
7. What should I do with my life?
LITHIUM – Nirvana
I'm so happy 'cause today I found my friends
Make friends?
8. Why must life be so painful?
HOLIDAY – Green Day
I beg to dream and differ from the hollow lies
This is the dawning of the rest of our lives
On holiday
Because this is not really life. Its hell on earth. Great.
9. What advice can you give me?
SEX AND CANDY – Marcy Playground
I smell sex and candy here
Who's that lounging in my chair
Who's that casting devious stares
In my direction
Mama this surely is a dream
Have sex. Eat Sweets. Let hot chicks stare at me. I like this one.
10. What do you think true happiness is?
LOSING MY RELIGION – R.E.M.
That's me in the cornerT
hat's me in the spotlight
Losing my religion
Don’t go to church. I agree.
11. Will I die happy?
SUGAR WE”RE GOING DOWN – Fall Out Boy”
We’re going down down in an earlier Round,
Sugar we’re going down swingin’”
I think this is a no, I die young and in a painful manner. Bummer.
Well. That was fun. And insightful. Sort of.
IPod shuffle thingie: only I used a list of songs I was keeping to have Bobert put on a mix CD for me because I do not have an IPod….here goes.
1. What do you think of me?
SAVE ME – Shinedown
And please just save me if you can
From the blasphemy in my wasteland
I can help people feel better about themselves? I had a psychic tell me one time I would be like a “god” to the people in my life once I found my calling….
2. Will I have a happy life?
DROPS OF JUPITER – Train
Can you imagine no love, pride, deep-fried chicken
Your best friend always sticking up for you even when I know you’re wrong
Can you imagine no first dance, freeze dried romance five-hour phone
ConversationT
he best soy latte that you ever had . . . and me
I think that means yes
3. What do my friends really think of me?
FRESHMAN – The Verve Pipe
When I was young I knew everything
She a punk who rarely ever took advice
I am a smart ass. I agree.
4. What does my significant other think of me?
NO RAIN – Blind Melon
just want some one to say to me
I'll always be there when you wake
Ya know I'd like to keep my cheeks dry today
So stay with me and I'll have it made
She’s co-depended and will stay with me to feel safe. Depressing.
5. Do people secretly lust after me?
MR. BRIGHTSIDE – The Killers
I just can’t look its killing me
And taking control
Jealousy, turning saints into the seaS
wimming through sick lullabies
Choking on your alibis
Hooray. I have a stalker
6. How can I make myself happy?
COLLIDE – Howie Day
Even the best fall down sometimes
Even the stars refuse to shine
Remember no one is perfect.
7. What should I do with my life?
LITHIUM – Nirvana
I'm so happy 'cause today I found my friends
Make friends?
8. Why must life be so painful?
HOLIDAY – Green Day
I beg to dream and differ from the hollow lies
This is the dawning of the rest of our lives
On holiday
Because this is not really life. Its hell on earth. Great.
9. What advice can you give me?
SEX AND CANDY – Marcy Playground
I smell sex and candy here
Who's that lounging in my chair
Who's that casting devious stares
In my direction
Mama this surely is a dream
Have sex. Eat Sweets. Let hot chicks stare at me. I like this one.
10. What do you think true happiness is?
LOSING MY RELIGION – R.E.M.
That's me in the cornerT
hat's me in the spotlight
Losing my religion
Don’t go to church. I agree.
11. Will I die happy?
SUGAR WE”RE GOING DOWN – Fall Out Boy”
We’re going down down in an earlier Round,
Sugar we’re going down swingin’”
I think this is a no, I die young and in a painful manner. Bummer.
Well. That was fun. And insightful. Sort of.
Pass the Prozak aka/ Worse and Worse all the Time
I am beginning to think this really isn’t my week.
Went to Lil bit’s party last night. They started dinner without me which saved me the trouble of lying and saying I wasn’t hungry. She liked the presents I got her and grandma had the presence of mind to bring me a new sewing machine.
However, that is about where the good part of the evening ends. Beloved has a certain, shall we call it, phobia, of hair. I wanted to get in some quality time, but this required me to spend quality time with a razor first, and I managed to nick myself and bleed for 30 minutes solid. After which, she asks me if I am not really just sleepy. I reply that I would like to spend time with her and she asks if she can read erotica for a while to get in the mood. I know she has no libodi anyway, but for some stupid reason it bothers me and I say so. Pissy whiny fight ensues. We eventually talk about it and I chalk it up to my crap self esteem and we go to sleep.
Work is making me crazy because I am getting crap for not having stuff that I shouldn’t have to have which makes me cranky. If my superior doesn’t give me something, I can’t give it to the owner when he’s on vacation can I? *huffs*
Have to get Boss’ day present tonight, and have to get to work on haloween costume, which still isn’t sewn. Have to meet mom to help her pick out more chiffon and ribbon, because she evidently cannot purchase it without my expert opinion. You’d think she was 6 not 46. Really.
I am being a bad friend, which isn’t cool of me I guess, sinceI have so few of them that don’t exist in cyberland. Begged off lunch with a guy friend tomorrow because I can’t stand th thought of listening to him complain all through lunch how his new promotion (and subsequent $100,000 per annum raise) stresses him out.
Also begged of Saturday lunch with Bear because I don’t feel like listening to him talk about his ex-wife getting remarried. I have listened for 6 months now, and I can’t take it right now. I feel really selfish and crappy.
All I really want is to go home, pull the blankets over my head and sleep until I feel better. Of course, I know this won’t help my problem. Mr. Cruse says I can help my problem by ov3erhauling my diet and exercise. I don’t think it will work since I have’t had a kid and I am currently both dieting and exercising and I think the lack of caffeine calories and chocolate is making me pissy.
I am having drinks with Sweet tomorrow afternoon which is somthign to look forward to. She cornered me and wanted to make sure I am not backing out, which makes me feel better, since I have less a chance of her canceling on me now.
Beloved gave me this tip “take her somewhere nice” Uh, huh. Like I would take her to a hole in the wall on a first buddy outing. I know better. I want to make a good impression since this will be my first time doing something with her other than talking on the phone or having her make my breakfast/lunch.
Now that I think of it. Beloved has found a girl in one of her classes at school that “looks just like you did when we first started dating” to quote her on the topic. (this means about 40 lbs less than me now, and shorter hair) They’ve been having lunch together and she tells me this girl bats for both teams. Should I be worried? Am I a total hipocrite for worrying since she apparently has no worries about me and Sweet? Eh, I am eing paranoid again, yes?
Well, off to sulk through the rest of my afternoon.
Lovins’
AG
Went to Lil bit’s party last night. They started dinner without me which saved me the trouble of lying and saying I wasn’t hungry. She liked the presents I got her and grandma had the presence of mind to bring me a new sewing machine.
However, that is about where the good part of the evening ends. Beloved has a certain, shall we call it, phobia, of hair. I wanted to get in some quality time, but this required me to spend quality time with a razor first, and I managed to nick myself and bleed for 30 minutes solid. After which, she asks me if I am not really just sleepy. I reply that I would like to spend time with her and she asks if she can read erotica for a while to get in the mood. I know she has no libodi anyway, but for some stupid reason it bothers me and I say so. Pissy whiny fight ensues. We eventually talk about it and I chalk it up to my crap self esteem and we go to sleep.
Work is making me crazy because I am getting crap for not having stuff that I shouldn’t have to have which makes me cranky. If my superior doesn’t give me something, I can’t give it to the owner when he’s on vacation can I? *huffs*
Have to get Boss’ day present tonight, and have to get to work on haloween costume, which still isn’t sewn. Have to meet mom to help her pick out more chiffon and ribbon, because she evidently cannot purchase it without my expert opinion. You’d think she was 6 not 46. Really.
I am being a bad friend, which isn’t cool of me I guess, sinceI have so few of them that don’t exist in cyberland. Begged off lunch with a guy friend tomorrow because I can’t stand th thought of listening to him complain all through lunch how his new promotion (and subsequent $100,000 per annum raise) stresses him out.
Also begged of Saturday lunch with Bear because I don’t feel like listening to him talk about his ex-wife getting remarried. I have listened for 6 months now, and I can’t take it right now. I feel really selfish and crappy.
All I really want is to go home, pull the blankets over my head and sleep until I feel better. Of course, I know this won’t help my problem. Mr. Cruse says I can help my problem by ov3erhauling my diet and exercise. I don’t think it will work since I have’t had a kid and I am currently both dieting and exercising and I think the lack of caffeine calories and chocolate is making me pissy.
I am having drinks with Sweet tomorrow afternoon which is somthign to look forward to. She cornered me and wanted to make sure I am not backing out, which makes me feel better, since I have less a chance of her canceling on me now.
Beloved gave me this tip “take her somewhere nice” Uh, huh. Like I would take her to a hole in the wall on a first buddy outing. I know better. I want to make a good impression since this will be my first time doing something with her other than talking on the phone or having her make my breakfast/lunch.
Now that I think of it. Beloved has found a girl in one of her classes at school that “looks just like you did when we first started dating” to quote her on the topic. (this means about 40 lbs less than me now, and shorter hair) They’ve been having lunch together and she tells me this girl bats for both teams. Should I be worried? Am I a total hipocrite for worrying since she apparently has no worries about me and Sweet? Eh, I am eing paranoid again, yes?
Well, off to sulk through the rest of my afternoon.
Lovins’
AG
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
Sweetly Scented
Alright, sunshine. this is your fault. I want you to know. I am having slow day at work and you liked my writing. I too ka stroll through your blog again and pulled out a little to write with. This one is written for you.
***************************************************************************************
There’s a special smell for memories. Did you know that? The soft sweet smell of aging photos and long forgotten love letters hidden in a decopaged box under my bed. Mixed with the petals of roses dried long ago, and concert tickets that have curled at the edges but still smell slightly of beer. That is the smell of memories.
Tonight, I am surrounded by it. Sprawled on my bedroom floor, pillow under my stomach, tissues close at hand, I am reliving my life.
No, I am not dying; although sometimes the lonliness and despair I feel creeping into the edge of my sanity makes me feel like it. No, I have not lost someone, although I suppose I have lost all of the things in these photos laying infront of me.
No, tonight, for a reason I cannot understand now, I felt like remembering what it was like- long before cell phones, email and computers. When letters were written by hand and gas at 50 cents a gallon was, as my mother put it, “highway robbery.” That was my time. When mix tapes were still cool and he CD hadn’t been thought of yet.
Was it simpler then? It must have been. I can still think of those times and wonder how I could have been so innocent. Yet, I do not resent myself. I just appreciate that there isn’t much of that in me anymore, but I wish there was.
Do girls still remember their first kiss? I do. How it felt, what he looked like, the feeling of my jacket scratching against my collar as I pulled back beneath the light of my front porch. I remember the chill of the evening and the horrible feeling I got in the pit of my stomach when I stepped through the door and daddy ws still standing there. And then he said, “He better treat you right, child, or there will be hell to pay.” Yes, daddy. Of course, daddy. Good night. It was 11 and well past my bedtime.
I wonder, will my children ever have cards from their birthdays? Will they know that Christmas is not swapping gift cards at the local buffet? Will they know what want is, or how it feels to get something you had to workreally hard for? I hope so. I hope they learn that pictures come from film, that you develop it at the drugstore and pray to god it doesn’t get lost in the mail.
My first pen pal. I remember how she and I made up nicknames for eachother. I saved my allowance all summer to meet her at the fair and I got in huge trouble the night I snuck a long distance phone call in and we fell asleep on the phone together.
Sifting through the pictures, I see bits of myself I had forgotten. I was a consumate roller skater, and went to skating parties and was quite the dish.
My first cat was yellow and he had a white spot on his tail. I called him marmalade.
My grandpa wore Stetson. I can still smell him if I close my eyes really tight. We used to sit on the porch and talk about when he owned a horse ranch. I can still feel the splinters from the swing he made and hear the sound of his neighbors voice calling over the road, would I like some ice cream.
Sometimes, I wish I could forget. When I think of lost love. When I think of friends gone. But tonight, I am grateful to know that I can still remember these things.
Maybe, somewhere, they are out there thinking of me too. It’s a comforting thought, as I cry over my first boyfriend, my best friend who moved to Florida, and the dog I got when I moved out of my parents house and went to college. I still have her collar. Her name was Molly.
Yes, memories have a very special smell. Roses, tears, salt and paper. The softest, most painful, yet beautiful smell I can think of. Smell of love. Smell of loss.
The smell of age. And youth.
***************************************************************************************
There’s a special smell for memories. Did you know that? The soft sweet smell of aging photos and long forgotten love letters hidden in a decopaged box under my bed. Mixed with the petals of roses dried long ago, and concert tickets that have curled at the edges but still smell slightly of beer. That is the smell of memories.
Tonight, I am surrounded by it. Sprawled on my bedroom floor, pillow under my stomach, tissues close at hand, I am reliving my life.
No, I am not dying; although sometimes the lonliness and despair I feel creeping into the edge of my sanity makes me feel like it. No, I have not lost someone, although I suppose I have lost all of the things in these photos laying infront of me.
No, tonight, for a reason I cannot understand now, I felt like remembering what it was like- long before cell phones, email and computers. When letters were written by hand and gas at 50 cents a gallon was, as my mother put it, “highway robbery.” That was my time. When mix tapes were still cool and he CD hadn’t been thought of yet.
Was it simpler then? It must have been. I can still think of those times and wonder how I could have been so innocent. Yet, I do not resent myself. I just appreciate that there isn’t much of that in me anymore, but I wish there was.
Do girls still remember their first kiss? I do. How it felt, what he looked like, the feeling of my jacket scratching against my collar as I pulled back beneath the light of my front porch. I remember the chill of the evening and the horrible feeling I got in the pit of my stomach when I stepped through the door and daddy ws still standing there. And then he said, “He better treat you right, child, or there will be hell to pay.” Yes, daddy. Of course, daddy. Good night. It was 11 and well past my bedtime.
I wonder, will my children ever have cards from their birthdays? Will they know that Christmas is not swapping gift cards at the local buffet? Will they know what want is, or how it feels to get something you had to workreally hard for? I hope so. I hope they learn that pictures come from film, that you develop it at the drugstore and pray to god it doesn’t get lost in the mail.
My first pen pal. I remember how she and I made up nicknames for eachother. I saved my allowance all summer to meet her at the fair and I got in huge trouble the night I snuck a long distance phone call in and we fell asleep on the phone together.
Sifting through the pictures, I see bits of myself I had forgotten. I was a consumate roller skater, and went to skating parties and was quite the dish.
My first cat was yellow and he had a white spot on his tail. I called him marmalade.
My grandpa wore Stetson. I can still smell him if I close my eyes really tight. We used to sit on the porch and talk about when he owned a horse ranch. I can still feel the splinters from the swing he made and hear the sound of his neighbors voice calling over the road, would I like some ice cream.
Sometimes, I wish I could forget. When I think of lost love. When I think of friends gone. But tonight, I am grateful to know that I can still remember these things.
Maybe, somewhere, they are out there thinking of me too. It’s a comforting thought, as I cry over my first boyfriend, my best friend who moved to Florida, and the dog I got when I moved out of my parents house and went to college. I still have her collar. Her name was Molly.
Yes, memories have a very special smell. Roses, tears, salt and paper. The softest, most painful, yet beautiful smell I can think of. Smell of love. Smell of loss.
The smell of age. And youth.
something for Sunshine
I haven't had a dream for a while, but this is one of my favorite stories that I have written.
Enjoy.
******
The café - if that’s what you want to call it- is small. Nicely crammed, as Mary Martin’s Peter Pan would say. Its dark, probably too dark for readers to be comfortable. Just dark enough for people who wish they didn’t have to have light at all. The ceiling is low and the tables jammed together tightly, their mismatched chairs banging into each other when anyone gets up. I can overhear the chatter of the tables around me, if I wanted. Boys wooing girls with their "sensitivity". College students discussing classes and politics over lattes and coffee cake. Parents wishing their daughters would find a nice boy and their sons would bring up their English grades as they sip gourmet coffee wistfully.
There are no chimes on the door to sweetly announce the arrival of a new member of this society that prefers smoke filled, second rate, sardine-can shops to the trendy bustle of cafes a few streets away. There is no noise at all to indicate anything has changed, the conversations press on, the dishes still clatter and pages occasionally turn. There is only the shuffle of feet, the scrape of chairs and the sound of a novel dropping on the table to alert me of my company.
"This place is abysmal. How did you ever find it?"
I looked up to the voice. " Good to see you too. I found it walking around after that jerk you set me up with became too affectionate to handle. When was that? A few weeks ago, huh? Anyway. I dodged him by ducking into the alley. So, here we are."
"Sorry about all that. But why go in an alley? Its just not safe!"
" The difference between me and you. It doesn’t matter." I kicked out the chair across from me. " So are you sitting or what?" I watched over the tip of my lighter as she sat down. She shuffled to put her purse by her feet, her feet on the back of another person’s chair and her right arm on the table. I love they was she fidgets. I looked at my watch. The sun would set soon. You couldn’t tell. It was always dark here.
" Des, do you have to smoke?"
" Yeah. I do J. Want one?"
"I don’t smoke. It’s bad for you. You know that."
" So do you want one or not?"
" You know I do."
She grinned, I had a fleeting glimpse of her crooked teeth before her perfect lips closed over them. She leaned back to catch the pack I had thrown at her. Her arm brushed the head of the guy on her other side. He turned to say something and she tossed him a cigarette too before turning back and lighting her own.
" Know him?"
" No."
"Right. So where are you today?"
J’s boyfriend likes to know her every move. He’s one of the "nice boys" all mothers want for their little girls. He is the son of a preacher. His mother teaches kindergarten at their churches private school. He was studying to become a lawyer last I heard. Good grades, great looking. He also was a manipulative asshole who had to know each time she washed her hair, went to study or left the house. He didn’t like smoking, drinking, anything progressive and especially me. Apparently, I am a bad influence.
" I went for a drive to the lake so I can get in touch with God’s creation. I may stay all evening if the Lord leads me to," she looked up to the ceiling with the face of an angel and closed her eyes. " It’s a shame that the Glory of the Lord turns me away from carnal pleasures."
Did I mention he is a moron?
" Aren’t you pious. Hey, try this one. It tastes like those nasty cinnamon candies they used to throw at parades back home. It feels nice in your mouth. Especially if you’re smoking."
The nice thing about this place, one of them anyway, is that the owner must like tea better than coffee. They had about 200 flavors of tea. I think they only sell coffee because a "tea shop" would go under really fast in a college town where coffee houses were en vogue. Today’s blend was from India. It really did taste like those nasty candies I always tried to trade away to my brother and cousin. I guess I’ve grown into the taste. Or maybe its because I like how it made me feel like there was a fire in my mouth.
I looked at the clock on the wall. Back to her. She was swishing the tea around in her mouth like it as wine instead- another habit of hers that annoyed the hell out of her boyfriend that I thought was delightful. She swallowed and took a long drag from the cigarette that had lain forgotten in the ashtray, paused, and then took a long drink of her coffee. Her face was very red.
" My God," she said in a rush. " That’s nasty. I feel like my head is on fire."
" You look it too, with all that hair and your face all red." I laughed.
One of my favorite ironies about Jane was that she had possibly the plainest name on earth and fiery red hair like I had never seen on any human being without the assistance of a salon. She did look as if she were on fire- a phoenix bursting into flame before me- a poetic thought I savored for a moment and then tossed away like a badly written love note.
I settled back into my chair and lit another smoke as she sipped her drink. I watched her look around again, from the door with the tiny window in it to the light that fell through the yellowed industrial skylight, to the plants that hung off pots and planters artlessly attached to the walls.
"Those plant’s must be some special breed that live off of nicotine and coffee. I wonder if I could get some like that."
" You’d kill them as clean as your house is." She snorted from behind her cigarette and reached across to flick the ash into the hand potted mug that was meant to serve as an ashtray. She missed, instead flicking it onto the sandwich that laid untouched between us.
"Oops. Did you want that?" She snatched a chip up off the plate and popped it into her mouth.
"I can eat around it. I’ll order something else later. Do you want anything?" She shook her head and popped another chip in her mouth.
" Nah, but I do need more coffee. I’ll be back." She stood up and made for the coffee pots on the wall, startling three or four people who were lost in their coffee, books and conversations along the way. No one cared though.
The clock on the wall said that the sun was almost gone. I reached for a new pack of cigarettes while she settled in with the coffee, more tea for me and another bag of chips. The art on the wall glared at me as I exhaled. Abstracts, full of dark color and heavy texture. I suppose it’s a good thing. A portrait would have choked to death sitting next to us.
" So how do you explain the smoke on your clothes anyway? He’s got to notice."
She smiled. Her eyes got a faraway, misty look for a moment. " Remember when we used to smoke in high school? How we were always afraid my parents would catch us and never let us see each other again? How we would always change clothes before going home?"
" You don’t!" I giggled. "That’s so much trouble..."
" No, I don’t. But it inspired me. There’s a Laundromat a few blocks away from the apartment. I have an extra shirt in the back of my car. I put it on and toss my shirt and a few dryer sheets in one of the machines," she paused again."Its only a quarter. You’re worth a lot more than that."
She took a long, slow drag from the last of her cigarette and blew a ring up to the plants expertly. Crushing the butt into nothing with one hand, she reached for another with her free one and took another drag. This time, she blew the smoke just to the left on my face , exhaling slowly and thoughtfully.
"Des-de-mona," she pronounced slowly, switching her cigarette from one hand to the other, ashing it quickly along the way. " I forgot to ask, did you bring me anything?"
" Oh, yeah." I reached into my bag and pulled out a tiny flask. She reached for it and lazily put some of the contents into her coffee." and don’t call me that. I feel so tragic. I hate to feel like I am certain to have a miserable life because of my name."
" I like it. It makes me think of the falling rain."
" Why?" " It just does. You remind me of the falling rain. I love the rain, but it always seems so sad."
" I make you sad? That’s nice to know."
"No, I didn’t mean it that way. I just meant that...I can’t explain it. Just watch the rain next time it falls. Tell me it doesn’t seem like you."
" Sure," I said, just a bit sarcastically. " Can I call you sunshine?"
" Whatever," she smiled.
The tip of her cigarette glowed. The clock moved slowly towards the middle of prime time television. I heard the wind blow outside, sending leaves across the skylight. The room got a bit darker. I toyed with the lettuce hanging from my sandwich. I pulled off a bit and flicked my ashes on it. Nearby someone lit a clove cigarette. It’s smell drifted to us, mixed with the scent of a fresh pot of coffee. It smelled sweet. Like a pipe on a cool evening in the country.
"So, Sunny- how long before you dump Mr. Wonderful?"
" I don’t know. Its nice to have my parents off my back about settling down, you know?" More smoke spilt from her lips. "He hasn’t proposed yet. He believes in a ‘long courtship’. I suppose that he figures its in the bag. I guess its over when he proposes. Did I tell you his parents still think he’s a virgin?"
"Ha! They’re as clueless as he is. I don’t know how you put up with it."
"I know. I know. After this one, maybe I’ll settle down and all. Maybe." She shifted her legs as she glanced at her watch. Her chips crunched softly in her mouth. "What else would I do? I couldn’t very well live on my own. I hate being alone."
"You could stay in my loft," I offered hopefully. " You like it there. You could smoke all you want. Drink whisky with me. We’ll go to flea markets and buy tacky art and funny vases. I fill it full of plants that live off of nicotine and coffee. It would be great. You could make me breakfast in the mornings and I could grill steak on the roof. You could sleep on a hammock outside in the sunshine. And when it rains we could watch it fall onto the skylight over my bed."
"Yeah," she sighed. "It would be nice. I haven’t had steak in ages. He’s a vegan, you know. You’d come here all the time though. I know you do now. You’ve known about this place two weeks and the owners probably know your name already. I’d be lonely Des. Besides, what would my family think."
"Fuck them," I said through the cloud of smoke we had created. "They don’t know what’s good for you anyway. You’d come here with me anyway. You like it here. I can tell."
"I do." She looked to the roof again, and smiled. "I’ll have to come here more often. Especially now that I know you hide here. I bet its pretty dark, huh?"
"Yeah. Its raining too, I think. Paul will know you’re not at the lake now."
She stood up and brushed off her pants, which were now covered in ash and chip crumbs. "Walk me to the door."
I leaned over and poked the guy behind me. "Mine, okay?" I indicated the table. When he nodded, I stood up and headed to the hallway that led to the door outside.
She put her arm around me as she walked, her arm resting across my hips. She cracked the door and looked out at the rain. "
Yep. It’s still coming down." She turned and gave me a hug. "Promise me you’ll go home sometime today, huh? Don’t write all night long."
"Okay." I leaned in to hug her again. When she pulled back and started to leave I stopped her.
"Wait, what do you mean ‘its still coming down’ ?"
" Des, its been raining since noon."
" Oh."
The brick of the alley wall felt cold as I watched her step from under the overhang into the rain and head towards her car. I could see her hair falling flat, like the petals of a dewy rose, as the rain poured down on top of it. It made me smile to watch her jump in the puddles on purpose, soaking her jeans with water and mud. The wind chilled my face as it blew through the alley, causing the rain to spray my clothes softly as I opened the door. She turned to look if I was still there when she reached her car. With a half wave, I turned back into the building and lit a cigarette.
Enjoy.
******
The café - if that’s what you want to call it- is small. Nicely crammed, as Mary Martin’s Peter Pan would say. Its dark, probably too dark for readers to be comfortable. Just dark enough for people who wish they didn’t have to have light at all. The ceiling is low and the tables jammed together tightly, their mismatched chairs banging into each other when anyone gets up. I can overhear the chatter of the tables around me, if I wanted. Boys wooing girls with their "sensitivity". College students discussing classes and politics over lattes and coffee cake. Parents wishing their daughters would find a nice boy and their sons would bring up their English grades as they sip gourmet coffee wistfully.
There are no chimes on the door to sweetly announce the arrival of a new member of this society that prefers smoke filled, second rate, sardine-can shops to the trendy bustle of cafes a few streets away. There is no noise at all to indicate anything has changed, the conversations press on, the dishes still clatter and pages occasionally turn. There is only the shuffle of feet, the scrape of chairs and the sound of a novel dropping on the table to alert me of my company.
"This place is abysmal. How did you ever find it?"
I looked up to the voice. " Good to see you too. I found it walking around after that jerk you set me up with became too affectionate to handle. When was that? A few weeks ago, huh? Anyway. I dodged him by ducking into the alley. So, here we are."
"Sorry about all that. But why go in an alley? Its just not safe!"
" The difference between me and you. It doesn’t matter." I kicked out the chair across from me. " So are you sitting or what?" I watched over the tip of my lighter as she sat down. She shuffled to put her purse by her feet, her feet on the back of another person’s chair and her right arm on the table. I love they was she fidgets. I looked at my watch. The sun would set soon. You couldn’t tell. It was always dark here.
" Des, do you have to smoke?"
" Yeah. I do J. Want one?"
"I don’t smoke. It’s bad for you. You know that."
" So do you want one or not?"
" You know I do."
She grinned, I had a fleeting glimpse of her crooked teeth before her perfect lips closed over them. She leaned back to catch the pack I had thrown at her. Her arm brushed the head of the guy on her other side. He turned to say something and she tossed him a cigarette too before turning back and lighting her own.
" Know him?"
" No."
"Right. So where are you today?"
J’s boyfriend likes to know her every move. He’s one of the "nice boys" all mothers want for their little girls. He is the son of a preacher. His mother teaches kindergarten at their churches private school. He was studying to become a lawyer last I heard. Good grades, great looking. He also was a manipulative asshole who had to know each time she washed her hair, went to study or left the house. He didn’t like smoking, drinking, anything progressive and especially me. Apparently, I am a bad influence.
" I went for a drive to the lake so I can get in touch with God’s creation. I may stay all evening if the Lord leads me to," she looked up to the ceiling with the face of an angel and closed her eyes. " It’s a shame that the Glory of the Lord turns me away from carnal pleasures."
Did I mention he is a moron?
" Aren’t you pious. Hey, try this one. It tastes like those nasty cinnamon candies they used to throw at parades back home. It feels nice in your mouth. Especially if you’re smoking."
The nice thing about this place, one of them anyway, is that the owner must like tea better than coffee. They had about 200 flavors of tea. I think they only sell coffee because a "tea shop" would go under really fast in a college town where coffee houses were en vogue. Today’s blend was from India. It really did taste like those nasty candies I always tried to trade away to my brother and cousin. I guess I’ve grown into the taste. Or maybe its because I like how it made me feel like there was a fire in my mouth.
I looked at the clock on the wall. Back to her. She was swishing the tea around in her mouth like it as wine instead- another habit of hers that annoyed the hell out of her boyfriend that I thought was delightful. She swallowed and took a long drag from the cigarette that had lain forgotten in the ashtray, paused, and then took a long drink of her coffee. Her face was very red.
" My God," she said in a rush. " That’s nasty. I feel like my head is on fire."
" You look it too, with all that hair and your face all red." I laughed.
One of my favorite ironies about Jane was that she had possibly the plainest name on earth and fiery red hair like I had never seen on any human being without the assistance of a salon. She did look as if she were on fire- a phoenix bursting into flame before me- a poetic thought I savored for a moment and then tossed away like a badly written love note.
I settled back into my chair and lit another smoke as she sipped her drink. I watched her look around again, from the door with the tiny window in it to the light that fell through the yellowed industrial skylight, to the plants that hung off pots and planters artlessly attached to the walls.
"Those plant’s must be some special breed that live off of nicotine and coffee. I wonder if I could get some like that."
" You’d kill them as clean as your house is." She snorted from behind her cigarette and reached across to flick the ash into the hand potted mug that was meant to serve as an ashtray. She missed, instead flicking it onto the sandwich that laid untouched between us.
"Oops. Did you want that?" She snatched a chip up off the plate and popped it into her mouth.
"I can eat around it. I’ll order something else later. Do you want anything?" She shook her head and popped another chip in her mouth.
" Nah, but I do need more coffee. I’ll be back." She stood up and made for the coffee pots on the wall, startling three or four people who were lost in their coffee, books and conversations along the way. No one cared though.
The clock on the wall said that the sun was almost gone. I reached for a new pack of cigarettes while she settled in with the coffee, more tea for me and another bag of chips. The art on the wall glared at me as I exhaled. Abstracts, full of dark color and heavy texture. I suppose it’s a good thing. A portrait would have choked to death sitting next to us.
" So how do you explain the smoke on your clothes anyway? He’s got to notice."
She smiled. Her eyes got a faraway, misty look for a moment. " Remember when we used to smoke in high school? How we were always afraid my parents would catch us and never let us see each other again? How we would always change clothes before going home?"
" You don’t!" I giggled. "That’s so much trouble..."
" No, I don’t. But it inspired me. There’s a Laundromat a few blocks away from the apartment. I have an extra shirt in the back of my car. I put it on and toss my shirt and a few dryer sheets in one of the machines," she paused again."Its only a quarter. You’re worth a lot more than that."
She took a long, slow drag from the last of her cigarette and blew a ring up to the plants expertly. Crushing the butt into nothing with one hand, she reached for another with her free one and took another drag. This time, she blew the smoke just to the left on my face , exhaling slowly and thoughtfully.
"Des-de-mona," she pronounced slowly, switching her cigarette from one hand to the other, ashing it quickly along the way. " I forgot to ask, did you bring me anything?"
" Oh, yeah." I reached into my bag and pulled out a tiny flask. She reached for it and lazily put some of the contents into her coffee." and don’t call me that. I feel so tragic. I hate to feel like I am certain to have a miserable life because of my name."
" I like it. It makes me think of the falling rain."
" Why?" " It just does. You remind me of the falling rain. I love the rain, but it always seems so sad."
" I make you sad? That’s nice to know."
"No, I didn’t mean it that way. I just meant that...I can’t explain it. Just watch the rain next time it falls. Tell me it doesn’t seem like you."
" Sure," I said, just a bit sarcastically. " Can I call you sunshine?"
" Whatever," she smiled.
The tip of her cigarette glowed. The clock moved slowly towards the middle of prime time television. I heard the wind blow outside, sending leaves across the skylight. The room got a bit darker. I toyed with the lettuce hanging from my sandwich. I pulled off a bit and flicked my ashes on it. Nearby someone lit a clove cigarette. It’s smell drifted to us, mixed with the scent of a fresh pot of coffee. It smelled sweet. Like a pipe on a cool evening in the country.
"So, Sunny- how long before you dump Mr. Wonderful?"
" I don’t know. Its nice to have my parents off my back about settling down, you know?" More smoke spilt from her lips. "He hasn’t proposed yet. He believes in a ‘long courtship’. I suppose that he figures its in the bag. I guess its over when he proposes. Did I tell you his parents still think he’s a virgin?"
"Ha! They’re as clueless as he is. I don’t know how you put up with it."
"I know. I know. After this one, maybe I’ll settle down and all. Maybe." She shifted her legs as she glanced at her watch. Her chips crunched softly in her mouth. "What else would I do? I couldn’t very well live on my own. I hate being alone."
"You could stay in my loft," I offered hopefully. " You like it there. You could smoke all you want. Drink whisky with me. We’ll go to flea markets and buy tacky art and funny vases. I fill it full of plants that live off of nicotine and coffee. It would be great. You could make me breakfast in the mornings and I could grill steak on the roof. You could sleep on a hammock outside in the sunshine. And when it rains we could watch it fall onto the skylight over my bed."
"Yeah," she sighed. "It would be nice. I haven’t had steak in ages. He’s a vegan, you know. You’d come here all the time though. I know you do now. You’ve known about this place two weeks and the owners probably know your name already. I’d be lonely Des. Besides, what would my family think."
"Fuck them," I said through the cloud of smoke we had created. "They don’t know what’s good for you anyway. You’d come here with me anyway. You like it here. I can tell."
"I do." She looked to the roof again, and smiled. "I’ll have to come here more often. Especially now that I know you hide here. I bet its pretty dark, huh?"
"Yeah. Its raining too, I think. Paul will know you’re not at the lake now."
She stood up and brushed off her pants, which were now covered in ash and chip crumbs. "Walk me to the door."
I leaned over and poked the guy behind me. "Mine, okay?" I indicated the table. When he nodded, I stood up and headed to the hallway that led to the door outside.
She put her arm around me as she walked, her arm resting across my hips. She cracked the door and looked out at the rain. "
Yep. It’s still coming down." She turned and gave me a hug. "Promise me you’ll go home sometime today, huh? Don’t write all night long."
"Okay." I leaned in to hug her again. When she pulled back and started to leave I stopped her.
"Wait, what do you mean ‘its still coming down’ ?"
" Des, its been raining since noon."
" Oh."
The brick of the alley wall felt cold as I watched her step from under the overhang into the rain and head towards her car. I could see her hair falling flat, like the petals of a dewy rose, as the rain poured down on top of it. It made me smile to watch her jump in the puddles on purpose, soaking her jeans with water and mud. The wind chilled my face as it blew through the alley, causing the rain to spray my clothes softly as I opened the door. She turned to look if I was still there when she reached her car. With a half wave, I turned back into the building and lit a cigarette.
Blind Rage
This is withregards to the post below. Man I am having a bad day.
Okay. I can cope with having tacos at mom’s place for Lil Bit’s birthday if thatis what she wants. That’s what my mom told me. Lil Bit said she loved mom’s tacos and that is what she wanted.
Liar! I’ll admit I was being trecherous and called my grandmother to see if we could talk to Lil Bit and see if she would like Chuckee Cheese or The Pizza Place that has Go-Karts or Something. (I know this is totally hateful because I don’t want my mom’s food. But she is 6 and can’t be expected to make a decision as to where to eat when you ask ‘where should be eat?’ I’d say ‘I want Tacos’ too.)
My grandmother says that it didn’t have anything to do with Lil Bit wanting tacos. My mom a) has a headache b) doesn’t want to mess with meeting at a resaurant c) didn’t want to spend the money on it.
Okay. First. I know I am going to soundliek a hypocite, but she should at least let Lil Bit pick! Good grief. She didn’t get a choice. She just made it up!
Second, I don’t care if you have a headache, if you marry a man with a 6 year old daughter and you want her to call you mom and be your buddy and have custody of her then you give her a birthday party whether you feel good or not. She’s 6. Dinner at home is not a party! Chuckee Cheeze or Skeeball and Go-carts or a happy meal even, that’s a party.
Third, its not about messing with it. I would have organized it if she had asked me too. Hell, I am doing everything else for her. I would not have minded. I would have called a clown or gotten balloons or found her little friends at school and gotten them together. That’s part of it. I don’t want to see my mom and my brother particularly. I resent 3.0 I admit. But I go, because that little girl calls me sissy and wants me to be there. I tough it out. Be an adult. She never would have done that to me as a child and I resent that ‘its good enough’ for this little girl just because she isn’t her blood daughter. Arghhhh!
Fourth, my mom can’t manage her money. I admit. They just bought a house they can’t afford. (they move in on Halloween) They just bought a brand new car they can’t afford. They just went shopping with me and spent more money than I makeina quarter on clothes for her, 3.0 and my brother, who is 22 and should be buying his own crap. BUT THEY CAN”T FORK OUT $25 FOR TWO PIZZAS AND SOME GAME TOKENS???? They aren’t even having a cake. I want to scream. When I was little girl and my mom pulled crap like this my grandma steped in and helped out. But grandma is broke too and I can’t afford a cake and presents and a trip to the pizza place for 10 people because I have this thing called a budget. See, I know I would end up paying for everyone, because this is what happened on mothers day and grandparents day and every other time I go to a restaurant with them. They say one check and then give it to me and wilt into their checkbooks sadly. Not kidding. 3.0 crashed my mothers day date at a very expensive restaurant in our town, said ‘I’ll just stay a minute’ and then ordered an imported beer or three, a steak dinner and desert and then ducked out as I got the check.
I am not having it this time I would have bought my pizza. I would have chipped in for the cake. Grandma would have boght her pizza. All they would have had was pizza for four kids and them. And if you can’t afford 4 kids, well, sack it, man. Really.
And she lied. It kills me.
Poor kid. I am going at lunch and picking up a cake at least. I am sure they are expecting I will. And I will. Because she is turning 6 and she deserves it. She’s a sweet girl.
Arrrrghhh! My mom makes me nuts. Okay. End rant.
AG
Okay. I can cope with having tacos at mom’s place for Lil Bit’s birthday if thatis what she wants. That’s what my mom told me. Lil Bit said she loved mom’s tacos and that is what she wanted.
Liar! I’ll admit I was being trecherous and called my grandmother to see if we could talk to Lil Bit and see if she would like Chuckee Cheese or The Pizza Place that has Go-Karts or Something. (I know this is totally hateful because I don’t want my mom’s food. But she is 6 and can’t be expected to make a decision as to where to eat when you ask ‘where should be eat?’ I’d say ‘I want Tacos’ too.)
My grandmother says that it didn’t have anything to do with Lil Bit wanting tacos. My mom a) has a headache b) doesn’t want to mess with meeting at a resaurant c) didn’t want to spend the money on it.
Okay. First. I know I am going to soundliek a hypocite, but she should at least let Lil Bit pick! Good grief. She didn’t get a choice. She just made it up!
Second, I don’t care if you have a headache, if you marry a man with a 6 year old daughter and you want her to call you mom and be your buddy and have custody of her then you give her a birthday party whether you feel good or not. She’s 6. Dinner at home is not a party! Chuckee Cheeze or Skeeball and Go-carts or a happy meal even, that’s a party.
Third, its not about messing with it. I would have organized it if she had asked me too. Hell, I am doing everything else for her. I would not have minded. I would have called a clown or gotten balloons or found her little friends at school and gotten them together. That’s part of it. I don’t want to see my mom and my brother particularly. I resent 3.0 I admit. But I go, because that little girl calls me sissy and wants me to be there. I tough it out. Be an adult. She never would have done that to me as a child and I resent that ‘its good enough’ for this little girl just because she isn’t her blood daughter. Arghhhh!
Fourth, my mom can’t manage her money. I admit. They just bought a house they can’t afford. (they move in on Halloween) They just bought a brand new car they can’t afford. They just went shopping with me and spent more money than I makeina quarter on clothes for her, 3.0 and my brother, who is 22 and should be buying his own crap. BUT THEY CAN”T FORK OUT $25 FOR TWO PIZZAS AND SOME GAME TOKENS???? They aren’t even having a cake. I want to scream. When I was little girl and my mom pulled crap like this my grandma steped in and helped out. But grandma is broke too and I can’t afford a cake and presents and a trip to the pizza place for 10 people because I have this thing called a budget. See, I know I would end up paying for everyone, because this is what happened on mothers day and grandparents day and every other time I go to a restaurant with them. They say one check and then give it to me and wilt into their checkbooks sadly. Not kidding. 3.0 crashed my mothers day date at a very expensive restaurant in our town, said ‘I’ll just stay a minute’ and then ordered an imported beer or three, a steak dinner and desert and then ducked out as I got the check.
I am not having it this time I would have bought my pizza. I would have chipped in for the cake. Grandma would have boght her pizza. All they would have had was pizza for four kids and them. And if you can’t afford 4 kids, well, sack it, man. Really.
And she lied. It kills me.
Poor kid. I am going at lunch and picking up a cake at least. I am sure they are expecting I will. And I will. Because she is turning 6 and she deserves it. She’s a sweet girl.
Arrrrghhh! My mom makes me nuts. Okay. End rant.
AG
Cranky Day
I’ve managed to get myself into a rather annoying predicament. Its all my fault I admit. I promised my mom I would make my step-sister a Halloween costume. She’s the cutest little thing, I always wanted a little sister, and my mom, in her third mairrage, finally gave me one. She’s turning 6 today and I am supposed to be taking the dress to her birthday party. Oh- she wants to be a princess. (of course)
It started off badly. My mom drops by my house and gives me 2 yards of pink material and a yard of pink chiffon (I called her yesterday to tell her to bring me an accent color and ribbon because that isn’t going to be enough) I ask her where the pattern is. Do you know what she gives me? One of her jean jumpers! She says ‘You’re clever. This is how your grandmother always did it. You don’t need a pattern” My A$$ I don’t! My grandmother had 6 daughters and all of them have managed at least two kids apeice, of which I am the oldest. She’s had more practice.
So I have been cutting and tacking and in general preparing for the easy part, as it were, using the sewing machine. Guess what’s broken. So I took it to her last night to get fixed, she fixes it, and I get home and it promptly breaks again. Guess who gets to go buy a new sewing machine on her lunch break today.
So, on top of all this, I call my granmother to see if she can tell me what I am doing wrong over the phone. Of course not. So she is coming by to our house tonight to look at the machine, which of couse means she is going to try and do it herself, so that I won’t bother her again. I am going to beat her to the punch and get the new sewing machine (which will have an instruction booklet) and tell her at lil bit’s birthday dinner I have it all under control.
Did I mention I am also committed to sewing her comforter, shams and throw pillows for her new bedroom in the house which my motherjust purchased with 3.0?
I think I am cranky today.
I am not looking forward to Lil’ Bit’s birthday dinner either. First, my mom and Beloved do not get along. This is partially because my Beloved is a grounded and sensible a courty girl there ever was. It is also in part because my mom is a bit of a manic depressant bi-polar maniac who lives in a world of her own creation. Now, I know I do too, it says so in my profile, but I can actually extract myself from mine. My mom can’t.
Add to this that instead of going to a restaurant like we had planned, mymother has decided to make mexican at her house. This means that there is much more potential for a scence to be made by my oldest brother (22) who is a total crackhead (not kidding) and last Christmas threw a fit because Lil Bit got more presents than he did. Yeah. Because she’s 5. It also mean she will be drinking (if he is there). Add to this my sulking 13 y/o brother who hates everyone for his dad marrying my mom (ick) an exuberant 10 y/o who just wants someone to pay attention to him, my grandmother and my co-dependent step-father to the mix, and I have a recipe for a mingraine. Oh yeah, and four cats. Did I mention, FOUR CATS? Her house isn’t that big. I also know that her dining room table only seats fourm which begs the question where everyone will sit (I have a feeling I will be at the breakfast bar). And my mom will make a point of ignoring Beloved, or sitting her far away from me, say – in the living room (she did that last Christmas) Yep. Should be lots of fun.
Yep. I’m cranky.
So how are all my blogger buddies?
It started off badly. My mom drops by my house and gives me 2 yards of pink material and a yard of pink chiffon (I called her yesterday to tell her to bring me an accent color and ribbon because that isn’t going to be enough) I ask her where the pattern is. Do you know what she gives me? One of her jean jumpers! She says ‘You’re clever. This is how your grandmother always did it. You don’t need a pattern” My A$$ I don’t! My grandmother had 6 daughters and all of them have managed at least two kids apeice, of which I am the oldest. She’s had more practice.
So I have been cutting and tacking and in general preparing for the easy part, as it were, using the sewing machine. Guess what’s broken. So I took it to her last night to get fixed, she fixes it, and I get home and it promptly breaks again. Guess who gets to go buy a new sewing machine on her lunch break today.
So, on top of all this, I call my granmother to see if she can tell me what I am doing wrong over the phone. Of course not. So she is coming by to our house tonight to look at the machine, which of couse means she is going to try and do it herself, so that I won’t bother her again. I am going to beat her to the punch and get the new sewing machine (which will have an instruction booklet) and tell her at lil bit’s birthday dinner I have it all under control.
Did I mention I am also committed to sewing her comforter, shams and throw pillows for her new bedroom in the house which my motherjust purchased with 3.0?
I think I am cranky today.
I am not looking forward to Lil’ Bit’s birthday dinner either. First, my mom and Beloved do not get along. This is partially because my Beloved is a grounded and sensible a courty girl there ever was. It is also in part because my mom is a bit of a manic depressant bi-polar maniac who lives in a world of her own creation. Now, I know I do too, it says so in my profile, but I can actually extract myself from mine. My mom can’t.
Add to this that instead of going to a restaurant like we had planned, mymother has decided to make mexican at her house. This means that there is much more potential for a scence to be made by my oldest brother (22) who is a total crackhead (not kidding) and last Christmas threw a fit because Lil Bit got more presents than he did. Yeah. Because she’s 5. It also mean she will be drinking (if he is there). Add to this my sulking 13 y/o brother who hates everyone for his dad marrying my mom (ick) an exuberant 10 y/o who just wants someone to pay attention to him, my grandmother and my co-dependent step-father to the mix, and I have a recipe for a mingraine. Oh yeah, and four cats. Did I mention, FOUR CATS? Her house isn’t that big. I also know that her dining room table only seats fourm which begs the question where everyone will sit (I have a feeling I will be at the breakfast bar). And my mom will make a point of ignoring Beloved, or sitting her far away from me, say – in the living room (she did that last Christmas) Yep. Should be lots of fun.
Yep. I’m cranky.
So how are all my blogger buddies?
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Questions, part 2 - cause I am not a complete moron
This is shamelessly stolen from Charby’s blog. Go visit Charby. A delightful and sensitive person. I felt really moved visiting there. But since I have a few regular visitors, I thought this might be fun for me to do. Do one yourself of you want, although I imagine you guys don’t have as much time on your hands as I do.
I also need to plug sunshine, so go visit her as well. Sweet girl ,she is.
_______Favorite_______
01. gum: Trident Strawberry Breeze, which I don’t think they make anymore.
02. restaurant: Olive Garden, Panera Bread
03. drink: soft: gramma’s ghetto tea, lots of sugar; hard: Crown Royal strait up
04. season: Autumn. The leaves, the weather, the smell of the air.
05. type of weather: Mid-60s. Jeans and t-shirt weather.
06. emotion: gratitude
07. thing to do on a half day: Sleep, walk dogs
08. late-night activity: dancing
09. sport: softball
10. city: Chicago, IL or Eureka Springs, AR
11. store: Oooh. Hard one. Borders.
_______When Was The Last Time You_______
12. cried: Bonnie Raitt Concert. Two nights ago.
13. played a sport: This summer. Softball team.
14. laughed Hysterically: Um, in my bed a week ago. This golf course we are doing work for (I work for an electric company) designed this canopy to go over their drving range, the lights in it were 3x’s the strength of gas station lights, and the canopy was only 12’ tall. It’s the equivelent of being able to tan under these things in the middle of the night.
15. hugged someone: Last night. Beloved’s mom
16. kissed someone: This morning. Beloved.
17. felt depressed: This morning.
18. felt overworked: Um, three months ago before I started my fabulous new job.
19. faked sick: Um, about three months ago before I started my fabulous new job.
_______What Was The Last_______
21. word you said: Thanks
22. thing you ate: Fruit Rollup
23. song you listened to: On Purpose? Killer’s Somebody told me, I think. I won’t count the crap they pipr though our offices
24. last thing you drank: Coke 1
25. place you went to: Sweet’s café for lunch
26. movie you saw: Mr. and Mrs. Smith
27. movie you rented: Monster in Law (family movie night)
_______Who Was The Last Person You_______
28. hugged: Beloved’s mom Peggy Sue
29. cried over: Beloved
31. danced with: Waffles- ex from long ago I saw out the last time we went dancing
32. shared a secret with: Chica, softball coach.
33. had a sleepover with: Snaps, Beloved’s sister when we went to a wedding
34. called: My granmother
35. went to a movie with: Beloved
36. saw: My boss
37. were angry with: Beloved
38. couldn't take your eyes off of: This isn’t fair. Okay. Sweet.
39. obsessed over: Um, the woman with obsidian eyes in my dreams
_______Have You Ever_______
40. danced in the rain: Yes
41. kissed someone: Yes
42. done drugs: yes
44. partied 'til the sun came up: Yes, and back down again
45. had a movie marathon: yes. Last weekend. Indiana Jones baby!
46. gone too far on a dare: Of course
47. spun until you were immensely dizzy: And promptly threw up/
_______Play_______
55. i'm feeling: plesant
56. i'm listening to: “Strait from the Heart” gag
57. i'm doing: not my job58. i'm talking to: no one in particular
59. i'm craving: ice cream. Odd that
60. i'm thinking of: sewing
61. i'm hating: um, can I mention politicians without the secret service coming after e? How about Oprah. I hate her.
______Love_______
62. love is: 0, the Score in tennis. You have everything and nothing to lose.
63. my first love: Alexy. I didn’t realize it until it was way too late. And yeah, it was a guy. Bite me.
64. my current love: Beloved. Great name huh?
65. love or lust: love on a good day.
66. best love song: My Lover, Melissa Etheridge
67. possible to be in love w/ more than one person at the same time: Yes
68. when love hurts: isn’t that how you know its love?
69. is there such thing as love at first sight?: yes
_______Opposite/Same Sex_______
70. turn ons: eyes, mouth, personality, honesty, confidence
71. turn offs: vanity, bitterness
72. does your parent's opinion on your girlfriend/boyfriend matter to you?: yes, butit won’t change how I feel about the person. I would be hurt if they hated them, or whatever…
73. what kinda hairstyle are you into?: Shoulder length or shorter
74. what is the sweetest thing a guy/girl can do for you?: Be patient
75. where do you go to meet new people?: Haha. I should say coffee shops…I don’t go anywhere specific, really.
76. are you the type of person to ask for numbers?: I am the type of person to give mine if it is requested and I have known them for more thanone day.
_______Picky Picky_______
77. dog or cat: Not fair again, I have both. If I lived alone, cat. If I had a hughe house, huge dog. 78. short or long hair: long on cat, short on dog. Oh, people? Short, girls – see above- Long on guys, for the most part.
79. sunshine or rain: Sunshine is a sweet person. I have never met rain. J/K rain. I think.
80. hugs or kisses: yes, please
81. summer or winter: summer
82. written letters or e-mails: hand written letters
83. nintendo or motorcycles: motorcycles
85. house party or club: club with close friends
86. sing or dance: sober/sad – sing. Drunk/happy- dance
87. freak or slow dance: slow, really close, whispering.
_______Lately_______
88. how are you today?: Frustrated and chipper. Paradox, no?
89. what pants are you wearing right now?: Jeans
90. what shirt are you wearing right now?: Tommy deconstructed looks like shirt under shirt newspaper shirt.
91. what does your hair look like at the moment?: Strait and messy. That photo over there is pretty close, actually.
92. what song are you listening to right now?: Walkingo n Sunshine. Gag again
93. how is the weather right now?: Perfect
94. who was last person you talked to on the phone?: Some person who sold my boss a trailer
95. last dream you can remember?: Yes. See my blogs about them
That was fun. Your turnif you have time.
I also need to plug sunshine, so go visit her as well. Sweet girl ,she is.
_______Favorite_______
01. gum: Trident Strawberry Breeze, which I don’t think they make anymore.
02. restaurant: Olive Garden, Panera Bread
03. drink: soft: gramma’s ghetto tea, lots of sugar; hard: Crown Royal strait up
04. season: Autumn. The leaves, the weather, the smell of the air.
05. type of weather: Mid-60s. Jeans and t-shirt weather.
06. emotion: gratitude
07. thing to do on a half day: Sleep, walk dogs
08. late-night activity: dancing
09. sport: softball
10. city: Chicago, IL or Eureka Springs, AR
11. store: Oooh. Hard one. Borders.
_______When Was The Last Time You_______
12. cried: Bonnie Raitt Concert. Two nights ago.
13. played a sport: This summer. Softball team.
14. laughed Hysterically: Um, in my bed a week ago. This golf course we are doing work for (I work for an electric company) designed this canopy to go over their drving range, the lights in it were 3x’s the strength of gas station lights, and the canopy was only 12’ tall. It’s the equivelent of being able to tan under these things in the middle of the night.
15. hugged someone: Last night. Beloved’s mom
16. kissed someone: This morning. Beloved.
17. felt depressed: This morning.
18. felt overworked: Um, three months ago before I started my fabulous new job.
19. faked sick: Um, about three months ago before I started my fabulous new job.
_______What Was The Last_______
21. word you said: Thanks
22. thing you ate: Fruit Rollup
23. song you listened to: On Purpose? Killer’s Somebody told me, I think. I won’t count the crap they pipr though our offices
24. last thing you drank: Coke 1
25. place you went to: Sweet’s café for lunch
26. movie you saw: Mr. and Mrs. Smith
27. movie you rented: Monster in Law (family movie night)
_______Who Was The Last Person You_______
28. hugged: Beloved’s mom Peggy Sue
29. cried over: Beloved
31. danced with: Waffles- ex from long ago I saw out the last time we went dancing
32. shared a secret with: Chica, softball coach.
33. had a sleepover with: Snaps, Beloved’s sister when we went to a wedding
34. called: My granmother
35. went to a movie with: Beloved
36. saw: My boss
37. were angry with: Beloved
38. couldn't take your eyes off of: This isn’t fair. Okay. Sweet.
39. obsessed over: Um, the woman with obsidian eyes in my dreams
_______Have You Ever_______
40. danced in the rain: Yes
41. kissed someone: Yes
42. done drugs: yes
44. partied 'til the sun came up: Yes, and back down again
45. had a movie marathon: yes. Last weekend. Indiana Jones baby!
46. gone too far on a dare: Of course
47. spun until you were immensely dizzy: And promptly threw up/
_______Play_______
55. i'm feeling: plesant
56. i'm listening to: “Strait from the Heart” gag
57. i'm doing: not my job58. i'm talking to: no one in particular
59. i'm craving: ice cream. Odd that
60. i'm thinking of: sewing
61. i'm hating: um, can I mention politicians without the secret service coming after e? How about Oprah. I hate her.
______Love_______
62. love is: 0, the Score in tennis. You have everything and nothing to lose.
63. my first love: Alexy. I didn’t realize it until it was way too late. And yeah, it was a guy. Bite me.
64. my current love: Beloved. Great name huh?
65. love or lust: love on a good day.
66. best love song: My Lover, Melissa Etheridge
67. possible to be in love w/ more than one person at the same time: Yes
68. when love hurts: isn’t that how you know its love?
69. is there such thing as love at first sight?: yes
_______Opposite/Same Sex_______
70. turn ons: eyes, mouth, personality, honesty, confidence
71. turn offs: vanity, bitterness
72. does your parent's opinion on your girlfriend/boyfriend matter to you?: yes, butit won’t change how I feel about the person. I would be hurt if they hated them, or whatever…
73. what kinda hairstyle are you into?: Shoulder length or shorter
74. what is the sweetest thing a guy/girl can do for you?: Be patient
75. where do you go to meet new people?: Haha. I should say coffee shops…I don’t go anywhere specific, really.
76. are you the type of person to ask for numbers?: I am the type of person to give mine if it is requested and I have known them for more thanone day.
_______Picky Picky_______
77. dog or cat: Not fair again, I have both. If I lived alone, cat. If I had a hughe house, huge dog. 78. short or long hair: long on cat, short on dog. Oh, people? Short, girls – see above- Long on guys, for the most part.
79. sunshine or rain: Sunshine is a sweet person. I have never met rain. J/K rain. I think.
80. hugs or kisses: yes, please
81. summer or winter: summer
82. written letters or e-mails: hand written letters
83. nintendo or motorcycles: motorcycles
85. house party or club: club with close friends
86. sing or dance: sober/sad – sing. Drunk/happy- dance
87. freak or slow dance: slow, really close, whispering.
_______Lately_______
88. how are you today?: Frustrated and chipper. Paradox, no?
89. what pants are you wearing right now?: Jeans
90. what shirt are you wearing right now?: Tommy deconstructed looks like shirt under shirt newspaper shirt.
91. what does your hair look like at the moment?: Strait and messy. That photo over there is pretty close, actually.
92. what song are you listening to right now?: Walkingo n Sunshine. Gag again
93. how is the weather right now?: Perfect
94. who was last person you talked to on the phone?: Some person who sold my boss a trailer
95. last dream you can remember?: Yes. See my blogs about them
That was fun. Your turnif you have time.
Is This How Strait Girls Do It????
Beloved and I went to the Bonnie Raitt Concert. It was fantastic. I cried during “I can’t make you love me” It was beautiful. She was beautiful. Although, wow, she is a lot shorter than I imagined. Dunno.
She said something really cool. I think it shall be one of my new motto’s – “Religion is for people who are afraid of going to hell, spirituality is for people who have already been there.
I liked that.
I have to pay tribute to our seat mates though. We were in a really big concert hall and sitting in theater style seats. On my side was a lady who was wearing Eau de Voddkka. I am sure of it. But she sat like I was going to bite her, I swear. And I didn’t even look gothic or menacing that night. *sigh*
On beloved’s side was a woman who obviously was involved in politics somehow, because that is all she talked about. The governor is screwing this up, the City Council past this and that bill. Loudly. And you could tell she was a bleeding heart liberal (nothing wrong with that, I am too) but she’s the kind that give the rest of us a bad name. A crazy.
We were also, I think , two of maybe 10 people under the age of 50 at the concert.
But it was fun.
Talked to Sweet this morning. Which wouldn’t be unusual if it weren’t for the fact I didn’t talk to her yesterday much. She is sick, and was busy coughing while I purchased my breakfast yesterday. She saw me at lunch, though, and told me she missed me that morning, which made me blush furiously, I was glad she said it in passing and walked off after…But I am pretty sure her snarky metrosexual manager noticed. Gods I hope he doesn’t say anything.
Anyway. So I saw her this morning and she asked me if I was coming in for lunch today. I said I didn’t know and asked why. She says “I am always so busy when you come in and I never get to spend time with you anymore…”
First, is it really spending time together when I go out back with her while she sneaks a smoke? 5 or 10 minutes every three or four days if we get lucky? Is that quality friend time? And when we chat for 5 minutes every morning while she makes my breakfast? I guess since that is how we made friends.
We have talked on the phone two or three times since the invite to the bar, and the invite to Fridays. She seems to think I am funny, which is good. Because I think I am funny but no one else does.
We are supposed to go have drinks with each other after work on Friday. She says she doesn’t mind waiting around while I get off work (she gets off about an hour before me) I should be flattered, yes?
Is it cute she wants to spend time with me, that she misses seeing me? I need a strait girl to tell me where she comes from on all this. Because I don’t have a lot of friends, nor do I know how normal strait girls interact with each other. I haven’t some out yet. Going to do it this Friday. I think. Or will it seem like a date. Because…Ahhhhgh!
Anyway. I suppose unless Beloved calls me for lunch (it is Tuesday and she is working, so it’s a possibility) I will be trotting off to get lunch. Again. I am pathetic.
She said something really cool. I think it shall be one of my new motto’s – “Religion is for people who are afraid of going to hell, spirituality is for people who have already been there.
I liked that.
I have to pay tribute to our seat mates though. We were in a really big concert hall and sitting in theater style seats. On my side was a lady who was wearing Eau de Voddkka. I am sure of it. But she sat like I was going to bite her, I swear. And I didn’t even look gothic or menacing that night. *sigh*
On beloved’s side was a woman who obviously was involved in politics somehow, because that is all she talked about. The governor is screwing this up, the City Council past this and that bill. Loudly. And you could tell she was a bleeding heart liberal (nothing wrong with that, I am too) but she’s the kind that give the rest of us a bad name. A crazy.
We were also, I think , two of maybe 10 people under the age of 50 at the concert.
But it was fun.
Talked to Sweet this morning. Which wouldn’t be unusual if it weren’t for the fact I didn’t talk to her yesterday much. She is sick, and was busy coughing while I purchased my breakfast yesterday. She saw me at lunch, though, and told me she missed me that morning, which made me blush furiously, I was glad she said it in passing and walked off after…But I am pretty sure her snarky metrosexual manager noticed. Gods I hope he doesn’t say anything.
Anyway. So I saw her this morning and she asked me if I was coming in for lunch today. I said I didn’t know and asked why. She says “I am always so busy when you come in and I never get to spend time with you anymore…”
First, is it really spending time together when I go out back with her while she sneaks a smoke? 5 or 10 minutes every three or four days if we get lucky? Is that quality friend time? And when we chat for 5 minutes every morning while she makes my breakfast? I guess since that is how we made friends.
We have talked on the phone two or three times since the invite to the bar, and the invite to Fridays. She seems to think I am funny, which is good. Because I think I am funny but no one else does.
We are supposed to go have drinks with each other after work on Friday. She says she doesn’t mind waiting around while I get off work (she gets off about an hour before me) I should be flattered, yes?
Is it cute she wants to spend time with me, that she misses seeing me? I need a strait girl to tell me where she comes from on all this. Because I don’t have a lot of friends, nor do I know how normal strait girls interact with each other. I haven’t some out yet. Going to do it this Friday. I think. Or will it seem like a date. Because…Ahhhhgh!
Anyway. I suppose unless Beloved calls me for lunch (it is Tuesday and she is working, so it’s a possibility) I will be trotting off to get lunch. Again. I am pathetic.
Friday, October 07, 2005
Meloncholy
Well. This evenign has been quite the event.
I told beloved about Sweet and I hanging out. She didn't seem to mind that too much. Then I called Sweet and she wasn't able to go tomorrow and she invited me to go out with her tonight. I told her to call me back before she left and I would think about it since I had dinner in the oven. I asked beloved what she thought.
Probably not a great move on my part. I had been bitching because beloved has to work all day tomorrow and I have been missing her since she went back to school full time and is trying to keep a job. She thinks I am being selfish since she would be home tonight. Maybe I am being selfish.
I feel like I have a right to have new friends though When I met her, I ditched all of my friends. Granted, most of them were horrible influences. Still, I have been surrounded for the last four years by her friends, whom I have always suspected never liked me. Turns out, she asked them about it about a month ago. I was right. They hate me. So I find myself in the position of having very few friends. Most of them are men, because I tend to get along with them better for some reason.
I was overjoyed (see previous post) that Sweet wanted to hang out and the fact that she has asked me to two consecutive evenings of fun that I have had to turn down (she also asked me to go dancing with her tomorrow, which I also truned down on Beloved's account) makes me really sad. I do want to spend time with her. I'd like to spend time with just about nyone who is willing to be friends with me. I know I am not easy to bear, I am moody and full of outbursts, quirky and a little annoying.
C'est La Vie.
Is it sad I am wandering off to bed tonight in hopes of having that dream again? I keep seeing the eyes of those people and I can't seem to let it go. It is beginning to become a bit of an obsession and my need to constantly record what happens borders on the insane, really. But I will think of these dreams before bed, although I worry now they will be tempered with the problems I have had throughout the day.
I love the idea of dreaming because it is a total escape from what is real. I don't have to be me when I dream. Maybe that is why I like this dream so much, I see the image of the self I wish I could be instead of the image of what I really am. I think that I love this dream because it is so full of the fantasy and romanticism I am missing in every day life.
I am beginning to think of life as a little mundane again. Work is not new anymore, things seem to fall ionto the old patterns of living so quickly. I don't think I can stand it sometimes.
But I do, I will. And you, poor visitor, you come here and read about it.
In case I forget to tell you in the future: thanks
Lovins'
AG
I told beloved about Sweet and I hanging out. She didn't seem to mind that too much. Then I called Sweet and she wasn't able to go tomorrow and she invited me to go out with her tonight. I told her to call me back before she left and I would think about it since I had dinner in the oven. I asked beloved what she thought.
Probably not a great move on my part. I had been bitching because beloved has to work all day tomorrow and I have been missing her since she went back to school full time and is trying to keep a job. She thinks I am being selfish since she would be home tonight. Maybe I am being selfish.
I feel like I have a right to have new friends though When I met her, I ditched all of my friends. Granted, most of them were horrible influences. Still, I have been surrounded for the last four years by her friends, whom I have always suspected never liked me. Turns out, she asked them about it about a month ago. I was right. They hate me. So I find myself in the position of having very few friends. Most of them are men, because I tend to get along with them better for some reason.
I was overjoyed (see previous post) that Sweet wanted to hang out and the fact that she has asked me to two consecutive evenings of fun that I have had to turn down (she also asked me to go dancing with her tomorrow, which I also truned down on Beloved's account) makes me really sad. I do want to spend time with her. I'd like to spend time with just about nyone who is willing to be friends with me. I know I am not easy to bear, I am moody and full of outbursts, quirky and a little annoying.
C'est La Vie.
Is it sad I am wandering off to bed tonight in hopes of having that dream again? I keep seeing the eyes of those people and I can't seem to let it go. It is beginning to become a bit of an obsession and my need to constantly record what happens borders on the insane, really. But I will think of these dreams before bed, although I worry now they will be tempered with the problems I have had throughout the day.
I love the idea of dreaming because it is a total escape from what is real. I don't have to be me when I dream. Maybe that is why I like this dream so much, I see the image of the self I wish I could be instead of the image of what I really am. I think that I love this dream because it is so full of the fantasy and romanticism I am missing in every day life.
I am beginning to think of life as a little mundane again. Work is not new anymore, things seem to fall ionto the old patterns of living so quickly. I don't think I can stand it sometimes.
But I do, I will. And you, poor visitor, you come here and read about it.
In case I forget to tell you in the future: thanks
Lovins'
AG
I Need
She’s kneeling at my feet. The beautiful woman with obsidian eyes and hair like polished silver has my ankle in her hands and she is softly stroking it with her hand. As she does, a beautiful paint appears on my skin, it is so soft and cool and comforting all at the same time. Its black, and she is painting me a bit like a warrior tonight and I feel like there is nothing that I wouldn’t be able to conquer for her tonight. She paints on me these gorgeous black boots, with laces made of gold. Up the back of my calves there is a thin line of gold and bronze in the center.
She moves up my thighs and the insides of my stomach, circling beautiful swirls of color. She paints beautiful tribal symbols down my back and binds my long, curling hair up in a fillet made of gold. She lines my eyes with a dark kohl and scents my hair with perfume.
When she finishes she looks at me with hope in her eyes.
“Take me with you,” she begs. Her voice is husky and cool like steel and water.
I hear my own voice, otherworldly and strange, whisper assent, “As you wish.”
I wrap her in my harms and take her away with me in a swirl of wind that blinds us both. When we land, on the shores of that beautiful lake where I live, I take her hand, and lead her up the cold stone stairway.
She shivers at my touch, and I can hear her think ‘I need, I need, I need’
I know what she needs, and I reach out and touch her neck. I bend down, and go to brush my lips there, and I see her eyes light up with fire.
And, I wake. I am shivering with cold and aching with a need for love.
She moves up my thighs and the insides of my stomach, circling beautiful swirls of color. She paints beautiful tribal symbols down my back and binds my long, curling hair up in a fillet made of gold. She lines my eyes with a dark kohl and scents my hair with perfume.
When she finishes she looks at me with hope in her eyes.
“Take me with you,” she begs. Her voice is husky and cool like steel and water.
I hear my own voice, otherworldly and strange, whisper assent, “As you wish.”
I wrap her in my harms and take her away with me in a swirl of wind that blinds us both. When we land, on the shores of that beautiful lake where I live, I take her hand, and lead her up the cold stone stairway.
She shivers at my touch, and I can hear her think ‘I need, I need, I need’
I know what she needs, and I reach out and touch her neck. I bend down, and go to brush my lips there, and I see her eyes light up with fire.
And, I wake. I am shivering with cold and aching with a need for love.
We had a "Moment"
I did it! If you could see me right now, you would see a smiling person who is secretly, on the inside, dancing around like a crazy. I asked Sweet, the barista, to hang out. This may not seem like a big deal, but I am painfully shy. Add on to the top of that I am gay, she is not, and all kinds of other paranoid worries and I feel like I have really accomplished something,. The moment went something like this:
‘So I was thinking…maybewecouldhangoutsometime?’
‘Yeah, that would be great.’
*sigh of relief* *jumps off cliff*
‘This weekend?’
‘Yeah, let me give you my number’
*secretly dances around coffee shop*
Now I just have to tell Beloved, which I hope goes okay. I don’t think she will care since I need to get some friends, especially of the female variety. I so not have nearly enough of those.
In other news. Talked to Chica night. It was nice since I hadn’t spoken with her in a long time. I had missed our little chats. Seems like her son got a part in Fiddler on the Roof. I am so proud. Feel a little like an aunt or something. He’s a sweet kid. I guess she’s all twisted for a hot little lady that works at her office. I don’t think her girl likes it very well, though. She’s all talk though. Heck, what can I say, at least the girl at her job is a sister of the inclination. I can’t even manage that with my crushes. Of course, it also keeps me from being tempted to do anything stupid.
Had more of those strange dreams last night. I can’t seem to keep away from them. Last night seemed to focus entirely on the way I was being painted. It was, I hate to admit, quite erotic. I might blog about it in a separate entry. But I have to get into the mood to write something like that.
Lovins’
AG
‘So I was thinking…maybewecouldhangoutsometime?’
‘Yeah, that would be great.’
*sigh of relief* *jumps off cliff*
‘This weekend?’
‘Yeah, let me give you my number’
*secretly dances around coffee shop*
Now I just have to tell Beloved, which I hope goes okay. I don’t think she will care since I need to get some friends, especially of the female variety. I so not have nearly enough of those.
In other news. Talked to Chica night. It was nice since I hadn’t spoken with her in a long time. I had missed our little chats. Seems like her son got a part in Fiddler on the Roof. I am so proud. Feel a little like an aunt or something. He’s a sweet kid. I guess she’s all twisted for a hot little lady that works at her office. I don’t think her girl likes it very well, though. She’s all talk though. Heck, what can I say, at least the girl at her job is a sister of the inclination. I can’t even manage that with my crushes. Of course, it also keeps me from being tempted to do anything stupid.
Had more of those strange dreams last night. I can’t seem to keep away from them. Last night seemed to focus entirely on the way I was being painted. It was, I hate to admit, quite erotic. I might blog about it in a separate entry. But I have to get into the mood to write something like that.
Lovins’
AG
Thursday, October 06, 2005
Two Different Directions
Stopped off at the local café to pick up breakfast, per usual. I am beginning to wonder if I am really quite readable. First, I know I always get the same drink in the morning, but I usually switch up what I get to eat, just because. This morning I couldn’t seem to decide. I asked S, my favorite barista, what she thought I should have since I could not make up my mind. She suggested a pumpkin muffin (I know, it sounds disgusting) half owing to her sweetness, half owing to the fact I didn’t want to make a decision, I got one. Wow. Its really good. I had to write out my admiration, I am impressed. Beginning to develop a barista crush, I think. Too bad she’s quite strait. Oh, well. She would be fun to hang out with, and I have my beloved, whom I am of course totally devoted to. Been stopping off there for lunch every once and a while, noticed that she knows what I order, even though she has never made my food before…cute, I think.
Speaking of harmless crushes, I watched America’s Next Top Model last night. Love Kim, the little lesbian they have on the show this season. Seeing her escort that one girl in her suit while she was in the evening gown was adorable. I also see someone has been giving her lessons in how to put on makeup. Now if only she could learn to keep her mouth shut! Not that she isn’t funny, but she should have known better than to talk to the judges. Really. I was thrilled that Cassandra left the show. Anyone vain enough to quit over an inch of hair needs to be executed. Why let them have the first two feet and not two inches. That girl is walking, talking proof that beauty queens are not all they are cracked up to be. She wants to be Ms. America. Please, after the mockery she made of herself does she really think that anyone would think she represents “normal” girls? She called herself a sociopath for crissakes!
Laid in bed last night talking with my beloved about our favorite moments we have had together. We’ve actually done a bunch of very nice things together. She was taking care of me. Had a hell of a migraine. They were testing the alarm system at work yesterday and it made me nauseous. Literally. I think it was a good day for my diet, since I wouldn’t keep anything down. Anyway, she was rubbing my arms and legs and talking to me in a soothing manner. We chatted about the things we had done to make each other laugh. She’s fantastic, my girl. Lately been plagued with the never ending fear that she is going to leave me because I make her miserable. I feel like I must work harder to make her happy. I am certainly going to try.
Going to go see Bonnie Raitt this weekend. Looking forward to it very much. I know my darling is. I hope it will be a fun show. There is going to be an opening act, but I do not know who it is. Hopefully this will be interesting. Otherwise Darling won’t forgive me for making her go to the opera with me, which is the recompense she so sweetly gave me as payment for going to see this show with her. I haven’t been to a concert in a long long time. Last one, I think, was All 4 One back in the nineties. My Aunt took me and I thought she was really cool for taking me. She wore leather pants and I thought that was really awesome. I don’t even remember how old I was. But it was when they were really popular, so it had to have been a long time ago.
So it turns out INXS is going to be stopping their new tour nearby. I would love to go to that show, more to see Marty Casey than them, but it would almost be worth the little trip. Unfortunately, I can’t see my love springing for that concert, she hated JD. Come think of it, I do too. But I did like INXS. Shame Dave Navarro isn’t going to be there. Wold definitely go then. He’s one of my switchers. But then, he wears an awful lot of eyeliner and feather boas, so I can see how my mind might go that way….
I also wanted to add the lyrics to one of my new favorite songs because that’s how I am feeling today.
“Sugar We're Going Down"
Am I more than you bargained for yet
I've been dying to tell you anything you want to hear
Cause that's just who I am this week
Lie in the grass, next to the mausoleum
I'm just a notch in your bedpostBut you're just a line in a song
Drop a heart, break a name
We're always sleeping in, and sleeping for the wrong team
We're going down, down in an earlier round
And Sugar, we're going down swinging
I'll be your number one with a bullet
A loaded God complex, cock it and pull it
Is this more than you bargained for yet
Oh don't mind me I'm watching you two from the closet
Wishing to be the friction in your jeans
Isn't it messed up how I'm just dying to be him
I'm just a notch in your bedpostBut you're just a line in a song
Drop a heart, break a name
We're always sleeping in, and sleeping for the wrong team
We're going down, down in an earlier round
And Sugar, we're going down swinging
I'll be your number one with a bullet
A loaded God complex, cock it and pull it
Speaking of harmless crushes, I watched America’s Next Top Model last night. Love Kim, the little lesbian they have on the show this season. Seeing her escort that one girl in her suit while she was in the evening gown was adorable. I also see someone has been giving her lessons in how to put on makeup. Now if only she could learn to keep her mouth shut! Not that she isn’t funny, but she should have known better than to talk to the judges. Really. I was thrilled that Cassandra left the show. Anyone vain enough to quit over an inch of hair needs to be executed. Why let them have the first two feet and not two inches. That girl is walking, talking proof that beauty queens are not all they are cracked up to be. She wants to be Ms. America. Please, after the mockery she made of herself does she really think that anyone would think she represents “normal” girls? She called herself a sociopath for crissakes!
Laid in bed last night talking with my beloved about our favorite moments we have had together. We’ve actually done a bunch of very nice things together. She was taking care of me. Had a hell of a migraine. They were testing the alarm system at work yesterday and it made me nauseous. Literally. I think it was a good day for my diet, since I wouldn’t keep anything down. Anyway, she was rubbing my arms and legs and talking to me in a soothing manner. We chatted about the things we had done to make each other laugh. She’s fantastic, my girl. Lately been plagued with the never ending fear that she is going to leave me because I make her miserable. I feel like I must work harder to make her happy. I am certainly going to try.
Going to go see Bonnie Raitt this weekend. Looking forward to it very much. I know my darling is. I hope it will be a fun show. There is going to be an opening act, but I do not know who it is. Hopefully this will be interesting. Otherwise Darling won’t forgive me for making her go to the opera with me, which is the recompense she so sweetly gave me as payment for going to see this show with her. I haven’t been to a concert in a long long time. Last one, I think, was All 4 One back in the nineties. My Aunt took me and I thought she was really cool for taking me. She wore leather pants and I thought that was really awesome. I don’t even remember how old I was. But it was when they were really popular, so it had to have been a long time ago.
So it turns out INXS is going to be stopping their new tour nearby. I would love to go to that show, more to see Marty Casey than them, but it would almost be worth the little trip. Unfortunately, I can’t see my love springing for that concert, she hated JD. Come think of it, I do too. But I did like INXS. Shame Dave Navarro isn’t going to be there. Wold definitely go then. He’s one of my switchers. But then, he wears an awful lot of eyeliner and feather boas, so I can see how my mind might go that way….
I also wanted to add the lyrics to one of my new favorite songs because that’s how I am feeling today.
“Sugar We're Going Down"
Am I more than you bargained for yet
I've been dying to tell you anything you want to hear
Cause that's just who I am this week
Lie in the grass, next to the mausoleum
I'm just a notch in your bedpostBut you're just a line in a song
Drop a heart, break a name
We're always sleeping in, and sleeping for the wrong team
We're going down, down in an earlier round
And Sugar, we're going down swinging
I'll be your number one with a bullet
A loaded God complex, cock it and pull it
Is this more than you bargained for yet
Oh don't mind me I'm watching you two from the closet
Wishing to be the friction in your jeans
Isn't it messed up how I'm just dying to be him
I'm just a notch in your bedpostBut you're just a line in a song
Drop a heart, break a name
We're always sleeping in, and sleeping for the wrong team
We're going down, down in an earlier round
And Sugar, we're going down swinging
I'll be your number one with a bullet
A loaded God complex, cock it and pull it
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
Two Different Trains
The Guy I Hope Got Fired
I was watching the presidential press conference with one eye yesterday morning at work. My co-worker in the front area of the office (her desk is outside my office, anyway) was going on about how she hates that these conferences always interrupt her favorite morning television shows.
As press conferences tend to do, they wandered away from the initial topic (the new supreme court nominee) to other issues like the hurricane efforts and, as always, the War in Iraq. I do not have a problem with this. I feel like any jab we can get in at the President for all of his misguided policy decisions, the better. However, there was one question, asked by a really hard hitting reporter, obviously very interested in the Nation’s morale that just got my blood flowing:
“Mr. President, how do you feel about steroids and baseball?”
I don’t remember what the president said. I don’t care. Who let that moron in??? Really. There are people suffering, going without food and water, who have lost their children, and have nothing but the clothes on their backs wandering the roads of the US. There are men and women across the sea killing other men, women and children in a war that we were not asked to fight. There is a woman who’s job nomination has the potential to effect the lives of every American citizen by the decisions she makes until the day she dies. And this, this….MORON…wants to know about drugs and baseball?????
Can you imagine the talk around the water cooler at his office this morning?
“Hear about Jimmy? Yeah…drugs and baseball…I know….poor guy. Never had his head on strait, I always said…”
“Man, the opportunity….he blew it, I’ll tell you that much…”
“Hear they already fired him, his wife said she’s leaving him…doesn’t want to be married to the world’s biggest moron. No, she really said that. I heard he’s camped outside the stadium with a flag and a sign that says “Liberty for all Players.” Going on a hunger strike…I dunno. I don’t think the starvation is doing much for his brain cell count. And really, he needs ‘em all right now, doesn’t he?”
It makes me want to cry with shame. But at the same time, was this guy a sports reporter? Who let him in. No, really. That genius needs a raise. Here we are, at home or the office, really ticked because our favorite shows have been interrupted, swearing at the idiocy of the man we (or most of us) elected as her hems and haws and stumbles over words and this reporter in a single question manages to take all the heat off the President in one go. Whoever let him in, seriously, keep him around.
Diet and Exercise, Day 8
Weight: 138
Morale: low
Body: In extreme amounts of pain
So my first week at the gym has been a good one, although full of disappointments.
First, I realized that I need to aim for an 11 minute mile, since I already can do a 12 minute mile. I didn’t think I would be able to. This means I will have to work much harder than I thought I would. I know that makes me sound like a slacker, but I am an asthmatic who used to smoke 4 packs a day. My lungs have taken a beating. I don’t want to die on a treadmill.
Second, I can’t leg press nearly what I used to. When I left my last gym I was at 190, which is not too shabby, if you as me. Now? 50. Not kidding. I wanted to cry.
On the other hand, I am able to do the bike and arm press whatever a lot better than I used to.
So I guess it’s a 50/50 thing.
I took my first body flow class last night, which is a combination of yoga, tai chi and pilates. I hurt in places I didn’t know I had, and I honestly thought that I had felt every muscle in my body last night. I am not ashamed though, because there were big, weight lifting men in my class and they were totally whipped afterwards too. No shame in a little pain. I am addicted though, I also managed to feel more relaxed than I ever have before. It’s a paradox, more relaxation and more (exercise inflicted) pain than I have ever felt all at once.
Well, I am off for a Tylenol and a glass of milk.
As my instructor would say:
The greatness in me acknowledges the greatness in you.
AG
I was watching the presidential press conference with one eye yesterday morning at work. My co-worker in the front area of the office (her desk is outside my office, anyway) was going on about how she hates that these conferences always interrupt her favorite morning television shows.
As press conferences tend to do, they wandered away from the initial topic (the new supreme court nominee) to other issues like the hurricane efforts and, as always, the War in Iraq. I do not have a problem with this. I feel like any jab we can get in at the President for all of his misguided policy decisions, the better. However, there was one question, asked by a really hard hitting reporter, obviously very interested in the Nation’s morale that just got my blood flowing:
“Mr. President, how do you feel about steroids and baseball?”
I don’t remember what the president said. I don’t care. Who let that moron in??? Really. There are people suffering, going without food and water, who have lost their children, and have nothing but the clothes on their backs wandering the roads of the US. There are men and women across the sea killing other men, women and children in a war that we were not asked to fight. There is a woman who’s job nomination has the potential to effect the lives of every American citizen by the decisions she makes until the day she dies. And this, this….MORON…wants to know about drugs and baseball?????
Can you imagine the talk around the water cooler at his office this morning?
“Hear about Jimmy? Yeah…drugs and baseball…I know….poor guy. Never had his head on strait, I always said…”
“Man, the opportunity….he blew it, I’ll tell you that much…”
“Hear they already fired him, his wife said she’s leaving him…doesn’t want to be married to the world’s biggest moron. No, she really said that. I heard he’s camped outside the stadium with a flag and a sign that says “Liberty for all Players.” Going on a hunger strike…I dunno. I don’t think the starvation is doing much for his brain cell count. And really, he needs ‘em all right now, doesn’t he?”
It makes me want to cry with shame. But at the same time, was this guy a sports reporter? Who let him in. No, really. That genius needs a raise. Here we are, at home or the office, really ticked because our favorite shows have been interrupted, swearing at the idiocy of the man we (or most of us) elected as her hems and haws and stumbles over words and this reporter in a single question manages to take all the heat off the President in one go. Whoever let him in, seriously, keep him around.
Diet and Exercise, Day 8
Weight: 138
Morale: low
Body: In extreme amounts of pain
So my first week at the gym has been a good one, although full of disappointments.
First, I realized that I need to aim for an 11 minute mile, since I already can do a 12 minute mile. I didn’t think I would be able to. This means I will have to work much harder than I thought I would. I know that makes me sound like a slacker, but I am an asthmatic who used to smoke 4 packs a day. My lungs have taken a beating. I don’t want to die on a treadmill.
Second, I can’t leg press nearly what I used to. When I left my last gym I was at 190, which is not too shabby, if you as me. Now? 50. Not kidding. I wanted to cry.
On the other hand, I am able to do the bike and arm press whatever a lot better than I used to.
So I guess it’s a 50/50 thing.
I took my first body flow class last night, which is a combination of yoga, tai chi and pilates. I hurt in places I didn’t know I had, and I honestly thought that I had felt every muscle in my body last night. I am not ashamed though, because there were big, weight lifting men in my class and they were totally whipped afterwards too. No shame in a little pain. I am addicted though, I also managed to feel more relaxed than I ever have before. It’s a paradox, more relaxation and more (exercise inflicted) pain than I have ever felt all at once.
Well, I am off for a Tylenol and a glass of milk.
As my instructor would say:
The greatness in me acknowledges the greatness in you.
AG
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Goddess Dreams
For the last few nights I have had a strange dream that lingers with me when I wake. It chases me down my hallway, through the workday and back in to bed at night.
I am walking in an alleyway, the walls of the buildings are made of glass that shimmers and beckons to me, yet I cannot see through it. When I reach out to touch it, I pass through into another place. It is a giant plaza with marble floors that echo as I walk under an open, brilliant lavender-blue sky.
I wander through the alleys of the plaza, and people come up to me and take my hand to lead me through them. They are strange, beautiful people, who whisper in a strange language I somehow understand. They pet my face and stroke my hair. The kiss my hands. They are amazing, some have eyes that glitter in the dark alleys, some hair that flows to their feet, some voices that sound like thunder.
I realize as I walk with them that somehow I can make things better for them. Anything they want, I can create it - change it. When we come to the edge of a lake that looks like it is made of cut glass and sapphires I already know what to do. I lift to the sky, stretching my legs out far behind me. Pirouetting, twisting turning, I swoop down to let my feet grace the top of the water, where the drops linger against my ankles, reluctant to let me go.
When I reach the other side, I find a giant palace waiting for me. Not a castle, per say, but a huge house full of rooms, courtyards and fountains. People are everywhere. They come to me with gifts, love and soft touches. I am taken to a room where everyone is painted. These people paint instead of wearing clothes, a beautiful expression of who the person is.
A woman with obsidian eyes comes to braid my waist length hair in long flowing weaves that fall down my back. Another paints my eyes blue and violet. A man with no hair and a voice that echoes inside my chest paints boots of black and gold onto me, while another traces dizzying circles across my back.
I wake, crying almost, wishing to go back. Each night I go further. I wonder what place I will go tonight?
I am walking in an alleyway, the walls of the buildings are made of glass that shimmers and beckons to me, yet I cannot see through it. When I reach out to touch it, I pass through into another place. It is a giant plaza with marble floors that echo as I walk under an open, brilliant lavender-blue sky.
I wander through the alleys of the plaza, and people come up to me and take my hand to lead me through them. They are strange, beautiful people, who whisper in a strange language I somehow understand. They pet my face and stroke my hair. The kiss my hands. They are amazing, some have eyes that glitter in the dark alleys, some hair that flows to their feet, some voices that sound like thunder.
I realize as I walk with them that somehow I can make things better for them. Anything they want, I can create it - change it. When we come to the edge of a lake that looks like it is made of cut glass and sapphires I already know what to do. I lift to the sky, stretching my legs out far behind me. Pirouetting, twisting turning, I swoop down to let my feet grace the top of the water, where the drops linger against my ankles, reluctant to let me go.
When I reach the other side, I find a giant palace waiting for me. Not a castle, per say, but a huge house full of rooms, courtyards and fountains. People are everywhere. They come to me with gifts, love and soft touches. I am taken to a room where everyone is painted. These people paint instead of wearing clothes, a beautiful expression of who the person is.
A woman with obsidian eyes comes to braid my waist length hair in long flowing weaves that fall down my back. Another paints my eyes blue and violet. A man with no hair and a voice that echoes inside my chest paints boots of black and gold onto me, while another traces dizzying circles across my back.
I wake, crying almost, wishing to go back. Each night I go further. I wonder what place I will go tonight?
Monday, October 03, 2005
Confessions of a Wannabe Butch
I am butch. I am. I swear I am. Deep down inside, there is a big, scary, ball bat wielding manly-woman. I swear there is. Unfortunately, on the outside, she gets to wear a skirt and ruffled blouse.
Did I choose this? No I didn’t.
Post-modernists would call me fag. I really think that word is for girls like me. Not because we want to be gay men, but because when we try to be masculine, that’s the closest we’ll ever get. We look like a piece of chicken, dolled up for the club.
Never you mind that I intentionally disregarded makeup. I look like I have on eyeliner anyways. Long lashes, see. Can I help that I have an hour glass figure that flatters in every outfit? That I can’t get my J-lo to get any smaller no matter what I do? (I am half tempted to shave it off….I swear. Get me a knife. We can do it. I have some whisky in the garage.)
It’s a funny conundrum. I am not sure how many girls deal with it. That when I go to a barbecue I would rather hang out with the girls by the fire that chat with the ones swapping recipes over the kids? I’d rather have a beer than a martini? I dunno.
I recently made an attempt to be a good girl. Dyed my hair red, highlighted it blonde and went “perky” at the office. Ugh. Torture upon torture. How do you tell your boss that the easy listening channel piped through the office pa is enough to make you want to run screaming for the hills. That life (and work) would be a little better with a bit of Nirvana, Offspring or (dare I say it?) Rage Against the Machine. How do you tell them that you are ‘not a pretty girl’ as Ani would say, and you don’t want help carrying books, or opening doors.
Anyway. Gave up on the red hair. Went back to black. Immediately went to have Mexican for dinner. The waiter asks me if my hair is naturally black…haha. Proclaims it ‘beautiful’. Gag. I swear. I want to buzz it off again. But that does me no good. People assumed I was a cancer patient.
“I did this voluntarily…no, really….”
Sad thing is butch, like sexy, is a state of mind. And I can’t look in the mirror and feel like I can kick ass. I can’t. I wish I could. Every once in a while I will sneak out a fedora, turn the mirror backwards and put on a tie. I’ll turn up my Sinatra CD and lip synch to Old Blue Eyes. Got caught by the girlfriend. She said it was “cute.”
Someone go get me a Liza Minelli recording. I give up.
Did I choose this? No I didn’t.
Post-modernists would call me fag. I really think that word is for girls like me. Not because we want to be gay men, but because when we try to be masculine, that’s the closest we’ll ever get. We look like a piece of chicken, dolled up for the club.
Never you mind that I intentionally disregarded makeup. I look like I have on eyeliner anyways. Long lashes, see. Can I help that I have an hour glass figure that flatters in every outfit? That I can’t get my J-lo to get any smaller no matter what I do? (I am half tempted to shave it off….I swear. Get me a knife. We can do it. I have some whisky in the garage.)
It’s a funny conundrum. I am not sure how many girls deal with it. That when I go to a barbecue I would rather hang out with the girls by the fire that chat with the ones swapping recipes over the kids? I’d rather have a beer than a martini? I dunno.
I recently made an attempt to be a good girl. Dyed my hair red, highlighted it blonde and went “perky” at the office. Ugh. Torture upon torture. How do you tell your boss that the easy listening channel piped through the office pa is enough to make you want to run screaming for the hills. That life (and work) would be a little better with a bit of Nirvana, Offspring or (dare I say it?) Rage Against the Machine. How do you tell them that you are ‘not a pretty girl’ as Ani would say, and you don’t want help carrying books, or opening doors.
Anyway. Gave up on the red hair. Went back to black. Immediately went to have Mexican for dinner. The waiter asks me if my hair is naturally black…haha. Proclaims it ‘beautiful’. Gag. I swear. I want to buzz it off again. But that does me no good. People assumed I was a cancer patient.
“I did this voluntarily…no, really….”
Sad thing is butch, like sexy, is a state of mind. And I can’t look in the mirror and feel like I can kick ass. I can’t. I wish I could. Every once in a while I will sneak out a fedora, turn the mirror backwards and put on a tie. I’ll turn up my Sinatra CD and lip synch to Old Blue Eyes. Got caught by the girlfriend. She said it was “cute.”
Someone go get me a Liza Minelli recording. I give up.
Saturday, October 01, 2005
Oscar
Okay. There are a lot of things I am dying to chat about. But since I firmly believe in the one at a time mentality, I think there is one pressing thing to discuss – the one thing I want to devote my new entry to:
Oscar. Not the award. NOT a boyfriend. Oscar is the name I have given my help tool on my word perfect program at work. It is frightening to think of how attached I have become to Oscar. Normally, you get a paperclip. I could ignore a paperclip, or turn it off. No, Oscar is an orange tabby cat. He sits in the corner of my work screen and drives me bananas.
I don’t mind the tips, really. But it bothers me how much time the people at Microsoft must have put into designing this little guy…First. He moves like a cat. He stretches and lays around and sleeps. Oscar shows me his belly when he is in a deep sleep. The same way my cat does. He also bathes himself. I am not kidding. He washes his face, behind his ears – which is adorable- but eh also washes his rear end. I am not kidding. And I yell at my cats for that. Its awful. Did they have to be that realistic?
Oscar also has a variety of entertainments. Oscar meows when he has a suggestion. He purrs when I accept it. When it asks me if I want to save my document, he shreds the corner of my screen like he is clawing a couch or something. Oscar has a filing cabinet he gets out when I save, and a stamp with copies for when I print. He even has butterflies to chase when I am typing in an error free manner for a while.
I am frightened by how attached I am to Oscar. I turned him off one day and had him turned back on within an hour. What does that say about me? What does that say about Microsoft, that they understand a person on their computer is less likely to click away the little orange tabby cat I now view on a minute to minute basis.
Is office life really that lonely? Am I really that bored? I am not entirely sure. Maybe its because it reminds me of my cats. Maybe it keeps me from being bored when I am sitting at my desk with nothing to do.
Either way, Oscar is here. I don’t think I’ll be getting rid of him any time soon.
Oscar. Not the award. NOT a boyfriend. Oscar is the name I have given my help tool on my word perfect program at work. It is frightening to think of how attached I have become to Oscar. Normally, you get a paperclip. I could ignore a paperclip, or turn it off. No, Oscar is an orange tabby cat. He sits in the corner of my work screen and drives me bananas.
I don’t mind the tips, really. But it bothers me how much time the people at Microsoft must have put into designing this little guy…First. He moves like a cat. He stretches and lays around and sleeps. Oscar shows me his belly when he is in a deep sleep. The same way my cat does. He also bathes himself. I am not kidding. He washes his face, behind his ears – which is adorable- but eh also washes his rear end. I am not kidding. And I yell at my cats for that. Its awful. Did they have to be that realistic?
Oscar also has a variety of entertainments. Oscar meows when he has a suggestion. He purrs when I accept it. When it asks me if I want to save my document, he shreds the corner of my screen like he is clawing a couch or something. Oscar has a filing cabinet he gets out when I save, and a stamp with copies for when I print. He even has butterflies to chase when I am typing in an error free manner for a while.
I am frightened by how attached I am to Oscar. I turned him off one day and had him turned back on within an hour. What does that say about me? What does that say about Microsoft, that they understand a person on their computer is less likely to click away the little orange tabby cat I now view on a minute to minute basis.
Is office life really that lonely? Am I really that bored? I am not entirely sure. Maybe its because it reminds me of my cats. Maybe it keeps me from being bored when I am sitting at my desk with nothing to do.
Either way, Oscar is here. I don’t think I’ll be getting rid of him any time soon.
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