The Baconator

Who'da thunk it? That cute little red-headed girl with the Pipi Longstocking braids is trying to kill us. My money has always been on the clown. And, in recent years, I've been hedging my bets with that creepy puppet king. But now I am pretty sure it's the pipsqueak who is going to do us in.

Have you seen this thing? It borders on gastronomic insanity. You eat one of these and you're practically saying "Here I am Lord. Come and take me."

Don't get me wrong. I love me some bacon. And, I love me some cheeseburgers. And I have, indeed, been known to chow down on a bacon cheeseburger or two in my day (OK, yesterday.) But still. There is a line and I do believe The Baconator crosses it. Crosses it, spits on it, rubs it's shoe in the dirt and then runs screaming away from the line waving it's arms. "Nyah, nyah you can't catch me!"

Does one person actually need to ingest that much meat, salt, fat and byproduct in one sitting?
Dostoevsky once said “The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.” But I say an equally valid judgement of civilization can be made by observing what we eat when no one is cooking for us. When left to our own devices, what are we ingesting? Are we seeking out meals? Or are we going for the quick cheap?

There is a lot to be said about the quick cheap. Namely that it is quick and cheap. And prolific. There is a fast food joint on virtually every corner and you can eat a full "meal" for around $5 any and every day at any one of them.

Which is a shame. Because it's very difficult to have the media, and your doctors and the government shouting into one ear about how you have to eat healthier. You have to cut out fats and eat more vegetables, get less sodium and drink more water. And, in the other ear you've got multi-million dollar corporations shouting about their new, triple stack double cheese, bacon, ham and mayonnaise sandwich combo death wish and a soda.

And we've done this to ourselves. The American love affair with fast food is as old as the interstate highway system. The more we buy, the more they try to sell us. But really we should reign it in a little here folks. Because this a slippery slope. You know that the next step is a slab of salt pork shoved into the middle of a frosted donut.

Oh, wait.

Rock And Roll! ... All Night?

I bet you've been wondering where I've been.

I bet you've been wondering what I've been up to.

I'll tell you what I've been up to.

I've been living the life of a part time rock and roller.

Rock And Roll, you see, does not begin until after 9pm.

So, partying everyday is sort of out of the picture.

Unless by "party" you mean sleep late.

But still. Exciting times. Very exciting times.

I feel cool.
I'm "with the band." Heh heh.

They're a really good band. And, I'm not just saying that because I'm marrying the bass player. I mean seriously. They're good. It's been a meteoric rise from the Christmas 2006 show at the VFW Hall in Villa Park, IL to next month's show at Swig on Milwaukee.

You should check them out:

HEYDAY

Go on, click it.

Parental Discretion is advised. It's Rock And Roll. We should always show discretion when exposing our parents to it.

And, yeah yeah. I'm still getting married. And, there have been a number of weddings we've been to in the last year that I have not written about.
I'm mulling.
Leave me be.

Death To All Aphids!

Bugs.
I hate bugs.

I really like my plants though. And my plants have bugs.
Little, green bugs. And some white ones. They look like lint until they start crawling across the leaf. The green ones are aphids. I don't know what the white ones are. I really don't like either of them.

We mixed up some soapy water to spray the pepper plants, as directed by a knowledgeable looking website. I think it made the bugs angry. I thought it would kill them. Or chase them off - an aphid diaspora. One application will just not be enough. But I don't want to over soap the plants. We're really close to having actual peppers. I can feel it. And, after our near fatal experience with the basil plant this winter (now having passed on to a better life in someone's garden in the suburbs.) I'm a little gun shy on the plant care front.

Also, sometimes Beatrice likes a nice side-salad with her meal. She'll nibble on pretty much anything that grows. I don't want to poison her with insecticides so I'm afraid to use anything stronger than soapy water.

I'm thinking about bringing in some lady bugs. Yeah, I know. Also bugs. But they are, at least, more attractive bugs. And I'm pretty sure Beatrice would snack on them if they got out of hand.
It doesn't seem as though my The Fiance is going to approve of this little ecosystem project of mine. I believe his exact words were:

"No. You are not allowed to have lady bugs."

So. Soapy water it is then.
Unless anyone else has any good ideas.

Memorial Day Weekend, 2007

The only thing worth interrupting the TNT Law & Order marathon for is the discovery of the Jaws marathon on Encore. The Brody Brothers have just been reunited at the gates of Sea World setting off a chain of 3-D events. Culminating in the spectacular demise of Louis Gossett Jr. All four movies. All day long.

At eight o'clock The History Channel is airing a special about the mythology of Star Wars.

It is as if the Gods of Cable heard I was planning on spending the day in PJs, recovering from the weekend-long grilling bacchanal. Hooray for long, cool draughts of water and chocolate chip cookies.

Even the cats are lazing it up. The cats, however, are pretty much always lazing it up. It's what they seem to do best. Second only to waking us up at ungodly hours for no discernible reason. Beatrice is splayed out, lolling around in front of the television. The fan ruffling the white fur on her stomach. Jabber, I'm assuming, is under the bed. He's scared of the fans. All of them. Also the dishwasher and any noises coming in through the windows. Summer is a tough season for Ole Boy.

Summer. It's already summer. It feels like just yesterday that I was complaining that summer would never arrive and here it is. Theknot.com tells me we have 501 days until our wedding. If we get the date we want. If we find a place to have it. When we find a place to have it? Another trip down to New Orleans in July. A couple of more venues to investigate. And then hopefully, this October, I can get a committee together to come down with me and find a florist and talk decor.

But between then and now there are still 3 other peoples' weddings to attend. Gotta stay focused. Gotta keep my head in the game. Gotta pick out some hot outfits, book some travel arrangements and ship out some gifts. It's going to be busy. So bring it on, summer.

Bring it on.

Cute Shoe Revolution

Ladies and Gentlemen, I'm here to share with you a new plan for total personal happiness and fulfillment.

(Hold for applause.)

It's really simple!
There aren't a lot of complicated steps to follow. So there's no literature to buy.
And, while there is an initial investment cost, how much you contribute is entirely up to you! There is no minimum.
And there's definitely no maximum!

(Hold for laughter.)

I just need you to listen to me on this. I know what I am talking about! And I want YOU to know what I'm talking about too! Are you ready?

(Hold for response.)

Are you ready?

(Hold for response.)

Are you ready?

(Hold for response.)

Then, Ladies and Gentlemen, give me your un-de-vided attention because here it is. Here's the secret. I'm going to tell it to you right now. This is what you need to do.

Buy yourself a pair of shoes.

You heard me right. It really is THAT simple. All it takes, at the start, is one. new. pair. of. shoes.

What kind of shoes? Doesn't matter.
Whatever you prefer.
Me? I favor a cute shoe.

(Show them the totally cute Anne Klein peep-toes you got last weekend.)

(Note: Get pedi b4 conference!!)

But you may like something a little more sporty. Or formal even. Whatever you want. We can't decide for you. And we don't want to! YOU are the best guide to your own happiness. And we're not about making choices for you. We're here to give you a "step" in the right direction!

(Don't forget to take the step!)

In the next (check time) ____ minutes I am going to give you all the tools you need to feel "pumped" about going out there and starting your own Cute Shoe Revolution!

(Hold for applause.)

Why buy new shoes?
How can shoes make you happy?

Let me ask you this: How can shoes NOT make you happy?

The right pair of shoes not only helps you look better, they help you feel better. Feel better about your feet. Feel better about your outfit. Feel better about you. Feel better about THE WORLD!

(Hold for applause.)

Say you're in a store. Say you're there to buy some bath towels and you're walking down the aisles and you have to go through the shoe section to get to the bath towels. And as you're going past all of these shoes you see a pair. That one pair. It's perfect. It calls to you from the shelf. And you see these shoes and you love them! You hear them calling and you love them.

What do you do?

Do you say to yourself "Oh, those are lovely shoes. Too bad I'm only here to buy towels?"

NO!

You pick up those shoes! You try those shoes on. You walk around, find that little mirror on the bench and model those shoes for yourself. Do they look good? Do they feel good?

Then you BUY those shoes. You can still get the towels! You can get towels anytime. But you need to start buying yourself those shoes!

It doesn't matter if you have something to wear them with. You can build an outfit from the ground up if the shoes are cute. It doesn't even matter if you have a pair at home "just like them."

Let me clue you in on a little secret:

No two pairs of shoes are exactly alike.
And the small, sometimes indeterminate, differences are what make them all necessary!

Because you know you are going to want an alternate pair to wear while you're breaking the new ones in.

I'm not going to lie to you here. It's true. We all know it's true. New shoes can be painful. New shoes can hurt. But when that day comes when you take the band-aids off, when the blisters have healed over and you're no longer hobbling around you know it's worth it. You know!

Because your feet look great! They just look fabulous. And they make your legs look good and shapely. Your whole posture changes and all of your clothes look better. And when you go out there feeling like a million bucks you can MAKE a million bucks.

And, when you make a million bucks what are you going to do with all that money? What are you going to do with it all?

That's right. You're going to go out and buy more, cute shoes.

Now I'm just going to take a little break here. Take a sip of water while my associates pass our pamphlets out to you and get my transparencies mounted up on that screen.

Mmh, this is good. What is this? Evian?

Untitled

It's not that I have known you for so long.
It's that I knew you so long ago.

The world and you and I were young
and more frivolous with our affections.

Different times and different pains
Different loves and reasons
came together, composing what was at once a friendship.

Kin by different bloodlines.
Running even deeper, at times, than veins can run in a body.

More solid than flesh and everlasting for the time.

When our world was one with walkable circumference
we were all it took to fill it.
Now the world is broader, bigger, wider than we ever bothered to imagine
when all of our time was filled with each other.

The distance between us makes the difference.
Not on maps so much as minds.
And hearts.
In soul and spirit.

It is the horizons that have changed.
Our angles in relation to the sun
and how we choose to revolve around it.

None of what we are or who we were has altered much.
Or been altered.
We are who we are who we were who we shall be.

The world, it seems, is big enough for both of us.
You there and me here.

Where ever there and here may be.

(aside)

This past weekend I played more video games than I ever have in my whole, entire life. (So. Not. Kidding.)

Oh ye of little hand-eye coordination, get thee to a Wii. For The Wii is Wonderful. You can dance (Fiance refused that game), box (beat him), and shake ants off a banana (No. I don't know why.) And, apparently, it's all really good for you because you're standing up and moving around (instead of creating permanent butt-prints on the couch) and the boxing? Actually made my arm a little sore. (Um, did I mention I beat my The Fiance? At Boxing? Also at bowling and baseball and ...well, I'll just stop there. But also golf.)

This weekend I also got to play Guitar Hero II (Poorly.) And it was nothing less than nerve-wracking.

There are reasons all of my attempts at learning to play an instrument have ended badly (usually with cats hiding under beds.) I would tell you that it brought me to a whole new level of respect for what my The Fiance does but that would be a lie. In the end, it's still a game. And, although I full-on blushed in embarrassment when the "crowd" booed me : -( I still know that they are just a video game crowd (Thank you friends who remained supportive every time I mangled a song and will remember to never ever ever tell my The Fiance how bad I was at it...Right?) It's fun. (And only just slightly addictive.)

It made me realize how important it is to develop some of these skills in childhood. (Catching a ball, for example. Kicking a ball? Also good.) Not (as you may think) because I wish to beat the stuffing out of my The Fiance at more video games, but because...um....sports are good for you? No one ever told me that. (Maybe a little bit of a lie. But for sure no one emphasized it. Or, I couldn't hear them from behind my copy of Little Women.)

Never much of one for organized sports (Dreaded being the last one picked. Also, fear of getting hit in the face with a volley ball.) Or musical instruments (Cats hate flute.) I really didn't do much with myself while my cousins got their pictures taken for the paper playing soccer or baseball or sbaccerball...whatever.

Not me. I read. And read, and read. I even read some books about musicians (high school final paper on The Ramones and college essay on Nirvana!) There was that one book I read about the sports guy (That would be The Sportswriter by Richard Ford. Reading a book about a guy who writes about sports counts. Maybe.)


Anyway - point being....um...

RIP

Rarely (ok, never) do I feel that a "celebrity" death warrents a post, or a picture, on this here bloggo. Kurt Vonnegut was a very influential force on my writing for a long time. And I will always credit him as such, and my father for taking "Breakfast of Champions" off the shelf and putting it into my hands. I am sad today to know that he has left us all here but happy thinking that he may finally know what his sister's real name was.

That's Entertainment

When I was younger my Uncle John accused me of having indiscriminate taste when it came to entertainment. Which I think actually translated to "Please stop coming to my house and making us watch Ghostbusters and Return of the Jedi every weekend." To be fair, when I was 12, there was nothing that kept me more happily occupied than watching Ghostbusters or Return of the Jedi.

As I have gotten older that hasn't really changed much. You can ask my The Fiance. He hates my taste in movies because I generally insist on watching any crap that involves ghosts, demons, witches, fighters of ghosts or demons or witches, talking animals, animals that swarm and kill, poorly choreographed fight sequences or zombies. I also enjoy any movie wherein Bruce Willis or Will Smith save the world. In fact the perfect movie, for my money, would be some sort of buddy comedy/action adventure movie starring Die Hard and The Fresh Prince. World in peril? Who else are you gonna call?

This is not to say I don't also enjoy legitimately good movies. Movies that win awards. Movies that Ebert and/or Roeper thumb up. Movies whose scripts were not penned by Joss Whedon or the guys behind Freaks and Geeks. I watch those too. I like them. I am, generally, the driving force behind all of our movie rentals and try really hard to expose The Fiance to the important films. You know, the whole John Hughes oeuvre.

I kid. Well, not really. Although I am pretty sure this whole marriage thing would be called off if I tried to make The Fiance spend a weekend watching Brat Pack films. We rent a lot of old war films, newer action movies, sometimes a thinker or two. A History Of Violence was very popular with both of us. We spent some time, before we coughed up the dough for cable, renting various National Geographic and Discovery Channel documentaries. We were sorely disappointed by the show on the giant crocodile. And, tempting fate again last night, we were also disappointed by the special about Gigantopithecus. Lame.

Were you to walk into my house on any given Sunday afternoon you would probably find me scanning all of the On Demand movie channels looking for the most obnoxiously under-budgeted, poorly scripted horror movies. Most of which were created during the late 70s and early 80s. I will occasionally subject myself to whatever "Chick Flick" is screening on USA/TNT. But really, if it's not Reese Witherspoon it's a pile of pooh. Yeah, I'm talking to you Drew Barrymore.

I also REALLY love bad comedies. REALLY bad comedies. Chris Farley is in it? I am all over it! Anything that Adam Sandler made before he started trying to be a "legitimate actor?" Word. Broken Lizard Production? Giddyup!

So, yeah. OK. I am, perhaps, a bit lacking in the discrimination department when it comes to movies. There are a lot of people out there making movies. And, just because it was released straight to video or as a USA Network Original does not immediately make it a bad movie. Hallmark Channel? Yeah no, those are all pretty bad.

When it comes to television shows though. I am a little more picky. Buffy and Angel fascinations aside my criteria ... Well, I actually have a criteria regarding what television shows I will watch.

I will not watch a sitcom involving a funny, fat guy married to a relative hot, intelligent chick.
I will no longer watch Reality Television. (I had to draw that line the summer I spent watching every episode of Paradise Hotel like it was my job.)
I will not watch specials on 9/11 conspiracy theories.
Lost makes my brain hurt. I wont watch that.

There are a lot of shows I just don't watch. Most of the time it's because they interfere with shows that I HAVE to watch: 24, The Simpsons, Law & Order (SVU and The Original,) South Park.

Sometimes it's because The Fiance has very high standards for is stubborn about his television viewing. So, I miss some stuff. No big deal. You can find pretty much anything on television somewhere else to watch. DVD collections, the internet, someone else's TiVo because your The Fiance doesn't want to mess with the space time continuum like that.

Plus, it's only television. At one point in time, when a regular, good old fashion television set was groundbreaking technology people were producing groundbreaking shows. People were telling groundbreaking stories. Now? Now we're mostly scraping the bottom of the barrel. We're living in a time when most of our movies are remakes or film versions of old television shows. Even some of our television shows are just remakes of old television shows. And I don't mean that in the "inspired by I Love Lucy" sense. I mean: have you heard they are remaking The Bionic Woman? Also, there are way more commercials and product placements than there is actual entertainment on TV now. Snooze. How many E.D. medication commercials can a girl watch?

I refuse to allow television to be that important to me. Except for, you know, 24, The Simpsons, Law & Order (SVU and The Original,) and South Park. I know it pays the bills. I know, I know. I think half of my anxiety dreams are because I participate in putting some of this crap on the airwaves. But whatever. It's just not that important. That's why I'm OK with watching the garbage when I have to. I can tune it out, reduce it so it's just background noise. And sometimes, it's just fun to be easily amused. Like eating cookies for breakfast.

Mmh cookies.

Technical Problems - Please Stand By

Ugh.

I seriously meant to publish about the latest wedding extravaganza (i am not even exaggerating when i use that word here people) we attended last week(ish).

However, software problems on the home machine have caused delays.

Translation: My computer is a P.O.S. that has no more room on it's memory for me to do anything else and I have no money for a new computer.
The one i'm currently working with was bought for $100 second hand on Craigslist.com. (Gosh, ya shoulda seen the porn on there when i brought it home!)

So, soon. I promise.
Keep yer pants on.

Here Comes The Bride. All Dressed In...

So.

Wedding dresses.

They are really heavy. I'm not talking in the metaphysical sense here. I mean, those things are made of a lot of fabric. And tulle. Don't forget tulle. In fact, you cannot forget the tulle. But, I have limited experience with these things. I've only tried on dresses today. This was the inaugural shopping expedition.

Mom flew in from New York. I assembled my crackerjack team of shopping and style experts and we headed west. Past Cicero Avenue and into the land where Polish, Italian and Mexican families live Catholic harmony. Just like Springfield has it's Hammock District, Chicago has a Wedding District and that is where we were today.

It is not, as one might expect, a glamorous district. But there sure are a lot of bridal salons out there. And a lot of dresses. Dresses in all styles, colors and silhouettes. That is how you refer to them. Not shapes. Silhouettes. I think I learned that today. Did I mention the crackerjack team of experts? You wanna know why I'm smart? It's because I know when to admit that I need help. I tell you right now, without my three ladies, I would still have my head stuck in a dress with an arm poking through one of those fancy, hanger straps they have. I would be lost.

When we first walked into Eva's Bridal I froze up. There were a lot of sparkles, shiny fabrics and pointy bodices around. I got a little overwhelmed and I shuffled over to the desk, a display case of tiaras and other ridiculous accessories. They gave me an information card to fill out and by the time I looked up, the ladies had already agreed upon a gown off one of the racks.
I love these girls. They jump right in where I fear to tread.

We were told it would be a few minutes before my consultant was available and we ushered ourselves into the room of gowns. Floor to ceiling wedding dresses. I had no idea where to begin. I touched a few, wandered past a couple of different price ranges but my chest got really tight and I felt really lost for a minute. I can't even go to Blockbuster without taking six and a half hours to chose from all of the titles. What was going to happen here?

Ultimately, we're talking about a room full of white dresses. OK, some were ivory. Some were antique, some were even baby blue but upon first glance it is a sea of white. It was like being snow blinded. However, there was no hesitation on the parts of anyone else. Head first and into the racks they went with me trailing behind them.

Most of the dresses were hung inside clear garment bags. We were unzipping and digging through massive amounts of silk, satin and tulle. Don't forget the tulle. We saw some really ridiculous dresses. Lots of lace overkill ... er overlay and sparkly detailed bodices. When our consultant (and I say our because today was, for sure, a team effort.) We had three gowns to bring into the dressing room. I gave the pictures I had cut from the only bridal magazines I have purchased thus far and she went off to find more gowns for me to try on.

One of the best things about having spent so much time in theater is that I am pretty comfortable in a dressing room. Usually I'm the one lacing people into corsets but the tables were turned today. I think I did good. I had a specific dress in mind going in but I kept myself open to some other designs and I had three of my most honest advisers with me. Plus my mom. She was there to make sure my boobs weren't going to hang out too indecently. In describing her sense of fashion, as far as my wedding dress was concerned at least, she used the word "parochial." I'm not entirely sure what she meant by that but I have a good idea, considering she favored the more "well structured" and least plunging necklines of all the dresses I tried on today.

Not that there's anything wrong with a modestly cut wedding dress. However, while I am looking to minimize certain aspects of my physique, there are others that I feel should be tastefully showcased on my wedding day. Tastefully.

I think the biggest surprise of the day, besides the whole "wow, I look pretty f'ing good in a wedding dress" thing was that I figured there would be some sort of conflict over dress color. But there wasn't. In high school, walking the walk in the mornings with Eileen Kaufman, when we discussed future wedding dreams I always described myself in something completely nontraditional. And, while I have veered away from my initial feelings on a black wedding dress with bridesmaids in blood red, I am still not too keen on the pure white dress thing.

Now, I'm as virtuous and virginal as the next chick. I just don't think I look all that good in white. Plus, I'm a clumsy eater. And a clumsy walker. Pretty much, I'm a little clumsy all around and therefore I've never favored white. I've had in my head something in a nice ivory, perhaps champagne. I didn't think mom would go for it. Only daughter, only marriage and mom's not the most progressive lady... But she agreed. That was pretty cool. We can only hope that things progress as smoothly over the next nineteen months.

Only nineteen months? Oy. OK.

So the dress thing turned out well. We eliminated some styles altogether. Bye bye mermaid silhouette. See ya at someone else's wedding, Mae West slinker. Hello Grecian draped style.
I know, it's a real shocker that I can rock the Grecian garb. What can I say? Some of us are just born to look good in raw silk. Elegant, simple, classical if you will. Indeed. Lovely dress, shame it doesn't exist in my size.

It's a really arduous task, trying on wedding gowns. I am not kidding about the weight of these things. Thankfully my crackerjack team was there to help me in and out of the gowns. Pulling down underskirts, lacing the aforementioned corsets and making sure I didn't fall off that little platform they give you to stand on, so you can see what the dress looks like without stepping all over the bottom. Not to mention six brilliant eyes and three mouths not afraid to speak the truth. None of the three of these ladies are part of the wedding party. That team is all in New York. But these three, they are my every day go-to team. We have our verbal shorthand and I know I can trust each of them to give me unvarnished opinions. Very important.

I feel pretty good. We dropped mom off at the train to the airport with information on two specific dresses written down for further internet searching. We took some pictures. And no, you can't see them. We're going to try and find the first dress we all agreed on. The one they told me is discontinued.

There's also a second dress. We popped into the shop where one of the girls bought her own wedding gown. Unannounced, you can't expect too much from a shop the size of this store. But the lady was super nice and very helpful. The one dress I tried on there is a winner. It's beautiful, but it's got a lot of "business" going on. I don't know if I want a lot of "business." But we've got all of the information on that one as well.

And I am confident, after today, that I can find a dress I look great in. Truthfully, I wasn't too sure of that until I started trying them on.

I don't know if I did it right though. I didn't cry. Wasn't I supposed to cry? I always hear about brides and their mom's crying when they find THE dress. Standing there, in front of the three-way mirror in a billowy cloud of white, tears of joy streaming down their cheeks. Yaddayadda yadda. No? Good.

Stop Me Before I Troll Again

there is some sick (SICK!) compulsion inside me that makes me do crazy things sometimes.

like putting my ex-boyfriend's name into google "just to see what happens."


you know what happens?

i find him.

and i go to his myspace page and stare.

and then i throw up a little in my mouth.

and then i do it all over again like a month later.
because...
i don't know.
maybe he makes mention of me? maybe someone finally posted a comment calling him out on his supreme douchebaginess (yeah, i made that word up. all on my own. fuck off.)
maybe some sort of non-fatal tragedy has befallen him and i can laugh about it!

curse you myspace.
curse you for providing access to the people, places and things we should never be able to access again.

curse you myspace and curse my trolling sickness.



ew. alanis morrissette's "you oughta know" totally just came on.
i'm going to go wash the gross off myself before it's permanent.

Love In The Time of Cold Remedies

Ahhh Valentine's Day.
In honor of this most auspicious holiday marketing scheme here is a list of the other things that annoy me:

* Men blaming women for Valentine's Day.
You know, if some people thought to be more considerate and perhaps more caring towards other people on a regular basis (and without prompting) throughout the year maybe we all wouldn't be in this heart-shaped pickle, now would we?
Is it so hard to buy a bouquet of flowers every once in a while? Sheesh.
Ahh, not that I condone laying on the pressure for expensive baubbles and/or trinkets either. The entire thing is a gross misappropriation of perfectly good emotions if you ask me.
Just stop blaming me for the whole thing.

* Food voyeurs.
The next person who comes up to me and starts sniffing my food at lunch is going to get a face full of ...well, whatever it is I'm heating up at the time. I don't sniff at your food now do I? Scram.

* The CTA.
Specifically the Blue Line and the Damen Bus.
SpSpecifically having to wait a full 40 minutes for both/either of the above.
SpSpSpecifically having the above mentioned wait quadruple my commute time.
SpSpSpSpecifically when it's 10 FREAKIN DEGREES OUTSIDE.
Thanks CTA, I'm so glad the revenue from all of those fare hikes is being put to good use.
Douchebags.

*The Cold. The Cold. Oh The Cold. Please God Make It Stop Being So Cold.
It's very difficult to reach into my pockets when I'm fully dressed and leaving the house in the mornings. I can't answer my cell phone if it rings when I'm outside. I can't, physically, get to the inside of my pocket. It makes me crazy. My fingers are virtually useless inside my gloves. My scarf is so big, and wound so high on my face that my neck is immobilized. And I so wasn't kidding about waddling to the bus stop in the mornings. Today it was a pair of tights, a pair of wool leggings, one pair of cotton socks and a pair of wool socks underneath the big, pink snow boots and my jeans. So much. Too much. Enough.
Thank you.

*Commercials.
Dear The Violent Femmes,
So sorry to hear you have fallen upon hard times. I guess you should have invested some of that early-eighties cashola a little bit better. Maybe then you wouldn't have had to sell one of the most awesomest songs EVER to Wendy's. Dudes.

*Oprah.
Still.

That's it.
Right now.
I'm gonna go work on the one-act.

Man, I Wish We Had TiVo

Now that The Panda Show is over I have regained full use of my Sundays.

Woohoo.

I love Sunday. It is a day spectacularly devoid of any responsibility or relation to the other days in my week. When executed without flaw I can manage to be in my pyjamas all day. I try not to make any promises or create any expectations for myself on Sundays. Sitting down to write here is sometimes a major accomplishment for me but Sunday is the only day of the week I have to myself. And, therefore, the only day I have the time to commit to it.

Which, I admit, is partially laziness on my part. Sure, I could take an hour or two after work every night. Or I could start writing in the mornings over coffee and breakfast. But really? No. Not really. In the AM my brain is pretty much in a vice-grip of stupidity until I'm actually in the elevator of my office building. After eight hours at work there's no less pleasant a thought than sitting down in front of another computer and having to use the same brain cells I've been exercising all day. I can maintain consciousness until about 11pm. After that, I guarantee nothing.

Yes, it's true. I live a simple life. A quiet life. Saturdays are generally for chores. Grocery shopping, forcing The Fiance to help me "clean up, just a little." Sometimes a movie, or lunch out. Not in this weather though. Occasionally, Saturdays are spent recooperating from Friday night, but most of The Big Events happen on Saturday nights.

Which brings us back to Sunday.

I sequester myself on the second floor. It's the bedroom, and our office, and the music studio, and a very comfortable lounge area easily fortified against the elements by strategic placement of our space heater. It's quiet up here. The forced-air heat doesn't have the same resonence as it does in the living room. There's not the constant volume monitoring on the TV or on the computer as there would be downstairs. It's oddly cosy for a space so open. Equally as important, my cell phone gets horrible reception on the second floor. Oh well.

I bring some snacks up from the kitchen and a beverage or two. After 6pm, or with whatever passes for dinner on days like this, I might have a glass of wine or two but usually it's tea or water or juice. I'll bring the paper up and spread it on the desk, piling the ad sections ontop of the ones I have no interest in - automobiles, business, classifieds and sports - and browse the rest of the paper. Beatrice will eventually come searching for attention and plant herself in my lap, or ontop of whatever I'm reading at the time. We'll watch a little TV together until she moves her fat, kitty ass onto the other chair finally freeing all of my limbs and attention. She'll sit quietly until Jabber comes up here to tell me that he's starving for food and from lack of attention. Beatrice will either run him off with a swipe of her paw or allow him to nest on the bed.

If I hadn't finished reading my book last night, I'd be making my way through that right now. Or muddling through the new novel I just brought home from the stash in my desk drawer at work. But there's a Law & Order marathon on (does it still qualify as a marathon if they show 5 hours of L&O every Sunday?) The cats and I are content enough to sit here and eat our snacks and pound out some thoughts on the ol' blog.

I've been thinking about a one act play. Today is the type of day I might work on that. Or I might spend three hours rambling here. Or perhaps I'll browse the list of wedding dress designers from the salon I am going to next month. The Hunt begins on March 11th. There are a lot of things I could, and probably should, be doing today. There are a lot of ways I could spend my Sundays. But the greatest feeling in the world is not having a single damn thing to do.

Big Mistake

Wearing one less layer of everything today.


Bonuses:
Less waddle on the walk to the bus stop this morning.
Trading in tie-up hiking boots for giant, pink snowboots = way cuter and much less me losing feeling in my toes because all of my socks make the boots too tight.

What I Wore Today

1 pair underpants
1 pair wool leggings
1 pair wool leg warmers
1 pair cotton socks
1 pair wool socks
1 pair ugly hiking boots that are more water/slip proof than any other shoes I own
1 pair corduroy pants
1 bra
1 thermal pullover shirt
1 cotton henley shirt
1 ugly wool "Mr Rogers" sweater over the whole mess


still cold.

2007 - The Year Of Living Frenchily

*Deep sigh of relief*

Today, January 16th, is the first day in over a month I have been able to just come home, kick off my shoes and relax with a some episodes from the Law & Order franchise.

The above is a lie.
I was supposed to go to the grocery store and buy breakfast food and pick up a pair of long johns for Bird.

Weeeeeeeelll. I copped out and hit the 7/11 for over priced bacon and eggs.
And, since I told Bird's mom to send him new, fancy, long johns for his birthday (It's OK, his birthday is tomorrow and he doesn't read this blog anyway) I figured I should wait and see if that happens before I buy him a pair.

So here I am at home. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

The end of 2007 went kind of haywire on me.
First of all I signed up to stage manage a show.
It's strange and it's French.
It's playing here, in Chicago, right now. Come and see it!

Then, in November, Bird promoted himself from my "The Boyfriend" to my "The Fiance."
Go figure huh? (squeeeee!)
It's very exciting and a little bit scary.
Not because of the whole "til death" thing. That I feel OK about.
What's really freaking me out is the idea of being the center of attention at a huge event.
Really. There's a reason I'm a stage manager and not an actor folks.
I am fabulous with planning and organizing and making all sorts of magic come together.


For other people.


When it comes to my own life, and art, and entertaining I am way more neurotic and a bit of a weenie about committing to ideas and choices.

This is not a good way to be when you have a wedding to plan. I am trying really hard to remind myself what I have told all of my bridalicious friends at one time or another. This is just a big budget, one-night show. Lavish costumes, complicated props but (thankfully) very few light cues. If I can continue to think of it in this way I should be able to deal with whatever the next umm.... eighteen months....has to throw at me.

Only eighteen months???!?! Crap.

On the plus side, even if the reception falls to pieces, we're doing it down in New Orleans so people will have some sort of fun. Somewhere. Somehow, that I may or may not want to know about later.

And can someone tell me how I am meant to refer to the occurrence to this event?
"One the plus side...we're _________ down in New Orleans."

Fill in the blank:
doing it
throwing it
celebrating it
tossin' it up
pledging our love
making me an "honest" woman
proclaiming our intended fidelity
making it all OK with The Big Guy

Is there a preferred term? Is there something in an etiquette book somewhere?
(This, by the way, is probably the last time you will hear me inquire about any sort of wedding etiquette.)

Anyway, so yeah. There's that.

In continence of the frenchified theme for 2007, for my birthday my The Fiance's Mom sent me a copy of Anthony Bourdain's Les Halles cookbook.
So far The Fiance has put together a splendid baked chicken.

A few years ago my family started exchanging Christmas gifts grab-bag style. Which is fun and cuts down on the spendiness that was Christmas but maddening when the wacky White-Elephant rules apply.

(You know, first person picks a gift from the pile. Second person can snatch the gift right out of first person's hands. Or can politely take one from the pile.)

Let's just say this. I started the game with a copy of "Young Frankenstein" and wound up bringing home a copy of the Balthazar cookbook.

Which, you know, one can never have too many cookbooks. But 2007 is surely shaping up to be the year of Parisian Brasserie cuisine.

Note to self: Register for those cute little ramekins to cook souffle in.
And perhaps an escargot fork.
But just one though. I doubt we'll ever need more than that.

So, that's all I've got for right now. Tomorrow is The Fiance's birthday. We are going out to eat something fancy and not at all French.

Things You Learn On Your 31st Birthday

1) The day goes by much quicker when you aren't forced out of bed by a blaring alarm clock at 6am.

2) Mimosas taste good ANY time.

3) Cats do not care if it's your birthday. They still want their litter box cleaned.

4) Funny e-cards come from www.lamecards.com (Thank you Kristina. And no, you weren't really an ugly baby. OK, maybe for a couple of weeks there.)

5) Waterworld? Still a bad movie.

Back to mimosa drinking.

Ta Ta for Now.
Happy Birthday to me!

And Happy Birthday to Cousin Kristina Tomorrow.
The strawberry shortcake is in the mail.

Pasting Down Reality

In the early months of 1999 I began clipping things out of newspapers: headlines, pieces of articles and pictures. At the time I was working as a news monitor. It sounds like an interesting job - most of the jobs I've had sound interesting (that's why I take them after all.)- but really it was brain-numbingly dull. I watched a tape of local news programming and kept notes on what commercials were mentioned at what times.


Hrm. With some perspective I think actually I was a commercial monitor and a hell of a lot closer to my current job than I ever put together just this very second.

Anyhow. So I sat at a computer all day. On the television next to me the news played. Five hours of news. And all day long I would watch the television news and type out short descriptions of each commercial. As you may guess, I did not last very long at this job. It was depressing. News all day, every day. If you subject yourself to that sort of thing for long enough, you begin to lose hope. Everything becomes ugly and mean. This is when I started cutting up the newspapers.

I don't remember having any plan for these clippings when I first started collecting them. I kept them piled together in one of those two-pocket folders - you know the ones in rainbow packs that you used to buy as part of back-to-school supplies. There weren't many of them. Just a few, at the beginning. When I fled from that monitoring job I wound up working as the de facto office manager and receptionist at a non-profit organization. Part of THAT job was to go through the morning papers and cut out any articles mentioning the companies that belonged to our organization.

So there I was, paid to sit at a desk and cut up newspapers. It was strange timing on the universe's part because what had once been just a slight interest became a fixation. All of a sudden I had little bits of newspaper falling out of everywhere. I don't remember when, or where, I got the sketch book that they came to be pasted in but I do remember spending a lot of hours on the floor of my living room cutting and pasting. And there's a date on the bottom of the last page. The day I decided I was done. There was a rush towards the end. I got tired of the labor of it all, so I filled the last pages very quickly just to wash my hands of the whole thing.

I pull it off the bookshelf occasionally and you can't really blame me for wanting to get it as far away from myself as possible once it was done. There is really very little goodness in it at all. It begins with pages of short articles about foreign wars and atrocities. Afghanistan, Guatemala, Cambodia. A New York Times headline reads "Eight Tourists, Including a U.S. Couple, Hacked or Bludgeoned to Death in Uganda." I forget that happened. All of the time, I forget about how that was news for at least a week. It was, it is, horrifying.

One page only has 2 headlines, pasted perpendicular to each other, about racism in the London Police force.

Ha. Here's a good one:
"War leaves Clinton feeling dispirited and boxed in."

Who wrote that? Why did that make it into 16 point font?

2 whole pages of NATO and UN forces in The Balkans. Kosovo. Serbia. "NATO apologizes for bombing residential area." A full page, black and white photo of Kosovar refugees in a camp.

There's very little organization to this whole project. The next few pages are all Chicago violence. Gunfire, children killed, women stabbed, officer slain on duty. 12 hurt by acid on a carousel in Indiana. Someone known as "The Naked Bandit" in Allentown, Pa. James Byrd Jr. A Richard Roeper column about fraudulent news stories and liars in journalism. A section about the release of exonerated death row inmates and abuses within the Chicago legal system.

Total shocker, right?

I have captured Columbine, the wreck of the City of New Orleans. Pages and pages of stories about the war on drugs - because there was no terror for us to fight back then. Christians, Catholics, and ex-Mouseketeer Darlene Gillespie was arrested for some dopey, white-collar crime. Gay rights, and the lack thereof.

One of my favorites simply reads "30 years later, and we're still not living like the Jetsons."
(Seriously, where the hell is my fold-up, bubble-topped, flying car already???)

Chicago Sun-Times Friday, July 23, 1999: Front page, full page color memoriam shot of JFK Jr. He was handsome.

The debacle that was Woodstock 1999. (What a bunch of douchebags.) Dana Plato's death by drug overdose. Robert Downey Jr. Sentenced to three years in prison.

And then something completely Monty-Pythonesque: "New Flare-Up in U.S.-European Banana Fight." Or maybe those boys had more fun with Kansas cutting evolution from its science curriculum.

There's a map depicting how many juveniles were executed, or are on death row in each American state.

There are stories about diseases and viruses and cloning and celebrity deaths (RIP Mr. Belvedere). All sorts of stories. Some pages are crowded with overlapping headlines. Some have pages to themselves, or only have a couple of small stories scattered on the clean white sheet. It's an interesting collection. But I am glad I stopped when I did. The date reads August 25, 2001.

I am glad I stopped there because if I hadn't I might never have stopped at all. I might have shelves of sketch books filled with clippings. A catalog. I am glad I got whatever that was out of my system. I think about it now and again. This past week especially. Pedofiles in Congress, rapists attacking Amish girls, consequences of war and politics. I don't know if it is worse, or better or the same and just renewed or if it has sustained itself for all of this time, for all time forever. Maybe I stopped paying attention.

OK, not "maybe." I stopped paying attention soooomewhere around the priest sex scandal. Sure, I relapsed a little with the celebrity "news" and all but I've weaned myself off of that ... Mostly. I signed up for a month of The Tribune to help out some neighborhood kids with a fundraiser. I've been reading the paper on the way to work in the mornings. Now I save the news section for the ride home in the evening. It was too difficult to read about all of the horrible and confusing things going on that early in the morning. I like the funnies. Perhaps a story about different olive oils or a theater review. These are things I can think about at 9am. I save the hard stuff for the ride home. Gotta figure, hard to make a day worse right?

Maybe not.

This compulsion, the reasoning is buried somewhere. I feel like part of My Job is to hold onto these things; keep notes. There's a reason, I just don't know what it is yet. But artists, we artists - those of us who are not merely content to sit and watch. Those of us who feel the need to transform our surroundings and realities, those of us who dissect and lead examined lives - at whatever level and with whatever means - we have a job. I think. Someday, all of the things we have been collecting in our brains: the images and stories, words and songs and sounds and numbers. We're meant to put them to some use you know.

And I know I just put some people off of their lunch by using the dreaded "a" word. Get a grip. I'm,like, the least pretentious person you know. It's not like I capitalized it or anything. I'm just saying. There are those people who are content to get up, go to work, go home, go to bed. Repeat. Then there are those of us who need a little more than that. We bear some responsibility, to take this all and make something of it. Perhaps bring some understanding, or at least a perspective. There are so many people out there afraid, or unwilling, to own up to their opinions. Those of us who have developed methods to our madness need to take the madness and make something of it.
If you live in reality you wind up with a lot of crap stuffed in your brain. You have to do something with it.

Illuminate.

Reconcile

Once Upon A Time...

There was a little girl who lived in New York City. All of her life she, and all of her family, lived in this beautiful city. To this little girl, at the time she was growing up, places like Milwaukee, San Francisco and New Orleans seemed to be completely disconnected from the place in which she lived.
As the girl grew older she began to explore all of the wonderful things this city of her birth offered her. Museums, concerts, parks and second hand clothing stores. She vowed in her heart and to her soul that she would never, ever, ever live anywhere besides this fabulous, loud and crazy city.
Then, one day, this little girl grew up. More specifically, she was expected to become a grown up. She had gone through all of her school days and now, armed with a diploma and a minimal sense of entitlement, she was expected to make her way in the world. She looked out onto the city of her home and where once she had seen beauty and wonder and adventure, she now saw high rents, low salaries and garbage piled on the sidewalks. While in her heart and soul a small voice still spoke out in favor of her earlier and earliest promises the other part of her (that would be the part that held the degree in Creative Writing) scoffed and called the dream impossible.
Turning then away from childish dreams and promises the girl packed her bags, grabbed her cats and her bear named Ted and hightailed it for a more promising scene financially agreeable scene in the great, mid-western city of Chicago.
The girl saw this sojourn as a resting point. A way-station of sorts, where she could learn to live and pay bills, perhaps write something off the wall fantastic and return, triumphant to her beloved city of New York.
She never intended to stay away for all that long. But, as it is wont to do, life got in the way. There were many trials and tribulations and dramas of enormous consequence to her life that prevented her from returning, let alone triumphantly.
And then, one day, a horrible, horrible thing happened. A big chunk of the city that she loved and watched from afar was set upon by Terrorists. All she could do was watch the horror unfold from the chair at her office desk as thoughts of everyone and everything she had left behind raced through her mind.
Where was her mother? Was she safe? Had she been hit in the head by falling debris? Had her father made it safely out of mid-town? What about her cousin who had an office near "Ground Zero?" Was she safe? When would the phones work again? Where were her friends and relatives???? How could she get in touch with them to know they were safe?
And what about the city? The city of so many dreams and hopes and promises? What about her city? Would it ever heal?
The girl sat at her desk and wept. Wept for all the people who were lost, all of the buildings that were gone and all of the needs of her city. If it had been possible, she would have been on the next plane/train/bus/slow boat back to New York. She felt as if the city might never forgive her for not being there at its greatest time of need.
For the next week she watched from the safety of her bed in her spacious, yet barrio adjacent, apartment in the mid-west as death tolls rose, speeches were made and plans for war were laid. She wept and wept and wept and wished that she had never left. Wished too that her mettle had been tested along with the rest of New York on that day. Feeling that she had inadvertently forfeit her right to be a New Yorker by being safely tucked away in The Second City on the day when all of New York rallied its resources and muddy good feelings to pull itself out of rubble. She looked at pictures taken by friends and strangers of the place that she still called home and felt that there could be no greater sense of loss than this gaping hole in her heart where those towers had stood as symbol of home and hearth and family.
Time heals all wounds. This is true. To an extent all wounds will heal and do. All wounds leave scars though. Some are visible. Like the way she cries on the plane after visits to New York. Some are more subtle, like the way she cringes with every mention of 9/11; no longer innocent numbers but an indelible mark on the lives of people all over the world. Or the way she handily avoided all news casts and internet news sites today, the fifth anniversary of that day.
But some scars are on her heart. Some of them do not fade with time but only sharpen in contrast. Some of them were reopened when she watched New Orleans wash away. Watched with her boyfriend as his city suffered grief and tragedy and injustice as well. Watched and realized that there is no difference - blown up or blown away. It's still your heart - her heart. His heart. And now they share a personal grief and guilt that they do not discuss and do not acknowledge. But it's there in the way they scoff at elected officials and their officious words. Promises of hope and healing for their cities are filtered through this grief and guilt. Knowing that in a solitary way they failed. Failed to be there when their family, and friends and homes needed them to be close and available - for a heartbeat, for a helping hand. As a daughter or son, cousin and friend. Failed to be there when their homes needed to be claimed as homes.
So now she must reconcile this guilt. She must remember that, although if any city in the world were capable of laying a guilt trip it is New York, there is no guilt. That, despite the length of her time in this city away from her city she is still a New Yorker and still a member of her family - family of blood and family of those that call New York "home." Because, no matter how long she is gone from New York she thinks about it every day. No matter how much changes in her city or with her family all of these people and buildings and walls and water run through her veins and make her heart beat. No matter what vacuous accent she picks up here in the mid-west she still falls into the familiar patois of New-Yorkese five minutes off the plane.
And no matter how hard her boyfriend argues against it, she will be back.
She will be back.