just another ink-stained wretch

2012-01-29T15:31:00.000-08:00

SOMEONE BROKE INTO MY HOME WHILE I WAS SLEEPING AND CRUMPLED UP MY FACE.

Thing I Learned Today While Walking the Dog

2012-01-26T16:49:00.000-08:00

Throwing a bag of dog poop with my non-dominant hand over the fence (for the trash can) may mean that, instead, a bag of dog poop will get caught high up in a tree and become suspended directly over the driver's seat area of my car.

2012-01-22T00:02:00.000-08:00

"Everything that we see is a shadow cast by that which we do not see."

-- Martin Luther King, Jr.

An Ode To 8:43 a.m.

2012-01-04T09:00:00.000-08:00

It's midway through the week,
The coffee here is cheap,
I should be in an awesome mood,
but the dog stepped in her own crap in the yard, and then ran from me, certain the fistful of damp paper towels I held was some sort of dog torture device, so there is a string of dog poop footsteps all over the porch, and one terrified, dogcrap-scented, 84-lb. mutt hiding behind the patio furniture.

Freaking out about the holidays?

2011-12-15T19:46:00.001-08:00

<br><br>It

Holiday Memory

2011-12-01T19:20:00.001-08:00

"All I Want For Christmas Is A Rock And Roll Guitar," by The Stompers.

It came on the radio one night in the Dunkin Donuts in Lexington, Massachusetts, where I had stopped to get an extra large, regular coffee. The guy pouring asked if I liked the song. Mid 1980s. I made some snarky remark about how embarrassing the lyrics were, just really God-awful, only to have a man on the bar stool next to me swivel my way and introduce himself as a member of the band.

Too late for Halloween now.

2011-11-10T18:52:00.001-08:00

What scared you, when you were little, that made no sense to anyone else?

I was afraid of the color yellow, and the inside of my doll's head, and the way the TV sounded when it was just static. Oh, and elves. Elves were scary little assholes. Don't let anyone tell you any different.

Hemingway's famous six-word story, updated for the modern age.

2011-11-05T22:42:00.001-07:00

Great news! I landed my dream job!

2011-11-02T11:34:00.000-07:00

Owl Rotation Technician. It's a Thing.

Almost Halloween

2011-10-30T08:36:00.000-07:00

I knew the night had taken an odd turn when I caught sight of the elderly gentleman (dressed in a nightgown and wolf's head) dirty dancing with two gyrating Little Red Riding Hoods, one of whom was also a zombie, atop a wood-working island in the shed out back.

Halloween is so weird. It's fun and silly and a little scary when you're a kid, but it gets truly transgressive when you're an adult. I'm not sure when we began needing this sort of outlet, but I do know I laughed so hard last night that I lost my voice.

Friday Awesometime!

2011-10-14T11:49:00.000-07:00

video platform video management video solutions video player

Ear Infection.

2011-10-03T14:47:00.000-07:00

I was in so much pain, I went into Urgent Care today. I had no idea that a simple ear could hurt that much.

I can barely stand the shame inherent in getting a pedicure (paying someone to de-ugly my feet? Dear God, I have no shame), which is why I apologized so pathetically to the medical tech as she attempted to irrigate my waxy ear.

She was pumping water into my brainpan, more or less, while I held a basin. It was really stupid, and wet, and loud. "I am so, so sorry you have to look in my ear for wax," I mewled. "Oh my God. That's just disgusting." I may have repeated myself several times.

She shook her head, not looking up (I envision her with a cheroot between her teeth for this part), "Oh, no. You don't even know what I deal with, all time time. You. don't. even. know."

So, I can only assume I've found Ground Zero for the medical office where people go after they get something stuck up their bottom.

Smashing.

2011-09-29T12:04:00.000-07:00

How to Peel a Head of Garlic in Less Than 10 Seconds from SAVEUR.com on Vimeo.

Someone had the audacity to ask me WHY one would want that much peeled garlic.

"Getcher peeled garlic! Peeled cloves here!" I'll call as I walk along the side streets and rutted alleys, pushing a rickety, sun-faded jogging stroller filled to overflowing with the many, many peeled cloves.

"Oh!" the children will shout. "It's the Peeled Garlic Lady!" And they'll come running out, as if I were delivering ice cream. And hope.

"Might we have three cloves this week, each, Peeled Garlic Lady?" They'll beseech me, dirty faces turned hopeful, hands outstretched.

And I will say, "Yes."

So, this happened:

2011-09-25T09:04:00.000-07:00

"Woman arrested after beating up a duck." Admittedly, I am paraphrasing.

I volunteered at an animal shelter for several years. Every weekend, I'd drive to this rural outpost to exercise and give attention to as many mammals as possible. The real issue for many shelters is that the animals are stressed in that environment, and need to stay normalized and socialized if they are to be chosen by anyone to take home. So, as much as they need food and water and a clean area, they need regular human interaction.

In addition to dogs and cats and rabbits, they had a dozen roosters taken from a cock-fight bust, and a goat or two, maybe an iguana. I never knew what would be there from week to week, and it was always interesting. It was a gift for me and my kids to be able to learn how to care for everything from a Shetland pony to a Russian tortoise, and feel like we were giving something of ourselves as well. It was often heartbreaking to see not only semi-feral pit bulls, but middle-aged, perfectly behaved Yellow Labs, and lonely, confused elderly Terriers waiting in pens for someone to take them on a walk. People would walk in with their beloved family pet, hand someone behind the counter the leash, and walk out again. You'd come in and there would be a box of kittens abandoned on the front stoop. A mom with anxious children trailing behind her would bang on the doors after hours, a dog in her arms, trying to get someone to take over.

It was a no-kill shelter, so many of the animals were there for months. At first I loved caring for the dogs the most. I would go visit their pens, give out cookies and take them into the play areas. After a while, I would feel that ache in the center of my chest every time I looked. The cats stretch their paws out between the cage wires, some of them, trying to snag your attention. The kittens just call to you, over and over. Eventually, I couldn't even walk by one of the areas without getting choked up.

The more I worked there, the less I liked people.

The Del Mar Theatre just won the social media game.

2011-09-13T22:16:00.000-07:00

And my heart.

I have found my next husband.

2011-08-18T20:05:00.000-07:00

Exactly.

2011-08-05T15:58:00.000-07:00

Firedancing

2011-07-17T14:54:00.000-07:00

A group of fire jugglers meet on the cliffs above the ocean almost every Sunday night, just before dusk. I like to go down to watch them, and also to watch the out of towners who have no idea what's going on and hold their bags close to their bodies. I also like to see all of the people who stop by, like me, who just enjoy the whackadoodle pageantry so often on display in this town.

But most of all, I enjoy how, if you listen closely, you will find that the guys jamming only know these lyrics to "Fire On The Mountain:" 'fire on the mountain,' and so just sing them over and over and over. Hippyjamfail, guys.

Stage Moms

2011-07-12T15:08:00.000-07:00

I was a child performer on a very small scale (like, not at all, really). I made a television commercial, I was in an operetta. But I was friends with real, professional, intense child performers, and later, I dated someone for a number of years who was deeply involved in a performance field. I feel I have seen and been around all levels of stage parents and crazy coaches, and witnessed a wide variety of behind-the-scenes behavior. I know what normal crazy looks like.

This is not that.

July 4.

2011-07-08T15:06:00.000-07:00

Standing in line at the local drugstore to purchase a twenty-pound bag of crushed ice, into which I was tempted to stick my head, as it was 106 degrees outside. With me was my four-year-old niece, wearing her cat ears and tail ("I'M A TIGER!"), who was shout-singing Rebecca Black's "Friday" with gusto while crawling on all fours. I avoided the gaze of the cashier and sang along. LOUDLY.

That memory is my new happy place.

2011-07-06T18:15:00.000-07:00

Overheard at the pet store today (elderly woman in a vivid green floral baby doll-style dress, to the college kid cashier):

I never did acid when I was younger,
but I should have, because now my reality is getting weird
and I'm simply not prepared.

2011-07-06T17:16:00.000-07:00

Did you know Pierce Brosnan is a trained fire eater?

Well, now you do.

Tripping

2011-07-05T21:14:00.000-07:00

Just outside Madera, California, a farmer had a big sign spelled out on a roadside sign:

DON'T BLAME ME

I VOTED FOR

THE HERO

AND THE HOTTIE

Sorry I don't have a photo to share, but I was too busy giving it the finger.

2011-06-13T13:30:00.001-07:00

Nothing much. You?

May You Chase Your Long Weekend Thusly

2011-05-28T08:29:00.000-07:00

Short version: Godless Californians? You are on your own.

2011-05-16T12:51:00.000-07:00

You know the Rapture is this weekend, yes? Well, there's a pet rescue service, for the animals left behind. And I like animals! So, naturally, I volunteered to help:

To Whom It May Concern,

I am currently a freelance marketing writer and editor, and I am in between projects for the next week or so. I would like to volunteer my services to rescue pets left behind in the Central Coast area of California (below San Francisco, to the west of San Jose) during the scheduled Rapture. I have rudimentary training in giving subcutaneous and intramuscular shots and general animal care.

Additionally, I can have someone (Jewish friend) cover the Fremont area (she has a hybrid SUV, so lots of cargo room), another Jewish friend in the Palo Alto/Silicon Valley area (not sure what her car is, I think it's a Ford Escape, and she's a devoted cat lover), and a few others on which I can call, if needed, which is good, because the entire Bay Area is a lot of area to cover. I would, if possible, like some sort of flag to stick on the front of my car, like the Secret Service gets when they drive the President around. I think it would add gravitas and maybe get me better parking. Also, if you validate for parking, that would be awesome. I can work out a budget for gas and kitty treats and submit as either an excel sheet or PDF. Oh and hand sanitizer for post-reptile handling, which is really just a good general best practice. Not sure if that's out-of-pocket expense. Maybe we could get a hand sanitizer company to sponsor or have some sort of tie in? "Eternal Earthbound Pets: Now with Purell!" You can use that, if you want (but you might want to change the name if Purell backs out. They might get upset if you say they are sponsoring, but they're not. I had that issue when I said they were sponsoring my fifth grader's science camping trip. For clean freaks, they're surprising litigious).

There's a lot to discuss.

Here's hoping you add California to your covered states. If not, I am happy to talk franchise. I know time is of the essence.

Agnostically yours,
Barbara

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Subj: Re: Rapture pet rescue volunteer inquiry

Dear Barbara,

Thank you for your interest in becoming a pet rescuer. And for your marketing ideas.

We have received thousands of applications from atheists across the country and throughout the English speaking world. Unfortunately at this time we are not adding CA to our service area. However, I will keep your email on file for possible consideration in the event our strategy changes.

- - -
I suggest you check out their information to see if your state has coverage. Some of us may have to go rogue on this one, not unlike the Lesser Zombie Apocalypse of fall 2010.

James Durbin

2011-05-15T00:03:00.000-07:00

I don't watch American Idol very often. I like that it's family friendly, but watching tv simply because it doesn't have nudity and innuendo seems rather pathetic. But we have been watching, sort of, for this season, in large part because James Durbin has been competing, and we live in his hometown. Dedication due to location.

I have been impressed by his story, his range, and his talent, but I found him a little muted, somehow, and not terribly charismatic during his performances. I liked him, but I wasn't really emotionally involved. And then he was voted off last week, and Santa Cruz hosted "Durbin Day" this Saturday, with a parade, and he performed three songs.

And James Durbin? He completely blew me away.

His voice, live, without the filter of a television speaker, was unbelievable. He also had charisma; he worked the crowd of an estimated thirty thousand people in a raw, disorganized, slightly messy fashion and he came across as funny, and emotional, and real. He seemed to instinctively know how to build the energy. After Durbin sang, and chatted with the crowd, he paid attention to the children who had been there all day, staying to sign autographs for hours.

I stood in the media section, with a few other writers, and with two moms and their profoundly autistic boys. One of the boys was in his teens, with a handmade sign, and he was so excited to be there. His mother and I talked a bit, and she kept grounding her son when he was overwhelmed, and she wept complicated tears the entire time.

There were a lot of stories in that crowd.

Here.

2011-05-05T09:30:00.000-07:00

::part one::

I don't know why I have Marshmallow Fluff in my house at all times. I mean, I know why it's here now; I have a child who thinks of it as a major food group, the way I think of coffee. But how did it first get into my house and into my kid? I have no idea. He consumes it, always, as part of a peanut-butter-and-fluff sandwich. Better yet? I only buy organic, no-sugar-added peanut butter.

Yeah. I know.

In Massachusetts, finding it wasn't an issue -- they invented it there, they made it there, they distributed it there. They practically handed it out in street corners. Here in California, you often can't find it, and when you do, it costs a ridiculous amount of money. I was in a small market last night, buying someone a food-related birthday gift, when I came across a shelf with tubs and tubs of Fluff. I brought it to the counter, where the cashier looked at it, and then looked at me. He eyed me up and down. He nodded.

"East Coast." he said. It wasn't a question.

::part two::

The them/us thing is ever-present here. An older man from a few streets away walks past our house as part of his evening constitutional, and sometimes I am outside when he passes, and we chat for a little bit. I asked him, the last time I saw him, about a house on his street where a large number of college students rent, and how that's working out. He told me about a recent large party the kids had, and how he had to ask them to stop yelling drunkenly in the street in front of his house, and we laughed about how it is when you are twenty. I told him about the house we had rented next door to a similar group, and how they had cultivated a huge garden of pot plants, with laminated care tip sheets and carefully oiled tools. It blew my mind, that in the middle of a town, on a major street, people would be so brazen. Just -- where I come from, people are more generally afraid (and anxious and proactively angry).

His eyes were suddenly guarded. "Yes," he said, starting to walk away. "Some people do grow their own."

Oh. I see. A gardener, are you?

Measure K was passed in 2007 - it makes pot possession the lowest priority for law enforcement (which it pretty much already was, with a growing meth problem and gang issues to contend with, some guys discreetly getting baked on a stretch of the miles of beach here is hardly an issue). And, I just don't -- do I care? No. The only issue I have with pot is that it's been difficult to explain to my kids what that smell is, when we're walking by the water. An eight year old believes "weird cigarette," while a twelve-year-old shoots you The Look.

I tell my kids that drugs are illegal and to be avoided, and then we see and smell people doing a drug and now I have an anxious kid who thinks we should be dropping a dime on the elderly professor and his wife enjoying a blunt on the park bench.

All the pot you want (and then some), but Fluff is almost impossible to come by. Santa Cruz is confusing.

Four and Twenty

2011-04-20T13:42:00.000-07:00

I live in a town where, on April 20 every year, there is a major pot smokefest up at the college campus. In general, actually, pot is fairly tolerated here. So, while many of my gentle townsfolk are marking 4/20 in their own way, I'd like to mark the day in my special way. This is the thirty-second anniversary of President Jimmy Carter's attack by a swamp rabbit, and recently, the Carter Library authorized the release of some previously unseen footage of the attack:

Of dinosaurs and flying men

2011-04-15T10:14:00.000-07:00

I would like to see Mr. Wallenda walk on the moving ferris wheel tomorrow at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk, but would prefer he not plummet to his death. The frisson that accompanies an extreme likelihood of death or impalement tends to impede my enjoyment of many things. You know how some people secretly hope something thrilling and slightly scary will happen?

That is not me.

So, I am planning to go and watch with a blanket (small, tasteful) draped completely over my head.

I don't understand the excitement of witnessing something that may hurt someone. How is that special? If *I* were to walk atop the ferris wheel or ride a small motorcycle on a high wire, I, too, might die, and there's nothing unusual about that. What would be unusual and therefore really arresting, is if someone could do it with no threat of harm or anything going wrong with the trick, whatsoever. That would be both awesome and relaxing to witness, and I'd be right there. No blanket necessary.

Also, this:

words

2011-04-10T11:24:00.000-07:00

Writing is amazing. I'd have a better descriptor for you, but I just ran out of the words in my head.

This has happened to me several times -- once, when I was managing editor of a newsstand publication and also the senior editor, head proofer and also writing four different columns -- we were on deadline for that day, and the EIC decided that we were short one feature. I was asked to whip it up and out in under three hours, some 1,900-words on a sport in which I do not engage, and which I had never even heard of until that moment. I brewed coffee and wrote and wrote, earphones on, kids watching cartoons mere feet away (always). I wrote my columns, and the front-of-book, and the feature. And yet another one, and then proofed it all. At the end of that intense day, when some five (six?) thousand words total had come out of my head and onto the screen, and were sent off for layout, I felt the way I feel now. Drained of words.

And I've done it again, finishing a HUGE project just last night. It's a good, slightly shaky feeling, like after a long run, but with my brain. I worked in one long, intense burst; it was hours and hours of writing, and now I need to regroup. There's not much left in here in my head, just a big bucket holding one small pebble, rattling around without much enthusiasm.

Down time is hard, between big writing pushes, because writing and editing are my top two, three, four things to do. And when I need to walk away from them, I have to rustle around until I remember what my fifth and sixth and seventh things are. I like to walk, I love movies, I garden and I throw things for the dog, hoping she brings them back to me (It's never guaranteed. She's part Retriever and part Apathy in fur).

But in so many ways, all of those things are just methods of waiting until I can write (or edit) again.

I took my kid to get a fruit smoothie today, still feeling writing-hungover. The copy-heavy sign in the waiting area was full of nonsensical ellipses, and missed commas, and too many adjectives. Imagine being with someone who stands next to you while you wait for your mango smoothie, muttering under her breath about weak ad copy and lousy punctuation. That was me, the muttering, head-shaking word snob.

I know. Poor kid. Still, it took most of my willpower to not take a red pen to the thing. Luckily for all involved, I could barely make a fist.

Apricots

2011-04-08T12:39:00.000-07:00

I grew up on the edge of San Jose. When I look on Google Earth to see my old street, I can't even type the address in correctly, because the town was eventually subsumed by the city and now isn't (named) what it used to be. We had an orchard at the end of the street and a horse stable at the top of the street; our houses had never been lived in before, and the newly planted, baby trees in our yards were all shorter than I was. I would walk the few blocks to meet my friend to help groom her pony and get rides when I was eight, nine years old.

I don't go back. I don't go back because there is no there to go back to. The orchard was razed for development thirty years ago. I can't even find where the horse barn was or where we made forts -- all the roadmarks are gone. I still dream about playing in the orchard, biking through the little ranch-house-edged neighborhood. In my dreams, I can smell the wet asphalt. I wake up in the night, sometimes, homesick for something that doesn't exist and hasn't existed for a terribly long time.

My new business card.

2011-03-12T10:57:00.000-08:00

Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields

2011-03-10T13:30:00.001-08:00

Just paper

2011-03-04T22:15:00.000-08:00

I have spent the past few days alternatively working on my novel and helping out an artist by packaging an unexpected (and humongous) order for her - I've been wrapping hand-made items in the old, soft pages from books. Books - novels - used as wrapping paper.

The irony has not been lost on me. Here, I spent most of my waking time (and most of my sleeping time), working on how to tell this story that is in my head, how to get it down so that it can be printed on paper, and then I walk over and carefully remove pages from old books, de-booking them to use those carefully crafted words as a lining.

When I first took on the project, I was so conflicted. I was young when I learned the Book Rules - never leave it open on its spine, never write in a book (not even in pencil), do not eat or drink while reading (I break that one, but always wipe my salsa-ed fingertips on the couch arm, or the dog). Honor the book. But these books are throw-aways, destined for a mouldery grave. So, I don't know. It looks gorgeous, and it's a sort of recycling, but it's also still against the Rules, isn't it?

It's construction and then deconstruction, and my wrists ache, and my eyes ache and my back aches. It seems only fair. I am using any old book as it's grabbed and passed on to me; I choose only by the paper weight, and by the lack of white space. But when someone unwraps their thing, I am certain they'll look at the print and wonder if those words are meant specifically for them.

2011-03-01T21:46:00.000-08:00

I feel morally obligated to tell you I dust, like I did just now, on an as-needed, on demand basis. I noticed a cobweb in the corner of my living room, took off one of my socks and swatted at it.

This is not a dusting anomoly.

Or else.

2011-02-14T16:35:00.000-08:00

I gave this valentine to three different boyfriends, three years in a row. They each mysteriously changed their phone numbers, stopped answering email, and moved out of town.

I just don't get it.

How's the winter treating you?

2011-02-11T20:19:00.000-08:00

Stalking

2011-02-07T21:56:00.000-08:00

I don't know how we made it out of January alive. So far, February has failed to launch a death threat, but it's early days yet. Keep your guard up.

I will here and now admit that my favorite thing about Facebook is looking at photos of children and spouses and vacations taken by people I have not seen in thirty years. Or, sometimes, ever. That half-remembered girl from photography class who friended me because her best friend once dated my once-best friend's younger brother and so my profile showed up and she felt guilty? Possibly, she thought, she knew me and just forgot, but really, she didn't and I was too embarrassed for her to say anything - and so I accepted her friend request. And now I love her niece's water skiing photos. My ex boyfriend's older daughter's prom photos? I adore them. You have an album with access - or better yet, a friend with an unrestricted profile, who has an album - or four? I'm there. Oh, good. I think, flipping through holiday family photos. By New Year's, Tricia stopped wearing that unfortunate sweater.

Only? I don't know Tricia. I don't even know anyone who knows Tricia. But I really wish her father-in-law would fix the color balance on that "Bahamas '09" folder.

It's a little weird, right? I also don't use the treadmills at my gym that face the bank of televisions. I prefer to work out while looking out the huge picture windows that face the street, so I can watch people walk by. Good lord, I sound like my dog (peoplepeoplepeople! hi, people!), but needier.

I just like the stories. Yesterday, a guy walked by the gym windows. Nice looking, college kid, with a jacket and jeans. Cleanly shaven, showered. No shoes. He walked quickly, on his way somewhere (a movie? lunch?) - barefoot. I know we're in California and all, but it was 60 degrees out and he was downtown. Last week, a woman got off her bike and locked it to a parking meter right in front, and then sat on the ground next to the bike, cross-legged on the sidewalk, and cracked open a paperback book. She was still reading an hour later, when I finally left. Months ago, when I was on the treadmill and the transom window in front of me was propped open, a food vendor passed me the most amazing samosas, still hot. "They're good for you!" he yelled, grinning. "Made with vegetables!"

Still January?

2011-01-23T23:00:00.000-08:00

January is one hard bitch of a year. We launch it, really, with January the second, since the first is a haze of fatigue and regret, or fogged with the self-pity of a miserable nonevent. And then – that's it. All that we have now to look forward to is Valentine's Day, which is fraught with anxiety if you are single, a test no one can pass if you are dating, and utterly ridiculous if you are married. And then March, cold and wet and stuck as far from the sexy heat of summer or the romantic fall as it can get, and then April. The year finally, I think, gets going in April. But January? It's a put-your-head-down, focus-on-your-own-paper sort of month. I'm already weary.

I had a friend for some twenty-odd years. TWENTY. We were friends for a long time, though I did not, I finally found, know him well. He told me he was too steely and inflexible, that one mistake made by someone and he'd cut that friend out of his life forever. "Really," he said, "I am totally unforgiving. Ruthless." I used to laugh when he told me, because I knew he wasn't kidding. I had seen him cut someone dead, and I wondered what that would feel like, if it ever happened to me.

And then it did.

We need a repository for these things, a place to call or email or write down the conversations we can't have with the person we need most. I have one million questions for a relative who died years ago, a person who, it turns out, had a secret life. I want to ask so many questions, hear about how that felt, what was lost. I have a sweetheart of an ex-boyfriend who gets terribly uncomfortable when I contact him, as if even a Facebook posting wishing him a happy birthday is some sort of secret code for "Leave your wife and four children for me!" But every year, I see his favorite old movie repeat on television and I itch to tell him to go tune in. There's a toxic family member I stopped talking to after the last in a line of horrible acts, and I never got to say anything first, and there are some nights when I wish I had. There are all of these one-sided, silent conversations.

It’s been several years since he fired me as his friend, and I visit his blog infrequently, as I don't find much of the real him there. But I still care about him, even if he doesn’t care about me, and I wonder, every six months or so, how he is, so I go and see if he's let any of his real life come through. I read his blog today, after months of not, to find that his mother died. She was a sweetheart of a woman and she loved him so very much – she lit up whenever he walked into the room. I can't tell him how I loved seeing her face when she spoke to him, and how magical that relationship was, and how much it touched me, and how much he obviously meant to her. I can’t say anything to him. I can’t even tell him how sorry I am, because we're no longer friends, because he doesn’t want me in his life, and I expect it might just bring him pain to get a note from someone he doesn’t like, mentioning her own sorrow for the loss of his mother. But I still grieve for him, it's a rock in my chest. And I have nowhere to put it.

So, instead, I'm telling you.

Questions for Early In The Year

2011-01-03T11:44:00.000-08:00

I make myself an egg white scramble for breakfast most mornings and load it with feta cheese. Then I only eat the areas of egg where I find the greatest concentration of feta cheese. Is this cheating?

Last night, I came across a coffee mug I had not used in years. I placed it on the counter, sincerely thrilled, and exclaimed, "I will drink my coffee from this tomorrow! That will be awesome!" Is this the clearest sign that working from home is perhaps not medically sound?

Do I want to see Black Swan, or would it work just as well to stare into my own eyes in the mirror until I get freaked out?

2011-01-01T13:19:00.000-08:00

Baby Got Back

2010-12-12T10:26:00.000-08:00

I was invited to attend a lovely company holiday party this weekend (not a company I work for, and still I did not get roaringly drunk or tell any of four offensively filthy jokes, though I was sorely tempted). I hate making people uncomfortable by appearing antisocial, but I really enjoy sitting and watching people dance, watching the good dancers and the bad dancers, and I like to see who looks self-conscious and who looks joyful.

And I really, really enjoy watching how many middle-aged women know all the lyrics (have you read all the lyrics?) to "Baby Got Back."

[Sir Mix-a-Lot]

I like big butts and I can not lie

You other brothers can't deny

That when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist

And a round thing in your face

You get sprung, wanna pull out your tough

'Cause you notice that butt was stuffed

Deep in the jeans she's wearing

I'm hooked and I can't stop staring

Oh baby, I wanna get with you

And take your picture

My homeboys tried to warn me

But that butt you got makes me so horny

Ooh, Rump-o'-smooth-skin

You say you wanna get in my Benz?

Well, use me, use me

'Cause you ain't that average groupie

I've seen them dancin'

To hell with romancin'

She's sweat, wet,

Got it goin' like a turbo 'Vette

I'm tired of magazines

Sayin' flat butts are the thing

Take the average black man and ask him that

She gotta pack much back

So, fellas! (Yeah!) Fellas! (Yeah!)

Has your girlfriend got the butt? (Hell yeah!)

Tell 'em to shake it! (Shake it!) Shake it! (Shake it!)

Shake that healthy butt!

Baby got back!

(LA face with Oakland booty)

Baby got back!

[Sir Mix-a-Lot]

I like 'em round, and big

And when I'm throwin' a gig

I just can't help myself, I'm actin' like an animal

Now here's my scandal

I wanna get you home

And ugh, double-up, ugh, ugh

I ain't talkin' bout Playboy

'Cause silicone parts are made for toys

I want 'em real thick and juicy

So find that juicy double

Mix-a-Lot's in trouble

Beggin' for a piece of that bubble

So I'm lookin' at rock videos

Knock-kneeded bimbos walkin' like hoes

You can have them bimbos

I'll keep my women like Flo Jo

A word to the thick soul sisters, I wanna get with ya

I won't cuss or hit ya

But I gotta be straight when I say I wanna *fuck*

Till the break of dawn

Baby got it goin' on

A lot of simps won't like this song

'Cause them punks like to hit it and quit it

And I'd rather stay and play

'Cause I'm long, and I'm strong

And I'm down to get the friction on

So, ladies! {Yeah!} Ladies! {Yeah}

If you wanna roll in my Mercedes {Yeah!}

Then turn around! Stick it out!

Even white boys got to shout

Baby got back!

Yeah, baby ... when it comes to females, Cosmo ain't got nothin'

to do with my selection. 36-24-36? Ha ha, only if she's 5'3".

[Sir Mix-a-Lot]

So your girlfriend rolls a Honda, playin' workout tapes by Fonda

But Fonda ain't got a motor in the back of her Honda

My anaconda don't want none

Unless you've got buns, hun

You can do side bends or sit-ups,

But please don't lose that butt

Some brothers wanna play that "hard" role

And tell you that the butt ain't gold

So they toss it and leave it

And I pull up quick to retrieve it

So Cosmo says you're fat

Well I ain't down with that!

'Cause your waist is small and your curves are kickin'

And I'm thinkin' bout stickin'

To the beanpole dames in the magazines:

You ain't it, Miss Thing!

Give me a sister, I can't resist her

Red beans and rice didn't miss her

Some knucklehead tried to dis

'Cause his girls are on my list

He had game but he chose to hit 'em

And I pull up quick to get wit 'em

So ladies, if the butt is round,

And you want a triple X throw down,

Dial 1-900-MIXALOT

And kick them nasty thoughts

Baby got back!

(Little in the middle but she got much back) [4x]

Even better? There was a woman who reminded me in large part of my own beloved mother (haircut, body shape, age), which was made all the more surreal when she danced with her booty out, mouthing all the lyrics and slapping her own self pony-style during the chorus.

Everything's fine here -- why do you ask?

2010-12-10T09:31:00.000-08:00

For the pole-dancing tot in your life . . .

2010-12-03T09:58:00.000-08:00

The Tassle tee, because even babies can be strippers!

To be clear, this shirt is a size 2T - as in "toddler."

On the day before Thanksgiving, my weird uncle gave to me . . .

2010-11-24T08:24:00.000-08:00

My First Bacon.

They had me at Velveteen pork flesh and super soft fleece fat.

On the 33rd day til Christmas/9th days to Hannukah . . .

2010-11-22T13:06:00.000-08:00

I'm starting my annual gift guide early this year, because I don't want you to be the last one to get your name in for the Steve Jobs action figure.

Except that they are already sold out. That's right, some 300 people forked over $79 plus shipping to have one of these bad boys sitting on their desk right now.

Jealous?

Shopping

2010-11-11T19:52:00.000-08:00

I am slowly, slowly redecorating my home. Slowly because I have no money for this (no, I mean really. no money.) and slowly because I have given myself an insane limitation: the pieces I buy, with very, very few exceptions, must be from Craigslist. Better yet? They must be from my town. Santa Cruz. Which, if you know Santa Cruz, is a) not all that large and b) boasts furniture offerings listed on Craigslist mostly from college kids, so any furniture I purchase will come from a very small pool of options. Also? More likely than not, those options will be damaged with burn marks, stickers and bong watermark rings.

A month ago, I scored a weird, wonderful, needs-to-be-reupholstered chair. Tonight, I followed a texted address to purchase some simple side tables. The woman selling them met me at the top of her apartment stairs, while holding a tiny, teacup dog who didn't bark so much as groan and wiggle. They both, the woman and the dog, had mini pigtails, like Cindy Lou. She had matched her hair to the dog's hair, or vice versa.

She was very sweet and I was horrified that she let me walk into her apartment in the dark, off a secluded hallway, and let my husband walk in, behind me. She didn't know my name. She was alone, just her and the dog, with their totally ridiculous hair. The place looked mostly packed, with a sheet-and-blanket draped mattress propped up against the wall and boxes in the tiny kitchen. Something in the apartment made the whole place smell vaguely of feces.

She asked for $8 for both little unblemished tables. I gave her $10, drove home and left them outside all night to air.

Atheists.

2010-11-09T07:11:00.001-08:00

Halloween in Santa Cruz

2010-10-31T21:31:00.000-07:00

Scary Movies.

2010-10-29T20:09:00.000-07:00

It's Alive. In the movie theater with my stepmom and my stepsister, I am assured this won't be "real scary, just kind of scary." A mutant newborn claws his way out of his mother, splattering the delivery staff with blood and gore, and escapes into the air vents of the hospital. Monster baby on a rampage. The rest of the movie is a blur as I panic at the thought of anything, ever, coming out of my vagina, or even acknowledging that I have a vagina. I am nine.

Jaws. I am ten. I can feel the "dum dum dum dum daadaadum" shark theme in my heartbeat, and worry that I have stopped breathing. I take to humming under my breath to feel the vibration, for comfort, in the dark of the theater. I cannot even swim in a swimming pool for the next three years without worrying that some dark thing will come up from below me, from the shadows, and swallow me whole.

The Exorcist. I have moved to a small, violent town in New England with a new father figure and a bag of freshly-minted worries. I watch The Exorcist alone one night when everyone is asleep, in the house people have died in, where devout, now-deceased Roman Catholics have hung their rosaries on the walls. I am certain, suddenly, once the movie has ended, that the place is haunted and I can never walk up the dark staircase of that house alone without crossing my fingers for luck. I am twelve. I can feel ghosts.

Alien. It's rated R, which is forbidden, but my best friend's dad takes us. He also buys the ticket for the small, hyper African American boy, maybe 14, who is lingering nearby. When the ticket seller questions him if "that kid" is really with us, the dad (loud, white, with a New Jersey accent that could cut fog) goes off on a gorgeous tirade about his wonderful black son until the ticket seller is almost in tears. It's the first time I see prejudice beaten back with humor and brashness, treated as something preposterous and easily cowed. A bully overcome by street theater. I watch two-thirds of the movie behind my splayed hands.

The Shining. I read it, and fall in love with Stephen King. I am fifteen. I backtrack and read everything else he has ever written, a fangirl for the first time. Then I see Kubrick's movie and I swear off baths, hotels, snow and long hallways.

Then there is a series of bad, scary movies, splattergore, because a boyfriend or a groups of friends wanted to see it, and I went along. And then I was a mom, and couldn't stomach anything scary, or see anything entertaining about other people's horror, even fictional.

The Mist. We see it on a whim. We're both in our forties, and we both hold my jacket up to our faces to hide behind, like children, not caring who sees us acting so ridiculously chicken. It's a good kind of scared, a pretend scared, which I can do.

. blue .

2010-10-12T14:28:00.000-07:00

This eighty-foot Blue whale was hit by a ship, they think. She died in the ocean and was washed to shore not far from where I was. I saw the first news reports and headed down to see her just before the sun set. The news hadn't hit the papers yet, it was just me, and man with a serious camera, and a couple with an anxious teenage son.

She had been pregnant, the whale, and her perfectly formed, ghost white fetus had been expelled nearby, with ropes of umbilical cord on the sand between them. She was rosy-hued from the sunset, not blood. There was no blood, no smell, no noises. Just the waves and the people. Even the seagulls were silent. And then a news helicopter showed up, and circled above us. And around, and around again.

The photographer stepped up to touch her, gently, slowly placing a finger on her side. He glancing furtively at us, to check if anyone had seen. We met eyes. She wasn't at all gross; she was still awe-inspiring and majestic and she retained all her secrets.

I tried to imagine her moving in the water.

That night, it was on the news, and the next day, and for days after, I drove past the swarms of people who came to see her. School buses and camper vans parked on the side of the road leading to the beach. There were sheriff trucks and hikers, and someone erected neon orange sawhorses to keep the few driveways accessible, so people could come and go.

2010-10-10T22:42:00.001-07:00

“I have woven a parachute out of everything broken.”

~William Stafford

One Eye

2010-09-27T21:14:00.000-07:00

I am suddenly really ticked off that I missed my Steampunk window. I can't change my look now, just willy nilly don bustles and watch chains and black-and-white striped crap, because I'm too old. It would be one thing if I were Helena Bonham Carter and looked like that always, but I tend towards ratty tees and hiking sandals - one flash of my brass fob and they'd laugh me out of the Sally Hansen nail care section of CVS.

I would like to wield a monocle, though, just for emphasis. And I might.

It all depends on how geeky you are feeling

2010-09-17T14:15:00.000-07:00

Greet folks non-Vulcan, or Vulcan.

Threadless.

Just smile and wave.

2010-09-07T20:46:00.000-07:00

It's the Queen of England -- SOLAR POWERED.

Yes, way!

I don't see who wouldn't want to own this. The solar panel is on her handbag! She is a perfectly dainty 6.25" inches tall. And she is solar.

WANT.

I don't know what just happened.

2010-09-02T19:30:00.000-07:00

Scene: Mammography room

Time: Before coffee

On stage: Bobbie. Middle-aged woman wearing jeans and a fabric gown top, open in the front.

Also onstage: Technician, Rena. Rena appears completely ordinary in all ways except that her hair, shellacked in place and not subject to move even when she bobs her head, is dyed a perfect, matte medium brown, as if cotton candy has been spun out of coffee and placed on top of her head. This is not a wig.

And, scene:
Bobbie and Rena exchange pleasantries ("toy boat, toy boat"), and then Bobbie doffs her fabric gown top. She waits for the whirring machine to commence pinging and whirring, wishing she had worn pants with a wider waist. She presses her arms against her sides, attempting to be subtle, hoping to compress the muffin top of flesh. Rena is busy pressing buttons and does not notice.

It is time to step up to the machine. Barbara automatically places her hand on the handle, above the large acrylic plates and Rena gently admonishes her, “Not yet, not yet.”

“Sorry,” smiles Bobbie. “I shouldn’t try to help.”

Rena smiles. Her teeth are perfect. “You know, you probably don’t even feel very privileged. We take things for granted.”

“Uh. Yes, I guess that’s true”

“And you don’t even know how lucky you are.”

“Sure. People have a way of –”

“You know, it really makes me think. It really does. People are so selfish."

"They –"

"You know what really will make you thankful? When you see someone try to help you out, and you really notice? You notice that they are really trying to help?"

"Umm –"

"Paraplegics.”

?

And then she shoves Bobbie’s right breast into the machine.

*Names have been changed.

Trust me.

2010-08-13T10:11:00.000-07:00

It's been an odd summer. My kid (he's ten) is kicking my butt at Blackjack. We've had three (no exaggeration - I have kept careful, edging into pre-suicidal, seasonal-affective-mood-altered track) sunny days since July first. My elderly dog keeps getting her head stuck under my bed at 3 a.m.

This is my lifeline:

The Epicurious Caramel Cake That Will Change Your Life

She doesn't look like much, this unfussy, beige little cake. Just go with it. It is milky, creamy, sweet and caramelly without being cloying. Cut it into small squares and you'll find you've eaten some 14 pieces before anyone else even knows it's there.

Women v. Wild (Also known as "I am just here to help.")

2010-08-10T19:10:00.000-07:00

Also known as "You want to do what?"

We know from watching Bear Grylls to go traipsing about in the tundra that life in the wild involves drinking raw bug guts and eating the hot, dripping entrails of some fluffy, arctic bunny you caught and gnashed to death with your bare teeth. We understand that the brutality of nature often demands a brutal (or at least creative) response. And yet we must admit to a dark fascination with how remarkably often it seems Mr. Grylls finds a reason to drink his own urine. When his canteen is empty, when the moon waxes full, when the breeze changes direction ever-so-slightly, it seems one suddenly finds Mr. Grylls rather eagerly hoisting a flask of nature’s finest.

Could we do this? Would we do this? While we sometimes do venture outside, where people seem somehow compelled by circumstances beyond their control to drink urine, we hope to never be caught hungry (or worse, dear lord, thirsty) on some beverage-deficient tundra. But if we were, and had we the urine-drinking reflexes of Mr. Grylls, yes, God help us, we just might do it. When you're life-threateningly parched, drinking your own wretched urine can help you live an extra few days, delaying your death by dehydration, and death by dehydration is a nasty way to go.

Of course, that’s an extra handful of days living with the knowledge that you are a big old pee drinker.

Urine, as you know, is the liquid waste secreted by your kidneys. The ancient Romans used urine to brighten their teeth, while in Scotland urine was used to prevent wool from shrinking. Urine was big in ancient Egypt, China and India, where the Former Prime Minister of India, Morarji Desai, a proponent of urine drinking, lived to 99 and stated that India would be better off if more of its people used this effective, inexpensive home remedy. Even now, there are many people who believe in urine therapy as a topical treatment for wound care, a tonic to improve skin tone and an alternative medicine for any number of ills. According to the Chinese news agency Xinhua, more than three million Chinese citizens drink their own urine. So what's the big deal? A Prime minister drank it. Bear Grylls drinks it. Maybe (stay with us here) it’s not so gross. Maybe? And yet, even one of the many official Army Field Manuals, all of which are full of helpful advice for survival, specifically lists urine as a "DO NOT drink" in the same nonpotable category as blood and seawater.

If you are healthy, your urine is sterile and contains about 95 percent water. It’s that other 5 percent that is chock full of waste products, and your body has been clearing them for a reason (though if you ask urinophiles, they say that last 5 percent is chock full of antibodies, but they are adamantly pro-peepee going into this argument). So, let’s say you are stuck in some godforsaken wilderness and you are thirsty beyond your wildest imaging. Thirsty enough to drink your own urine. Really, really thirsty. Why not go for it? Well, here’s where it can be an issue: You somehow go ahead and choke down your own urine. Now that urine is back in your system and finds its way again to your poor, beleaguered kidneys, still loaded with all of that junk your kidneys were trying to rid themselves of. You really need other fluids to flush that out, and without those other fluids, just drinking and re-drinking the same urine? You can, in quite short a time, cause the same symptoms as kidney failure, including headache, muscle pain, nausea, vomiting and no desire to eat. (Also? Everyone you meet hands you a breath mint). Though how can we begrudge you some nausea? You just drank pee.

Another option, if you are stuck on that tundra and hankering for liquid refreshment, is to drink someone else’s urine (this is definitely easier if you are stranded with someone to whom you've previously been introduced), if only to give your kidneys some new chemical mix. How you are going to ask some stranger for a urine swap, however, is not covered in the more traditional etiquette books.

In case this all sounds just swell and you feel you are now free to enjoy your easy-peasy hot toddy, know that in Ohio, legislation was recently passed making it illegal to collect (and then drink) someone’s urine without their knowledge. Because more important than laws are manners: A lady always asks first.

I am now just posting random things to keep you checking in until my mojo comes back.

2010-07-16T12:12:00.000-07:00

2010-07-14T15:04:00.001-07:00

I can't help it if I am better than average, and by "better," I mean "fleshier."

2010-06-24T13:41:00.000-07:00

I just had a checkup. My doctor told me that I was a bit fat, which was far from some surprise.

The sweet part? He couched just beautifully. "Your ancestors gave you superior genetic material," he said. "Your people stored fat and were able to survive famine. They were the last folks standing, and thrived during lean times!" And then he paused, and looked thoughtful. "But now," he said, "Your superior genetics are screwing you over."

Honestly? He was so matter-of-fact and cheerful, and so, "Hey, it's science!" that I was utterly unashamed and totally drawn in by the truth of the matter. It is my burden: I must work harder to lose this weight, unlike plebeian types who simply wave a slender, inferior limb at the issue. Poor, skinny bastards. And while my own scientific background is limited to repeat viewings of "The Magic School Bus," I am pretty sure he should get a Nobel Prize.

I hope to use this technique on other people, and soon. "Your refusal to hustle while serving me pancakes," I will tell my waitress, "Surely kept your slow, careful movements from attracting predators. I commend your people. But now, it's just making me want to stab you with this fork."

2010-06-16T17:02:00.000-07:00

I will be done with this novel by the end of this month.

See you then.

Crap. She's become one of those Doggie Bloggers.

2010-06-14T16:52:00.000-07:00

Mabel stops every day on her walk to roll around joyously on the Lutheran's grass. Every single day.

And I shall put it in a carved box all its own

2010-06-06T12:22:00.000-07:00

I was walking Mabel the Magnificent and forgot to bring poop bags. I spent forty-five minutes hoping she didn't take a dump on some nice lawn, and, if she did, that she choose an unoccupied home. And she did and she did.

After the walk, I dropped her off and headed back to the nice house a couple of blocks over to retrieve what had been left on the lawn, like a good citizen. However, I appeared to be nothing more than a complete nut to the folks who looked out of their dining room window just in time to see me, a strange woman with no dog, strolling purposefully onto their lawn to scoop up a pile of poop and scurry away.

Ceci n'est pas une usine.

2010-05-31T09:30:00.000-07:00

Botox, Burka, Bedouin jokes, oh, my!

2010-05-28T21:53:00.000-07:00

"Sex And The City 2" has premiered, and I'd rather poke my eyes out with a Malono Blanick dark grey suede, pointed toe, spike kitten heel than see it. And I am one of those 40-something women who watched the "SATC" series unabashedly, enjoying each little episode as a confectionery treat which sometimes hid, in its gooey center, an issue of actual meatiness. Cheating, abortion, lousy sex, fear of asserting one's own needs --- SATC was known to occasionally serve up a small tray of provocative along with the round of Cosmos.

Here we are, some nine years after the series debuted, and the writers have worked to give each character some growth and change. Charlotte was foolishly romantic and rigid in her world view; she opened her heart and her big brown eyes wide enough to take in the love of a mench. Samantha redefined her self-image and ability to commit. Miranda stopped being so angry all the time and saw how lucky she was. And Carrie? Once naive and quirky, in love with the city as well as a series of wrong-for-her men, she slowly morphed into a self-absorbed, whiny, spoiled brat. But, hey, small screen, 30 minutes. We could handle it, while waiting to see how she'd evolve again. And then it was time for the big screen, where it seemed the writers lost all sense of the heart of the show; the last SATC's pivotal "healing" moment was when Charlotte had exploding diarrhea and they all laughed at her. Actual shit hitting the fabric, it seemed, was the one thing that could mend being left at the altar.

Trailers for SATC2 show a breathless 40-something Carrie cooing "We're not in Kansas anymore," and every time I hear it, I cringe in embarrassment -- for her, the writers, and for me. What was soul-searching at 25 -- the waffling over men, the obsession over shoes, the complaining that life isn't enough of a fairy tale, simply becomes, at 45, self-indulgently creepy. And then there are the tent pole (pun intended) items: a gay wedding; swirly "ethnic" outfits, references to Arabian Nights, Liza. It's as if some producer put together a list of things "the gays" find attractive (Liza! Sheiks! Liza! Bad puns about genitalia! Liza!) and checked them off one by one on the master shot list.

To be honest, the real reason I won't see SATC2 is that it's lame as well as outdated. The entire SATC franchise, should it survive this latest round, needs to catch up with the rest of us. Here are some ideas for the third installment, should they be so lucky:

"Shock And The City." The four gal pals travel to the far reaches of suburbia, where, facing 11 percent national unemployment, they try to make food stamps stretch enough to feed a family of four for one month.

"Sick And The City." The ongoing debate over universal heath care takes a turn for the worse when aging sexpot Samantha needs new dentures and Carrie suffers debilitating, surgery-serious bunions.

"Slick And the City." The fab four don designer protective gear and set about cleaning up the oil spill in the Gulf Coast, saving thousands of miles of wetlands and wildlife. Carrie holds an international bidding war over her shoe collection and makes enough to cover the rescue cost for countless numbers of suffering sea life.

Someone once described the women of SATC as "those skinny bitches in designer britches," and she got it. Outspoken, unapologetic, outragous outfits -what's not to love? While I need fun and fluff right now more than ever, a little relevance would also be nice, or just less of Generally Stupid and Culturally Insulting. The ocean is poisoned, the economy is in shambles, and the concept of truly equal rights in this country continues to be a joke – do I really want to spend two hours and twelve dollars watching women in designer shoes contemplate cheating on their better-than-they-deserve partners while making fun of gays, Muslims and Middle Easterners?

Not a chance in Chanel.

Repeat: NOT crazy.

2010-05-10T11:50:00.001-07:00

Not You. You.

2010-05-09T17:45:00.000-07:00

Happy Mother's Day!

I did this: My friend lives in a state far from here. It was her birthday recently. I found her wish list on Amazon and sent her a book she had listed, feeling terribly clever and sneaky. "Oh!" she will exclaim. "How ever did she know I had this on my wishlist?"

Then, time passed and she didn't mention receiving it and commenting on my thoughtful cleverness, so I tracked the package, and apparently there are several women with her (very common) name in the same area of the state far from here. Who (who isn't me and therefore has a working cerebral cortex) knew? So some OTHER Ann now thinks she has a stalker and I am out $15.

I thought the robot mouth was the scariest thing ever. And then I saw this.

2010-04-28T15:51:00.001-07:00

My. Total. Nightmare.

2010-04-21T18:39:00.001-07:00

Friday: A Rant

2010-04-16T17:51:00.000-07:00

Why does any woman want to be SATC's "Carrie?" Who are these women? Carrie is one of the most self-involved, whiny, cheatery, lazy characters on tv or the big screen. Go be Xena or go home.

Also, this guy? Dude. The next time someone pisses me off, I am so totally going to intentionally projectile vomit on them. Philly for the win!

Also, also, I know I have let this blog go fallow. I am working on a novel, and working a full-time job, and working a part-time second job, and projectile vomiting on people at sports venues, so my time has been elsewhere. And, most of the real things happening in my life involve other people, and those stories are their stories, not mine, so I don't know how to write about them. I'll be back here eventually, but I don't know when.

Red and Blue

2010-04-04T18:39:00.000-07:00

This is not a good look.

Dude!

2010-03-26T14:55:00.000-07:00

And in case you have problems viewing the image, here's the text:

Drunk Pa. man tried to revive dead opossum
Friday, March 26, 2010

PUNXSUTAWNEY, Pa. -- Police say they charged a Pennsylvania man with public drunkenness after he was seen trying to resuscitate a long-dead opossum along a highway.

State police Trooper Jamie Levier says several witnesses saw 55-year-old Donald Wolfe, of Brookville, near the animal Thursday along Route 36 in Oliver Township, about 65 miles northeast of Pittsburgh.

The trooper says one person saw Wolfe kneeling before the animal and gesturing as though he were conducting a seance. He says another saw Wolfe attempting to give mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

Levier says the animal already had been dead a while.

The Associated Press could not locate a home telephone number for Wolfe.

(Copyright ©2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

and then it got weird

2010-03-22T12:46:00.000-07:00

I took an online bra test (no, I am not a fourteen year old boy). It started off kind of helpful . . .

and then I became confused (who is this test for, exactly?)

And then the tone shifted . . .

So, I decided to just duct tape these babies in place and get back to work.

drifting onto the shoulder

2010-03-17T20:56:00.000-07:00

I won't say I'm distracted, exactly, but I did pull out and start to hand over a panty liner instead of my credit card at the cash register.

scritchy.

2010-03-16T20:47:00.000-07:00

The past few months have been really odd. Like, really, really odd. I have seen some extremely lousy behavior from grown ups who know better. Seriously heartless, odd behavior, with no apology, apparently, forthcoming. Ach. It happens. People go sideways. And still, it never ceases to disappoint.

What helps? Well, March is National Noodle Month. So, we have that. And then there are sweat pants, the kind with the elastic, not the ones with the tie belt that gets lost in the waistband and then you try to dig it out with one chopstick so you can tie your sweat pants again and don't have to fix the front closed with a hair band and look like you have a huge, too-low, outie belly button. Which I do not have. And then there's always a handmade Frida Kahlo uterus plushy.

And if that doesn't help, how about George Clooney's feet? You'll feel better knowing that his toes, at least, are not perfect.

(Or they are perfect, and he's just doing an adorable "scritchy" thing with his toes where the asphalt has been warmed by the tropical golden light. Shhh.)

Like ordering Chinese food, but totally not.

2010-03-09T12:31:00.000-08:00

I assume you are faster and smarter than moi and have seen this already, but here it is again. Deal, yo, 'cause I am all is a "got all that mouth but can't step" bitch. Dang. Number 6. With a side salad of 14.

I am so sorry for their loss, honestly.

2010-03-03T22:49:00.000-08:00

I am not proud to admit that this is probably how I am going to go, once I master the peeing-standing-up thing.

Alice In Wonderland is really hot right now . . .

2010-03-01T13:52:00.001-08:00

. . . and always has been.

iMaxi

2010-02-26T15:39:00.000-08:00

This is from Etsy:

iMaxi - The Apple iPad Case with Protective Wings
Introducing Hip Handmaids’ exclusive iMaxi—the only Apple iPad case made with protective wings! With its durable vinyl outer layer and plush, quilted-cotton sleeve, the iMaxi helps keep your iPad clean and dry. Plus, the iMaxi's Velcro-latched, advanced wing design wraps snugly around your device, so your iPad always stays where it should. Best of all, it shields it from all those unsightly and embarrassing data leaks that would make any motherboard worry! Each handmade iMaxi can be easily customized to fit your active lifestyle. Choose from white, white/red, or all-red interior options. Or if you don’t see a color you like, just ask! We can even use red thread on the interior for that special…uh…“lived in” look.

PRE-ORDER YOUR iMaxi CASE TODAY!

I don’t want an iPad, but it's tempting to get one, if only to be able to pull this case out on the subway.

Acronyms

2010-02-20T11:23:00.000-08:00

The "Sh!t My Dad Says" TV concept has just cast William Shatner as the dad. This, to me, is huge, huge news. It's turning my February frown upside down: Shatner is one of my ILO - "Inexplicable Lust Objects."

Really, seeing how it feels to admit this thing to you, I suppose he's more like an SILO - "Shamefully Inexplicable Lust Object." See also: Alec Baldwin. From all I know, Baldwin is one heck of a piece of work in his private life, but he shows up in my teevee and I luff him anyway.

Some Shatner life trivia for you: He . . .

Dude. Shatner is fluent in French and Esperanto. CMIS!*

*Catch me, I'm swooning.

Okay, and then there's this:

hating today

2010-02-18T13:33:00.000-08:00

I feel you should know that I am, right now, wearing the world's most unflattering sweater.

It's one of those sweater that should be fine, but in actuality sets off one's backfat until it is a veritable mogul run of flesh, encased in quickly pilling acrylic. The thing about a bad sweater is that you're stuck with it all day. Until 5 p.m., at the earliest, I am encased in this thing. Sausaging my fat. It's aesthetic torture.

Santa Cruz

2010-02-16T14:50:00.000-08:00

Cops responded to a call of a man screaming and holding on to a tree for dear life.

But haven't we all been there, really?

Other news - residents feel overwhelmingly happy in Santa Cruz (as long as they didn't get a bad tab).

Why the divorce rate is so high

2010-02-10T22:03:00.000-08:00

It all started when they began exchanging notes of affection based on bad puns, set in muted, sickly colors, which slowly infected their hearts until, sickened, they could stand it no longer, took the dog and the taller of the two children, and left, keys still in the door.

Slimed.

2010-02-08T14:26:00.000-08:00

Breaking news! GHOSTBUSTERS 3 is coming!

Whoever said Hollywood is only chasing the almightily dollar must be

pretty embarrassed right now.

Dear Lindsay Lohan,

2010-02-06T09:40:00.000-08:00

While I do not have mental health training, I do own a long-term subscription to Entertainment Weekly and have a honorary advanced degree in Teeveeology, so I feel fairly confident when I say this: You do not have a hoarding problem. You have a messy problem.

Yes, the amount of stuff you have is technically "a lot," which is the exact technical term for the measurement of junk owned by any 20-something feamle who has been in the Hollywood machine for twenty-plus years. As a starlet, you have been given clothing and accessories and bought clothing and accessories and maybe "borrowed" some extra clothing and accessories. You do not have not enough money for an assistant to put things away and a maid to clean and a hot carpenter to make you a rotating shoe closet*, but your racks of clothes organized by color and shoes neatly in boxes with a color photo on the front of each box and the clutter in extra bedrooms, a.k.a. , out of the way? Not Hoarding.

Stop watching reality TV, go donate to charity the many pants and sparkle tees you could only really wear two rehabs ago, slap on a nicotine patch and begin the long soak needed for your tobacco-stained fingers into something bleachy. And get thee to a shrink for everything else.

Your friend,
Wretch

*Overboard shout out!

Oh, Vanity Fair! You are adorable!

2010-02-02T11:09:00.000-08:00

Up and coming young Hollywood actresses, eh? The ones "the ones looking to breakthrough and become household names"? I don't see Gabourey Sidibe in this spread. You know, that fat, black girl who just got her first Oscar nomination? Maybe she would just ruin the look of your size two, white girl buffet.

Judy.

2010-01-31T13:06:00.000-08:00

Judy was a rescue puppy - I found her at this shelter when she was four months old.* She looked exactly like a Yellow Lab, which is what I thought she was, for a month. Soon after bringing her home, she began to spring brown and tan spots, and her muzzle lengthened and her body morphed, and this was no mellow Yellow Lab. This was some weird, anxious, terrier/pointer mix. And while I like all sorts of dogs, I very much had chosen her for her suspected Lab breed - I wanted someone who would be mellow around small children, because we a) had small children and b) lived next door to a playground. And when you live next door to a playground, you quickly discovered that you need to keep your downstairs bathroom clean at all times, because mommas and their toilet training toddlers will bang on your door.

Judy was terrified of small children. I assume she was not socialized enough during that puppy developing psyche window before I brought her home. She liked adults well enough, and was not interested in chasing cats, but a small, quickly moving child made her bare her teeth in worry and defensiveness. We enrolled her in all sorts of puppy classes and really stayed on her, and she was fine with our kids, but we kept her from neighborhood children, just in case.

Fast forward five years. We lost everything and had to start over in California, and our landlord would not allow us to keep Judy. Thinking it was temporary, we sent her to live on a relative's farm, which suited her so much better. There were acres to run and only grownups there; she quickly mellowed and became a different dog, but it still ate at my heart, because I come from the school of Never Giving Up A Pet. Ever. You make a commitment, and you don't just hand over a pet like a pair of shoes that don't fit anymore unless that pet is a danger to your kids or your environment is no longer the best one possible. Judy loved her new life, although I missed her terribly and I still can't stand that we gave up my kids' dog, not on top of everything else they had lost.

Well, Judy's back. She's old, and her breath smells like Damp Corpse, and she sits sideways because her hips no longer work the way they are supposed to. But the mellow stuck. And my kids no longer have lost a dog. I'm a big fan of the whole "full circle" thing.

*Massachusetts is one of the largest importers of rescue puppies. The spay-and-neuter campaigns are so successful that they can ship puppies from Puerto Rico (the "Save A Sato" program, like Judy here), and from other areas, because the shelters are not overrun with local puppies. The airlines charge a nominal fee to ship the puppies on flights that have room in cargo for dog crates. It's a very cool system. And most of the Satos (slang for "street dog")look alike.

This makes me tired.

2010-01-27T13:40:00.000-08:00

My New Pink Button

Hey, gals, do you suffer from the Labia-blahs? Go from labi-blah to labi-beautiful!

Because NO PART OF YOU IS EVER OKAY.

I am going to make a mint by selling googly eyes and wee felt berets for men. Except I am not, because that would be stupid, because what man is going to adorn or bedeck his genitals in order to fight the shame he has about his body? It doesn’t happen.

Is this vag rouge a joke gift? Are we solving a real problem? How many women actually walk around worried because they feel their pigment is unsightly? Because, if someone with whom you are or with whom you wish to be intimate is in that region, and he or she is criticizing your pigment? Your biggest problem is not your pigment, baby, it’s that the person in your bed is doing the sex wrong. Push them – push them – out of your bed.

Boggled by Google

2010-01-26T12:56:00.000-08:00

The delightful Bloggess wrote a bit about the mysteries of The Google. I read it and said, "Yeah, right" (in my head), because there was no way people were actually googling those things, right? She totally doctored her Google search page for humorous effect, because No. And then I tried it. And I got this:

So, not only did The Bloggess not falsify her Google search, which is a relief because I think that's a felony, but also? People are even scarier than I thought. Plus now with more stupid.

And why are we here?

Wanna burger?

2010-01-23T11:55:00.000-08:00

I am working on my professional web site ("a portfolio thingy" is, I believe, the technical term), and it only took me twelve seconds to work in the words "penis puppetry." But that's because I interviewed them, not because I performed with them. Which I did not do. Seriously.

Although, if you were hiring a copywriter, wouldn't you want one who knows how to properly describe the act of making a balloon animal out of one's genitals for profit? What if I didn't know how to use the term in everyday copy? I might write "penis puppetry" in place of "customer service," and that could really redirect the tone of your trifold brochure.

It totally pays to hire a professional (copywriter, not weener puppeteer. Although one should probably be trained in either case). I find the penis puppet fellows have quite the following in Australia, with the call for many a show, and not so much in the Midwest of North America. I don't really want to think about that too much, nor do I suggest you go to their site and click on the "Trick Of The Month." Except that you really should.

Mervin Peake

2010-01-21T14:23:00.000-08:00

Lean sideways on the wind, and if bears your weight you are a daughter of the dawn.

If not, pick up your carcass, dry your eyes, brush down your dress, for that sweet elfin horn,

You thought you heard was from no fairy land. Rather, it flooded through the cellar floor,

From where your Uncle Eustace and his band of flautists turn my cellar, more and more,

Into a place of hollow and decay.

That is my theory darling, anyway.

California

2010-01-20T12:17:00.001-08:00

2010-01-15T10:40:00.001-08:00

Why robots will never completely be our overlords

2010-01-12T12:13:00.000-08:00

The Beaver, Canada's second-oldest magazine (published since 1920), is changing its name because its emails keep getting removed by spam filters.

I have decided to spend 2010 as a young Sean Connery.

2010-01-11T16:58:00.000-08:00

Original is here.

All heart, with some nose(s)

2010-01-06T19:19:00.000-08:00

I am participating in CPR training tomorrow (please don't have a heart attack within my immediate vicinity for another 12-to-16 hours, thanks). And I am not saying I snuck a peek into the training box that was delivered a day early in preparation, or that I removed items from said box and lined them up and then photographed them, because that would have been wrong.

But if I had, they might look something like this:

I live in terror that someone, person or beast, will fall gravely ill near me. It's not that I fear death (but oh, how I do fear death!), or that I fear the work involved helping alleviate the suffering of others (but oh, how I do dread the suffering of others!) - I have given it a lot of thought and I think it's that sense of helplessness when someone needs you and yet you can do nothing for them.

So, yeah. I don't know how much will this help relieve that panicky feeling I get when a pet has a medical emergency, or when I must stay overnight to help an elderly friend get to the bathroom in the dark. Probably not much. But if you have radiating chest pain and are currently stored in a blue cloth zip bag, I soon will be able to pound on your chest most effectively. Baby steps, my friend. Baby steps.

Chase, master of the secrets that divide man from animal, animal from man!

2010-01-05T10:05:00.000-08:00

True Story Tuesday

I went to college by blocking out one day and several nights into which I would wedge all my classes, and then the rest of the work week, I was a temp. This was in the early 1990s, when not everyone had PowerPoint and PageMaker on their computers, when knowing how to navigate them and also make a table in Word was fairly exotic-seeming stuff, and the pay was excellent. I had several long-term assignments, months-long, always with consulting companies, in Boston or nearby. One company set out huge containers of both plain and peanut M n Ms, and four differently flavored coffees, and catered breakfast and lunch several times a week. I cannot image how much money they burned through. It was an amazing place to work, and the workload was slow enough that I could do much of my homework there, as well.

The agency-client liaison assigned to me was a sweet guy, who, shortly after placing me, was hit by a semi while riding his bike. He recovered, but had short term memory loss; he would often call me three times in under ten minutes to offer me the same job, and apologize every time. "Did I just call you?" he would ask with a slight laugh each time I answered the phone.

Sometimes, he admitted to me, he was fairly certain, brain-damage be damned, he was actually Manimal and he was getting ready to go fight crime.

Nic Cage as Sarah Palin

2010-01-04T12:00:00.000-08:00

Nic Cage as Everyone.