Spring break

I was just sitting here, compulsively checking my email in case my future spouse has just selected me among thousands of internet strangers (have you tried internet dating? It promotes all kinds of super healthy habits), when I suddenly remembered--hey! didn't I claim to be a writer somewhere along the way? Maybe I should give that a whirl. Now, before you get all excited about my new leaf, let me state for the record that I still haven't A) reviewed my Italian, B) set foot in the gym , or C)gone to the grocery store. But at this point, I'm celebrating all small accomplishments. To wit: I folded several sweaters that were strewn about and I put them...in the closet! Hooray for me!

New York!

The Algonquin was closed for renovations, which thwarted me from crossing a Dorothy Parker salute cocktail off my Life List, but I did get to meet Winnie the Pooh, so I think it all evens out. (It's true. The real Winnie was at the NY Public Library along with Tigger, Kanga, Eeyore, someone I didn't recognize who was wearing a string of pearls (who is not in the pictures, I note. Perhaps she was their chaperone), and Piglet, who is a good deal smaller than I imagined. No wonder he was afraid of Heffalumps. I got all teary-eyed immediately upon seeing them, but that is hardly surprising. I love those guys.)

If you go to New York, I would highly recommend that you do so in April during a week when the weather is perfect and everything is in bloom. When you stand waiting to cross the street, a flurry of petals from nearby trees will swirl around you in the manner of confetti and you will be the star of your own constant Easter parade. I further suggest that you stay with a terribly beautiful, funny, generous hostess who lives on Central Park West. I was fortunate in that I already had one of these, but you should take the necessary time to find one of your own. Truly, it makes all the difference: high ceilings, deco details, an expansive view over the treetops of Central Park to the East Side skyline beyond. It was like being on Fantasy Island. I had a delightful time.

Things I Meant to Do, but Didn't
1. See the Noel Coward exhibit at the Performing Arts Library.
2. Go to a museum of any kind, but notably the Tenement Museum (and apologies to the Blog Bully who wanted me to go to the Whitney)
3. Go out to tea
4. See 4,000 Miles at Lincoln Center (which was only about four blocks from the apartment). It was sold out.

Things I Meant to Do, and Did
1. See several friends, including Talya who came all the way down from Amherst, and two former students I hadn't seen in years. (Everyone's doing well; thanks for asking.)
2. Have dinner at Cafe Habana, as recommended by my friend Bill. Cheap! And delicious.
3. See a play. I knew I'd be sad if I didn't go to the theatre, but I kind of blew it on the half-price ticket booth, so I bought a last-minute mezzanine seat for David Ives' Venus in Fur. I liked about half of it very much.
4. Walk along the High Line. I am a very vocal fan of the High Line. Particularly in springtime. I can't overemphasize this enough: springtime.
5. Go to Smalls jazz club in the Village. Marvel that you can arrive somewhere at 1am on a Thursday night (Friday morning for all you sticklers) and have it be packed. Damn, New York. You're not messing around.

Things I Hadn't Particularly Meant to Do, but Did Anyway
1. Injure my foot with all the walk, walk, walking such that I was limping pretty significantly on the last day (and indeed well into last week).
2. Get completely lost in the Village. Again. Argh. Why is West 4th next to West 10th? Why is the Hudson River where I was pretty sure I'd find Washington Square? Damn you, Village. Damn you.
3. Have Pimm's cups in a sunny restaurant with Talya.
4. Eat an entire sea bass at a fancy restaurant with flocks of waiters.
5. Get in a taxi driven by a man who could not get me from 63rd Street to 53rd Street. (Before all you fitness champions get all "serves you right" about my taking a taxi a mere 10 blocks, I'll remind you that my foot was basically broken at that point.)

Things Many People Told me I MUST Do, that I Narrowly Avoided
1. See the Cindy Sherman show at MoMa. It's not that I didn't go to the show; I did. So did hundreds of other people. My feet hurt so much by the time I arrived that I couldn't imagine standing in line. I went into the lobby, mostly to sit down, but also to take a look at the gift shop. I perused a book in there that allows me to tell you this: as it turns out, I absolutely hate the work of Cindy Sherman. Hate. I couldn't be more thrilled that I discovered this before buying a ticket. Would that I had known before I limped my way to the museum. Should have gone to the Frick. Ah well.

I loved it. I'm wondering if maybe I should move there, even though springtime is not its natural state. I'll let you know what I decide. My upstairs neighbors are going to have a baby sometime this week, which may impact my thinking on this front. Meanwhile, in case you wondered, I have continued to check my email compulsively during the past many, many minutes it's taken me to write this, and my future spouse has not written. This may also impact my thinking on whether or not to move. Possibly my future spouse does not live in San Francisco. This would be inconvenient, but explain a lot.

To answer your question...

No. I did not die in New York.

I've been home for a whole week and yet I have said nothing to you, my faithful reader. Do I feel bad about this? Naturally, reader. Of course, I am assailed by guilt. Pretty much every lazy, inertia-based thing I [don't] do assails me with guilt. There is, therefore, a lot of guilt hovering around me, Pigpen-style. My aura is guilt-colored, which might make amends to some degree, but is hardly the same as actually going to the grocery store, now is it? Or the gym. Or reviewing my Italian. Or reading a book instead of watching television. On and on it goes.

I had a really delightful time in New York and I'll tell you all about it. However, I seem to be having a rough re-entry. Mi dispiache. (Ha! Look! Italian review! Things are already improving. I'll be back here soon.)

Chop chop

I got an email this morning from the blog bully with the subject heading "chop chop" and I steeled myself for some stern words about blog slacking, but that's not what he meant. Yay! It was a joke about the speediness/busy-ness of New Yorkers and how I'd better step up my game because I'm headed to NY in the morning. Don't worry, I had been planning to tell you: Hi. I'm going to NY tomorrow. I have to be on my way to the airport at 5:45AM, which is a time of day I generally opt out of, so please wish me luck. I hope to have stories to tell you when I get back.

Meanwhile, I'm in a dither about packing. April is a tricky time weather-wise. Will I be too hot? Will I be too cold? Will I look like a country bumpkin? (That has nothing to do with April. That has to do with New York.) What to do? This is also the inaugural journey of the very light suitcase I got for Christmas (thanks, Mom!) and I have discovered that its lightness may very well be related to its smallness. It is worryingly small. This doesn't concern me so very much for a four-day trip, but I am less confident about this summer's three weeks. Tell me, little suitcase, do you have the capacity for me to be consistently lovely for three weeks? On second thought, perhaps that is too much to ask of a suitcase. Have I mentioned the acne? It's true. My skin has been worse over the last month than it has at any point in my life. Why? Why, O ye gods? Whatever the reason, there is nothing the suitcase can do about it.

Something for you to ponder in my absence: why do pears rot from the inside out, so that you bite into their firm outer flesh without the slightest sense of trepidation, only to spit out a mouthful of mush? It seems odd for fruit to enjoy practical jokes. I win in the end though, because it's Free Cone Day at Ben and Jerry's (a mere block away). Ice cream! Take that, fruit.

(And don't go ahem-ing and raising your eyebrows toward the acne paragraph. I'm sure ice cream has nothing to do with it. In fact, I may apply an ice cream compress directly to my chin. Perhaps that will clear things up.)

As I keep saying...

Thank you, Married to the Sea.

Life-Changing Cinema

Last weekend, in a rather pleasing downpour, the blog bully and I went to see The Sound of Noise at New People Cinema, which is the year-round programming home of the San Francisco Film Society, located in San Francisco's Japantown. I had never been there, largely because the films deemed worthy of being shown all seem to be relentlessly depressing. I may be mistaken. After all, I have not seen them, but I do read about them and I cannot say that the descriptions fill me with yearning to hand over twelve bucks.

This time, in an exciting departure, the film was one I'd seen at last year's festival and loved. It's clever and funny and also inspiring of foot-tapping, which is a thing the blog bully seems to enjoy. I was quite excited to see it again and to share the joy, since I had seen it alone the first time around. Before the feature we were treated to what seemed like approximately three dozen (though I think it was just four) previews of capital "F" Films that, true to form, seemed ...anyone?... relentlessly depressing. There was one that was supposed to be "erotic" and "visually stunning" that seems to involve a great many extremely miserable (though lavishly dressed) prostitutes of a bygone era. Then there was one that made me feel like maybe "cinema" as such is just an elaborate joke and that perhaps no one really enjoys it at all, but smart, fancy people pretend to enjoy it just to see if we'll play along. I call this one The Freezing, Freezing Horse. There were others, but really The Freezing, Freezing Horse is sufficiently emblematic.

Voila:
(This is apparently the official trailer, a fact that makes me almost weak with mirth, but I will try to find something more akin to the preview we saw, which is to say longer and even windier. I know, I know. I am a Philistine.)
Ah, here we go.

Look. I'm not saying the thing is devoid of austere beauty and the like, but it also makes me want to kill myself in less than two minutes, which, I suppose one could say is an artistic accomplishment in and of itself. I just feel that if I want to be exceedingly depressed and meditate on bleakness, I could, say, spend an evening alone lying on the concrete floor of my garage. For free.

Just to cheer you up, here is the film we actually went there to see: See? Delightful, no?

But here you are waiting to hear what changed my life. And I'll tell you. The bathroom, that's what. Are you female? Do you live here? You should go to a very depressing foreign film (because, really, in spite of it all, hooray for art) and avail yourself of the ladies' room. The toilets look as though they may have the power to transport you back to your house after the final credits. So many buttons! I am not altogether sure how I feel about a heated toilet seat in a public restroom, but how I otherwise feel about a heated toilet seat on a cold and rainy night is A) surprised and B) good. And if I had a toilet that was equipped with bidet technology featuring heated water? Well, let's just say I would be well contented and very clean. I suspect that Japan is awash with high-tech toilets, but I've never been to Japan. By all means, if Japan is convenient to your home, just go there. Otherwise, you might find it easier to go to Japantown. Among other benefits, the buttons are identified in English.

Oh! I almost forgot. The movie theatre is also very nice.

Present and accounted for

I won't go so far as to call it depression, but the general malaise has continued apace and since I don't like to put all my "oh woe is me" nonsense here [read: did you just spend another evening in your filthy living room watching TV while consuming whiskey and chocolate chips?], it makes me quiet. But it's Friday! And tomorrow a trained professional will attend to my roots such that I may live to be carded at Trader Joe's another day. Also, I have plans this Sunday, which means I will not have the opportunity to sink into the morose, shuffly, sweatpant-clad inactivity that tends to befall me on most Sundays. So, see? All is well. And here I am to entertain you with miscellany.

[Overheard in the hall just now. Girl: Do you want to hear my poem? Boy (with no hesitation): No! Not at all.]

1. I have spent much of the week trying to prepare clues and endless other documents for upcoming scavenger hunts. I am remarkably bad at this. While trying to sort out the order of clues, I thought my brain might actually burst into flames.

2. The blog bully created a small sign to dissuade the oft-mentioned Urinators in the corner by my garage. Our trial run was St. Patrick's Day on a Saturday night, which was kind of a lot to ask of a very small sign, but, to be fair, there was only evidence of one voided bladder. We'll see how it goes this weekend. Also? The blog bully actually undertook this project entirely under his own initiative. He came by my house on the sly last weekend and posted the sign in Pee Corner. He is like a super hero. It may be because he eats so many vegetables.

3. It is a curious thing when you decide on a whim to go to a 9:30 movie on a Thursday night and emerge around 11:15 to find the lobby positively brimming with people. I mean, film festival levels of crowdedness. Wha...? Oh, right. Hello, Hunger Games. Dammit. I was so close to being on the cutting edge. And yet, so far.

4. Lionel Ritchie apparently has a new album out. You can't be more surprised than I.

5. For the record, I have a horror of men who, when not employing them to shield their eyes, put their sunglasses on the back of their neck. Seriously, men of the world, this is a choice that makes you look like a yahoo. Do not do it. Please.

And with that, I wish you a pleasant last weekend of March.

Disappointing fact

An email from NPR links to an article, but has a little paragraph to get you started:

People who consumed about one serving of red meat (beef, pork or lamb) per day had a 13 percent increased risk of death, compared with those who were eating very little meat, a study found.

I hate to bring this up, and I certainly don't think we should dwell on it, but actually we are all going to die. Even the vegans. I was pretty sure NPR already knew that. But since they apparently don't, I kind of don't want to be the one to tell them. You do it.

********
Bonus Unrelated Fact:
Yesterday I accidentally hit someone with a viola. True story.

In which I discuss television for lack of better options

I'm pretty sure I just heard a kid ask his friend, "Why do you want to learn about The Bible? Do you want to learn about, like, Hercules?" I hope that she says no. Otherwise she's in for a big disappointment.

People, it's already Wednesday and, despite what I like to think of as my improvements vis a vis actually writing things here, I am behind this week. It's only a matter of time before the blog bully starts scolding me. Why have I written nothing? Mostly because I have nothing much to say. I am grouchy and today has been a cavalcade of petty mishap. Also, I barely left the house all weekend and during the depressive shut-in festival, I ate a great deal of pasta. I enjoyed the pasta (I always enjoy pasta), but I do not enjoy its seemingly immediate roly-poly results. While skulking around feeling sorry for myself and adding to my girth, I watched two whole seasons of an English show called "Skins," which is kind of like "My So-Called Life" only with nearly continual drug use and a great deal more sex. I liked season one more than I ought to publicly admit, but in season two things became absurd. This seems often to be the case with second seasons; all the plausible dramatic territory has already been covered, so you have to move on to kidnapping! and comas! and stalkers! and hallucinations! and lots of death! I know it's uncool to ask this in a show about teenagers but, why doesn't anyone have any parents? I'm struck that parents would have come in handy in many of these situations. For instance, if my roommate suffered some kind of brain hemorrhage and died in front of me, I'd probably call my mom.

I also have watched several Miss Marple mysteries (more have suddenly become available on Netflix, which is excellent news if you are me). In the opening sequence of one, Miss Marple is in a taxi making her way through London. She passes many charming buildings and then the car turns a corner and a massive industrial building heaves into view, rather marring the landscape. "Oh dear." I said aloud. Almost immediately afterward, Miss Marple utters her first line: "Oh dear," she says.

So there you have it. As I have often suspected, nay, feared, I am secretly an elderly English lady in the 1940s. This may bode ill for my romantic future (and yes, I persist in believing I'll have one).

Opinionated again, but nicer

I recently wrote about a nameless, grandiose, yet still silly play. I cautioned you that the Wrong Response was to think "Ew. Plays. Blech." But in case some of you are feisty renegades who went ahead and thought "blech" anyway, I want you to know that last night I saw a great play. Generally, I would exhort you to go see it, but I got an email today announcing that the run is totally sold out. (In fact, the tone of the email was just slightly "nyah nyah nyah-ish," but one can forgive a small theatre for wanting to say, "See? We've been TELLING you to come." when they have the chance.) Still, for the record, The Aurora Theatre does good work and Body Awareness was a play to make me proud of plays. I laughed; I cried; I thought about human folly and feminism and sex and our eagerness to reject the different and our need to be seen and valued. All that in just 90 minutes. Hooray for the theatre!

Unrelated. Most mornings on the radio, I hear a publicity announcement about the upcoming celebration of the Golden Gate Bridge's 75th anniversary.

Dear copywriter, About this phrase:

A big bridge deserves a big party.

Really?

Pitfalls

This morning I went to the gym. AGAIN. In the MORNING. I amaze myself. I even ran into a colleague in the locker room who said I had inspired her to get back into the exercise habit. I find this far more hilarious than I could ever explain, but whatever works for her. I had put on my bathing suit under my clothes so I could be a time-saving swimming superhero, but I have once again been reminded of the perils of trying to do clever time-saving things in the morning. The thing about wearing your bathing suit on the way there is that you cannot wear your bathing suit on the way back. And while I'm proud to say I did not forget all my underwear, I do find myself accidentally braless at work. Fortunately a) the students are not here this week, b) I am no Dolly Parton, and c) I have a very bulky sweater. Still, oops.

As a somewhat untraditional breakfast treat I am eating a mango popsicle (a thing spell-check feels I am spelling incorrectly, but if that's the wrong way, what could possibly by the right way?) Why? Because there is no milk for my tea, it seemed like it might be more fun than drinking water and, mostly, it was in the staff freezer with a note that said "help yourself." As I raise the popsicle to my mouth, I am disturbed to find that it smells exactly the same as the lotion provided at the gym. The sensation, therefore, at least from an olfactory perspective, is not unlike sucking on my own hand. I do not recommend it.

Opinionated

Have you ever seen something (heard something, read something) that is hailed as sheer brilliance that you found to be...um....not good? Well, of course you have. And if that thing was Titanic we should be friends. Why do people love that movie so much? Why? It is the worst casting and possibly the worst dialogue in memory. (And while that would seem a weirdly out-of-date example, apparently it so beloved that it is being re-released. Nooooo!) However, that's not the bad thing we're here to discuss. We are here to discuss a play I saw recently. A play that shall remain nameless because I don't want anyone to say "See? Plays. Blech." On the contrary, I have a great love of theatre and I want more people to go see plays, so do that. However, I keep getting email that tells me this play is "shocking," "engrossing," and "not to be missed." When, sadly, it is none of these things.

Let's just say that a major plot point hinges on a Greek tragedy style recognition (think: "I too have half an amulet. Lo! You must be my brother"). Only, in this case the critical object is a clown nose. A clown nose that was tucked into a infant's blanket as he was carried off to an orphanage within, like, twenty minutes of his being born. In the Middle East. Through a war zone. A clown nose that we are meant to believe he somehow still has--in pristine condition--about 30 years later, despite having been moved around constantly his whole life to avoid slaughter. I have trouble even believing that bright red, foam clown noses are likely to be available in remote rubble-y Middle Eastern villages to begin with, let alone that the orphanage personnel would be all, "Do we have all the babies that would otherwise die in a fiery explosion? Great. Oh! Do we have the clown nose that came with that one baby? All right then. We're good to go." This is not, alas, the only problem with the play, but it is a major one. When you hit the big gasp-inducing climax of your very serious drama, you don't want anyone to think, "Are you kidding me? Is there a dramaturg in the house?"

But then, when the lights came up, I saw people in tears and a bunch of people gave it a standing ovation. So what do I know? Thank you, audience, for supporting live theatre and making it satisfying for the artists to perform and for generally being nicer than I am.

Also,we should definitely let those people know about the Titanic 3D re-release. They'll probably be super excited.

On the other hand

Yesterday I was all fired up to Take Advantage of the whole magical extra day phenomenon. I started strong what with the breakfast and the letter-writing and all, but the big Wednesday night extravaganza that I had in mind failed to come to fruition. At all. And that's why I've decided to recant and to let you know, belatedly, that the point of the 29th of February is that it doesn't really count as a real day.

That means that the fact that I got home; watched idiotic sitcoms; shed a few lonely, frustrated I'm All ALOOOONNNEE tears; had dinner comprised of chocolate chips, a glass of whiskey and then later, begrudgingly, some leftover rice; and, as a finale, fell asleep on the sofa fully dressed at 10pm while watching some show involving sorcery is all perfectly fine.

Welcome, March first. I am ready for you.

P.S.

About twenty minutes ago, I mailed my last letter for February. I did it! The challenge was to put something in the post every day in February that there was mail service. Somehow, I sent 25 pieces of mail, though with 29 days, four Sundays and one holiday, I think it ought to have been 24. I hope whoever got the bonus "my math is terrible" missive was extra pleased. So, 25 things mailed, 9 pieces of personal correspondence received. I liked it. The fact that I brought more dedication to this project than anything else I can think of (eating breakfast every day, going to the gym, keeping up the blog, doing any "real" writing, studying Italian, on and on and on) perhaps begs some kind of examination, but, with your kind permission, let's leave that until March and allow me this one bonus February day to bask in my accomplishment. Thank you.

Feeling rather pleased with myself for having written a six-page letter over breakfast (breakfast!) while the sun broke dramatically through the rain clouds (though, frankly, we need a great deal more rain), I drove to work quite smiley (a highly unusual occurrence, I'm sorry to say) and when "A Whisper to a Scream" came on the radio [which a quick Google search informs me is not even the title of the song. Apparently it's called "Birds Fly"], I turned it waayyy up. And that's how I came to discover--yet again, as I do every time it comes on the radio and I turn it waaayyyy up--that the only lyrics I know, or indeed can understand, in the entire song are "a whisper to a scream." The rest of the singing along is more like rhythmic mumbling, but I came in very solidly on the chorus. For those of you keeping score, I have a similar, though slightly less mumbly experience with "Shadows and Tall Trees."

Happy magical extra day of the year.

Broken news

I planned to say "breaking news" but I think we're about 6 hours too late for that.

1. I went to the gym BEFORE work this morning. There is no reason whatsoever that you should care about this, except that it is a MIRACLE. I also seemed to have pulled basically every muscle in my neck and shoulders because maybe I am a very bad swimmer? But I arrived there at a time when I am usually hitting the snooze alarm and therefore I am a Champion of Fitness.

2. Gas at what I think of as the cheap gas station is $4.21. And I don't own nor know how to ride a bike. This is concerning.

Nothing more to see around here. Carry on.

Half a double feature

I love double features. Two movies back-to-back on the big screen for which you pay one ticket price. Man. That's a great idea. I particularly like double features at the Castro Theatre because they have all the excellent qualities of double features everywhere [see above] and they are also at the Castro Theatre, my favorite place in San Francisco. However, things seem to have gone awry over there this month because one element of double features is that they ought to have some thematic link. Or actor link. Or director link. Or some damn link other than "they are both about couples." This week, Funny Face is playing (yay!) in a double bill with Love Streams (boo!). I was not previously familiar with Love Streams, but I watched the trailer and wanted to kill myself after about 70 seconds.

Here are some questions for you, Love Streams:
1. Do you have Audrey Hepburn? (no)
2. Do you make me wish to be kissed in a charming bookstore? (no) [To be fair I pretty much always want to be kissed in a charming bookstore, regardless of the movie I'm watching, so maybe I'll give you a pass on that one. Maybe.]
3. Do you make me want to glide down a marble staircase in Paris holding a chiffon scarf over my head and saying, "I don't want to stop. Take the picture!"? (no)
4. Does Fred Astaire ask for forgiveness by way of a dance in a Parisian courtyard? (no)
5. Do you make me wish to own at least 80% of the clothes worn by female characters? (Don't be ridiculous. You were made in 1984)
6. Just to be sure...no Audrey Hepburn? (still no)
7. Are you depressing beyond imagining? (apparently)

Right. So who the hell programmed you with Funny Face and ruined my Thursday evening?

Now, in the spirit of things that have nothing to do with other things: an anecdote.

This weekend I organized a meeting of some students at a student's house. The student's dog, Cinnamon, was terribly excited to have eight people in her living room, dropping snacks. She became a bit too, um, present for me at one point and I asked the student if he could rein her in. "Cinnamon!" he said, loudly and sharply. Then he looked at me and said, "Um, she's not actually trained." I laughed for about ten minutes.

Are you a dog owner who likes to entertain? Is your dog sticking her nose in your guests' laps with too much gusto? Feel free to say your dog's name with a great deal of authority. You never know, maybe something useful will happen. Perhaps she's trained herself while you were at work one day. Always worth a try.

Cruel and unusual

I check my email compulsively all day long because You Just Never Know when someone might be thinking of you and send you some amusing note or declaration of love or party invitation or something. Also, I'm quite bored much of the time. It is hardly surprising then that I become quite excited when the little (1) shows up, indicating that I have a new message. Nor is it the least surprising that when the new message--the sole message I've received in the last five hours--proves to be an offer of a coupon for a 2.5 hour Segway ride through Golden Gate Park, I become just that much more embittered.

Foresight

When you are brainstorming about possible mascots or icons for your athletic team, you should bear in mind that at some point, probably quite soon, whatever you decide on will be bandied about versus whatever some other team has decided on. And, because it's sports, you will want to sound all bad-ass and threatening. That's why--although they are widely popular things and would probably make for great fan appreciation days--nobody chooses The Puppies or The Cupcakes. And yet today, when I was half listening to a litany of imminent matchups on NPR news, I heard "The Sharks take on the Maple Leaves."

It's true that if unexpectedly covered by a flurry of maple leaves, sharks would probably be baffled and thus bested, but one wonders if that is the kind of battle that hockey fans are really looking for? I'm looking at you, Canada.

Weekend

In brief.
1. I told a story at Previously Secret Information and it was good! Not as good as Joe's story about his unreliable temporarily cemented tooth, but good nevertheless. It's always a relief when people laugh. (I mean, when you're trying to be funny.) It's hard to tell when you're rehearsing alone in the living room.

2. I bid farewell to a really wonderful man. It sucked. Though I choose not to blather on too much about my romantic endeavors here, I am still out there on the epic quest, trying to do the right thing along the way. Frankly, it is exhausting. And confusing. I'll miss him. The woman smart enough to hang on to him will be very lucky indeed.

I hope to be amusing again soon.

A sense of foreboding

Email subject heading from Yoshi's San Francisco.
Coming soon: The Music of the Grateful Dead & Pink Floyd.

I'm not sure they intended it as a threat, but that's certainly how I'm taking it.

A small collection

1. I've not listened to Sinead O'Connor since 1987, so learning she has a new album stirred some nostalgia. I'm listening to it on NPR, but the opening love song involves a buggy ride [seriously. "It's so warm inside when he takes me for a buggy ride," which I suppose might be intended as innuendo, but I'm not sure I ever want sex to be referred to as a buggy ride, so that doesn't help matters.] and the second song has the lyric, "for so long I've been a junkie; I ought to wrap it up and mind my monkeys." I think, like many people I knew in 1987, Sinead and I have grown apart.

3. I discovered today that someone rides their bike to work and then hangs their sweat-soaked garb to air out on the rack where we hang the tablecloths. This person perhaps never had a mother. Also? Ewwww.

2. If your dress no longer fits after you have had half a burrito, your dress really didn't fit to begin with. In case I forget this lesson in the future, maybe I should keep a caftan in my desk drawer.

3. Wait! A caftan you say? Well, you're in luck. When I went to purchase the aforementioned burrito, I passed the mystery store on the corner. (I have mentioned it before. It regularly goes out of business and then reopens under a different name with the exact same merchandise. It is currently called Things Lucky.) Displayed outside, they usually have several belly-dancing-type ensembles, but today they also had yellow caftan, the entire front of which features a life-like rendering of Bob Marley smoking a joint. I don't know if there is a more perfect "I'm in the Haight and I also accidentally ate too much" outfit. I should probably buy it right away.

Suggestions

Were I to arrange my life as informed by the radio commercials I hear every morning, I would wake from a restful night's sleep on my new mattress; drive in my newly insured car (saving hundreds of dollars!) to the warm, supportive fertility clinic where the doctors sound like members of a cult. Ultimately, though, none of this would matter since I would soon thereafter die of carbon monoxide poisoning. Apparently, it can happen to anyone, anywhere, anytime--regardless of the quality of your mattress.

Environmental

Standing in front of three possible receptacles, peering at a cup made of mystery material, it suddenly occurred to me that up until, say, the advent of metal being used for stuff, the question: "is this compostable?" was superfluous. Because--guess what--pretty much everything on the planet was compostable.

Aside from the fear, ignorance, pestilence, war and relentless labor, it must have been quite a carefree, restful time.

Treading carefully

A young woman with long hair, wearing an ankle-length skirt and somewhat eccentric combination of patterns, and carrying a sunflower is walking toward me in the company of a neatly coiffed young man, all in black, walking a bicycle. As I pass them I hear:

"Why don't you like Honey-Boo?" she asks plaintively. "What's wrong with Honey-Boo?"
He smiles diplomatically, "Well..."

Let us hope for the sake of the man--to say nothing of the currently nameless creature--that it is a pet and not a child.

Wednesday miscellany

1. According to an email in my spam folder, nir tsalach wants to be my friend on Windows Live. Poor nir. He probably doesn't have a lot of friends, not least because who even knew Windows was a place to be friends? Despite my sadness at his plight, he will have to carry on without me.

2. I keep hearing a radio announcement about a concert in which the band is described as "one of Philadelphia’s funkiest performers of laid back, alternative hip-hop blues." Are we therefore to understand that there are numerous performers of laid back, alternative hip-hop blues? Perhaps all of whom are in Philadelphia? This surprises me.

3. God bless the very young checker at Trader Joe's who scanned my wine, glanced at me, glanced at me again and asked to see my ID. As I've said before, they must be instructed to card people who look younger than 60, but, I admit it, being carded by people who could be my children thrills me a bit.

4. In honor of imminent Valentine's Day, a student group has festooned the school with paper hearts upon which are written affirmative statements. "You're a great friend." "I love having you around." "I love the way your mind works." "You just GET it." "I love your eyes and that messed-up tooth MAKES your smile." "I would totally kiss you." The one at eye-level on the faculty room door says, "You look nice today." Aww. I walk around all smiley. Grazie studenti.

5. I am on board with the month of letters project. It is more satisfying than I even imagined. True, I am sending far briefer correspondence than is my usual wont, but on the bright side, more people are hearing from me. If you sit down and write seven letters right now, you can catch up and join us. Hot tip: buy more stamps.

Janitorial-2

I'll bet you thought I was kidding about the hoses. Ha! Joke's on you. Why would I hold back when I have no doubt that you are enthralled by my detailed accounts of outdoor chores? Truthfully, I am positively assailed by doubts that you care about this du tout, but isn't blogging really just the author talking to herself? (a thing I do in actuality with increasing/alarming frequency. I find that I cannot make it through a grocery store visit without accompanying myself with persistent, audible narration. Surely this is worrisome?) And I find the sidewalk outside my house to be terribly compelling, so it is a hot topic of conversation with myself. I'm not even kidding. You have no idea how much time I spend thinking and muttering about my corner of the urban landscape. Shall I tell you why?

Peeing. That's why. And no. It's not dogs. It's dudes.

There is an absolutely unbelievable amount of urine that is dispensed by passing men in the corner by my garage door. Sometimes, after particularly copious amounts of beer have been consumed, one imagines, the quantity is sufficient to create seepage into the garage proper. The degree to which this disgusts and infuriates me cannot be overstated. I have lived on fairly significant urban thoroughfares since 1992 and never before have any of my dwellings been mistaken for a more than usually commodious urinal. The pee is always in the same corner and it happens with baffling frequency. Would you pee on a house? Of course you wouldn't.

I have spent a lot of time trying to figure this out and the best theory I can come up with is that between the bar two blocks away and my garage, there is no other deep-set corner. There are a great many doorways (but peeing in a doorway is even worse and maybe the urinators have standards? Once someone opened our front gate and came in to pee in the [nicely swept] entryway. I exploded with fiery indignation and have only recently been pieced back together.) and numerous garages. However, those garages are flush with the wall of their building and even with the sidewalk. Meanwhile, my garage is set back from the sidewalk by about three feet (which makes backing out without killing people a special challenge, but that's another story altogether) creating: Pee Corner.

MEN OF SAN FRANCISCO: HEAR ME NOW. THERE IS A SPECIALIZED PEE RECEPTACLE AT THE BAR. PROBABLY NEAR THE BACK. IN A SPECIAL LITTLE ROOM EXCLUSIVELY FOR PEOPLE WITH PENISES. IT IS NOT AGAINST THE WALL UNDER MY BEDROOM WINDOW.

Previously, my upstairs neighbor used to occasionally take it upon himself to hose down the sidewalk, the front stairs,and the gritty garage doors. But he moved (with his relentlessly noisy children. Goodbye, relentlessly noisy children) and took his hose with him. There is a hose in the back, but it must be about 300 feet long; I once tried to follow it from the faucet to the other end, but it is buried very deeply in the wilds of the thorny spider farm that we call the back yard, so I gave up. This means that in every pee incident (or in one extra special occasion on Christmas Eve eve, vomit) I am obliged to employ the bucket and broom method (actually, I don't have a bucket, so I go up to the kitchen, empty out my recycling bin, fill it with water from the back stair spigot and return to the grisly sidewalk and makeshift my way to a cleaner tomorrow). I should note that there is a mystery broom in the alley that I use for these bio-hazard jobs; my blue-handled broom undertakes the more dignified sweeping tasks for which it was raised.

All this has changed. "Why?: you ask, "Have the men of San Francisco suddenly decided to comport themselves in a civilized manner?" Well, no. Would that it were so. Instead, I have been presented with a hose by my thoughtful Home-Depot-frequenting friend. And it works too. I happen to know because, returning home very drowsily about midnight on Sunday, I pulled into the driveway only to have the beam of my headlights illuminate a glistening fresh swath of newly voided urine. I'll bet the hose would work on the actual pee-perpetrator too, but I've never caught one in the act.

I suppose that people's homes are peed upon in the country, as well, but presumably by woodland creatures or livestock, which seems, if not actually appealing, at least more forgivable. I think that when I opted for city life, I was hoping for urbane more than merely urban. Alas, what a difference an e makes.

Janitorial-1

At my old apartment building, my landlord was around all the time. He liked to keep busy. He may have been a bit overly present, in fact, seeing as how he didn't live in the building. However,as a result of his constant puttering, things were tidy without my thinking much about it. Not so, the new building. For one thing, it is run by a management company who didn't even come back to take their "For Rent" sign down after the available unit had long since been occupied. Clearly, they couldn't care less about the state of our front stairs (or the terrifying back yard, which is another story). For another thing, the exterior bits of the property are basically filthy. The back stairs are covered year-round by various plant matter from the neighboring yard, which is at a higher elevation--the better for showering leaves down upon us in every gust of wind (of which there are a great many). The sidewalk in front of the building, the entryway, and front stairs, are blasted daily with dirt and detritus that, once it has blown into the corner by the garage or into the gated passageway, is trapped there forever. In short (as though it were not far, far too late for that), there is a lot of sweeping required. There were two options: A) ignore the need for sweeping (because it is not, technically, MY responsibility) and live in squalor or B) be my father's daughter and, if sweeping is clearly required, just do the damn sweeping.

I chose B. I have found that it is surprisingly satisfying to sweep. It is fairly easy and yet makes a marked and immediate difference (unlike vacuuming for instance, which I know makes a difference, but one that I can not easily detect without crouching on the floor to admire up-close its post-vacuuming hairlessness [I shed like mad]). Besides, with the sweeping, I get to feel all Civic Minded and Neighborly. Once, in a particularly leafy, windy time, I even swept the sidewalk in front of the neighboring building. I expect to get a cookie in the afterlife.

I keep my broom just inside my garage door for easy sidewalk access. One day, upon returning from work, I found that the broom had been moved to a far less convenient corner and, perhaps even more mysteriously, that about two inches of its previously relatively pristine bristles had been stained black. I was very puzzled, since the garage is locked and I am the only one who has access to it, but I thought maybe I had done some sleep-sweeping or something. Who knows? Better not to dwell. Fast forward a few weeks. I was home sick and I heard someone open my garage. When I went to investigate, I found that the plumbers were working to deal with some kind of back-up in the drain in my neighbor's garage. I left them to it.

During the time of my fairly lengthy indisposition, the trash/dirt collection in the walkway became very condemned-building-esque, such that entering the building became a rather hopeless, depressing affair. Pulling the car into the driveway after work one night, I told myself that the gritty urban despair vibe had gone on long enough and that I might as well just sweep the entryway while I was already down there. And [cue ominous organ music]...the broom was gone! Gone, I tell you! The plumbers were clearly the culprits. They must have come on more than one occasion--the first time they used my poor broom to sweep drain sludge (egads!) and then put it in the Wrong Place. The second time, they either utterly destroyed it with further drain sludge and took it away for disposal OR they had grown so fond of it, they simply couldn't bear to part with it. In either case: vexing.

I called the management company to tell them my sad story and ask for restitution. They asked me to put it in writing and specify the amount of the reimbursement. This meant I had to purchase a new broom before I could send the letter and last week I found that I had no time to purchase a broom. I did try on Friday, but the brooms available at the hardware store I visited were strangely enormous and unless they came with Fantasia-style enchantments, seemed that they would quickly exhaust the sweeper. Particularly if the sweeper had no upper-body strength to speak of. Finally, finally on Saturday afternoon I went to a different hardware store, bought a broom of reasonable size, and returned home to address the now entirely deplorable entryway (seriously. The Blog Bully told me that he had noticed it in passing one day and considered going home to fetch his own broom to deal with it). As I was sweeping, my neighbors came downstairs and were quite surprised and grateful to find me cleaning a common area. I said that I was happy to do it and, indeed, would have done it sooner had it not been for the rascally plumbers who had stolen my broom from my own garage. "Who stole it?" asked the neighbor. "The plumbers, I think." I said. "Well, that's weird because there's a broom in our garage and we have no idea where it came from." "Does it have a blue handle?" "It has a blue handle."

And that, readers, is how I came to own two brooms, the more recent of which I can neither return nor can I, ethically, request reimbursement for it now that the other has been found.

On the bright side, the walkway is looking good.

Tomorrow: hoses!

Message from the past

I noticed today that I have eight unpublished drafts languishing around here, so I took a look at them to see if they were worth publishing now. It is now my rather unfortunate duty to report that on May 5, 2005, I titled a post "Vive les bivalves!" and then wrote nothing else. This is a great mystery to me.

Nevertheless, even having no idea what prompted this rallying cry, I would not want to leave anyone out. Therefore, if you are, say, a clam, I belatedly congratulate you and enthusiastically wish you well.

On correspondence

Earlier in my life I was a very committed letter-writer. Partially this is because I am old and my need to correspond predated email; partially it is because I like to write and it's nice to have an audience (to wit: this blog); and partially, even now when I feverishly check my email all day (just in case, just in case, just in case),I still believe that there is something truly joyful about receiving personal correspondence by post. I am notoriously (and only very slightly apologetically) sentimental. It means something to me to see my friend's handwriting and to know that the paper now in my hands was previously in his hands. Even that the paper had to make a physical journey to link the two of us strikes me as poetic. I have mentioned this before--here and here, for instance, always a bit wistfully.

Imagine then, my surprise and pleasure in finding I am not alone. This week I have been pointed in the direction of Letters of Note, a curated collection of correspondence by persons of some celebrity. It is terribly diverting. Albert Einstein writes admiringly to Mahatma Gandhi; Babe Ruth encourages an ill child; David O. Selznick defends "damn"; Mark Twain addresses burglars; E.B. White discusses his dachshund; William Saroyan advises his young son about love. There are hundreds of letters. I think you should read some; you'll be the better for it. As for me, I can only read a few at a time because so many of them make me cry--no great feat really, as it seems rather more remarkable when things do not make me cry. Still. Proceed with caution.

Then, as though that were not enough, I came across the Letter Writers Alliance. The very small fee required for membership seems well worth spending in exchange for the warm glow of fellowship which, frankly, upon learning that such an association even exists has already begun to spread through my letter-loving heart.

Mostly though, I'm struck by how comparatively few letters I write these days and what a pity it is. I will send away for my membership card and begin to mend my ways. Perhaps you would like to do the same. I'm sure that someone you love lives elsewhere. She'd very much like to hear from you.

Addendum:
Having read this, my friend Amanda let me know about the letter a day challenge for the month of February. We're three days behind, but I'll bet we can catch up.

Upcoming

On February 19, I will be telling a story at Previously Secret Information. If you are a real devotee of this blog, you will have already seen me tell this story though the magic of video, but you should probably come anyway. I'll wear something different to make it worth your while.

Interestingly, I had an anxiety dream about it last night. I showed up at the theatre all ready to recount my tale and it turned out that they had cast actors to perform it instead. So I had to stand in the wings--all dressed up--while two actors interpreted my personal mishaps. I was approximately 2% flattered and 98% really annoyed.

La lista

Buongiorno amici,
Aside from being briefly confused about celebrities, I have been pretty quiet. I realize this. The dreaded illness that required tea for days on end proved more miserable and tenacious than the average cold. I watched an absolutely incredulous amount of British period drama, coughed like a consumptive, and was reduced to tears on several occasions. Blech. Then I got well and was suddenly all fired up about my summer plans. I like to have a plan. I like it so much that I will often do things like make plans for July in January.

Indeed. Vado in Italia in luglio. Vero! Not just "gee, I'd like to go to Italy this summer" but, as of yesterday: tickets bought, apartments reserved, excitement afoot. I'll go to Switzerland to see my dear distant friend and then to Rome for four days and Florence for a week. That means that #8 on the list shall be accomplished at long last. I even sent an inquiry about payment in Italian so maybe that counts as #9. It's a start anyway. Maybe I'll learn to say enough things that I can charm someone into drinking with me and thus accomplish #38. What's more, I may be able to see my cousin while I'm in Switzerland (#50). It's shaping up to be quite the life list extravaganza. Since I moved two years ago and gave up my cheap rent, I've not been able to afford to leave the state, so you'll excuse me if my sundresses and I do a little jig around the living room with my new Christmas suitcase.

I'll tell you a secret, shall I? While researching Rome apartments, I stumbled upon this one that is so lovely it is even called lovely and it pleases me to the point of sleeplessness. It is also really too expensive for me. Having extended experience being smitten with those who are out of reach, I was familiar with the sensation. I thought I'd get over it. Why I thought this, I cannot tell you. The aforementioned experience certainly offers no "getting over it" precedent. In any case, I didn't. Instead, I thought about it every day. Frankly, I blame the bathtub. Ultimately, as the adage says, "when in Rome, be in love with your apartment." I think that's the expression, anyway. Yesterday, I confirmed my reservation. Vero! I am giddy with delight. As a result, it's possible that I will forget to go out and see the Colosseum, but that's okay. I'm pretty sure there are photos of it available online, right?

Oh! And I almost forgot! I am also going to NY for a long weekend in April. Algonquin cocktails (#12), here I come.

I predict that in 2013 I will be clad in a barrel and eating instant ramen every day to make up for all this reckless extravagance, but for now sono molto felice.
Ciao.

Wrong again

The frequency with which I confuse famous people's names makes my life more confusing, albeit more amusing, than yours. Notable misunderstandings of the past: Gary Cooper for Gary Coleman; Bill Cosby for Bill Clinton (I know. That was a bad one.)

Today, I am reading a list of books that will be made into movies in the coming year. Among them is The Hobbit. In a small blurb it is noted that Martin Freeman is playing Bilbo. I think you know what I thought.

Morgan Freeman? Isn't he kind of old to play Bilbo Baggins? And too tall?

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Morgan Freeman:

Aaaannnddd....Martin Freeman.

Oh.

Sick

On the first day home with my seemingly entirely throat-centered illness, I discovered that I don't have a spoon that will fit into the mouth of my honey jar. If jar is the word. It is a plastic container that was designed as a squeeze bottle, but, of course, this presupposes that the honey remains in a liquid state. No one's honey remains in a liquid state.

I subsequently discovered that putting honey on the end of a knife, holding it over the tea cup, and pouring the tea directly over it, it is possible to melt the honey in an efficient manner while being simultaneously evocative of pouring absinthe over a sugar-filled spoon.

True, it does require significant effort of imagination to recast myself as a wanton flapper in a silken dress, rather than the hacking creature in sweatpants that I actually am at present, but it is day four of tea and Kleenex, and I'm doing my best.

Strategy

Hallway. Lunchtime. Group of girls.

Girl 1: Wait. What's happening right now?
Girl 2: What's happening right now is that I really have to pee. But I'm holding it 'til Spanish class.

Need knead

There are many things that people do for relaxation that I do only stoically because for me it's less "ahhhh" and more "ouch!" Pedicures fall into this category and, most of all, massages. I get massages occasionally when I feel there's no alternative, in the way you might finally go to the doctor to address your pesky rash only once you've exhausted all the home remedies you can think of.

Having finally accepted that the dreaded crick was unrelenting and that if I ever wanted to turn my head again, I would need to pay a professional to knead me, I made the appointment. My massage therapist turned out to be excellent. He also turned out to be pretty much cross-eyed. This made our pre-session conversation unsettling. We both tried to make eye contact in a respectful fashion, but, in the hopes that my gaze my accidentally fall in the right place somewhere along the way, I transferred my attention constantly from one of his eyes to the other in what must have seemed a very nervous or downright shifty manner. Meanwhile, his crooked gaze leant him a strangely disbelieving aspect, as though he were thinking, "Old back injury? Yeah, right. Tell me another one."

Still, I was impressed with his work and I emerged crick-free, though feeling rather bruised. And, as one is reluctant to eat anything after having one's teeth professionally cleaned, I was reluctant to engage my muscles at all, for fear of ruining everything. Turns out you have to use your muscles to even get home. Bummer.

Cut to the next day when I was still feeling pretty good and pretty careful. I had dinner with my friend and her remarkably hearty four-month-old son. And that's how I learned this valuable lesson: if you are kind of a weakling and you want to maintain your stress-free shoulders, do not spend the next post-massage evening carrying a squirmy twenty-pound baby around no matter him much his dimples may charm you.

Dear science,
Thank you for ibuprofen.

One guest

You know that thing where people ask, "If you could have dinner with five people living or dead who would they be?" Frankly, I hate that question. I always draw a blank as though I've never heard of any people living or dead, much the same way as when asked for a restaurant recommendation I suddenly feel like I've never been to a restaurant. Plus, I think it's some sort of test. As though you're supposed to say Winston Churchill and Einstein and Sartre or something. Big names. Big thinkers. Well, I just watched And Everything is Going Fine and now I have the answer. Just one guest. Spalding Gray.

The monologue he must have developed by now about being dead is one I deeply long to hear.

Unconditional

On Sunday, my family got together to celebrate my father's birthday via bowling. It was fun; I'll admit it. Plus, I think I injured myself more seriously by falling asleep on the sofa last night (seriously. People walk into my office, I turn my head to see them and...ow! I've had this stupid crick in my neck for about three weeks though. I kind of don't remember what it's like to not walk around compulsively [albeit fruitlessly] kneading my own shoulder, It's terribly elegant.) than I did by hurling a heavy object about. What? I'm spindly and I have a bad back. Bowling is anxiety producing. Yes. I know you're cooler than I am.

Yesterday I got an email from my mom that said, among other things, "You can go bowling with anyone. You were great."
My mother is totally biased. To the point of delusion, apparently. I wish you could have actually witnessed my "form" so you could be getting a nice hearty chuckle right now. But isn't it nice to have someone love you so much that they instill you with imaginary bowling prowess? It is.

On the other hand, in case I actually become a good bowler, I hear there'll be a venue in my very own neighborhood to showcase my mad skillz. I'll probably become some sort of local legend. Stay tuned.

Words Escape Me

Thanks to my friend Andy, I'm venturing into a whole new frontier. Were this the radio, it'd be a radio show. Instead it is a computer, so it is a podcast. And that, friends, is as technical as it's gonna get around here.

Episode 1 is up. Exciting, no? Go listen why dontcha? You'll find that I'm the mumbliest person on the show. And possibly in the world. Discuss. Also, Silvio? Silvio is hilarious.

Oh. In case you're wondering what all the talk about Wiretap and Jonathan Goldstein is about, all will be revealed here.

What are you doing hanging around here? Go listen.

Class discussion

I sent an email to a colleague inquiring whether a board member could visit his class.
He replied, "Yes, though we will be reviewing a violently (and sometimes sexually) graphic story that the class is reading. If you don't think that's inappropriate for the visitor to see, by all means."

So, it's not inappropriate for the students, then? Just checking.

New Year's Eve Eve

Things have been pretty lackadaisical (a word it turns out I'm not very confident about spelling) on the blogging front and I thought in this moment between one thing and another, I might try to say something. If 2011 has taught us nothing else, it's that just when one thinks the Blog Bully is lying dormant, or, at any rate, otherwise engaged, he may suddenly spring from the metaphorical bushes and shake his head disapprovingly. Besides, yesterday I had lunch and Project Planning with the, frankly, almost ridiculously adorable Katy Stephan (was she wearing a woolen cap, a bright blue sweater and a bright green coat-- looking every bit the heroine of some movie I'd happily see on a chilly afternoon at the Clay? She was.) who makes a song a week. Then I see that the highly impressive Lisa Congdon plans to embark on some kind of daily artistic endeavor for a year. Well. It's not like I don't have time on my hands; I've been watching Jeeves and Wooster for hours. Sometimes (read: again and again and again) it takes the example of my very prolific friends to nudge me in the right direction.

Katy, having seen the oft-mentioned list, has offered to take #13 in hand and make me a dress. Apparently, she also sews. I know. It might be better not to dwell too much on it. I don't think does it to make us feel inadequate; some people just like making things and others like, say, eating things prepared by others and sitting on the sofa. I'm terribly excited about this Dress of the Future. I think the very idea of it augurs well for 2012.

Christmas afforded me the opportunity to give my horse-loving nieces cookie cutters that will enable them to make a small celebratory herd of their own. I can only hope that they find it a less overwhelming task than I did. Royal icing? Is very sticky. Blue food-dye gel? Is very, very blue. It's possible there may still be some on the cutting board. I'm not saying. They did seem pleased, which was gratifying, although my younger niece was visibly disgusted to have been given an apron. She is ever vigilant lest we try to foist any gender normative accoutrements upon her. I would argue, however, that cookies, horse enthusiasm, and sticky hands are gender neutral. As is--ahem--the gracious acceptance of gifts.

In other Christmas news, apparently the Bible has been re-translated. Beware, lapsed Catholics. In case you missed Christmas and were planning to drop by for Easter, if the priest says, "Peace be with you," you can no longer rest in the calm assurance that you know the proper reply. "And also with you" has gone the way of hoop skirts, apparently. The (seemingly much more peculiarly translated) response, "and with your spirit" has taken its place. This sort of thing is going on throughout all sorts of prayers I thought I knew. It made for a lively mass. Well, that and the bongos. Yes. Bongos. The thing traditional carols have been just crying out for.

As 2012 rises into view, I wish you well and thank you for keeping track of me over here. I am always astonished (to say nothing of touched) when anyone tells me they read it. Though it may be difficult to detect though the veritable wall of complaining, I do live in a near constant state of gratitude. Were anyone to scratch the complainy surface, in fact, they would probably be sickened by the gooey sentimental mess of love and admiration they'd find. There are so many extraordinary people in my corner, I imagine it's pretty stuffy and uncomfortable. They don't seem to mind. I'm lucky that way.

May your 2012 be sparkly and full of people who love you and small personal hoorays.

Christmas spirit

I bought a goofy little wooden ornament from some bygone era for my bother. It's a very cheerful cat on skis. Here he is:

Unfortunately, he came to me with one broken ski (which seems to bother him not at all, so I see no reason for it to bother me) and missing his little loop from which you can hang an ornament hook. That seemed a graver problem since he is, after all, meant to go on the tree and, besides, he can't stand. Yesterday, I wrapped him in tissue and took him to Tuggy's Hardware a few blocks away. When the man helping me discovered he was out of the very small size of eye hook required for the job, he opened up a prepackaged picture-hanging kit that was hanging there for sale, removed a little eye hook and screwed it carefully into the hole already on the cat's head. Then he just handed it to me, refusing my offer of payment and said, "That's my gift to you. Merry Christmas."

Sheesh. Hooray for neighborhoods. And kindness. And generosity. And fixing what's broken.

In case you need one, here's my gift to you:

#63: Check.

I checked something off my oft-mentioned Life List.
#63: Buy a real painting.

I really wanted to own a painting--you know--with actual paint. Not a print. But I hardly knew where to begin. You know what there are a lot of? Paintings. Many I don't like, and more I can't afford, which narrows the field a little, but not really enough to give me a starting point. I thought that it would be really great if I could buy a painting from a friend. In that way, I would be supporting the work of someone I care about while also owning art that was that much more meaningful to me. Great idea. However, I didn't actually know any painters.

At least, not when I wrote the list. Enter: Lisa Congdon.

It's very fortunate when the painter you befriend at the moment you're in the market for a painting happens to make art you think is beautiful. She might just as easily painted a bunch of stuff with bleeding eyeballs. (I have a particular horror of bleeding eyeball paintings of which there are more than you might think. Often hung in cafes, which seems to show a real lack of foresight.)

Instead, I am really delighted to have this beautiful little forest to call my own.

Maybe she's made something just for you and you didn't even know it. You should probably check.

The results are in

NPR posted their top 100 songs of the year.

I have heard 8 of them. Eight. I counted. And one of those is by Paul Simon. Of the other 92, I had heard of maybe six of the artists.

So that's official then. I will never be cool.

It's this or silence

In which I write something for fear of slipping back into the black hole of writing nothing. The lack of what I believe is nowadays called "content" should not thwart us, right? Right.

Last night, the blog bully and I went to see a play at Shotgun, where the box office manager is perhaps the nicest man in the world, in addition to being a very snappy dresser. I enjoyed the play, and its sparkly lead actress (seriously, she just glitters up there despite being dressed in Puritan garb), however, I would have enjoyed it, say, 32% more if the songs had been much, much shorter. The songs were a little bit like "you know the story that you are watching? Well, I'm going to tell you, through the magic of song, all the things that are happening, even though you're right here. Understandably, this will take me quite a long time." Perhaps this was a popular device in Ye Olden Times? Perhaps people could not pay attention to things that were merely spoken? I don't know. On the bright side, though: sparkling girl. I cannot overstate this. Also, the blog bully brought snacks in very tiny containers, in the manner popular among parents of preschool-aged children. However, later, as he is ever-vigilant lest people develop any treacly sort of feelings about him, he mocked me for not being able walk up a steep hill at his insane rate of speed. I have a sub optimal level of fitness, yes, but I'm the one with the blog. So there.

Speaking of sub optimal fitness, the needlessly renovated gym reopens today (it really seemed quite nice before; I can only hope they have transformed it into some kind of unimaginable nirvana such that I will long to go there as often as possible) and I intend to go. This very afternoon. I have been in a pool once in the last month and a half, but that was in Palm Springs where I was floating languidly around in my un-serious bathing suit and, thus, doesn't count. Indeed, I dread shimmying into my serious, unembellished bathing suit, which more than any other article of clothing, should quite bluntly reveal what my bread-eating days of leisure hath wrought. [I suspect "hath" and "days" fail to agree grammatically, but I've no idea what the plural of "hath" might be.] Anyway, the point is, I will look silly and then I might drown. So, I look forward to that. I'll let you know how it goes.

Update: The figure I cut in my serious bathing suit was downright demoralizing, but I did not drown. This might have occurred to you since you're so smart, but it didn't occur to me: when the gym is under renovation for three weeks, they turn the heat off. That pool was cold. I hope no octogenarians (of whom there are usually many in the pool) were speeded towards their graves. In other news, there are no longer any curtains in the showers--a strange "improvement"--so my unexpected fascination with the Boobs of Others (seriously. I really had no idea they were so variable) and the cautionary tales writ large on the bodies of the elderly will presumably run rampant.

Is this even legal?

The incense-scented purveyor of saris and scarves and beads and things on the corner by my work is, according to a large banner, having a "Grand Opening!" How is this possible? By my count this is fourth time the store has reopened under different names while continuing to sell exactly the same merchandise. Sometimes they actually go out of business and have a liquidation sale before completely emptying the shop before they bring it all back--display cases, lighting, cash register, ten million incense holders, boxes and boxes of merchandise--a month or two later. It seems like a great deal of work for nothing. Perhaps they have come to share that view because, this time, I'm pretty sure they never even closed. They painted over the awning and changed the shop name to "Things Lucky," (which, frankly, is not too great as shop names go). This new method seems less exhausting, certainly, but also kind of like they are--um--big cheaters?

Are you a tax lawyer? Or maybe a mafia boss? Terrific. Please explain this to me. It's been baffling me for years.

Sing along...it's a round

This has been languishing pitifully in the drafts folder for a full three weeks. It is displeased with me. But today, but hook or by crook, I'm clicking "publish."

Camp.

We were addressed by several people with good things to say.

We learned that Oprah built her empire based on intention. Not the kind that the road to hell is paved with, but the kind, apparently, that changes the lives of scores of people. I have never actually seen the Oprah Winfrey show, incidentally, but don't tell anyone. What I mostly appreciated is that Brian Piotrowicz, one of the show's producers who came to talk to us, cries every bit as easily as I do. Meet a president? Cry. Meet Carol Burnett? Cry. Hear a terrible story of personal loss? Cry. Disagree with a colleague? Cry. Yep. Me too.

We learned that we are basically zombie slaves to dopamine. Okay, it was more complicated that that, but Buster is smarter than I am. Plus, his name is Buster, which I enjoy.

We learned that one way to address the profound problem of water-borne illness in Ethiopia is to get a bunch of fancy friends together and climb Mount Kilamanjaro. Look, I'm not saying it's my way, or even your way, but it was his way. And frankly, he was so handsome and charming (did he call his mother on speaker phone so we could all sing Happy Birthday to her? He did. Did she ask if he was taking his vitamins and had he met a nice girl? Uh...she did.) that you might have been briefly convinced that you could totally climb Mt. Kilamanjaro if it meant you could hang out with him.

But none of that relates to the Girl Scout song.

Make new friends but keep the old...One of the reasons that this has been loitering around the drafts folder is that I felt unequal to the task of explaining how marvelous these two women are. The good news is that during my procrastination, video of their presentations has been published. Now you can just see for yourself how rad they are.

Old, forever keepable friend: Evany Thomas. I have known Evany for about thirty years. (I know!) I don't think there is a bad photo of her in existence, though that is merely an aside. I have often told Evany that she is my hero, but she never believes me. Evany does all kind of amazing things, but she has the grace to be at least a little apprehensive about them first? I appreciate that.

Camp Mighty - Evany Thomas from Rcom Creative on Vimeo.

New, shiny bright friend: Lisa Congdon. If someone asked, "what did you get out of camp?" I'd say, Lisa Congdon. Lisa is inspiring and quite ridiculously talented and disciplined and generous and snarky. She is way cooler thsn I am. Now, she is also my friend. How great is that? For Lisa, I will try to put together some kind of vegan menu so I can invite her to dinner and you know I've never made THAT commitment before.

Camp Mighty - Lisa Congdon from Rcom Creative on Vimeo.

After the Mighty Addresses (which is a title I just made up), we broke into teams and talked about our life lists and identified five things we'd like to get done within the year. And yes, I did cry. It was exciting to hear everyone's plans and struggles and intentions, but what I found myself reflecting on most--even as I blubbered in front of a bunch of almost-strangers--was how damn fortunate I am and, secretly, even in the fearful, underemployed version of myself, how I'm pretty mighty already. Indeed, even while I was down there I got an email about performing in a story slam and another about collaborating on a podcast. I have this extraordinary community of creative people around me all the time of which Evany and Lisa are just a small sample. One of the things Evany suggested would help to make you the best version of yourself was to "have fantiasigreat friends." Check.

Here are a few of them: Katy writes a song every week. Indeed, she'll even write one just for you. Daniel and Darren and Rob have filled my life with music in a way I never expected. So has Hannah. And Lori. Sara has written/drawn several books. This one is the latest. Christopher still makes me laugh and I've known him for more than 20 years. Stephanie takes people all over the world. Abby flies through the air with the greatest of ease. Samantha writes and writes and opened the door to storytelling for me, which, to our mutual surprise, turns out to be my niche in the world. Andy has done all sorts of things including writing this book. He is developing the aforementioned podcast and wants me on it!

And those are just the people most easily linkable. There's a whole cadre of less cyber-present people who are brightening the world while being solidly in my corner. Finding your people is half the battle. This means, I suppose, that I'm halfway to being really quite astonishing.

It's finished! Can I get an amen? You have no idea what a relief it is to hit....publish.

Mi dispiache

I have read in blogs about blogging (exhaustingly, such things exist) that it is very gauche to A) lapse in posting and B) then blather on in an apologetic way about it. About this I say: too bad. I fully expect to continue to do both as long as this little platform limps along. (A fairly incongruous image, for which I suppose I must also apologize.)

So here's what happened.
1. I never finished posting about camp (I will, I will) and now--lo it does hang over my head in the manner of an unfinished term paper. Interestingly, being haunted by unfinished tasks is pretty much the antithesis of Camp Mighty's whole...um...gestalt. Oops.

2. I got sick. Blah. And ate nothing for Thanksgiving dinner but a great many goat cheese crostini, which I was meant to have taken to the family home for hors d'oeuvres. Presumably, they managed within the confines of the actual oeuvres. We didn't really discuss it.

3. Immediate following tiresome illness, I got awfully busy at work and for days came home latish devoid of creative impulses.

4. My gym closed for renovations. I continue not to care at all nor, indeed, to notice very much. This insouciant attitude, combined with goat cheese crostini and similar, will come back to haunt me I suspect.

5. I finished Italian Two. Or, Ho finito Italiano Due. Do I parlo italiano now? Non proprio, ma posso dire uno o due cose. E molto divertente. (My teacher told us that every exercise we were about to embark upon would be "molto divertente." I love her.) Sadly, I will not be taking Italiano Tre any time soon. Forse in primavera. I will miss i altri studenti and my delightful professoressa.

6. I told a story out in the world. It made for an odd evening. I'll tell you about it sometime.

7. I got a Christmas tree. It is smaller than the first (small) one I saw and liked, but it was also not FIFTY DOLLARS. Wha? Additionally, it is from the Christmas Tree Lot of Moral Superiority that funds a nonprofit, rather than the other The Cheapest Thing Here is FIFTY DOLLARS and Funds Two Dudes Who Sell Costly Trees lot. My house is now quite snug and I think it is not inaccurate to say "it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas."

8. I rendered the house jolly in the aforementioned manner while suffering from the worst headache of my life. I took several breaks in order to weep.

9. I am now better and, thus, I am here. Hi.

During the previous weeks of various indispositions, the blog bully similarly has been otherwise occupied and--foolishly--I thought I could sneak all the sloth past him, but he is nothing if not alert. Today I got busted. And I was so close, too. Sigh.

I hope that all four of you faithful readers are in good health, good spirits, and have ten warm toes.

Christmas shopping

I thought I might try to find a baseball-charm necklace for my eight-year-old niece (who is a slugger). A Google search results in this among other things: "Very cool necklace that shows off your passion for baseball and faith in Christ at the same time."

There may never have been a more hardworking piece of jewelry.

Thankful

As it turns out, rather than trotting my fresh hair cut out to have turkey with my parents and cousins, I will be lying on the sofa in dismayingly hair-flatting fashion, wearing sweatpants, and drinking fluids. Later, I may dine exclusively on goat cheese costini, which, though not popular among the Pilgrims, I have in ridiculous abundance, as I was relied upon to bring hors d'oeuvres this evening.

Why I should be so ridiculously susceptible to illness, I could not say: I enjoy sleeping; I take many vitamins; and did I not, just this very week, eat Brussels sprouts? Yet, nevertheless, I am sick nearly every holiday. Last New Year's Eve, I was lying on this very same couch with a fever. Sigh. Here's hoping the Thanksgiving indisposition means I will be robust for Christmas.

Meanwhile, I am still very grateful. I lead a blessed life, a thing I try to keep in some small corner of my consciousness even on my complainiest days. When you try to call them all to mind at your table this evening, may you too discover that you have too many blessings to count.

Seven things

Let it be known that just because I have been a blog slacker does not mean that I have failed to be mighty. Last week featured (in chronological order): total exhaustion, Italian class, dinner with a stranger (including a delicious sidecar), The Civil Wars at the Fillmore with a woman I'd only met once before (Dear Fillmore, I don't think it would be so very terrible if you let us sit down. Still, thanks for the poster. Dear Civil Wars, Damn. Is it reasonable to be so talented and so good looking at the same time?), catching a cold and failing to go to Caught in Motion's CD release concert, and my much beloved Nice Guy Trio at Viracocha. Ta da!

Nevertheless, I know I owe you Lessons from Camp. I've not forgotten. Domani e un altro giorno.

For now though, lessons from today.
1) The key to not watching TV all night is to not turn it on. I know this sounds elementary, but it I am having a small lightbulb moment. Once I turn on the streaming what have you, I am unlikely to turn it off, but having not turned it on upon entering the house, I have instead done some dishes, made a proper meal featuring Brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes (a previously unimaginable extravaganza of healthfulness for which I am feeling rather pleased with myself), and I'm here--not leaving you all lonely and abandoned in the dreaded blogosphere.

2) Knowing the temperature that baked chicken is done has changed my life. Gone are the days of guesswork and exploratory slicing. For your records, the magic number is 165 degrees Farenheit. The thermometer makes dainty holes compared to the knife.

3) Brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes needn't be disgusting. I know. It surprised me too.

4) While it is profoundly dispiriting to be able to hear one's new neighbors talking through the walls (perhaps the former neighbors never spoke to each other? Perhaps they had softer voices?) I find it less upsetting because they are speaking French. I am officially ridiculous. Ou, si vous voulez, je suis officialement ridicule.

4b) While it is profoundly dispiriting to be informed that one of one's new neighbors is pregnant, I find it less upsetting because she is French. Je continue d'etre officialement ridicule.

5) Yesterday, I said, "I can say almost nothing; I'm in Italian Two" in Italian to an Italian. He seemed favorably impressed. Upon reflection, that doesn't really count as a lesson so much as showing off. Sorry about that.

6) If you sleep through your alarm, you will be late to work, but rested.

7) My back hurts rather a lot. Also not a lesson, just something that is becoming increasingly clear as I sit here. Or perhaps it is a lesson after all. Now hear this: do not be twisty in your sleep. You will regret it, even if you do have the benefit of accidentally sleeping an extra hour.

Forward looking

I just happened upon this interview with REM on NPR. It's worth looking at just to see the picture of them. Were any of us ever so very, very young?

In discussing the strangeness of a new life as seen from the audience rather than the stage, Mike Mills says to Michael Stipe that that is not likely to be their future. That surely they will continue to make music, just not together. "It won't be what we had," he says, "but it will be what we have."

Ah. I struggle with that particular life lesson (as we shall discover in further dispatches from camp), but it always helps to have things so nicely said.

Mightier

I'm back! Did you miss me (as requested)?

I am very aware that it is difficult to make a case for the fact that I am mightier in the face of all the silence. I'll be honest; I've been tired. It turns out that meeting hmmm...let's say meeting 127 new people (There were 125 of us; I knew 2 before I got there; but I also chatted with several members of the hotel staff and the lead singer of the Ton Tons, so yeah. 127.), dancing, swimming, drinking, trying to make a plan for a shiny new life, and driving for many, many hours takes a lot out of a girl.

It was good. I wish you had been there.

I think I'm going to have to take it in pieces, so there will be further camp dispatches to come, but we'll start small. It's less overwhelming that way.

1. A salute to Joanne Harris whose book Gentlemen and Players--in CD form--I listened to alll the way there and allllllll the way home.

2. I stayed the night at the Crescent Hotel in Beverley Hills before I went to camp. When I pulled up to the [compulsory] valet (p.s. I never use valet parking because I resent paying for parking and I have tipping anxiety) I was all sweaty and t-shirt clad and shaky from the scary LA freeways and the disinclination of the populous to let anyone change lanes under any circumstances. I told the valet that I felt like I was one of the Beverly Hillbillies. I'm pretty sure that saying that made me even more one of the Beverley Hillbillies. I'm also pretty sure that he was from another country and had never encountered the Beverly Hillbillies. So that went well.

3. I bathed and changed and later looked totally like I belonged in the swanky lobby. In case you worried.

4. Marja came to see me, which is always a good thing.

5. The bartender gave me better directions to Palm Springs than Google did.

6. The Crescent has perhaps the most comfortable bed in the world. I also found the sheets to smell very faintly, and yet not unpleasantly, of grape soda.

7. I got out of LA without dying in a fiery crash, but I very much felt that it could have gone either way.

8. The Ace Hotel is a charmer. The rooms, though in the middle of the desert, have a nautical theme. Go figure. The shampoo, conditioner and body wash have rather masculine scents and there are many channels of gay porn available. I'm pretty sure these are serious indications that the Ace has been given the gay seal of approval. This means, of course, that its cool status is now official.

9. The Crescent has better beds, but the Ace has that warm, warm open-late-at-night swimming pool. Even. Oh! The Ace also has these lights over the bed that on one end is a bright, normal reading light or, on the other end, a red bulb with a dim glow. These made me sad to be alone as it would have been entertaining to have some witty fellow to make "Roxanne" jokes with and then share, you know, hotel bed shenanigans. Alas. 'Twas not to be. Someday I'm going to meet that guy, though, and then I'm going back.

10. The singer for the Ton Tons is almost too fantastic to be real. We pretty much all wanted to be her and use our hands in big dramatic gestures.

11. The chili at the hotel restaurant was too spicy for me to eat. I felt I had failed.

12. The tea at the restaurant was $4.85. I am still trying to get over it.

13. Many people you've never met before prove to be delightful. That was a pretty pervasive theme.

14. A lady admired my bathing suit. That's always nice.

15. There is a fig cocktail available, but I can't whole-heartedly recommend it. Get the one with gin and mint instead.

16. We were given small camp care packages: s'mores kits wrapped in bandanas. There was a chocolate bar, some graham crackers, and a little box of marshmallow peeps. That was jolly.

17. It turns out that a Space Camp themed costume party is way more fun that I imagined it would be. People from the wedding on the other side of the property showed up to do some dancing. Also, my large astronaut helmet (which, when on one's head, is like listening to a seashell in surround sound) was a huge hit both with other campers and with random hotel guests. Some of the latter group seemed to find it life altering. They were also sorry to have missed the hotel's monthly full-moon drum circle the night before. You may draw your own conclusions.

18. Previously, I had only been to camp once: Girl Scout Camp. It was not altogether a success. I was very shy, for one thing, and for another, they tried but ultimately failed to wake me up for the midnight fairy party and I still harbor some bitterness. Still, I'll bet we sang this Girl Scout hit "Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other gold." They don't specify which is which, but I don't suppose it matters. We will further discuss the real life enactment of this ditty another day when we address Things I Learned. To spare you the suspense I'll just tell you now that there was some crying. It wasn't all coming from me, though, which made for a pleasant change.

Arrevederci

So. It's upon us. In the morning I get in the car and drive to LA. I am taking too many clothes, but that is the joy of driving rather than flying. It takes much, much longer, but you can overpack to your heart's content.

Unless I become suddenly both sufficiently technologically advanced and patient to update this from my iPod (a thing that strikes me as actually hilarious; therefore, unlikely), I will tell you all about camp when I get home.

Meanwhile, please behave yourselves and if you miss me a little bit, that would be nice too.

Go see it

I'll be honest, I'm all excited about camp and I think it might be keeping me from having amusing things to say. Is that possible? Probably not. Nevertheless, my brain is mostly doing this: "should I take those shoes? Those shoes are really pretty, but they make me miserable to walk in for five seconds. or the other shoes that are less impressive, but also less crippling? I think it's going to be colder during the day that we thought. I have to rethink the sundresses. Should I take snacks in the car or should I plan to look for an In&Out Burger like the rest of America? blahblahblahblahblah." Like that. It's not entertaining.

Instead, I will tell you that Race, by David Mamet, is a hell of a good play. An uncomfortable, surprising, great play. In fact, the only down side was that the blog bully, who came along, somehow lost his hat at the theatre. It is a small hat and a large theatre, but still. It's gotta be in there somewhere. And yet...where? We were sad. But that was not the play's fault. Really, I think you should go see it. If you live here, that is. It's in its last week at ACT, so hurry.

Bad news: Bob Marley is no longer with us

This morning, a woman called into the radio station with an urgent question.

Woman: I might have dreamed this because I dream a lot of things, but my friend told me that Bob Marley died. Is this true?

DJ: Um...well, Bob Marley...

Woman: (laughs) Oh! No! Not Bob Marley. But a man with a son.

DJ: A man with a son died....?

Woman: A reggae guy.

DJ: A reggae guy. Um...I'm going to have to go with: you dreamed it.

Now I don't have to stop in order to smell them

Remember this? So do I.

Aside from a sense of bitter disappointment, I walked out of that doctor's appointment with a prescription for a nasal spray. Never having used a nasal spray, I think I lack panache in administering it, but I do try. The most notable quality of this product (aside from mitigating the headaches) is that it smells like roses. I don't know if it is actually "rose scented" or if it just seems that way to me. The result of squirting rose-scented liquid up your nose is somewhat confusing-- olfactorily speaking--as you thereafter encounter various things that never previously smelled of roses, but it is not entirely unpleasant.

Still, as a concept, it lacks the romance of "looking at the world though rose-colored glasses." Squirting stuff up your nose is just not all that poetic, no matter what the result.

Zzzzzz

Last night, I had a dream that a hot Australian guy moved into the garage of my building. He'd put tile down on the floor which apparently made it legal for habitation. Upon waking, this amused me mostly because "hot Australian guy" is not a big ideal of mine. I'm more for "lanky, attractively be-spectacled, tie-wearing, literary guy." I think the buff dream Australian was also a surfer, which, if you're me, is even funnier. However, dream me was all flustered around him. Understandably, that type of guy is not particularly drawn to me, but I was very taken with dream Australian and desperately wanted him to like me. He kindly helped be re-set the level on my water heater (which was located in his "apartment") and then... invited me to have pizza! Sadly, I was already late for my birthday picnic and wasn't able to stay. But, for the record, I was very torn.