Metropolitan Life

I'm glad to see one of my literary girlfriends hasn't succumbed to consumption yet. This from Gawker Stalker:

"Bar Pitti, outside under the scaffolding, 8pm: Fran Lebowitz, looking no older than she did the last time I saw her, at the Rainbow Room (seriously) ca. 1985. When not making conversational points with her cigarette, she held it, characteristically, in her right hand with the thumb of that hand attached to her temple. Weirdly, in this age of gentrified Bleecker Streets, she seems to be a refreshing bit of Old New York. Practically Henry Jamesian."

Yankee Cajun

Ah, I just lost a whole entry on my trip down to New Orleans this weekend. Bummer. Here's a quick recap: family reunion, crawfish boil, red beans and rice, beignets, Tony's Seasoning, gumbo, beignets...mmmm, glorious beignets.


Powered sugar, here I come!

Guilty!

I'm sorry, but with hair like this? Man's guilty as charged. 

Jennifer Wilbanks, the next Julia Roberts?

The letters from the general public to the authorities in Duluth Georgia about that run-away bride are HI-larious!

Gotta wonder about folks who have time enough to write/fax/email some low-level town managers in Georgia...do you think they also write their own elected officials about, say, the fillibuster? Somehow I doubt it...

How you say?

I need a word for when, after months/years, you've successfully avoided coming into contact with someone you're not particularly interested in ever seeing again (e.g., one night stand who peed your bed, hated ex-coworker, Don Rumsfeld) only to be confronted with said person two times within 3 days. This town is not big enough sometimes.

Season Opener

Ah, the new WNBA season is upon us. With sweet deference to my dear Miss V, nothing breaks the monotonous and stupifying boredom of non-stop major league baseball coverage better than a bit of summer basketball. Now, I like sports as much if not more than the average person, but baseball has never held my interest, even when I've attended live games. I mean, a stadium hotdog can do only do so much for me but for a 9 inning game? Aye, I'd rather watch the grass grow. But enough of this baseball talk..

So the opening games I did watch were hardly what I would call thrilling. Now I'll watch any amount of women's basketball (college or pro) no matter what, but after 9 seasons, I expect more than say 30% fgp. Sure, it's just the first game and there are lots of extenuating circumstances for why teams are not at their best, but lordy. My Seattle Storm looked like one of those popup thunder clouds we sometimes get out here. You think it's going to be a good hard storm, but then *poof*, it's gone. This LJ at the 3 experiment is only going to work if they get a decent center. Simone, god love her, needs to get out of there. And frankly, even when they do get a decent center (like Batgirl), if LJ's only going to sit outside and throw up 3s, forget it! I know she's good, but I miss my Aussie gal down low in the post, banging and beating Leslie (dirty!). I can only hope they make the right adjustments..I truly was surprised that even Sue seemed off-kilter in that second half. Oh well, first game and all, but losing like that to the Sparks and west coast rival is NOT representing. Don't make me come out there!

Also watched a bit of the SASS/Houston game..poor local gal Kendra Wecker went out of her first pro debut with a torn ACL. Also watched a bit of the Phoenix/Sacto game. While I really really like basketball and will watch any game that is actually televised, those all were four teams I might possibly care the least about. Still, gotta support my gals. Besides, I'm sure there was some baseball game on that I cared even less to watch...but for Vivvy, I'll give a shout out to those steroid boys she loves so much. Go Yankees!

Little bombs

The new Aimee Mann cd finally came in the mail, two weeks after I ordered it. Alas, I am not bitter because it is really good. It's a bit of a concept album following a storyline between two people in a relationship, as always focusing on addiction and dependency. Though it's best to listen all the way through, there are some great individual standout songs: Video; Little Bombs; and That's How I Knew This Story Would Break My Heart. I really just appreciate her word play and unusual imagery...

"I am get sad and stuck in a cone of silence. Like a big balloon with nothing for ballast, labeled like a bottle for Alice -- drink me or I'll drown in a sea of giants"

"Life just kind of empties out, less a deluge than a drought, less a giant mushroom cloud than an unexploded shell inside a cell of the Lennox Hotel"

"So, like a ghost in the snow, I'm getting ready to go. Because baby, that's all I know -- how to open the door"

That's how I knew this story would break my heart...

The pole and the hole

Due out in the fall:


Jerri! 

God works in mysterious ways (and drives a stick shift)

Apparently, with a little prayer and a lot of driving around in circles, you can save the sinners andkeep "those" people out. Sheesh, Jericho's going to hell in a handbasket without Lynne Sander's watchful eye and trusty Dodge Dart. I think we've found the new Betty Bowers for our very own Landover Baptist Church.

Tornado season

Here's a snap of the current radar. All the storms are north of me currently, but I'm hoping for some rain, it's been dry. It's tornado season once again, I'm kind of afraid to admit that I love tornado season. I think it's the adrenaline rush. I'm a weather junky anyway (I have no problem watching The Weather Channel for hours). For any Midwesterner, tornadoes seem to play a role in the collective unconscious. The fear, excitement, anticipation..it all plays out somehow/someway. I wouldn't be surprised if every Midwesterner out there didn't dream of tornadoes at night. Mine always revolve around seeing them coming towards me or knowing that they're on the way and me trying to keep my loved ones safe from them. I think of the many times I've huddled in various basements, waiting for the sirens to go off. One time, my friend and I were in the basement of this house I was renting, we had our dogs down there and were watching the wind whip the neighbor's tree around through tiny basement windows. At one point, we turned to check on the dogs and when we turned back, that tree was gone. Less than 20 feet away from us, it had been uprooted in the street. One time I spent about an hour in my bathtub in a rickety apartment building while a tornado spun through South Park, about 2 blocks away. I had sofa cushions on top of me, as if that would save me. Better than nothing I guess. I have only seen one once in person, when I was young. My mom and I were driving home from the restaurant where she worked and off on the eastern horizon coming across a field was the familiar black sight.

I am also the person the weather guy/gal targets when they have continuing coverage of approaching storms. I will watch that shit all night...




Yea! Storms! 

Pictures!

Some recently taken pictures...



Blooming 

Katie Smith, WNBA 

G, Norm, and River napping 

S's big fish 

Peonies

I transplanted some peonies last November and they're just now developing tiny little heads. I hope they do okay where I put them. They come from bushes that are over 35 years old -- I used to be able to hide in the middle of them when I was young -- pink and white fortresses.

One of my favorite Mary Oliver poems:

This morning the green fists of the peonies are getting ready
to break my heart
as the sun rises,
as the sun strokes them with his old, buttery fingers

and they open ---
pools of lace,
white and pink ---
and all day the black ants climb over them,

boring their deep and mysterious holes
into the curls,
craving the sweet sap,
taking it away

to their dark, underground cities ---
and all day
under the shifty wind,
as in a dance to the great wedding,

the flowers bend their bright bodies,
and tip their fragrance to the air,
and rise,
their red stems holding

all that dampness and recklessness
gladly and lightly,
and there it is again ---
beauty the brave, the exemplary,

blazing open.
Do you love this world?
Do you cherish your humble and silky life?
Do you adore the green grass, with its terror beneath?

Do you also hurry, half-dressed and barefoot, into the garden,
and softly,
and exclaiming of their dearness,
fill your arms with the white and pink flowers,

with their honeyed heaviness, their lush trembling,
their eagerness
to be wild and perfect for a moment, before they are
nothing, forever?

Me and Mom 

Room without a view

I had a job interview yesterday, my first in many years. I think it went well; only in certain circles can you impress someone by being too geeky. Yes, I sang the joys of statistics and designs and applications and multi-level analyses. Who knows if I will get offered it and who knows if I will take it. There are a couple of issues I'm concerned about that will take some negotiation/consideration. I'm not sure I can go back to a cramped, small office with no window. I mean, really...

Can I just skim it?

Ok, I'm on page 19 of a 66 page dissertation proposal and the meeting is at 1. It is now 12:30 and I'm writing a blog entry instead. I wonder if I can just skim ahead to the good parts (I fear there are none) and not look like I haven't read it all. I know that's a disservice to this gal, but I'm just filling in for someone at the last minute and to be honest, I can think of a million other things I could be doing. Unfortunately, I'm only driven by guilt when the work is self-relevant. Is that bad?


EDITED TO ADD: I was wrong. The proposal only goes to page 31. The rest was a damn appendix, a 30 page appendix no less. Good thing I skimmed.

Amy Wynn

I suppose it's shallow to want this book just for the pictures? Actually, I'd probably read it, I love home improvement books and hello, that toolbelt!

L Word

ps. No wonder Jenny is so fucked up.