February 2006 Archives

Or Happy Fat Tuesday everyone!!!

For those of you who don't know, a pÄ…czek* is a 72lb heart-attack-waiting-to-happen disguised as a fruit-filled doughnut...

The traditionalists claim that the purpose of such evil things is to rid the house of lard, sugar and fruit before Lent...

The beauty part for me is that since I'm not Catholic, I get to eat PÄ…czki on Fat Tuesday, but I don't have to actually give anything up for Lent!!!

Ain't life grand????

*Click on the photo to see a life-sized version (oh you think I'm KIDDING???)
photo: www.umwba.org

In real life it is neither absolutely required, nor inescapably inevitable...

That all bombs be defused within 10 seconds of detonation...

(I think...*)


*I know I know, suspense, thrills, suspension of disbelief... I'm a willing participant... after all Pierce is the hottest Bond there ever WILL BE!! (Any and all naysayers can just talk to the HAND!!)


photo: yuchtar.users4.50megs.com

When the phrase 'I feel the buzz'...

Refers to the fact that people are sending email to your blackberry!!

















photo: Googled

I finally got a chance to go to John K. King Books in Detroit!!!

Four floors of nothing but books books books (over a million actually!!!)...

I found the coolest things:

• The Universe is a Green Dragon - Brian Swimme; Bear & Co., 1984
• Eve - Katherine Howard; Boston, Sherman, French & Co., 1931
• Science, Prophecy and Prediction - Richard Lewinsohn; Harper & Row, MCMLXI
• The God Particle - Leon Lederman; Dell Publishing, 1993

And those are just the ones I brought home!!!
 
(I WOULD'VE picked up the first edition 'As I Lay Dying' with an autograph and note by Faulkner, but I didn't happen to have $12,500 with me (left it in my other purse you know)... Ok ok so they wouldn't even let me in the ROOM with it!)

 Next time I'm bringing in a sleeping bag and a secret stash of space food sticks and I'll just refuse to leave!!!

photos: John K. King Books North (mine) & John K. King Books Detroit (not mine)

Turns out it really was a good solution…
Being your own person, being different… is a skill serves you well throughout your life…

But damn it's hard in the early years isn't it?

And watching my own daughter struggle with it… makes me cry…

I know she will be happier for it in the long run...

She's happier now...
Except when she's lonely...

(Why does high school have to suck???)


photo: www.nicolepangelinan.com

I always think I have...

I go for days and even weeks without once checking my ever-growing list-of-stupid-things-that-I-have done or even my list-of-things-I-should-have-known-better-about...

I'm generally happy with my life, and who I've become...

But sometimes... I will be going along, minding my own business, doing the things that well-adjusted people do (I SWEAR)...

When something, a song, a sign, the color of the light or the way it filters through the trees, will remind me of something...

I'd rather have forgotten... and my cringe-worthy actions come flooding back to me in all their 20/20 hindsight glory...

And I wonder if I will ever get over ANYTHING...

Or will I just keep adding to the list of things...

I don't want to remember anyway???


photo: Googled

Ok... so she's not new...

But seriously... ladies... pin your girls down and make them watch this...

Over and over and over...

Oh... and when you're done... Throw in some of this...

Really...

They'll thank you for it later...



photos: ninemsn.com & IMDB

It's a day to get out the broom and clear some debris...

Ok you know what??

You can find ANYTHING on the internet...

(Ok YES I loved this show as a kid... I SO wanted to be HER!!)



photo: www.spiritualitea.com/isis/isistv.shtml

The pictures stall and the words get stuck...

Like old 8mm film... you know, the kind that melts if it stays in front of the bulb too long???

Fun to look at, but then you're left with a mess...

Maybe I need a nap!!

>:p

photo: film to tape Q&A

photo: free-stockphotos.com

She's an angel in the first degree...

I have a brand-new niece… she was born yesterday and she is beautiful…

So YES for one day only…

I can whisper to her…
 tell her all the things I think she should know…

She won’t even be able to roll her beautiful eyes at me and say… ‘I wasn’t born yesterday you know!!’

Because she was!! 


photo: not my niece - Peter Thurin Photography
lyrics: Van Morrison

When you leave someone standing at the altar to run off with the person you really SHOULD be with in the first place...

It's not romantic...

It's unforgivably unthinkable hurtful... In fact, it's probably one of the most humiliating things you could do to a person...*

And yet Hollywood insists on using it...  (I suppose it doesn't count if you spend 3/4 of the movie making the audience hate the groom or bride-to-be...)


*And no... I've never been left standing at the altar, nor has anyone close to me... it just continually strikes me as a ridiculous thing to use as a 'romantic' ending...

photo: Googled

Ok so I'm in love everyday...

What can I say... my life totally rocks!!

(Do I get points off for having taken so long to get there???)

How did people with way more stuff INSIDE than OUTSIDE ever meet people before blogs???

Yeah yeah I know... it was work...

If I didn't work, I wouldn't know ANYONE!!

(My neighbors? Puleeze... Didn't I mention I live in Stepford??)

Anyway... reading blogs is like a 'Go ahead and cheat FREE' card...

'Look, here is a backdoor into my head... c'mon... take a peek'

And whenever I get to meet one of my 'bloggy-pals' for real, I feel like I have been given the ULTIMATE Sundance-goodie-bag...

I love you guys...


photo: Cambridge Party Bouncers

SOMEBODY at my house now has a new ipod...

Nice and thin...

Color screen...

I am SO jealous!!!



photo: apple.com

Thanks
(to all of you)
for making
my life

Sweeter!!!






photo: www.find-a-sweetheart.com/blog/

photo: Flickr Creative Commons

in every song that I sing
and the price of a memory
is the memory of the sorrow it brings

and there is always one last light to turn out
and one last bell to ring

and the last one out of the circus has to lock up
Everything...

- Counting Crows


I think everyone has someone...

who has had such a profound influence on their life... that they are in every song...

Someone who has helped them become who they are...

Or maybe someone they just can't get out of their head...

I'm lucky... mine is still part of my life... though not in the capacity I might once have wanted...

Sometimes that takes a long time to come to terms with...

and then you can listen to the songs again...

Who's your Maria???


photo: Maria Anna Loisia de'Medici; WERFF, Adriaen van der; 1700
reposted from the other place

Now to sweep out the residue...

Not really my idea of a good time, but sometimes things just have to be done... oh... forcibly...

Those have been there a long time and they weren't doing any damage, but really...

Who needs yikky mouldering grabby things contaminating all the pretty sparkly things that are in there now??

Interesting though... when the melodrama starts, I just turn to ice...

Whatever... Now to find a nice big trash can...


photo: Elvgren - nylon.net

In real life when you catch the 'jerks' red-handed and call them out on their manipulations, they don't slink off with a stricken look on their faces never to be heard from again...

In real life they continue to stick to their facade of innocence and non-manipulation...

And it's really convincing... After all, they've most likely had years of practice at it...

But really, that would make a sucky ending for a movie...


photo: The Cinematic Intelligence Agency

To understand the game and still be able to decide not to play it...

To take the bits and pieces you choose and not really care about how those shapes and colors are interpreted...

To walk a fine line, to dance on a wire, to experience whatever sensations make the most sense at the time...

To discipline yourself only to the extent that it causes the ship to sail faster and no more...

To recognize the heaviness of the shackles we place upon ourselves in order to be free...

To hold a piece of truth within yourself and not depend on the validation of others to know it's there...

To hold still with open hands and allow power and freedom and understanding to approach and find it's own place within you...

To sing... any song you like... any time you like...

For as long as you like...


photo: Flickr Creative Commons

Which is strange because it's sunny...

Could be that the sunshine is making me restless...

I get tired of the endless variations of running circles... The achievement, the trying to fit in, the selfishness, the selfLESSness... From inside each circle they seem very different... but when you look from above, it's circles... and circles within circles... All pretty... many necessary... but really just a pretty pattern of turning and turning...

So what to aim for then? Even a 'higher purpose' is very limited in scope...

But if it were larger... would that make a difference?

Sometimes it seems to help to just be 'different'... But even that becomes a pattern after awhile...

And I need something... more...


photo: lumatheatre.com

 In magazines!!!

I get so many that I can't keep up:
 
Infoworld
InformationWeek
CIO
CFO
Inc.
Fortune Small Business
Money
Ski
Wired
Spin
Food & Wine
Wine Enthusiast
Cigar Afficionado (NOT mine!! :p)
Optimize
Parachutist (Also NOT mine!!)
WSJ (Ok, techically not a magazine but it comes every DAY!!)
Technology Review
Hour - Detroit
Las Vegas Advisor (Not mine either haha! Do you see a pattern?)

Not to mention the occasional:

Popular Science
Physics Today
Crain's Detroit Business
Automotive Weekly
Cosmo (ok I only read this when I'm getting my hair cut (I swear!) hahaha!)

And all the silly pseudo-mags put out by companies who want you to buy more of their stuff!!

I fully INTEND to read them so I put them in ever-growing stacks which will soon reach the ceiling...  (If you don't hear from me for awhile, one of them probably tipped over!!!)

And to think, I did this to myself!!!

(Maybe I'll take an ENTIRE weekend soon, and try to catch up!!!)


photo: Googled

The kind of day that makes you forgive winter for being so... unforgiving itself...
 
 
Snow is beautiful in a way that nothing else can be... And on days like this I'm not sorry that I get to experience it for myself...  It's no wonder kids make angels in the snow...  Snow seems to be the kind of stuff that angels would be made of...


Still... I want spring...


photos: Google public domain

Now you can all take your footballs and get out of my city!!!





photo: Googled

There was a type of linen closet thingy in my room... It was high off the ground, and fairly inconvenient, so it wasn't used much...

It made the perfect hidey-hole...  I liked to get inside and shut the door...

There in the dark, where no one could find me, my thoughts could get really big...







photo: Google public domain

Heard at my house tonight:

Me:       Honey do you want a drink?
Honey:  Hmmmmmmmmmm...
12yo:    Dad... when a woman offers you an alcoholic drink you should ALWAYS say yes...

I think I should be locking him up or something!!!



Photo: Google public domain

She took no enjoyment from the sorrow of others...
Rather, when she had to she became like ice...

She had learned how over the years in order to deal with the hunger...
To deal with the fact that she was hungry...

They come... they throw themselves at her feet...
And cry to be devoured...
The sweetness of such things... is not... to be denied...

But later... as the images flicker across her memory...
The hunger seems too much... too... much...
And she freezes... the images...
And herself...

Even now she appears calm and still..
But inside there is a cyclone... whirling energy gathering strength...

Gathering speed...

Inside she burns...

While outside crystals slowly form around her edges...

and she waits...

Like the luckiest person on the planet...
And sometimes I feel like the most selfish person on the planet...

I think being aware of both of those things helps me try to be a better person...


photo: Google public domain

Of COURSE I have a Magic 8-Ball...

Of COURSE I ask it questions I should already know the answers to...

Of COURSE I get pissed when it won't tell me what I WANT to hear!!!*



*It's favorite retort: 'Reply hazy ask again later'  (It's a wonder I haven't chucked it out the window!!!)

photo: Google public domain

It makes other things seem a lot less important...

It's easy to be kind and forgiving and patient and calm, when you know you are way above and beyond all that...

But those who can't, those who aren't... Well c'mon we all have to do SOMETHING to improve our lot in life...

It's human nature...

So we go about figuring what things make life better and try to become good at those things...

And along the way we discover what we really are good at... and if those things don't make us important enough, then by god we go around trying to change the list of important things... to fit better with our natural skills and talents... 

After all, one's own personal value is certainly worth changing the rules over!!*



* I don't disagree with this approach... it's actually quite efficient... it's just interesting to me that people don't realize, for the most part, that that's what they're doing... and if they do... well they don't like to admit it...  (and for those star-spinners out there, how 'bout some kindness, patience and calming influence... you can afford it!!)

photo: crab nebula - courtesy of space.com via rotating chaos