I have not been the chattiest blogger in the world, lately. Bad blogger, bad, bad, bad blogger! Try to type "bad blogger" a number of times that not turn "bad" into "blad." I did it twice. ("Blad Blogger" sounds like the emo nephew of Dracula.) It's been over 100 degrees here the last two days. Blame any weirdness below on the heat.
Well, I've been quiet because I've been kind of angsty lately and I really don't like to subject people to my angst. I'm semi-finished with my angst, and I've basically decided, what's better -- to be someone who has a few things that I'd like to have, but don't, but in order to get them you have to be positively glacial, or to be sort of person who animals, little kids and old people tend to like. I guess it's best to just accept my gifts in the form of a trusting animal, smiles from little kids and conversations with old folks. And everyone else in between. I not a cold bitch, so I don't get the cold bitch acoutroments. End of story.
I'm going to try to brew up a good batch or two or three of sangria tomorrow. I associate sangria with the 4th of July. Now, WTF? A Spanish wine for an American holiday? It's just a summertime thing.
And what is it when you go to the pool and you see the man with his bald head, bobbing just above the water, and then he emerges from the pool, it is revealed that his body is one of the hairiest things you've seen? As in, more hair on the guy's back than on most men's chests, not to mention all the hair on the legs and the chest and arms? I know it's testosterone doing its thing, but it always amazes me. Not that I have a thing against a nice hairy chest or hairy arms or legs, for I like secondary sexual characteristics, but when the back is almost solid hair, I do draw the line. I'd be getting out the waxing strips and using them on the fellow. But it would be like trying to wax a Grizzly! It would be like pulling carpet! Jeez, and guys like that would clog up your drains all the time, and no one would be able to figure it out, because they have a cue-ball head. Where is that hair coming from?
You can see what I was looking at and pondering at the pool today!
A year ago, my Airedale Terrier named Karma turned 9 years old, and that very same the day, the vet came to the house to euthanize Karma. She had a very aggressive bone cancer in her spine and by the time it was diagnosed, there was no treatment recourse. She was such a wonderful dog, very much a proud, haughty terrier who could also be silly and goofy. But largely, she was Princess Karma, and about 3 years ago, I found a tiara during Halloween costume season and purchased it for Karma's use. While she had a "don't hate me because I'm beautiful" attitude, she was also a bit of a ruffian and preferred to have her hair long and shaggy. She wasn't one of those preening terriers who came home from grooming with an attitude. Well, she did have an attitude after grooming, but it out of annoyance and embarrassment -- she far preferred her "au natural" state. Thus, her official princess portrait properly shows her in a bit of a wooly-bully dishevel. I do so miss playing with those curls. Here she is in all her glory...
Yeah, I read the Bronte sisters and Thomas Hardy, and I like to quote poetry every now and then, but I also listen to Ani DiFranco and I'm in an Ani mood these days. Not that Ani isn't poetic, in her own 20th/21st century way. And anyone who started their own recording label called Righteous Babe Records has to be alright.
Right now I'm listening to the "reckoning" disc of the "Reveling/Reckoning" double CD set. I was driving around last night singing along to "So What" and I looked over at the car in the lane next to me, and there was a teenaged girl, singing and doing upper body dancing as she drove. I thought, damn it, I miss the surly grunger days. In the town that I live in, there's way too many perky teenagers, but I was in suburbia and the closer I get to downtown, the closer I come to finding surly youth. However, a lot of them tend to sit around outside coffee houses and sing folk songs with people closer to my age, and I find it rather confusing.
Back to Ani. A few years ago in "Jazziz" magazine, in response to the question "What is your guilty pleasure?" Ani replied: "FUCK GUILT." That was my New Year's resolution that year. It worked. (I wasn't raised as a Catholic, so maybe it was easier for me.) Then a year later, I did a spin on that and made my New Year's resolution "FUCK 'WHAT-IF'S.'" I realized late last week just how well that one took, because I spent some time around someone who was spinning "what-if" scenarios, that to me, were no more than fantasies about something that was painfully impossible. I realized how I simply never go there, or if I do, I pull myself back. (Hell, I don't even fantasize about Bob Schneider, and that would be a sweet diversion!)
But as a result, I have a bit more of an Ani DiFranco attitude, which is to jam reality right back in my face. It makes for an interesting life, I'm not missing as much, except for when I'm so sulky that I'm not really paying attention. Better to be looking around than your head in the clouds or up your ass, right?
But even then, almost in spite of everything I've said above, I'm still a romantic. I've yet to figure that one out.
I sit here on a late Sunday morning, with my cockatiel, Herb D. Byrd, sitting on my shoulder, doing his imitation of someone dialing a cordless phone: beep, beep, beep... He can also do a killer imitation of the phone ringing and then the answering machine going off, then the beep at the end of a message. He is a little character.
On Friday, the postman delivered a bottle of Dorian that I won on eBay last week! The seller charged me $5 for shipping, which seemed a bit high, but then I realized that she lives in Canada and she it airmailed to me. Bless her. I also bought a bottle of Dorian on the forum three weeks ago, and unless something changes soon, I think I've been swaplifted. I'm giving the seller one more chance to write back to me/send me the bottle and then I file a report with the mods. I'm more than willing to consider that it could have been lost or stolen by the USPS, but the seller's lack of a response to my PM makes me wonder what's happening. I've never had that happen before on the forum, and by and large, most people selling and swapping are incredibly nice and generous.
Anyway, the aroma of Dorian has some sort of effect upon me that I find hard to describe. It involves associations, and scents and music are my two major emotional associations. I love, love, love the smell of Smut and O and Urd and Underpants and Khajurajo, but Dorian almost makes me cry. I get over it after a while, but the first sniff gets me every time. But I love it, I want to wear it, and I think the emotional rush that it gives me is a cathartic thing I'm going through at this time. However, when I did wear it (when all I had was an imp), I had a couple of my male "noses" sniff it and they both responded with a dazed, wide-eyed "you smell so....incredible." Smut gets a vaguely drooly "ohmygodyousmellgood," Underpants and O gets the "yeah, that is nice," but Dorian, I think, has magic dust in it. I think it's the scent that Beth made for her beloved Ted, so maybe in a "Like Water For Chocolate" way, it reflects how she felt when she created it. My, I'm romantic this morning.
Like I said, music also creates some circuit-jamming emotional associations for me. I was at a wedding and reception last night, and weddings don't do that for me. I never cry at weddings. But at the reception, once the endless tape loop of Michael Buble music ended (he gets REALLY tiresome after 2 hours) and the lovely-dovey dance music was tuned on, I was somewhat relieved, if only for a change of pace. I was sitting there watching the bride and groom dance the first dance, thinking how sweet and cute they looked. And it was rather odd, no one else was watching. The parents were too busy being tense (bride's mom and dad are bitterly divorced, groom's dad had a lot to drink by that point), and the wedding party was utterly blitzed. Everyone else was eating, drinking and talking. I was glad that I gave that little moment of theirs my attention. I hope they never forget that they once were like that.
But then some country rock song came up on the rotation, and while I normally detest country rock, this song gets to me. I can't even tell you the name of the song, but it almost made me cry. I thought, well shit, I could sit here and sniff the inside of my elbow, get a big hit of Dorian, and just start sobbing, right here in the middle of the reception. I didn't. It was an open bar, and I got another drink and disassociated for a while. I hate to disassociate from my emotions, but sometimes it's what you gotta do, if only not to make a scene at a wedding reception.
My friend Ron always tells me that in spite of what I call my cynical attitude, I'm the most romantic person he knows. He says I'm not sentimental, but I am romantic. Did I read the Bronte sisters entirely too much when I was a teenager? Yeah, let's blame it on Emily and Charlotte! And Dorian, and that stupid country song! Charlotte and Emily and Dorian don't annoy me, but a country rock song? I humilate my own sensibilities with that one! But at least I take comfort that it wasn't a Celine Dion song! (Whew.)
It occurs to me that I have not provided a definitive update on the cat who took up residence on my front porch nearly two weeks ago. I was calling the kitty Puddy or Puds or Puddin', and a week ago I took the little geek into the vet to get the giant hairballs cut out of his fur and to get a general health assessment.
So here's the news: the kitty is a neutered male, the vet guesses he's about 10 years old. He'd probably lived on his own for a while, considering the extent of the matted hair on his back, but he obviously was someone's pet for most of his life. He had no microchip, and no lost cat report fits his description. His ears were simply very dirty, he had no mites or parasites except of evidence of some fleas, so he was treated for the nasty fleasters. His bloodwork came out clean and vet gave him vaccinations. The vet also said he was in amazingly good shape, considering his age and his recent "on the road" lifestyle. The shambling gait that he has is probably due to general age and perhaps some sort of old injury. But some of it, I believe, was due to the fact that the poor guy was skin and bones and half-starved.
So for now, he's living contentedly on the front porch with his little kennel for shelter and his food and water. He isn't going anywhere, believe me! He's filling out, I'm brushing him daily to get more of the dead hair out of his coat, and his wobbly gait is improving. He loves to crawl onto your your lap, purr and knead his paws. Ella Bean, Basset Queen, was taken out on the porch to meet him, restrained by her harness and her leash, and Puddin' Tom just watched her and gave a warning growl every now and then. She didn't push it. Mugzy the Boxer was curious, but not aggressive. If they keep meeting up, a truce may be established over time
And as you can see, I'm calling him Puddin' Tom. I think it sounds like a cross between a children's book title and a good ol' southern boy. He apparently feels like he's found his retirement home!
I just love this -- there's a roller derby club in the town that I live in called the No Coast Derby Girls. The name alone is priceless. There's two teams -- Gang Green (team color green, obviously) and the Mary Kay Mafia (wearing pink, of course). There's a match in early July and I hope to attend. Several of the girls on the teams go to my favorite coffeehouse, and come limping in, sporting large bruises, all that jazz. They are just wild maniacs, and I do so appreciate that.
And speaking of being in No Coast land, if there's a beach near you, please go to it for me. I have a good friend in Tampa and I'm always asking her to at least drive by the beach and honk at it for me. For those of you who live near very large lakes with quasi-beaches, that works too.
I must share a bit of kitsch from my home state that is probably more evidence that since there's no beach or large body of water or mountains, we fixate on phallic symbols. (You need look no further than me for evidence of that. ) I believe it was in the 1930's that someone decided to create a lake and a faux beach between Lincoln and Omaha near the Platte River. It's called Linoma Beach (heh, heh, Lincoln and Omaha, get it?)
And below is a photo of Linoma beach, and yes, that is a light house. It's often said there have been no shipwrecks there, so it must be doing its job. That may be because the lake is so shallow and it's so dry in this state that only an inner tube can make its way out onto the water. I think I'll have to go there at least once this summer, if only for the amusement value.
My hairdresser does have a good sense about what is trendy, because she cut my hair into this cut about a month ago, and I haven't been entirely sure about it. It's a lot healthier, but I just wasn't sure. My hair does grow really fast, especially in the summer, and now it's probably a half-inch longer. Anyway, last night I walked by the TV and there was Sandra Bullock on Leno, with my haircut. Mine needs another half-inch or so to hit the same length as Sandy, and I have sideswept bangs and she doesn't. But I'm taking in the Sandy photos at the end of this month and instructing Brandi that I want to maintain at Sandy's length. Same cut, just a bit longer.
Sandra, you probably know, went with Matthew McConaughey for quite a while. What you might not know is that her next boyfriend was that my favorite singer and designated ideal cutie-pants, Bob Schneider. I am not very jealous of her about Matthew, but about Bob, oh yeah, I'm jealous. Not really, I just say "good for you, sistah!" Then she married Jesse James, the West Coast Chopper guy. He doesn't do much for me, but I think Sandra is a biker chick at heart.
Last night I was listening to Caroline Myss, and sometimes I find her to be borderline moonbatty, but in general I really enjoy her perspective. And that perspective is looking at the intuitive, mystical side of life, as seen by a really brassy Chicago broad who doesn't mince words. I was lucky to pick out the CD that I did, because it was equivalent to getting a good lecture from a friend who pulls no punches. I am not going to lay all my garbage (or as I like to say it in this context, "garh-bhage") on you, but I really need to get my shit together. If I would detail all the complications in my life right now, you'd probably not believe me.
Caroline makes some statements that always help my perspective -- to look at the people in your life, especially those who have a great impact upon you, as someone with whom you have a sacred contract. It's not your job to figure out why they are there, or why you are there. And don't worry about your life working or not working if they are there or not there -- because you know what? You weren't born to live for them, you were born to live for yourself. And at the end of the day, if you're meant to be together, it will happen. And if you're not meant to be together, it won't happen. Simply endeavor to live out your end of the deal as well as you possibly can, giving respect to yourself first, and then to the others in your life. But don't take shit off of them if they aren't playing fair. She calls it living in the heart of the paradox, and that's very true.
Ah, should it be that easy. I'm there a lot of the time, but then there's always a person or two who are huge, huge challenges. And then I feel like I'm being eviscerated. It's such a lovely sensation. But as one of my other favorite wise women, Pema Chodron, likes to say, a lot of these really strong emotions have a shelf life of 24 to 48 hours.
So I'll wait it out, kind of like how I'm waiting for my hair to grow out to Sandra Bullock's length. Actually, I'll forget about how I'm feeling faster than my hair will grow, and I'm not upset about my hair, so what gives?
It's summer! I know the solstice isn't until a week from today, but I had one marker last night and another one this morning. It's official in my world.
Last night I went outside at dusk and the fireflies are out! I'd seen one or two fireflies in the garden over the weekend, but it was during the daytime and I didn't notice them at night. Last night, at dusk, they were rising up out of the garden and twirling all over. The first sight of hundreds of fireflies waking up for the night always stops me in my tracks, because it is so gorgeous and amazing, especially living here on the prairie. We go through the harsh and barren winter, the mercurical spring, and it's hot and dry a great deal of the time in the summer, but you can go outside on summer nights and watch the stars rise in the sky and watch the fireflies repeat the act as they rise up out of the garden. It's just a miracle.
And when I walked out to check the baby cardinals in their nest this morning, I discovered that the first day lily of the year is blooming in my garden! Day lilies are named appropriately, since each lily lasts but one day, but fortunately they produce a lot of blossoms. The one that's blooming is a pink-peach color and it literally yells "summertime!"
I buy coffee from a guy who is a custom roaster. He used to have a little downtown storefront where he served coffee beverages and roasted and sold his beans. About five years ago he closed the storefront and built a roasting hut on the farmstead where he lives. Now he sells beans on his web site, but he still delivers beans to the old downtown coffeehouse crowd.
He also sends out very chatty emails to his clients to tell us what coffees are in stock, to remind us of the weekly order deadline, and to give us his opinion on current events, or whatever else might be on his mind. It's a bit like walking in on his surreal and rambling discourses when he ran the shop. The man is never short of opinions and is rarely afraid to express them. Did anyone see the movie "Blue In The Face" with Harvey Kietel? (It was the follow-up to the movie "Smoke.") Lou Reed had a cameo role in that movie, and our roaster man is more than just a bit like Lou Reed in "Blue In The Face," sans the cigar.
Now don't get me wrong -- this man knows his coffee and roasting techniques thoroughly, and I consider him a master roaster. As a political pundit, it's another thing, although I'm rather amazed he isn't a guest commentator on Fox News. To illustrate this point, here's a sentence from his most recent email. It is one of the most weirdly hilarious things I've read in a long time, if only because I know he was dead serious. Read it and weep or laugh or howl:
"So, now what do you think of this? A 25-year-old female Spanish language schoolteacher has been arrested for having sex with an 18-year-old male student. It seems that Texas passed a law against teachers having sex with students. The initial bill was for students 17 years of age or under taking into the fact that the age of consent is 18. But some old fart in the legislature had that dropped and made it any student. Now come on, this man, can sign contracts, he can vote, he can serve his country, he can marry but he can't have sex with his teacher."
Well damn it, a man has a right to bonk his teacher! But isn't turn around fair play and that 18-year-old female has a right to bonk her 25-year-old science teacher? I may have to ask him that when he drops of the coffee beans. He'll probably say: "Hell yeah!"
If I could play music to close out this segment, it would be The Police, with Sting singing: "Don't stand, don't stand, don't stand so close to me..."
There's a thread in Randomness about what you'd like to pick as a member title when you get enough points. It occurs to me that some day I may have enough points and I can choose my own member title. So I began to consider options.
I cracked myself up with this one, and it would be simply odd to most people, who would probably assume I was a perverted little goth who was overly identified with a certain part of the male anatomy. (This may in fact be true.) But let me explain -- I work in this building:
It's nicknamed the "penis of the plains," although I prefer calling it the "prairie phallus." And I think a BPAL forum member name like "Phantom of the Phallus" would be good for a giggle as an inside joke. Besides, if a group of malcontents decided to get all prudish on Live Journal, it would take pressure off of Andrabelle and her Ron Jeremy joke icons. "Who is that valentina who calls herself the "phantom of the phallus?" What is she talking about? Eeeew, gross!"
P.S. Spellcheck keeps suggesting "Phyllis" as a correction for "phallus."
The Puddy Cat, also known as Puds or Puddin' (a nod to Puddin' of BPTP!) has happily moved onto the front porch. She's sleeping in the small dog carrier that has a towel inside for her comfort, and is eating Tender Vittles and drinking water. I have this vintage wooden bench on my front porch that was originally a gym bench used in a high school in the 1950's or '60's. It's the kind of thing that basketball teams sat on during games -- it must be 10 to 12 feet long. (Speaking of that, I need to check the Dallas - Miami score...) Anyway, Puddin' likes to sleep on the bench. She's not crying as much and she likes to hop up in your lap if you sit on the bench. She's just a happy camper.
She's seeing the vet ASAP, probably Tuesday. I'll probably just drop her off on the way to work and let the vet's office scan her for a microchip, look at those poor ears, generally check her out, and get the hideous clumps of matted hair cut off. They will also be able to give us an idea of her age... I think she's older, looking at the color/condition of her teeth. Assuming she's not microchipped, we'll check Humane Society reports of lost cats. And there's a few people that my DH knows who might want her, although it's also an outside option that we could keep her in the basement. Time will tell! But she's already acting healthier and happier. And she is a sweet pea with such a cute little face.
About two years ago, a small town around 30 miles from here was literally flattened by a tornado. A family who lived there were running into their basement, and their cat got spooked and got away from whoever was holding it. They never saw the kitty and assumed it had been killed, until this spring, when the cat returned to their house, now rebuilt on its original site. They knew it was the same cat by the distinctive meow and markings. Where the little thing went for two years, and how it found its way home, is quite the mystery. Maybe little Puds has a similar story, but if not, she'll find a home somewhere, although she seems rather certain that she is home right now!
Today's animal story is that a cat was camped out on the front porch last night when I got home. There are feral cats in the neighborhood that are truly wild, and over the winter we'd put a dish of dry cat food out on the porch to hide them over. Lately, a yellow and white cat has been up on the porch, but vanishes when anyone appears. Until yesterday, when it was just hanging out, meowing and acting like it was at home. This isn't a feral cat, it's a poor house cat that was either abandoned or got out of the house and never made it home. The poor little soul has terribly matted hair and mite-infested ears. It's really skinny and a bit skittish, but it wants to be house kitty so badly! It starts kneading its paws and purring when you talk to it, and if it sees you through the window, it meows at you. It will let you pet it if you sit with it long enough and it comes to trust you. It's never hissed or clawed once; it's a sweetheart.
What to do? I can not let it in the house very easily, for Mugzy and Ella Bean would try to eat it. Mugzy has apparently declared cats to be his mortal enemies. I could get it inside and lock it in a basement room, but I think it needs veterinary assistance, because it lists around a little bit when it walks. I wonder if it wasn't hit by a car or injured in some manner. All the feline shelters are full, but I can't let this poor thing sit around much longer. I may have to use canned cat food to lure it into a small dog carrier and get it to the vet. I won't take it to the Humane Society, because considering the state of its coat and its tendency to list a little bit, they might euthanize without giving consideration to adoption. This kitty just wants to go home, or to find a new home. The poor, poor baby.
It's bad enough to have lost dog karma and baby bird in distress karma, but now lost kitty karma is following me around. For the time being, I'm calling him/her Puddy, since Tweety Bird has always rocked my world.
There's a still-smallish pine tree in my back yard (probably 6 or 7 feet high) that has a cardinal nest in it. The nest is tucked in a bit, but is right at eye level. Mrs. Cardinal was faithfully sitting on the eggs, and would hold still if you approached quietly to look at her. Yesterday the eggs began hatching, and now there are four baby cardinals, making their tiny tweepy noises, little heads thrown back and beaks open wide. They are so cute. Both Mr. and Mrs. Cardinal are feeding and guarding.
About 5 or 6 years ago, a fledgling cardinal, really a pretty tiny little thing, was flapping around in the back yard. The parents were frantically accompanying it, trying to get it to fly again. It was almost 100 degrees, and the poor little thing was exhausted and stressed. All the wild bird experts say to leave the bird alone if this is going on, so I just watched it. But then I noticed a neighbor's cat rambling around and that was it -- I went out and picked up the little bird. I brought it inside, put it in an old finch cage and fed it watered-down canned dog food all evening. I got up in the morning and fed it. I came home at noon and fed it, and by this time, it was just opening its beak and crying for me to feed it when it would lay eyes on me. It would fall asleep in my hand after it ate. Too precious for words.
At that time, I had an Airedale Terrier named Karma. Karma was most interested in Birdy-Birdy (as I called him), and I let her sit in the room when I was feeding the little guy. She wasn't being mean, just curious -- she was used to my pet cockatiel and didn't consider birds to be food. When I came home at noon, Karma was sitting outside the closed door of the room where Birdy-Birdy was staying. It was a much nicer day, and the wildlife rescue folks had told me to put the little guy out and see if he'd fly again. So I did, and as it turns out, his parents had been hanging around waiting for him. I put him out and they were there right away. He fluttered away and I hoped like crazy that he made it to saftey.
But here's the strange thing -- later that summer, a male cardinal would frequently come sit on the fence and Karma would sit and look up at it as it gave her a sweet, chirpy tweep. She wasn't watching it aggressively, it was like she was just listening to it. She never acted that way with other wild birds -- she just ignored them. But this bird and Karma were talking to each other. I always wondered just what that was all about. I like to believe that it was Birdy-Birdy, back for a visit.
Well, I haven't been very chatty on my blog lately. I've focused a lot of my chatting towards commenting on everyone else's blogs! You give me things to talk about without coming up with something of my own!
Hey, it's 06/06/06 and the President landed in my state a few hours ago. Hmmm... what does this say? It's ostensibly because he is going to deliver a speech on immigration tomorrow, but as a blue person in a red state, I find it significant. As in: "Oh my god, Satan has arrived!" So I exaggerate. The W. isn't clever enough to be the Old Nick. Now Dick (hmmm...Dick/Nick, Dick/Nick...)Cheney or Rumsfeld, maybe, but not W.
OK, now to drive this into the gutter, because I always go there, has anyone seen photos of Dick Cheney's package? Not that I would want to look, but the Wonkette political blog runs a few photos of it every now and then. Now we know why he isn't called Richard. However, I think he has an ostomy bag or something like that packed in front, especially in the first picture. I can't get a link to the photos, because Wonkette always redirects you to the front page of the blog. But if you want to see what I mean, google "Dick Cheney very big Wonkette." You will get hits on links to two photos of the Dickster that ran on Wonkette. You be the judge of what THAT is all about!!!
I was at the health club, riding the cardio cross-trainer (I've nicknamed it the sadiomaster), but I'm having a fine time because I'm reading "Insatiable" by Gael Green, the escapades of an unabashed sensualist food critic who had lots and lots of fun in the 1970's, eating and screwing her way around New York City. And while I was reading and riding (the sadiomaster, remember!) I was listening to Billie Holiday.
I finished a chapter and looked up at a TV, and there was Andy Garcia on screen. What a fine man he is. Could I take much more? Of course, because then the scene switched to George Clooney. ("Ocean's 11" was on TV.) In a brief aside, I think Andy and George make Brad Pitt look plain, but I'm a sucker for dark-haired men.
Could I take much more? Yeah, the guy at the club that I mentally refer to as "Scenery" (I don't know his name) was walking around the track, cooling down from his weight training. He has dark hair too, plus he's classically handsome and he doesn't realize it. I think that men who aren't especially handsome, but act like they are, are really appealing, as are handsome men who don't understand just how good looking they are.
But after that flurry of man-watching, I was content to return to reading Gael and listening to Billie. It certainly did make the sadiomaster session much more worthwhile.
I was still on my kick the other day about "The Philadelphia Story" and went online to see what DVD versions existed, and I found a box set of 1940's movie classics, that includes: "Casablanca," "The Maltese Falcon," "The Philadelphia Story," "Arsenic and Old Lace," "The Big Sleep," "Now, Voyager" and "Citizen Kane." Damn, what a set! It costs about $170 and I simply don't hold still long enough to watch movies very often, but it's tempting.
But actually, if I get a box set of classic movie DVDs, the first one that I must buy is The Marx Brothers Silver Screen Collection, which has their first five movies: "Cocoanuts," "Animal Crackers," "Monkey Business," "Horse Feathers" and "Duck Soup." They early Marx Brothers movies were the very best, when the boys still had their tendency towards political commentary and general weirdness intact. Granted, there's semi-cheesy musical interludes (remnants of the Vaudeville Days), but that's what fast forward is for.
I watched "Duck Soup" on the day of both George W. inaugurals rather than watching the real thing. Hail Freedonia! I'm rather certain Rufus T. Firefly was a more cogent leader that the W. could ever hope to be. That movie has one of my favorite Groucho lines, spoken at the "trial" of a political spy, played by Chico: "Gentleman, Chicolini here may look like an idiot and talk like an idiot, but don't let that fool you, he really is an idiot." Maybe now you see why I watched it on both inaugural days.
But as much as Groucho's acerbic humor makes me laugh, my favorite Marx Brother is Harpo. I was utterly fixated on Harpo when I was a little kid, and I still love Harpo. I am completely unable to look at anyone else if he is on screen. He is the consummate trickster. And he was really, really cute in his wig. Has anyone seen a photo of Harpo out of his wig? Gah. He and Groucho really looked a lot alike when out of makeup, except Harpo went bald at a pretty young age. I prefer to think of Harpo always looking like "The Professor" in Animal Crackers, because he was the horny little imp in that movie. Let's see... I have 3 Harpo figurines, a big "Animal Crackers" poster and a smaller "Duck Soup" poster in my office. That's in between the vintage Wonder Woman reproductions.
I think in a previous life, I had one hell of a good time in the 1930's and 1940's.
If you had to pick your favorite "romantic" movie, what would you pick?
Romantic is indeed in the eye and mind and heart of the beholder. If you look up "romantic" in Webster's, you'd find definitions that include: "consisting of or resembling romance," "having no basis in fact," "imaginary," "marked by the imaginative or emotional appeal of what is heroic, adventurous, remote, mysterious or idealized," "marked by expression or love or affection," and "conductive to or suitable for lovemaking."
Indeed, what some call romantic, I might call sentimental and almost maudlin, and thus, unromantic as hell. And I'm sure others might watch my favorite "romantic" movie and wonder what was so romantic about people who were all confused, drinking a bit too much and acting snarky most of the time. But I do love "The Philadelphia Story." First of all, it's too damn funny and witty. It has Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn and Jimmy Stewart zinging lines back and forth at each other. The snappy repartee is delicious. But what I really find romantic about that movie is that for some people, when you meet your match, when you meet someone who can both dish it out and take it, you just can't let it drop. Ever. Finally you just give it up and give in to what's going on. But the fight is fun and it makes giving in even more delicious. That's a very romantic notion of mine, and "The Philadelphia Story" has it in spades. Sigh...
So tell me your favorite romantic movie, and tell me why...
Calling someone's mouth their "pie hole" has always amused me considerably. As in: "Shut your pie hole." It's even better when said with a Andy Griffith/Mayberry accent, as in: "Shuhut yer pah hawl, Barney. Ima thankin' 'bout sumthin.'"
I work with someone who is apparently a monument to oral fixations. If she isn't talking at a very high volume, she's eating at a high volume. This person likes to hear herself smack, schlurp and snort as she eats. She is a professional person, but she is a grotesque eater. She also makes little murmuring and yummy sounds as she eats. And she feeds her pie hole all the time. Often she has food smeared on her face when she's eating because she virtually sticks her face in it and slops like a hog. Astonishing. Disgusting table manners are truly one of my pet peeves. If she had french manicured toenails, I would probably lose my mind.
And have a look at this, I pull this site up and play it every now and then. It's good for a titter.
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/piehole.php
Last night another saying that I've only heard said by The Prophet Raoul -- if you don't know who I'm talking about, read my entry from a couple days ago -- came out of my mouth. Whenever Raoul was discussing something or someone that he found to be particularly unsightly, he liked to say: "If _______ was a dog, I'd shave its ass and make it walk backwards."
What a visual.
Billie Holiday simply rocks my world. I was listening to her a bit this morning. Her music simply hits you in the heart. Even when she's singing a happy song or a love song, there's always a little pathos in her voice and I love it. Billie isn't my only favorite jazz singer, I also adore Ella Fitzgerald, and if you asked me to pick my favorite version of "The Way You Look Tonight" it would be Ella's, and not Billie's or Tony Bennet's.
But I digress. Billie loved dogs, and she had a Boxer dog named Mister that she loved like crazy. Since I have a Boxer named Mugzy (or Mister Mug, as I like to call him), I know why she was so devoted to him. A lot of people enjoy Billie because it's cool to say you like her or because she was an such an iconic beauty in her time. Actually, she had a tiny little voice that wasn't that pretty, especially compared to Ella or Sarah Vaughn or other great female jazz singers of her time. However, her style was incomparable.
And Billie also made some great comments about life in the course of her time here on earth, so here are a few:
“Don't threaten me with love, baby. Let's just go walking in the rain."
"If you copy, it means you're working without any real feeling."
"You can be up to your boobies in white satin, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane for miles, but you can still be working on a plantation."
"You've got to have something to eat and a little love in your life before you can hold still for any damn body's sermon on how to behave."
I love that last quote. Amen, sister!
If one wears BPAL scents, people who know you can't go into a department store, go to the fragrance counter, pick up the tester bottle of the fragrance you wear, spritz it on a card and walk around sniffing it, thinking about how it smells like you. There is a certain allure to this, assuming it's the right sort of person doing the sniffing. But let us not weep, for look at it this way -- because they can't go to the department store to sniff your fragrance, they have to come find you.
This thought crossed my mind because a guy I work with was patiently trodding around the mall with his wife over the weekend when she decided to sniff all the fragrances at the perfume counter. It gave him a headache and made him vaguely dizzy. He said he realized that they all smelled alike after a while, but nothing smelled anything like the perfumes that I wear.
I told him that his reaction was akin to people buying produce at a Farmer's Market and saying: "Wow, this tastes so much better!" Well yeah, the more natural the product, the more your senses are going to like it.
I have to wonder if the overconsumption of synthetic smells, tastes and textures starts to blunt the senses. And damn it, I am all about our senses! If we forget how to pay attention to them, we start to disassociate from our bodies and then what kind of fun are we having? Not as much.
I used to teach yoga every now and then, and the hardest thing for me was to try to get through to the people who are so disassociated from their physical selves. Sometimes the sense of dropping into their physical senses would cause them to feel anxious, nervous, frightened or terribly vulnerable. They either went into the feeling and worked with it, or they'd just shut down and stop coming to class.
So I think everyone who wears BPAL does a favor to society because we, at least for a few moments, make people drop back into their sense of smell when they get a whiff of something real.
The last statement is a great rationalization to more more oils from the Lab. Feel free to use it to pad your next order. Consider it your humanitarian work: "I must re-teach people how to smell." It's a tough job, but we're up to it.
There's a guy I know here at work who tends to use what I consider rather quaint and old-fashioned terms to express outrage, like "What in the Sam Hill?" and "Son of a buck!" I never hear anyone else use those terms, unless I would happened to head down to a senior center. Apparently "Sam Hill" somehow got started as a way to avoid saying "hell," but whenever I hear that term, I always picture the cartoon character Yosemite Sam.
I also used to know a guy from work who would say: "Well cheese and crackers!" when he was trying to not swear, which was on very rare occasions. I have never heard anyone else use that term in my life. I always found it really hilarious, because it was so odd and because this guy would normally use f**k like most people say "uh."
Then there was the guy who was seemingly the basis for Ignatius J. Reilly in the book "A Confederacy of Dunces." Seriously, he was a big, fat, extremely high-IQ person who lived in his own little la-la land most of the time. He made his living as a software tech support specialist. He used to go sit outside the building that he worked in and chain-smoke and hold court of the topic of the day. The bench that he sat on was made of some sort of industrial-strength recycled plastic and he warped the bench because he was probably 6'4" and around 400 pounds. His name was Jerry, but somehow I came to call him The Prophet Raoul, a term that amused him greatly. Two of his favorite terms were: "Well Christ on a bicycle!" and "I don't give a flying f**k at a rolling donut." The last comment always produced visions of this gargantuan man throwing himself at a huge rolling donut, trying to leap through the hole the way dogs jump through hoops.
Anyway, The Prophet Raoul shuffled off this mortal coil (another one of his favorite sayings, courtesy of Will Shakespeare) a few years ago. Anyone who has read "A Confederacy of Dunces" would probably agree that Ignatius was not a role model for health and long life. The Prophet was a huge football fan and he died laying around in bed while watching the Super Bowl on the day of the Janet Jackson wardrobe malfunction. It is my hope that he said to himself: "I've just seen a tit during Super Bowl halftime, I can die a happy man," and did just that.
This morning I set the alarm for 7:45 (way, way early for me on a Sunday) and went out to my back yard and bailed out all the old water in my two small garden ponds. They're pre-shaped plastic liners and a once-a-year emptying and refilling is a nice idea. So I was bailing out all the stinky old water and sludge and slime and it made me thing of the LJ wank. Generally, I consider that sort of behavior to be stinky and slimy.
While we relish our freedom of speech, the institutions that help give us freedom of speech (unless the current administration gets its way), like legislative bodies and courts, have very structured rules of debate. The procedures are there for a reason -- if it's a free-for-all, discussions can drop to the lowest common denominator and nothing constructive occurs. I consider the anonymous wank to be a free-for-all and the resulting discussion is generally worthless. While there may be nuggets of a legitimate discussion here and there, the presentation does not lend itself to anything but discord.
And that's all I'm going to say about this topic, because I think the more we just ignore the behavior and refuse to give the wankers the attention that they want, the sooner they will pick up their toys and move to another playground or simply go home and pout.
But damn it, I do adore that asshattery word. And I did know who Ron Jeremy was, pervy old bag that I am!
Oh yeah, for those of you who are old enough, do you remember an INXS song where he's reciting words, like appreciate, dedicate, ect? They should have had satiate in that song!
I think "satiate" is a great word to say out loud repeatedly. It's difficult to say it out loud a number of times without putting a bit of an inflection into it, but that's part of the fun. Let's head off to the dictionary:
Pronunciation: [v]'seyshee`eyt, 'seyshi`eyt
Etymology: satiate (v.) c.1440 (implied in pp. adj. satiate), from L. satiatus, pp. of satiare "fill full, satisfy," from satis "enough," from PIE base *sa- "to satisfy"
Satiate is the root of "insatiable" and while I also love that word, it takes on a harder edge when said out loud. However, if Beth ever made a LE called "Insatiable," it would rank right up there (at least in my own private universe) with Smut and Monster in the Panties. I would buy it even it had jasmine and gardenia and rose and leather and everything that amps up and doesn't smell good on me. I'd decant it into imps and keep the bottle.
My tendency to talk about words that I like to say out loud, repeatedly, comes from a character in a short story called "The Smoker" by David Schickler. That story ran in the new fiction edition of The New Yorker in 2000, and as legend has it, Schickler had a book deal by noon on the day the story was published. You can find the story as a chapter in his book "Kissing in Manhattan," but I prefer to read the story as it stands on its own. It's a funny, mysterious little fantasy about a young man who's an English teacher at an all-girls private school in Manhattan and his most extraordinary student. The student, whose name is Nicole, likes to point out that certain words are nice to say out loud, repeatedly. I think "rinse" is one of them. "Trauma" is another.
But I like satiate the best.
