The [Pear] Story

All of these lines across my face/ tell you the story of who I am / so many stories of where I've been / and how I got to where I am...but these stories don't mean anything if you've got no on to tell them to / it's true. I was made for you!
- brandi carlisle

Here are three pears: from L-R, Pear 1, 2, and 3. This is their story:
Pear 1 is happy, calm, and confident; flies under the radar; is a little on the stocky side, and is the perfect ripeness.
Pear 2 is average in most respects, but has gorgeous coloring. Look at that smooth butter yellow next to the blush. Wow, what a knockout.
Pear 3 is on the athletic side, not quite ripe yet--you can see he's got some grainy issues just from his skin. But maybe he'll grow into a handsome looking/tasting peach someday. He's had a rough life: look at those battle scars from previous relationships.

Pear 2 likes Pear 1. See how she's leaning in, her stem curled a little in anticipation, the blush burning up her face? Look at her sticker. If stickers were mouths, Pear 1 better make up his mind right now about whether he's going to turn away or not! Shameless hussy!

Pear 3 likes Pear 2, and is trying to sidle up to her (! personal space issues, if I were Pear 2!) His poor little stem is hopelessly bent toward Pear 2, as if he's looking for any little hint or speck of a spark that might bring her to him. If he had feet he'd be shuffling them uncomfortably and looking at her constantly, but as soon as she looks in his direction, he pretends to be fascinated by some speck on the wall to his immediate right. Pear 3 is young and has been hurt a great many times before, leaving gash marks which have not, and never will heal. But he has not given up hope on the female pear population just yet. However, he's gotten the process a little out of order in his head and has moved close but has not turned to look at her (look at that sticker position! how will he ever get the girl doing that, I wonder?) to see if she is interested in reciprocating.

Pear 1 is not oblivious to Pear 2's overtures; however, he is not sure that he wants any part of being part of a pear pair. See how his stem is straight up? In his mind he's going straight forward, without regard for Pear 2 or any other beauty who might cross his path. But his head (literally) is being turned...look at that sticker. Tsk, tsk.

So, how did the story end? I can only tell you that all three ended up in my stomach, and that no matter how hard I tried to get Pear 2 to take a look at Pear 3, she would not do it. Her natural inclination is to lean toward Pear 1. Pear 1, did you cherish her? Hm...I wonder. Pear 2, stop being such a flirt! Pear 3, hope you made something happen in the interim between when the photo was taken and when y'all got eaten, because if not, you ended up sad and lonely.

All I want for Christmas is...

not my two front teeth. I mean, I'm grateful I have them and all, but since I already have a set, I don't need another. That would be....awkward.

So here's what I want. Rather, these are the things that I will not be getting for Christmas this year, but that I want anyway. These are not in the order I most want them, for privacy purposes. (HAHA. Since most of you reading this would know exactly how to rank them for me anyway.)

1. Super awesome recording equipment.
2. DSLR from Canon. The Rebel XSi looks pretty good to me.
3. Guitar with a plugin, with an amp to match.
4. Boyfriend. Might seem lame-o to actually put this on a Christmas list, but oh well. I've been known to do lame, potentially embarrassing things before. I've turned out okay anyway.
4. Nintendo DS Lite with Mario Bros. game and Brain Age.
5. No more accounting!
6. New job. Preferably in Utah or Seattle or San Francisco. Since this is a wish list, pay should be >$70K/year, 40 hrs/week, with 4+ weeks vacation. Unreal expectations, yes, I know...
7. Real furniture. None of this twin-bed-without-a-real-bedframe-put-on-risers-so-it's-three-feet-tall-and-wobbly garbage. Or the fakey "desk" I've got.
8. Someone to go to Italy and Britain with.
9. Vacation days enough to visit above countries.
10. For it to feel like Christmas in LA.

the waiting is the hardest part

Ah, Tom Petty...the link to this movie, which I had to watch 3 times to make sure it was really him singing it, is here. His voice is so funny...the part where his guitar goes through the paper makes me laugh, and simultaneously reminds me of those gargantuan rolls of the stuff that we used to make posters of back in public school. Thank goodness I am no longer in public school. I don't know which is more stressful...dealing with the possible threat of 2.5" long cockroaches scurrying about, or randomly appearing dead in corners that were clean just a few hours ago, OR going to school with the weird and popular kids alike who are so mean to each other and eating cafeteria food and dealing with lascivious teachers and dirt everywhere. Seriously, both just make me want to crawl into a freshly made bed where the sheets are still warm from the dryer and huddle for a good long while.
Anyway, back to the waiting: I find it rather hard to wait. I'm a pretty impatient person, it seems. I've learned to deal with traffic (mostly), and the printing queue at work (some people print 65 MB jobs, several in a row, without warning), and for everybody to go to the bathroom before we leave to go places (we meaning the immediate family). But I'm not patient on the big stuff, like finding jobs and men who will treat me well. It's a longstanding struggle. I can't live with myself, and I can't live without myself. Sometimes I'm just whistling in the car after moving ten inches in ten minutes, and sometimes I'm about ready to pull my hair out (guess it has to do with the time of day, how far I am from home, and how recent my last meal was....but still...) after a few taps on the brakes. I'm having a hard time accepting that my timing is not always perfect. And what I want is not always what I need. So. Waiting to see whether what I want is what I need, and whether I get my way or not, is very hard. Lots of times it's harder than actually going forward and moving on. That's why, as Tom Petty says, the waiting is the hardest part.

change is in the air

So. Lots of things are happening for me. In the mix, I'm trying to decide whether or not to: (a) move; (b) find a new job; (c) dedicate my entire being to an accounting course; (d) buy a new bed; (e) buy people christmas presents or make them presents, and (f) generally move on with my life. In the meantime, the sky is falling (literally! due to the fires, there is ash floating everywhere) and traffic gets worse.
I've got relationships to start and to get over, trips to plan and take, and life to start the living. Something is in the air here in SoCal. Something big is on the move - my weather-predicting scars in my back from when I had those pesky tumors removed a few years ago can sense it. I don't know what is going to change...all I know is that I hope I'm ready for it!
Thanks to you all for your love and support. I have to say that the thing about blogging that I don't like is that if you keep writing, people who weren't there 'at the beginning', per se, hardly ever go back and read the best posts (of which this is not one). This ambiguous person is not me! Something's gotta give! I'll let you know what it is when I find out. :)

Proposition 8

Much has been said on this topic. Much more will be said. However, I feel the need to express my thoughts on 'paper' about this measure.

First, by recognizing same-sex marriages, the law would be changing the inherent definition of what a marriage is. What one group of people is asking for would be null and void if they received what they were asking for, so even though they think they're getting what they're asking for, it's not exactly what they wanted, because the definition changed.

Second, I'm a bit disgruntled because the whole push of anti-Proposition 8 is about the right of two individuals of any sex to have a marriage legally recognized, but they're actually campaigning for a GROUP right, not an individual right. Campaign away, but on at least one political issue this election, let's call a horse a horse and a carrot a carrot.

I am in favor of Proposition 8. !!!! I truly believe that marriage is meant for one man and one woman. I am not hateful or angry toward people who do not share my beliefs, or who don't adopt my preferred lifestyle. I just have a belief, and I'm going to act on it on election day.

just saying...

that if the highlight of your day is squishing a 2.5" cockroach at work, then you are either under ten years old and your employer is breaking child labor laws, or your day has just been sad, sad, sad.

City of Angels

I think I wrote awhile back about the terrible, rotten, no good, very bad car accident I got into about fifteen months ago. The one that involved me and a garbage truck, which ended with my car angelically parking its battered, soon-t0-be-junkyard-self perfectly, three inches away from the sidewalk, just as if I'd meant for my car to be there, fully stopped, regardless of any impact with trash-collecting vehicles. Anyway, after that accident, I knew there really were angels in the City of Angels, and seriously thought that when I leave this place, the angels will go with me.
So. Angels have not deserted me!
Saturday night I was getting ready to play in front of people for the first time in a long time.
I'd had my friend Kim come over and help me pick out what to wear...silly, I know, but I needed the moral support. I ended up in a regular black shirt and jeans, but I added a cool spidey scarf in honor of it being Rocktoberfest. I had even written a song (see two posts below) especially for the occasion, and been practicing it day and night, sleep and wake, in car and out. Now it was 8 on Saturday night and I'd gotten gussied up (haha, what a funny expression) and was ready to go. I grabbed my gear and drove up to Westwood. I got out of the car and opened the rear door to grab my guitar and go....but it wasn't there. I blinked, turned around, and checked again. Still not there. I started to panic. Here I was, about to play for real, and I go an lose my guitar. Wait, had I really lost it? Had I really brought it down the stairs with me? Was it still in my apartment? I suddenly had this horrible image in my head of this time when I was in eighth grade and Casey Getzelman had gotten a brand new cool guitar while we were waiting for our jazz band carpool parents to come pick us up, he'd put it on the ground where we were waiting, and then some stupid ninth grader without a license...his name was Paul, and he rather reminded me of Kay in Disney's Sword and the Stone...had driven along and promptly run over it. Had that happened to my baby, my sweet little roommate-fingernail-gouged Seagull? I raced back as fast as hitting every red light possible allowed me to...and get this: it wasn't until I was three blocks away that I even contemplated the fact that someone could have stolen it. I rounded the corner, and coasted by the spot where my car had been parked, and there was no guitar. None at all. Not even shreds of gator guitar case. I got out and peered all around, even squatting to look under the cars on the side of the road. I started to panic even more because I realized that I had put my phone in my guitar case, and my camera as well, and so half my life was missing. I went back to my apartment, thinking I might have left it by the table in the front room, but even as I raced up the stairs, in my heart I knew it wasn't there, because I distinctly remember having the grandiose feeling of walking along, guitar in hand, being a guitar girl for all the world to see. I trudged down the stairs, defeated, not knowing what to do. I sent up shreds of prayers from my heart - I couldn't even form cohesive sentences. As I exited the building, I overheard some lady talking on the call-in phone about how she had a guitar, and some girl was supposed to be playing in a concert that night...and I turned and looked at her, and said, you have my guitar!?! That's MY guitar! You have it? And she said, "nevermind, I found her" and promptly hung the phone up and came and hugged me and said, "we have your guitar." I was seriously about ready to cry from relief. Anyway, the angels, Peggy and Dan, and their dogs, who are nameless to me, but who I see every morning on their walk, had my guitar safely ensconced in their condo. Apparently Peggy had been ready to take the dog out and he started barking and barking and they didn't know if the guitar case was a bomb or not, and then there was my syringe inside for making sure my guitar is hydrated, and they thought it might be drugs...let's just say that in the end, the angels were there for me, and I got my guitar back.
So I found another parking spot, and made it to Rocktoberfest, where I managed to completely bungle the chorus of TMBG's New York City twice, but managed to keep playing anyway...seriously, my ego was at an all time low. I thought, can I even manage to play this next song? This song I put a lot of effort into? Help! It went fine, even though it was so noisy that I wasn't sure anybody could hear me. But I got a few compliments later, which was nice, even if the guy who was my crush of the week last week totally made it obvious that he isn't even the slightest bit interested after I, bolstered in my courage by my successful singer/songwriter debut, made a slight overture. Seriously, being rejected is just no fun. Although it's a lot better than being strung along and THEN rejected, so I guess it's all part of the learning.
Just wanted to say that there are angels. I know, because even though I haven't seen one with wings, they stop & direct wayward traffic and help small lost girls in LA find their baby guitars.

Memories

When I was about five or six...back in the days when it was fun to ride in the 'way back' of the '90 Dodge minivan, we were on the way back from an excursion to the City library. My sister and I were harking back to the gunslinging days, using our index fingers to as gun barrels and making shooting noises as we 'shot 'em dead' ('em' being all the drivers of the cars unlucky enough to travel in our wake). There was a guy in an old Ford Ranger behind us who looked eerilyl like Gordon Lightfoot...the version of Gord on the Gord's Gold LP. He followed us for a long time, all the way down Capitol Hill and Victory Road, and we shot him enough times that by all rights he should have expired several imaginary bullets ago. But he was still alive, and perhaps was getting annoyed, as later, we both swore that he pulled something black and shiny from the dashboard and pointed it at us. We huddled behind our 'cover' (aka, below the window) and did not come out to peek at the competition for a very, very long time.

I used to stare at the Simon & Garfunkel Greatest Hits album cover for hours. I wonder how exactly Garfunkel's hair got that texture, and wondered if Simon was really holding a golden egg in his hand. I'd listen to the songs and really feel the mournfulness of the boxer, and the despair of Mrs. Robinson, even though I had absolutely no idea what the song was about at the time, and wonder what the devil difference it made between being a hammer or a nail, as both came with pound-a-trucks which were to be guarded jealously against the stealings of younger siblings.

I remember the first time I went to the subpar Robintino's grill on Highway 89. I had been elected Student of the Month, and my fellow cohort, Paul, and the principal went along. We had pizza which I had heard rave reviews of, but which I remember thinking looked and tasted exactly like the pizza cafeterias used to serve before Ambassador Pizza got the contract to provide the little people with greasy carbs....that is, it didn't taste appetizing at all. Remember, how it was cut in squares, and had canned mushrooms on it, and dripped grease everywhere? (No wonder I brought my lunch from home so often!) Later, Paul gave me a small beanie-baby (yes, this dates me) lamb for Christmas, which I named, but I cannot remember its name to call my little sheep home. Help! what was its name? He (Paul) delivered it to my neighbor's house on Christmas morning, and it had snowed, so I put on my boots and trudged in my pajamas (no coat, as it was bright and not too cold) to the neighbors...the pristine snow glinting. I was so surprised...it was the first time a boy had ever given me a Christmas present, and I was totally overcome with happiness that someone had been so thoughtful...and it was so unexpected! What a great surprise!

My favorite baseball players are Derek Jeter, John Smoltz (what a great last name...I think if I chose a last name, that would be it), Orel Hershiser (I nicknamed him Oreo Hershey), Chipper Jones, Mariano Rivera, Greg Maddox, and Kenny Lofton. I saw Lofton, Jeter, and Rivera in action four summers ago at a game at Camden Yards. (Bet you can't guess who I was rooting for...) When Jeter got up for his second at-bat, I silently willed him to hit a home run with all my little heart...and on the third pitch, that's exactly what he did. I jumped up and down, shouting, shaking my roommate and shouting, "He did it for me! That one's for me!" So all you people, the homer he hit on June 24, 2004 is all mine.

HMPM and I used to eat 'cheezits' from the side yard. Cheezits come from weeds. Yes, I ate the 'fruit' of a weed. The plants usually grow to be about a foot high, but can sometimes be higher, and the leaves are wrapped tightly around a very tiny pumpkin-shaped green fruit. We ate them, and actually thought they were good.

I told Shanelle in my 2nd grade class that her crayons were toxic, because they weren't Crayola and didn't have 'non-toxic' written on them. She had absolutely no idea what I was talking about, and after I explained that she would be poisoned and die from using her crayons, she started to cry. I don't know if I was being malicious or just trying to show off that I knew what 'toxic' meant. I don't think I want to know, either.

Before having the Internet at home was common, my siblings and I all had Juno accounts because you could access email without actually having an Internet connection...you just dialed up, and it made the little fax machine noise, and then a bar would appear and it would jump forward in lime-green increments. If it went straight from 0-100%, chances were really good that you had no mail waiting for you; however, if the bar took even a few seconds to load, you almost certainly had mail. I played the old game Lemmings on this computer, too. The graphics and layout of the Juno page stick in my mind...wish I had a printscreen of them to show you.

We used to get Mario and Luigi points for reading back in elementary school. We had a schoolwide reading contest and my older sis was mad because third graders had to read 20 minutes to get a Mario head on the classroom poster chart, whereas first graders only had to read 10. Therefore, I racked up a lot more points than she did, and due to my overzealous competitive edge and my love of reading, our grade managed to win. Mario and Luigi. My kids (if I ever have any) probably won't even know what dot-matrix printers, record players, modems, typewriters, or land lines are. Sad. Most of me wishes I could go back to not being so 'connected.' Seriously, do I have to be looking at a screen ALL THE TIME??????????? I realize that was shouting. I meant it to be.

Ah, a trip down memory lane always takes too long to type. Gotta go to bed now or I won't be able to get up to take my trooper of a car into the stinky dealership to get my headlamp and oil changed. Timeconsuming and tiresome, but necessary, nevertheless.

Music & Lyrics

Clarification: not the movie. Although I have to say that the film, starring the terribly terrible Hugh Grant, and the somewhat dopey Drew Barrymore (not to be confused with Drew Carey...had a really hard time with that one for awhile, just because their names sound so similar), is HILARIOUS because of the music video in the opening credits, which may be viewed here. Seriously, hilarious.

Anyway, so recently I wrote a song. A rather simple song, but decent. The lyrics go like this:

My heart was shuttered and I walked along the street, head down

I was trying to decide whether to try to fly or stay on the ground

To stay safe on the curbside or to give myself a new start

And then I stumbled off the sidewalk and fell into the path of my heart

Where are you? I've been searching for you

Where are you? I've been looking for you

Where are you? I've been waiting for so long

to find you so I can belong with you

My path to you is set like a story in a fairy-tale book

I want a love to fill my whole heart, not just the breakfast nook

My eyes and heart are open and I'm starting to see color

Life was dull and grey before but now I know I want you and no other

chorus

Sometimes I wonder if I'll know you when I first see your face

Or if I'll bump into you one day showing off my lack of grace

Until the day I find you I will daydream of your smile

Hope you're also searching for me or I'll be in this sad state for awhile

I'm going to perform at Rocktoberfest tomorrow night. There will be video of the performance forthcoming.

"Be Sure To Wear Some Flowers In Your Hair"

As the 60s song goes, I went to San Francisco. No flowers were present, but millions of sea lions, ubiquitous seasickness, and one girl with a bright-red-sunburnt face were.

Saturday in San Francisco: Whalewatching in S's
seasickness: what I experienced all day. I would receive an A if seasickness were a class and our boat trip was the final exam.
sunburn: the result of being a redhead out on the water for eight hours, one of which was fully sunny. Note to self: hats, sunglasses, and sunscreen application do not matter: you will be lobster-faced the next day regardless, so come prepared with aloe and lotion!
sea lions: a gajillion of them. First in the bay, following the boat, then in the ocean, on the buoy, then on Pier 39, barking away. Sea lions, not to be confused with seals, have an 'elbow' joint and very small ears.
shivering: what I did on the boat. Layers on the Bay are good...the more, the merrier. Undershirt, then shirt, then jacket, then coat, then blanket, are all good. More is better. Further note: shivering consciously is a good way to distract your body from being nauseated.
swatter: what I wished I had for the millions of flies which descended on our boat at the Farallon islands.
small islands: the Farallons. okay, so I cheated. Give me a break; one cannot be perfect at alliteration. Commonly known as the Devil's Teeth among sailors along the SF coast, the

Farallons are basically small mountains of pure bird droppings about 20 miles west of San Francisco. Millions of birds roost on the islands. No non Ph.D people are allowed.
Shark, great white: what we did not see at the Farallons. :( Their breeding ground is very close, and the captain saw one earlier in the week, but our luck was not with us.
species, new fly, discovered: The flies on the islands are very odd - they're football shaped. That is, most flies are paper-airplane shaped, but these flies folded their wings over each other, instead of side-by-side. Apparently bird leavings are excellent for fostering exotic fly species. Who knew? They also flew different. I'm no physicist so I'll leave the velocity stuff to others.
smelly: what I was at the end of the day. Nothing beats being on the ocean, seasick (praise be fore boat railings to lean over), and an all-you-can-eat-cook-it-yourself-Korean barbeque.

So here are some pictures of the trip
1. Passing Alcatraz
2. Sea lions on a buoy (if I were a sea lion, I'd be one of the ones on the buoy, not one of the ten or so hovering around waiting for one to get off to have a turn)
3. Going under the golden gate bridge

What's in a Name?

So, taking a page out of my sister's book, I decided to make a post. each picture represents a name of mine, or a nickname i've been called at one time or another. I just googled the names, and here they are! Got some quite interesting results. Just have one thing to say: about the picture of the man and the woman, I hope I look more like the man (he's got a soft, contented look about him) than the woman in fifty years!!!

The Secret of Life

is enjoying the passage of time...
right. So James Taylor is not really my favorite, and I think that song is kind of lame, but there is something to being able to enjoy the moment. Lately I've had a few 'moments.'

Events: Saturday, I went to my first MLS game ever. I used to play the glorious game a bit when I was a kid - never got really good at it though. Something about aiming while moving was just too difficult to master...:D to those of you familiar enough with me to know that that's how it's always been for me, and it's not gonna change anytime soon. It was at the Home Depot stadium...Galaxy vs. Real Salt Lake. Beckham wasn't there though. World cup qualifier, shmollifier, is what I have to say. Let me see a cute man who's ace at what he does run around in shorts and look attractive while doing it! (He is one of only a few people I would actually encourage to wear shorts.) In the end, it was a lackluster tie. It was interesting to note that the better team (Salt Lake) had control of the ball almost the whole time, and yet they didn't win. Weird how those team sports work! Also, I thought it was weird how many of them had long hair. I've played soccer with long hair, and trust me, it is no fun. So why these people who get paid tons more than I do would run around all day after a ball sweating in their super long hair when they could conventionally wear it super short makes absolutely no sense to me (the hair part, and the salary part).

Complaints: Today, I'm tired. My throat feels like it got scrubbed with acid, I didn't perform super well at work, and I slept oddly - woke up knowing I had slimy, unnatural dreams. Ick. Made me want to take a shower. Usually I don't even remember a thing about my dreams, but this time, i just remembered the feeling. My room is a mess, and my resume won't tweak properly, and I found a rather large flying bug in my shower. further, there is no decent food in the fridge OR in the pantry.

Plans: Saturday, I'm going on my first-ever (and, depending on how well my stomach performs, the last-ever) whale watching cruise with my brother. Whee! I'm so excited. He's going to be my personal documentary narrator, and I'm going to bring the blanket and the snacks, and we're going to drink lots of fizzy ginger ale and have a general old good jolly time. I'm seriously praying that we get to see a blue whale. Of course, it would be nice to see anything at all, but I would really love to see a blue...they're so big and awkward, but so rare and unique. Kind of like me, only downsized about a hundred feet and about a hundred thousand pounds. Imagine this: blue whales are 23-27' long when they're born. They gain an average of 8 lbs per hour for the first few months of their lives!

Things I would like to be, professionally, theoretically speaking:
1. a photographer
2. a gardener
3. a writer
4. an organizer
5. a professor
6. a mom
7. a storyteller
8. a listener
9. a singer
10. a sleeper

Which do you think I'm most likely to actually break loose from the banking noose and do?

Keep on tryin'

/I'm tired of lying/ just like the sun above, I'll come shining through

Well, lately my sun has been shining, but rather weakly...I think I'm running out of hydrogen to turn into helium...but I digress. Here are some things I've been trying lately...I figure I've got to shake the mix up a bit in order to dislodge the permahaze that's been in my head for the last eon:

1. Auditioning! Last week I tried out for "Don't Forget the Lyrics," hosted by Wayne Brady and shown on fox, for those of you who don't know what it is. It had been a very long time since I'd auditioned for anything and frankly, I was a bit nervous. I passed a written test, got in a tiny box-room and sang a few songs and interviewed in front of a camera, and then had my picture taken, and was told they'd call me back if the producers liked me. Apparently they didn't, since I didn't get a callback. But I'm totally fine with it, because I really thought I did well, and was happy with the audition, so I'm not crestfallen that I didn't make it. Thankfully, I do have a day job, so I wasn't pinning all my financial eggs on the Fox basket (yes, I realize that was mixed). It was in Hollywood, and it took forever to get there.

2a. Making it to Sea World: Okay, I still haven't gotten there. But at least I have now found a partner in crime willing to make the hours-long trip down there to see the oceania!

2b. Well, in order to get down to San Diego, I wanted to ride Amtrak...something I've never done before. Ha ha, I totally choked when I saw that prices, one-way, from Union Station to Sea World was $40! talk about adding up quickly. I mean, I guess parking is $12, plus gas...let's see...well, perhaps it comes out even, but still. eeps! Snack car aside, I am a bit shocked at the price.

3. Thawing out. My apartment is growing permafrost. Seriously. I am a little icicle. I am threatening to become the little egg on March of the Penguins which cracks and freezes the tiny chick inside within seconds. Okay, well, not. It's taken me months to get here, but I'm sick of paying to be cold, and my roomies keep turning the stupid thing on. garbage.

4. Recycling. I have to do it clandestinely, so my roommates won't know. Sometimes this involves picking their diet coke cans out of the top of the garbage can. Seriously, people, the recycling bin is 30 feet further than the trash...can we not help save our environment? I go to extremes just to get a few pieces in the bin every week. I'd tell you how I went about it and why, but that's really embarrassing. Almost as embarrassing as the fact that I published that I feel like I need to get my would-be non-trash out the door under the radar!!!!!!

5. Making lists on my blog. I would like for everything I write to be either a poem or a list. That way I'm outlined and organized (supposedly). The posts, I think, will be more meaningful because I will really have had to ponder each line and each item, instead of letting my fingers rocket along typing babble, nonsense, and hearsay (NOT heresy) in Dickensian proportions and sentence length.

These are a Few of my Favorite Things

1. cinnamon stack biscuits, hugs
2. flannel pj bottoms, snuggling
3. cell phones / chargers, gardening
4. homemade spaghetti sauce, laughing
5. corn on the cob, clean hands
6. singing with katherine, Christmas rumpuses
7. going to bed after a good day's work, a good day's work
9. quilting, reading
10. scrapbooking, photography
11. guitar playing, time with family
13. gaming (includes: Thistle, Ticket to Ride, Blokus, Rook, and Settlers, not to mention StarMunchkin, Mario, etc.), alone-time

Neverending Story

Things which seem interminable but which (hopefully) produce positive results:

1. Job hunting, also known as: (a) the art of tweaking & fine-tuning resumes for each application, (b) not getting cover letters mixed up, (c) finding jobs that one is actually qualified to apply for, (d) not admitting that to be qualified for one’s dream job is often a dream.
2. Weeding a garden, or rather, persevering through: (a) the bugs and the bees, (b) the sun and the sweat, (c) the aches in the back from bending over.
3. Practicing the Piano—“torturing the siblings”: (a) chopsticks, (b) heart & soul, (c) the opening five bars of Fur Elise, (d) the first two lines of Moonlight Sonata (e) freedom to play whatever! (Note: I never did get this far; I never even properly learnt my scales—see next entry.)
4. Learning theory: the endless vis a vis marker ‘erasing’, the constant scales, sharps and flats
5. Reading Numbers in the Bible: benefits include: (a) math skills improved (b) concentration span is broadened (c) nap time provided.
6. Listening to CCR: the only bright spot I see in this cloud is perhaps the fact that the next ten airtime minutes are free of the stuff.
7. Scrapbooking: one page, even in the bare-bones version that I do, seems to take forever! But if my kids get a laugh out of it, it will be worth it.

Everyone Knows it's Windy

and Windy has wings to fly/above the clouds...

this is how I feel about the air in LA and the ingenius, if elementary, scheme I devised to survive the hot weather here while my A/C is broken.


the brownish yellow haze, hydrated, leaves a caramel colored glaze
on the rolls of Beverly Hills, and Valley choc-smog pools o'erspill
their contents on the drab, dry flats of downtown, which lingers for days;
obscuring views, clouding moods, choking jobbers like me with workdays to fill

i join the throng of worker bees hovering on the interstate
to give their honey (worktime) to the Queen of Life (the Industry),
while our lifesource (petrol) drains, we perpetuate the smogful state
our vehicles are streams of large black beetles, glaring painfully

teamed with eastern sun, the brackish air robs me of my vision--
my ventilation's busted; hot sun boils me as I inch forward
I must choose between inhaling laden air and suffocation.
Overheated, I inhale and push the the window buttons downward

Front and back, passenger side: two three-inch vent cracks should do the trick
suddenly the traffic breaks-- I sigh, relieved, then accelerate
at sixty, traffic peaks; the odometer starts its quiet tick
the physic phenomenon starts its workings-- cooling down can't wait

The roaring road noise is eclipsed by airy, cool, pleasure tendrils
as a swirl of softserve ice cream (air) begins to lick my elbow
No wind-whipped hair for me today! I crow as my lungs start to fill
Genius! I will drive my faithful, ailing car until tomorrow.

Time in a Bottle

I've been thinking about time lately, and how time means absolutely nothing to most of us until we don't have enough of it...just like sugar when you're making cookies, or air when you're at the bottom of the pond. For example, if I'd been even a half second faster on August 9, 2007, my car would not have been totaled by a garbage truck.

But it's come to my attention recently that timing is everything. Example: two months ago I went to the beach with some friends. It was a zillion degrees out, and I was super hot and sweaty, and looked horrid by the time I got home. While I was fishing all my beach junk out of M's trunk, a car pulled up behind us, and a couple guys jumped out. I thought nothing of it, and went on piling my towel, bag, book, and other beach necessities onto the lawn, and I waved at my friend as she drove away. The guys approached me, and said, "Are you Mormon?" which I thought was totally weird, but I nodded, and they said, "Oh, we saw the BYU license plate holder, so we pulled over."

Turns out they in town for the weekend, and were looking for a place to live, and there just happened to be a vacancy in my building. They wanted to get a feel for the building, so I (foolishly?) let them in and showed them my apartment, and they called the manager and got a quick show-through of the empty unit. They flirted it up, and said since we had 3 apartments of LDS girls in the building, we needed some guys to protect them, blahdyblahdyblah, which I thought was an odd stab at a pickup line, but whatever. In the end, they didn't get on the stick, and the place was taken...end of story.

Or so I thought. A month later I had just parked my car after getting home from work, and I was totally amazed because the same guys were sitting on the side of the road, doing nothing. I walked up to them and said, hey, fancy meeting you here (was tempted to add "Judith Tremaine", for those of you familiar with Thoroughly Modern Millie, but refrained)! They were STILL looking for a place, as all the others they'd looked at had fallen through. So I recommended some places to look...none of which worked out, by the way. I was beginning to think that they were (a) cursed, or (b) had no idea how to lock in housing. (Notice it didn't even occur to me until just now that I might be giving them bad advice.)

However, through the grapevine, I heard they found a place in Inglewood (better them than me). On Sunday, I was invited to dinner, and couldn't get in because the doorman said the inhabitants weren't answering the phone, so we (two other girls and I) decided to wait around for ten minutes. Ten minutes expired, and lo and behold, as we were walking out the door, starving, who is standing there, but those guys! Turns out by some weird fluke the guy whose apartment we were having dinner at had only had met those three dudes in LA, and no one else...so I randomly had dinner with them.

If I'd gotten home from the beach a few minutes later, I never would have met those guys. If I didn't take so long deciding what to wear in the morning, I would be earlier to work. And if I don't take time to say "I love you" to the people who matter most, it may be too late. Because you can't keep time in a bottle to save it for later, as if it were a jar of home-canned peaches, so I'm going to stop blogging and go tell them how I feel, because if I don't, it might be too late.

What was I thinking?

I know what I was doing / But what was I thinking?

Yesterday I went to Costco with a friend of mine, and I foolishly bought way too much fresh stuff, especially fruit. I bought:
1 pineapple
13 lbs oranges (in a box)
4 lbs grapes
2 lbs sugar snap peas
2 bags of lettuce

and then something not so fresh, but still too much:
1 carton creampuffs (96 ct)

I'm gonna be eating a lot of salad and snap peas in the next few days. Maybe I'll write about my experience and create some fangled diet called the "Rabbit Imitation" and I'll get put on the NYTimes Bestseller List.

I Can See Clearly Now...

...the rain has gone. I can see all obstacles in my way/ Gone are the dark clouds that had me down/ It's gonna be a bright, bright, bright sunshiny day!

Well, it's not really that the rain is gone, it's that I managed to rescue my glasses from the DMV where I'd misplaced them on Saturday when I went to get my driver's license. I didn't even have to wait a million years...a very un-DMV-like experience, I know.

It was hotter than blazes this weekend...over 100, and it's only June! It's killer because the A/C in my car isn't working, and since the car's life is almost over anyway, I don't want to pay to have it fixed only to have the car die a week later. I was sweating everywhere I went, and the DMV was no exception. It was really hard to concentrate while I was taking the written test, and few of the questions were about driving--they were more about other laws, like smoking and cell phones, etc. Oh well. So you can miss 6/36 and still pass if it's your first time applying for a CA license, and I missed 6, and just barely squeaked by. Everybody around me didn't even pass, so I felt extremely lucky.

I lost my glasses because I thought I misplaced my keys, and emptied my purse in pursuit of them, but then forgot to put my glasses case back in my purse, so I only had my sunglasses with me for the rest of the weekend and had to wear contacts, which I hate, because my eyes are so dry. I even watched a movie with my sunglasses on, so now I know what movie stars must go through when they try to go to a film incognito.

Later in the week I had another heart-stopping moment when I went to the library on my lunch hour. After circling the stacks of DVDs several times, I finally made up my mind, and was in line to check my items out, but then I realized I couldn't find my library card...which means I couldn't find my keys, either. But I didn't start panicking until I got back to work and the drawer where I keep my purse had no keys in it, either. So I walked across the street to the parking garage to check on my keys, and lo and behold, I'd locked them in the car and there they were, plain as day, sprawled for all to see on the front seat. In the end, I had to call AAA to come (thank goodness for that $45 I paid a year ago!) and rescue me, and after some confusion with locating the driver, my keys were restored to me. whee!!

Hopefully I can keep better track of my stuff this week....

Journey of an Organic Marble

I stood on the beach yesterday, and watched beams from the setting sun
filter through the smog-filled air and cause the sea to glint in welcome.
Squishing my toes in the sand, I waited for the surf to send its fingerlings of foam
rushing toward my legs; then watched as the tide was forced to retreat
smiling as I heard it hiss in displeasure as it left me behind.

I watched the gulls pick at the kelp left stranded by the tide,
sorted through my own snack: red grapes, firm and juicy
that burst in flavor upon my tongue with a slight "pop" as they gave way,
their soft flesh melting down my throat, leaving crunchy skin behind.

I wanted to throw a handful of grapes into the air in jubilation
to celebrate life, glory in the sea's scent, dive into the waves.
But I was hungry, and my grapes were few, so instead, I threw one...
a solitary sphere, that didn't pass the texture test
and watched as it sailed in the air and landed without a splash:

the organic marble tumbled pell-mell toward me, dancing
driven by the wind and tide, its progress was quick, unhindered
till the waves' grip failed--left it bereft, alone, upon the shore.

It lay there, sad and lonely, quite red amidst the cooling sand
like a lady whose eyes endlessly sweep the skyline, watching
for the ship carrying her sailor love to hove into view.

But fate deemed she was not to wait: not one, but two waves emerged,
and raced toward the preening grape and tossed and swirled and jostled
she rolled and danced, but did not choose, and selfish were her motives.

The waves got bored, and couldn't wait--their retreat call soon sounded
and she, who tried to play two beaus, was scorned and pushed far ashore
the grape was left, quite high and dry, to contemplate her actions.

Looking for housing in the city

the vacuum bag's full, and the garbage can, too;
the shower is pink with bacterial goo...
the tv is blaring, the hall smells like pot
and all of the food in the fridge? Full of rot!

the cupboards are sticky and covered with ants
and under the sink roaches do a small dance
the laundry room's gathering spiders and lint
to see out the windows, well, one has to squint

the neighbors are fighting, and sirens blare out
the drunk on the corner complains he has gout
the paint's chipped and cracked, and is starting to peel
so you see, city life? it has little appeal.

I think I'll start looking for housing elsewhere
perhaps in the country, where there's fresher air
where dogs bark and kids play and stars can appear
and I can go walking with little to fear.

When I Ruled the World

facebook.comTitle credits: Coldplay, "Viva la Vida" --is that not the best ad ever?

When I rule the world, I'm going to:

1. Get David Cook to go out with me on a date, and shoot for a long-term relationship. He's amazing, I love him. Not just for the sparkle in his eyes, his sexy smile or his control of his voice. He's real, he's good, and I really feel like he connected with me. When I rule the world, he'll see that the connection is two-sided, and forget all about that stupid Kimberly Caldwell girl (plastic faces will not be in vogue when I am in charge, by the way).

2. Go on a date with Sidney Crosby, too, if things with DC don't work out. Cradle robbing is all the rage!

3. Work 23.5 hours a week, and get paid $120K/year.

4. Make a national Sleep Day! Honor the sleepers! It won't be "the big six"--it will be "the big seven"! Sleeping will not be compulsory; however, operating lawnmowers, revving motorcycles, turning up NPR, and any other activity that generates enough decibels to awaken me will be banned, and punishable with fines.

5. Fix Wal-Mart's wagon. Byebye, "Sam!"

6. Make sure the patch of road at the intersection of Gateway and Barrington is smoothed out. Gosh, my brain has joggled so much from going over all the bumps it's amazing I have any noggin power at all!

7. Have a driver named Max.

8. Reinstate the civil liberties of keeping your shoes on in a public place (the airport) and being able to take a bottle of water on the plane!!

9. Build a public transit system that will make Tube-riders jealous of LA.

10. Have a genius, workable idea of a health care system.

11. Create the most comprehensive, awesome library EVER, and ban terrible employees!

12. Prosecute pornography distributors and employers of illegal aliens, derail all pyramid schemes and the oil oligarchy, and ensure each person has easy access to a recycling facility.

Noise

It never ceases to amaze me how people respond to each other...how they automatically tune out what they aren't interested in and 'read between the lines' to get the answer to the question they're looking for, instead of the non-answer they're getting.
Case in point: a person I knew in high school (I did not know him well, but I still remember his name, and vice verse) found me on Facebook, and said, "Hi, how are you?"
I responded that I was in LA, working, and that life was a bit hectic.
He thought I said, "I am amazing. I live in LA, and rub shoulders with celebrities every day. I love my life! I have the best job, and I am so proud of myself that I moved away from home and am attempting to make something of myself!"
No, no, NO, people! What I was actually saying was that I am having a tough time hacking it in this city of celebrities, that the world seems very shallow and People (the magazine) oriented, and it's very hard to make friends, much less acquaintences, and that LA seems to equate with loneliness. Hectic = traffic jams, working = tiredness and frustration, and life = trying not to let the rat race encompass my entire existence.
So much for LA being the City of Angels. There are angels here, watching over me, but they are not of the city...when I leave, they'll go with me. Besides, the air's so dirty you couldn't tell if the flying object was an angel or a special effects creature on the loose because the angel's wings would have been permanently tinted brown by the smog. Surely the angels would have created a more patron-friendly library system, and blessed the leaders of the overcrowded metropolis with the foresight to make an efficient, attractive public transit system for citizens to ride instead of hogging the road with their cars and paying $4/gallon for gas (and that's for regular unleaded on the cheap side of town).
Listen to me, people, don't hear me...see what I'm writing, not what you want me to write.

Viruses

Is Viruses the plural of virus? I've gotten a mind cramp regarding this one (perhaps a new sort of virus? haha, okay, that was a bad joke). I was thinking maybe it was virii, or something.

Regardless, since I moved to LA I've caught several viruses:

1. Netflix. I live off the red envelopes. You know I don't usually like red, but I love it on envelopes containing movies! (especially when my roommates are home...I do not have a mail key. Discrimination! Give me my mail rights!!!)

2. American Idol. Since Season 2 I haven't really cared much about the show...mostly because I was in school and didn't have time for such inaneness...especially Idol Gives Back. RIDICULOUS!!! cough. Now more than ever I want to go try out just to see what Simon would say about my crazy style. :) Also speaking of which, Michael Johns going home instead of Carly or Kristy Lee? Unforgivable.

3. Sunglasses. I broke down and bought a $300 pair of designer sunglasses. They make me look really "LA"--whatever that means. But I like them, and one really needs a good pair of sunglasses here, where even when it's overcast you still need them (and yes, I realize I switched from third to second to first tense in this sentence).

4. Snoozing. In high school I could have the clock on the bed with me and as soon as I heard it beep I'd be up and awake. Now, 25 minutes later, I'm still languishing in bed...

5. Blogging. Ick! Why I ever started this is beyond me. I think it was the whole You've Got Mail factor..."so I just wanted to send this off into the void. Goodnight, dear void."

6. Facebook. What a great way to not stay in touch with people! It's all about the applications. Sheesh, don't send me a two line post, call me if you want to know what's going on! (see earlier post)

7. Staying up too late. So to remedy the situation, I'm going to go attempt to go to bed now.

Haha, I'm listening to Hanson now. Don't you wish you were me? "Whoaaa-whoaaa...hmmm..hmmm, ooooh, yeeaaah"

I've been thinking a lot lately about how we as a people communicate nowadays--or rather, how we don't. Text messages have replaced invitations and traditional flirting, emails have replaced letters, phone calls have replaced going to dinner and chatting with friends, and TiVo has replaced dinner with family. Seems like we have regressed, not progressed. Life is hectic enough...our attention spans are getting shorter by the day...so why not use the attention we have on the people we love, instead of giving someone we're with half of our attention while we blithely text away to someone else? Why not grant the clerk at the store the same courtesy we would extend to, say, our boss, by giving him (or her) our full attention while we're checking out? In the last ten years we have completely changed how we communicate...which, in my book, is not necessarily a good thing. Now we don't think--we text. We don't ponder the consequences of our actions--we call our friends to discuss minute details instead of thinking things through ourselves.
How will the world be when I actually get around to having kids? How will I teach them how to communicate properly in a world where true communication is rapidly becoming extinct?
I'll go ponder that now...instead of calling my sister to see what she thinks.