SEW

Not surprisingly, I am just lousy at sewing. I am too impatient for such tiny detailed work. Even threading a needle irritates me to the point where I want to kick a puppy. My lack of patience is very evident in my sewing, on the rare times I have been forced to sew a button or gawd forbid, hem something or mend a sock. My sewing looks like medical stitches or just a pile of thread vomit. I haven't sewed anything in a really long time; I just give it to my mom to sew or I throw it the eff out. In a couple of cases I have resorted to taping a hole shut in a shirt. Pathetic. I had two bad sewing experiences in my youth and maybe that is why I detest sewing so much.

My mom likes doing all this domestic crap. She actually LOVES to iron and sew and cook and clean and all that. I never understood it. I would look at her and go, "wow, why are you so happy to be ironing a damn shirt of Dad's?" She would iron all our bedsheets too. Just wow. Anyway, she had a Singer sewing machine on her desk in the office. When I was about four, I became really fascinated by it, how fast the needle went up and down, how magical it seemed to be that she could feed something in there and BUP BUP BUP BUP BUP BUP, it would be sewn together. She warned me all the time not to touch it. Well, we know what happens with warnings. She was off in the kitchen, kitchening, and I was in the office, reading a book snuggled in the windowseat. I looked at the sewing machine, set my book down, walked over and sat in her big desk chair in front of it. My feet couldn't touch the sewing pedal on the floor. There was a piece of bright red fabric with bright red thread in the machine, and I remember seeing the shiny silver needle against it. Somehow, my fingers made their way to the shiny needle and my foot to the pedal.

BUP.

SCREEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAMMMMMMM!

I let out what my mother said was a blood-curdling cry. The needle had gone into the top of the nail of my left hand index finger, pretty far down, too. I remember pain pain pain and being frightened and also scared that I was going to now get in trouble for touching the machine. My mom came running, of course, saw me crying and freaking, still attached to the machine by the needle. She released the needle from the machine, and I remember crying even harder seeing the damn thing sticking out of my finger. Eventually, she pulled it out, I lived, but distrusted sewing machines forever.

Fast forward ten years or so to 8th Grade. Shop and Home Ec are required in Junior High. I had already passed Shop, even though I put the roof on the bottom of the damn birdhouse I had to make. The cooking part of Home Ec was done, and went OK despite an incident of strawberry throwing, but next was sewing. ON MACHINES. To make it infinitely worse, oh yes listen to THIS, we had to sew something to wear to an ALL-SCHOOL FASHION SHOW. Holy shit, NO. OH NO NO NO.

The bird-faced evil Home Ec teacher quickly surmised that I had a "poor attitude" and suggested I sew the easiest project she had, a powder blue t-shirt. I very begrudgingly started to work on it, and it was obvious that I was lame beyond lame. As the semester passed, I found many reasons not to come to Home Ec class to work on the t-shirt: as editor of the school newspaper, there was SO (sew) much to do yes yes; sick (cough cough); sunny day (byeeeeee); extra band practice; cute boy in study hall alert. ANYTHING. Well, Home Ec Bitch decided enough was enough. One day, she came up to my math class and announced that she was pulling me out to finish the shirt. This was unheard of, to pull someone to Home Ec from an academic class. But she got her way, plunked me in the empty white Home Ec room, just me, a sewing machine, and that stupid t-shirt. She warned me not to leave until it was done. Furious, I started to sew on the demented garment. When it seemed like it was appropriately patched with thread, I took it out from the machine and looked it over. All the hems were pulled and uneven, the scoop neck was saggy, and one arm was significantly longer than the other. There was no way in HELL I was going to wear that thing in some fashion show in front of everyone, and I wasn't about to try to redo it all either. I furtively glanced around to see that no one was coming, and took Powder Blue Frankenshirt into the large Home Ec storage closet, mashed it into a tight little ball, and shoved it deep into the far corner, and covered it with boxes. There. Problem solved. There was no time to make me do anything else, the show was the next day. WIN.

When it came time to get dressed for said show, I made all desperate and worried to Home Ec Bitch, telling her I searched EVERYWHERE and could not find my shirt and that someone must've STOLEN IT. Livid, she went with me to the room, leaving the stage area where the show was almost ready to go on, girls and guys dressed in their various Home Ec finery. We tore the room apart, me cleverly being the one to "look" in the closet. No shirt, AWWWW. She said nothing further, and I sat in the audience, pleased as could be.

She flunked me. It was the only F grade I ever got. AND SO WORTH IT! HAH!

Read More

INTELLECTUAL

I am not one.

I could have been, had my life not been taken over by rock n' roll, pop culture, Spaghetti-O's, and hour upon hour upon hour of "The Beverly Hillbillies." I could have dug deep into the recesses of my brain, and thought much more about Things and Why Things Are They Way They Are And Such and become a true Bulge Brain. But instead I went for the immediate, the flashy, and definitely unsubtle. I did read many classic books, read a newspaper everyday, watched the tv news every night, spent many hours thinking about the workings of the brain, and the chlorophyll in grass, and what went into the genetic mashup of the dachshund. But I am simply not serious enough to be an intellectual. I can ponder and wonder and poke and prod, but then something in my excavations will seem absurd or pointless or hilarious, and I will abandon them forthwith to get some gum or something. Some of this is laziness, but some of it is efficiency.

I have produced papers of intellectual worth, but they weren't worth anything to me, just to the professors that liked that I was able to vomit back their blather. Intellectuals seem to want to go endlessly over their subjects at hand, whether it is literature, music, poli sci, economics, religion blahdeeblah, but nothing ever really seems to come of it other than precious opinions. Is that harsh? Oh, who cares. So much of what passes for intellect is really just the ability to be more convincing in your opinion, as long as you don't actually hit someone in the face because that doesn't count. I like when there is a point to discussion, other than lip-flappery. I like it even more when someone actually does something worthwhile, rather than talk about someone else who has done something worthwhile. There are flappers, and there are doers.

My favorite kind of intellectual conversation is one where the topics keep veering off into unlikely tangents that keep you on your mental tippy-toes. It's easy to spew on topics you are comfortable with, another thing altogether to stay in the ballgame when you are really farm team level. It's fun. It's too easy just to stay in your comfort zone, and I think you end up losing respect for yourself after you've heard yourself deliver the same solid but tired rants a thousand times over. If I think about it, the best things that ever happened to me came out of situations where I was at first deeply uncomfortable, afraid, intimidated, worried, or self-conscious. That is where I find value and growth, not so much in making a checklist of what correct books, movies, political stances, educational experiences, or job choices other people think are right for me to take on. I am delighted to listen to flappery a good deal of the time, if it is given from a passionate and knowledgeable perspective. But I will only take on the things that really resonate with me. Those things I can describe no better than that they are things that feel at home in my brain and my heart, like they always had a place set up there, even if they may at first seem not that way at all. There is the immediate, and there is the considered.

Anyway, my point is that I am really just a goofball. Thank you.

Read More

SNOT

There are some things you see that you never forget. Oh, you may want to, you very well may, but you just never do. They can play over and over in your mind in a loop, clear as when you first vaulted them into several complimentary and interlaced areas of your cortex. This particular event for me I liken to some kind of post-traumatic stress imprint, and I struggle still to comprehend it, but it indeed did happen.

I was around 16 years old, very morosely attending high school in Wisconsin. It was a cloudy, windy, and chilly fall day, one of those that come just way too early and remind you that you will be in Dairy State Antarctica in a month or so. The ground was already dry and dead, the leaves off the trees. I had a few minutes break in-between classes, so I left the fluorescent-light misery of the school halls and went outside to the campus "porch." This is what everyone called it, where all the kids who smoked went outside to light up. Yes, this was condoned by the school, officially. Ha ha, wow, huh? Anyway, all they required was that you kept to the porch and didn't throw the butts on the ground. I was three years away from quitting, never was a big smoker, but smoking was better than being inside school not to mention being a social plus, so I pulled out my pack of Marlboro Greens and my Bic lighter out of my black ski jacket and sucked some smoke in. Wasn't anyone I knew out on the porch that morning, which was kind of strange, so I just stood off by myself near the brick wall of the building, absently watching the other groups of 5 or 6 kids laugh and smoke and talk quickly in the 10 minutes we had before the bell rang.

In front of me and slightly to my right was a group of girls that I didn't really know, standing in a circle. It was the start of cold and flu season, and one otherwise nondescript girl with long stringy sandy brown hair kept coughing and wiping at her nose. I stared a bit at her, thinking how much I did not want to get sick, but knowing there was never any escape. Suddenly, she turned fully away from her group directly towards me, bent halfway over, and let out a tremendous sneeze. At that very instant, the propulsion of the sneeze produced out of one of her nostrils the sight that haunts me to this day. A huge slime-green string of snot, as thick as a jump rope, shot out of her nose a good 2 or 3 feet in length, reaching nearly to the ground as she bent over. In that same fraction of a second, as she sucked air back in, the entire snot rope went completely back into her nose, like a whip that had been uncoiled and retracted by a dungeon master.

I was stunned. She was stunned. I glanced around quickly. No one else was by me or behind me. Only I saw. She stood upright again and looked at me with pale apologetic horror on her face. All I could muster was the weakest, lamest, tiniest smile, trying to apologize as well for witnessing the bountiful booger. She turned back to her group while I stood with my burning cigarette in my fingers, too consumed by what I had just witnessed to finish smoking. The bell rang, shaking me out of my mucus-reverie. I quickly stubbed the smoke out in the big silver ashcan on the porch and followed everyone in the glass double doors into school again.

I never saw her again, never figured out who she was. But her massive snot snake lives with me, in my brain, like some kind of waste product pet. That was really something, I tell ya. Damn.

Read More

STARBUCKS 10

Another rip-off cloudy cool summer morning here. It had better get sunny later or I’m gonna sue one of my neighbors just for fun. The house across the street, the cool log cabin from the ‘30s, is finished being destroyed so a new home like mine that will sit forever overpriced and never sell can be put in its place. I really liked that house. Yes, I know it is my fault it got knocked down. I get it.

Before I start my morning of scanning blurry and damaged photographs into my computer so I can ruin my eyes a little more trying to fix them, I do a Starbucks run, to the one downtown. Of course, this is suburbia, so downtown is really rather tame. I am surprised that traffic is so light this morning. Maybe this is Monday Sleep-In Day and I was uninformed. Ah well. So I park, frown grimly at a car going the wrong way in the parking lot and go inside. It is very busy, for the usual reason – some poor dude getting trained as a barista is slowing it down. I would make a shitty barista because I would feel such pressure to get the drinks out fast that I would throw beans all over and spill 2% milk on the floor and just end up drinking all the drinks myself in a perfectionist panic. I can’t even really make change without feeling like the Wrong Change Police are looking. “Here’s five, ten, fifteen and three cents, ma’am.” “WRONG! YOU SHORTED HER A CENT! FOUR FOUR FOUR!” Then the Wrong Change Police would hit me in the head with a bag of nickels and take me to a bank vault to count pennies while listening to a loop of “Money” by Pink Floyd.

Everyone is cheerily chattering away at the Starbucks, except for a couple of guys who are clearly a little irritated that their drinks are slow in coming up. Interestingly enough, they both ordered short extra-hot lattes. I guess they just want to toss that baby down, like a burning sake or something. Does the trick. There is a pair of elderly sisters with almost identical short squat rectangle bodies. I have déjà vu thinking I wrote about them already at Atrium Starbucks, but maybe that was a different pair of elderly sisters; I am too lazy to go and read back. It’s nice anyway, that sisters go to get coffee together. I am pleased to note that the brush-cut muscle-y lesbian woman running one of the cash registers is proudly growing a new moustache. It is still dubious, but I imagine with time and more hormone therapy it will be looking all Snidely Whiplash in no time.

In front of me is a really truly gorgeous young woman, holding a toddler girl on her tiny hip. She is bird-thin but still with a shape, with expensive jeans that show the slight skeletal bow to her legs. Her long layered dark brown hair is perfectly cut, colored, and styled. Her face is pretty much perfect: gorgeous white smile, pretty green eyes, smooth tan skin, just movie-star pretty, but prettier than that. I think most movie stars are actually sort of odd looking. They all seem to have large heads. Anyway, a slightly older boy comes up to her from a table and starts stamping his feet and whining at her. I looked at her, thinking, oh come ON, she’s got two little kids? Damn. Some people just sail through, huh. But when I hear her say to the boy that he has to wear shorts today because that is what his mommy put out for him to wear, then I get it. Nanny. That’s a dangerous nanny to have there, I say! Later as I walk to my car with my Venti Latte and ham breakfast sandwich, I see her in the parking lot, hugging and kissing a man standing next to a huge shiny black Navigator. Such is suburban life.

Now I am home, watching the orange digger across the street swing back and forth, dumping loads of dirt into a dump truck. The sun came out, so no frivolous lawsuit today. The coffee should perk me up soon. The scanner is warming up, too.

Read More

PIE

GUEST BLOG by Lisas, New York State:

This grandma drives into...and I MEAN INTO...the side of a restaurant one day, walks in like she hasn't moved 3 inches of the foundation, and says, "I'm not very hungry, can I just have a piece of pie?" The waitress laughed at her and says, "You're not hungry because you left here 20 minutes ago from eating a huge lunch!" and the grandma said "OK, can I still have my pie?"

When she went outside to get in her car to drive away, it wouldn't start so she goes back inside to ask my father, who was sitting at the counter, to start it. He walked out, put it in park and turned the key for her.

She never got charged for hitting the building.

Read More

CNN.COM

Might as well be the Enquirer these days.

Read More

SHED

I am pretty certain that one morning soon I am going to wake up and the entire house will be filled, floor to ceiling, with nothing but huge black tufts of dog hair. They will fill my eyes and ears and nose, and I will believe that I have died. I will only know that I have not when a final tuft releases from her body, and the house collapses.

Read More

DRIVE

Anyone who knows me knows that I have Driving Issues. Which is odd, because I really like cars, and I am a decent driver. I just do not want to drive them on any highway, ever, and I am also not a big fan of merging. I need to know exactly, and I mean exactly, where I am going when driving, and furthermore need to do a test run half the time with another driver so I have a visual reference. I did not even get a license until I was 34, and spent at least a year quivering in fear anticipating driving even a few go-the-back-way blocks. But I have made some progress over the years, I really have. If given the out, I won't drive, but I do my thing most days and get the errands done, anyway.

But today, I had a revelation.

I was driving about 40-45mph down a long, slightly-curvy tree-lined road, which was not too busy. It was a perfect day, sunny with bright blue skies, about 80 degrees. I had the windows down and the sunroof open and the radio blasting away. My hair was blowing all around, not unpleasantly, and the sun felt wonderful on my face, and on my arms, one resting on the window, one on the wheel. It occurred to me that I was happy! While driving! A car! I was really digging the whole scene, man, and that was something I think I have never thought while driving. It was just fun, and I wish that the highway interchange had not come up so quickly to clog my zippy little groove with cars filled with suckers getting on the 405 North. I could've just kept going, singing along, enjoying the feel of the car hugging the curves in the road probably at a slightly too-fast rate of speed, all by myself in the car.

Instead, I had to make a determination on how not to get decimated by a semi as I turned left across traffic with no light. My judgment and timing were sound, I and my car lived, to maybe feel happy driving another day.

This was the song I was singing, while sometimes getting my windy hair off my lip glossed lips -- Spacehog's "In The Meantime":

Read More

SMILE

Ah, what is better than a smile? Nothing, really. A smile can change everything. When do new parents fall in love with their babies? Not really right away. They feel protective, curious, fascinated, caring, but they fall in love a few weeks later when the baby offers up a first toothless, goofy grin. Such power, the smile has. It makes people soften, relax, open up, feel accepted. Smiles make more smiles. Not that everyone should be going around smiling all the time. I hate that crap, it’s creepy. Makes you look like a cult member or something.

It’s really not that hard to tell a fake or forced smile from a real one, if you pay attention. It’s all in the eyes. The skin stays flatter, doesn’t crinkle around the eyes, like it was Botoxed. The look in the eyes is the giveaway. There is no sparkle, no warmth, no depth. Go look at a picture of someone smiling and cover it from the nose down with your hand. If you cannot tell from the eyes that the person is smiling, it’s not a real smile. This is a good thing to know. Some people misuse their smiles, which offends me, because I like smiles so much. Some people don’t have much to smile about, and that is the saddest smile to see. Or maybe it is the best, because they keep trying. Both, I guess.

You cannot be in love with someone unless you love his or her smile. The eyes are the window to the soul, and the smile is the Firewire to the heart. The combo is the knock-out punch.

You should probably smile more. It’s free, and it makes you and everyone else feel a little better. You might even make someone’s day, in a small or a big way. Pick up some Whitestrips while you’re out too, eh.

Read More

SCHOOL

Not a fan. Sorry. I am just not a fan of school. I have had a decent amount of years in school and I can confidently say that most of that time would've been better spent chewing gum and staring at cloud patterns. I may in fact do that after I am done writing this, if I can find where the gum is.

I will preface by saying that I am in favor of education, or at least what the educational process should be about. There is tremendous value in opening the mind to all kinds of ideas, facts, perceptions, and opinions that come from all kinds of people. I just don't think that in general the system works. I swear people come out of school more clueless than when they went in, or at least wondering what the hell that was all about. If I get down to what I think should be the outcome of an education, it is this: you should know the basic facts of the world, how it works chemically, financially, historically, socially, etc. You should know how you work, biologically and psychologically. You should know how to work with numbers and words well enough to balance a checkbook, understand mortgage rates, write a resume, read a classic book. But most importantly, school should help you figure out what you are good at, what your passions are, and encourage you and support you in finding a way to combine those to make a living.

I think back to the first day of 1st grade. When dear old Miss Lurvey, who was in her 70s and seemed just incredibly ancient to me, wrote on the blackboard a big letter "A," I thought, "oh no." Oh no no no. She is going to start teaching reading from the letter A. I can remember feeling stunned and so disappointed. Of course, I didn't have any view of what she had to accomplish in a class of 25 kids -- I only thought about that I could already read very well and that this was a nightmare. I didn't think about how most of the kids could not read, and it was her job to teach them. But it was also her job to do something with me, and that didn't happen. I spent almost all my elementary school years in the library, waiting to be called back into the classroom. The only option the school gave my parents was to move me up a few grades, and they declined to do so. My education was a triple fail: the school, my parents, and me. I could have made more of it, asked more of it, and didn't. I was prepared for nothing except to expect less of the world and myself.

Teaching is an incredibly difficult job. Your day never really ends -- you are always planning and thinking and grading and worrying, well past school hours until when you crawl into bed, and often after. You have to try to please the state, the school, the parents, yourself, the students, and we all know you can never please everyone. There isn't one way of teaching that is right for everyone, but educational boxes abound. Really excellent teachers are rare, the natural ones. They just have an intuitive feel of how to present information and how to get it across to each individual. They are undaunted by bad attitudes, learning disabilities, class clowns, ESL students, looming standards tests, and pushy parents. They love what they do, and are energized rather than burnt out by the challenges. There are many very good teachers, that sometimes cannot keep going past the difficulties. There are many mediocre teachers, and there are far too many people that have no business teaching at all. There are many people who would love to teach and would be good at it, but can't live with the low-pay/low-prestige/low-rewards perception. How did we get here? When my mother taught school, teachers were valued and respected members of the community. Do a check right now: when you meet someone for the first time and they tell you they are a teacher, what do you really think?

I know there are some people who thought their educations were pretty good, all in all. I know some feel more like me. A great education is an invaluable, priceless gift. If I could think of a way to deliver that to more people, I'd be pretty damn happy. But first we have to make people believe in education again and make the benefits real. Daunting task.

Read More

HOLLYWOOD 2

Ah, wonderful fate! Here I sit, at The Other Other Coffee Place, after having a Fail Coffee at home using Dunkin' Donuts beans, and who is standing in line in front of me? Mr. Hollywood!! YAY! It took me only a second to recognize him, even from behind. He was chatting up the very pretty young barista: "I think I'm lookin' pretty damn good for 83 years old...most of the old guys I see are all 'eh eh eh eh' but I think I'm still pretty with it, huh?" The girl, of course, gushingly agrees, and I do too. I expect to see Mrs. Hollywood with him, so I glance to my left and there she is, lounging in a somewhat-slatternly way, talking into a pink Blackberry. Oh, YAY!!! I am so happy. I get to find out more!

They are both impeccably dressed again, but not as fancy as before. Mr.Hollywood has on snappy tweed cuffed pants and a striped button-down shirt, shiny bronze loafters, lots of gold rings, and a gold watch this time, and his hair is flatter today and looks unwashed. He has his cane again but doesn't really seem to rely on it much. Mrs. Hollywood, frowning importantly on her cell phone call, has on a tight light pink sweater, and black knit pants, and crosses and uncrosses her legs languidly as she speaks. I see more of her face today, since she is not wearing her sunglasses inside, surprisingly enough. She kind of looks like a cat, and you could see that back in the day she was just cute as can be. She has no doubt had a couple of face lifts and is seriously botoxed, which may account for the cat look, but she's had better work done than most I've seen. I have determined that there is a strong possibility that her long gray super-styled hair is a wig.

I'm trying not to be too obvious in looking at them, but I am probably failing. Something in Mrs. Hollywood's gaze tells me she is used to being looked at. Hmm.

AH HA! Another clue! The tall hunky guy barista that works here sometimes goes up and speaks to them while he is on the phone. Grandkid? That's how the Hollywoods found this place! Now they are both taking calls, Hollywood-style. I can't hear what they are saying over the coffee grinder and the music. It's probably better that I imagine.

I like the Hollywoods. They class up the joint, yo.

Read More

RAY

Random things I like about Ray Davies:

• I like that he likes to work, even though he doesn't have to.
  
• I like that when he talks to you, he looks you right in the eye.
• I like that he is bright, but doesn't make a big deal about it.
• I like that he is often gracious, even when it is not expected.
• I like that he has taken care of himself enough over the years to still do an amazing split leap onstage. And still totally rocks the black drainpipe jeans.
  
• I like that he thinks a sense of humor and music go together.
• I like that he observes at all times. There isn't a moment when he is not processing.
  
• I like that his voice is as good or better than it ever was.
• I like that he is feisty.
• I like his smile very much.
• I like that he is an oddball.
• I like watching other people react to being near him. Even people who do not know who he is. Ray Davies helped to make me an observer.
  
• I like Ray Davies, despite his many weirdnesses and flaws.

Ray is like a charismatic Uncle that I don't see very often, that no one will never know very well, but always leaves the family with lots of good stories to tell after he goes.

OK, I will get back to work now.

Read More

CONCERT

It is completely impossible to attend a rock concert without experiencing some level of Concert Attending Assholery. I don’t know why or how I keep getting surprised by this. I have long long years of dealing with all manners of rock n’ roll rectums -- boors, clods, idiots, dipshits, you name it -- yet I keep thinking that it will stop. Of course, it never does. It does not seem to matter a whole lot who is playing, seats vs. no seats, a bar or a theatre. Assholes everywhere. And I am no shitty uptight concert-goer , either! I am very appropriately enthusiastic, but I always keep in mind there are OTHER PEOPLE THERE. OMG, being considerate at a rock show? WHUUUTTT?

Here were the latest sphincters, from last night’s wonderful Ray Davies show in Seattle:

The Giant Completely Wasted Dude: Oh, you know him. You do. He is at every show, everywhere. For all I know, he is at a chamber music show as well. Now you tell me: what would inspire someone attending a mainly acoustic concert given by a British man in his 60s to get so drunk out of his skull that he could barely stand? WOOO! WOOOO! WOOO! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!! That is the call of the Giant Completely Wasted Dude. Oh, and he knows what to do, he does. He knows that he can stand right in front of everyone, even if he doesn’t have a seat, because he is huge and lumbering and moves in frightening lurching ways. Dude was so gone that he pressed his ear against the PA stack for most of the show, while he played heavy and detailed air guitar, and fisted the air and screamed during the quietest moments. Ray was speaking to the crowd about a recent serious injury when Dude decided his overwhelming love for Ray was so important to express that he tried to interrupt by lunging at the stage, then farted incomprehensibly out of his piehole, “YEAH! MAN! LOLA! EL-OH-EL-AY! HLKDHFLKHLADKSFH! WOOOO! RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY! WOOOOOOOOO!”Fortunately, Ray is a total pro and helped us all out. He looked at the guy and said, “Oh, so you’re the guy who shot me?” The audience broke out in laughter and Dude slightly melted and retreated back to his eardrum-shattering PA position. Thanks, Ray.

The Smelly Hippie: Sat down cross-legged in front of me about mid-show with a book in his hand, and his filthy fingers keeping place on a page. What, was he going to stand up and start reading to Ray? It took about three seconds before his stale stench assaulted me. It was the smell of no bath, no laundry, no deodorant, and with every breath I took it felt like razors in my throat and a homeless shelter in my nose. SOAP AND WATER ARE CHEAP, SIR! USE THEM! He left after about 30 minutes. My throat still hurts.

The Old Elaine Dancer: Again, I am all for enthusiasm. Nobody loves music more than yours truly, and I understand sometimes you just have to get up and move. However, when you are in the front row, you are well into your 50s and should not be smoking so much pot anyway, please think about how the audience feels when you stand up and start jerking around like you have epilepsy, especially when no one else is standing in the entire theatre. If you were 20 and totally hot, you would get somewhat of a pass, however.

The Clueless Completely Wasted Superfan: Beware the single-seat dude who carries a full backpack into a show filled with cds and records and pens. This is a bad, bad combo. He had the seat right in front of me. Of course he did. He sat quietly, if wavering, in his seat for awhile then started obsessively fussing with the contents of the backpack. He finally settled on bringing out a cd and a Sharpie, then started getting excited. He did the fist-pump and the chicken neck thing where the neck is extended out and back as if he were a rooster strutting, and the Random Yell, similar to Dude above. All of a sudden, Superfan decides it is time to Stand. He barely makes it to his feet, clutching onto his cd. No one else is standing. He keeps standing for a REALLY LONG TIME, completely blocking me. Was he thinking Ray was going to stop in the middle of the show to sign the cd? Something had to be done. I know well from past dealings that there is no telling a very high person to do anything rational. My revenge would have to take another form. I was going to pull his chair back so that when he did sit down he would completely fall, but then I thought no, he would also fall on me. I looked over at my Teen. He is Evil, like me, and we communicated with no words. He took a mighty slug from his water bottle, and in one perfectly-aimed arc, spit it out onto Superfan’s seat, not a drop to the floor. When Superfan finally sits, we laugh together in mightily-restrained shoulder-shaking delight. A short while later, he leaves, never returns, and a teen boy takes his seat, thrilled at his good luck.

EDIT: Here we go, Giant Completely Wasted Dude included!

Read More

NAILED

What an intrusive day. I had my annual checkup this morning, so was prodded, poked, scraped, smashed, and questioned. I am such a good patient. I do not flinch, leap, pass out, or whine. I do all the proper exams, I exercise and eat right, don’t really drink, no drugs, no smoke, no nothing. Goddamn, I RULE! The best part was that the doctor’s scale made me weigh 4 pounds less than home, which is UNHEARD OF. I will put up with the Pancake-ing of the Breasteses for that, oh yes.

After stopping at Starbucks for breakfast to actually break my fast because I had a blood draw, I took A Child to the dentist and then went to get my nails done. I cannot recall the last time I was in a nail shop where the technicians were not Asian. This is not a novel observation of course – the episode of Seinfeld where Mr. Constanza starts speaking Korean in the nail shop is vurrry funny. But I do wonder why it is. I always imagine that the women doing my nails were once doctors and engineers and lawyers but cannot get work in the US doing that, so they do nails. I stopped wondering what they are talking about to each other, though. I hope it is catty and funny. If I were a lawyer living in a foreign country, couldn’t speak the language, and had to pick out nasty stuff from women’s toes all day to make a living, I would really need to just slam on clients in incomprehensible-to-them English nonstop, pretty much. You can’t blame anyone for that.

The girl I had today was cuticle obsessed – she picked and poked and clipped them with an intensity that was impressive. I zoned out while she oiled and filed and soaked and all, until she pointed at the top of my right hand, and said with a concerned voice, “Oh! OK?” She had noticed that I had burnt my hand. I told her I was fine, and smiled. She put some lotion on my hands, gently, then got a warm white towel, clasped my hands together, wrapped the towel around them, then wrapped her hands around mine. I looked up at her, and she looked at me and said, brokenly, “I hope your hand and inside heal better,” and smiled.

Well.

She painted my nails a lovely deep pink, and waved goodbye to me as I left the shop.

Read More

HA 6

When you are playing pretend with your five-year-old daughter and she offers you, straight-faced, the "souffle of awesomeness," something is right with the world.

Read More