The Thread Where I Post Stuff That I Just Happen To Really Like

Every once in awhile, I find little things that put a smile on my face and I like to share them. Some of these things don't really fit into any neat classifications, so I'm just going to chuck them here.

__________________
Review: Cabin in the Woods 8/10

This is part of a letter I got from a great friend though, and I wanted to save it, and thought it might make interesting reading for at least the older posters here.

Speaking for myself – as I got close to age 40, I realized that investing in my own identity/ quality of my life and future was an unavoidable priority. That meant putting away my parent’s expectations, putting down other’s (Jim) baggage that I had been carrying, taking the time to fully enjoy my friends and interests – (with or without a partner), and dammit…….just having FUN.
What some people would simplistically label “a mid-life crisis” is the realization that you cannot continue to do things the same way for the rest of your life. It’s simply a life evaluation of where you are at.

Jim tends to position himself as a “victim” going through life….waiting for good things to happen and bemoaning the bad things, and not DOING anything about either.

I started realizing that life isn’t something that you wait to “happen” TO you, i.e. weekends, more money, parties, and vacations. You make life happen, and if it’s fun and you’re comfortable and happy in your own skin, its because you made it happen that way.

And yes, after working on that philosophy for 7-8 years, along came Dave. What an absolute gift. But if I had not been in that “place” [that I had actively worked to practice], my relationship with Dave never would have happened as it did.

In other words, “when life hands you lemons…..ask for Tequila and salt.”

50 Things I Hate

1. Phoney people.
2. Racism., including "reverse".
3. When I forget to spot treat my laundry.
4. "Your call has been dropped."
5. The cost of flying.
6. Crabgrass.
7. Mosquitoes.
8. Whoever stole my bike.
9. Whoever stole my car stereo and music.
10. Lipstick that bleeds.
11. People who don't do their jobs.
12. Screaming whitey "music".
13. Ingrown toenails.
14. Addiction-induced behaviours.
15. Liars.
16. Crumbly wine-corks.
17. Things that grow in shower stalls.
18. People who yell at other drivers.
19. Piss-poor grammar by choice.
20. That teachers aren't paid more.
21. That I'M not paid more.
22. Whiney, needy, boring people.
23. Bush. (GW)
24. That I didn't know who Gavin Rossdale was when I talked to him online.
25. Bad remakes of good songs.
26. Spiders. I don't care that they kill other bugs.
27. That I can't see without corrective lenses.
28. Untimely death.
29. Glitches where I lose a longass PM or post.
30. How fast food spoils.
31. That I lost touch with Kathleen.
32. When they discontinue the perfect shade of lipstick.
33. When people leave their clothes in public laundry machines.
34. Indecision.
35. Being eaten by scarabs.
36. "I did a modified Atkins (that I made up) and it didn't work. Atkins is a scam."
37. That bottled water often costs more than soda.
38. When filmmakers butcher good books.
39. When people dismiss the experience of others.
40. Hornets. What is the point, there??
41. The necessity of drug interaction precautions.
42. Gender-bashers.
43. Pantyhose.
44. Inefficiency.
45. That piano bars have turned into sports bars.
46. Number of channels I can get without cable: 0.
47. When I can't remember something I learned.
48. People who take potshots at celebrities.
49. The flypaper people who try to keep you from cancelling a service.
50. Verbal hiccups.


50 Things I Love
1. Colored pens.
2. The smell of white carnations.
3. High-pressure systems.
4. Terry Gilliam.
5. The gift of someone cooking for me.
6. That my eyes are the same color as my father's.
7. Dry humor.
8. Integrity.
9. When friends call.
10. When my neice wants to talk to Auntie Cindy.
11. Colored glass.
12. Dr Pepper Lipgloss.
13. Maxfield Parrish's art.
14. Thank you cards.
15. Breezy songs in french.
16. amazon.com
17. Talking with intelligent, opinionated people.
18. Stone henges.
19. Old houses.
20. Light perfumes.
21. Arriving on time.
22. Men who can play the piano.
23. The satisfaction of my curiosity.
24. Keeping secrets.
25. Learning new things.
26. Artfully designed utility items.
27. Soft, flowing skirts.
28. Google.
29. Pulled meats and sweet tea.
30. Singing with friends.
31. The luxury of a manicure/pedicure.
32. Sending/recieving packages in the mail.
33. John Stewart.
34. Good writing.
35. Great sex.
36. Home cooking.
37. Mountains.
38. Night swimming.
39. Skilled singing: Fiona Apple, Eva Cassidy, Amalia Rodriguez, Phoebe Snow...
40. How much easier this list is to make.
41. Torani French Vanilla sugar free syrup.
42. When the underdog wins.
43. Sensuality.
44. Wearing sandals in February.
45. Earthquakes.
46. Irony. Which will come in handy when I die in an earthquake.
47. Driving long distances.
48. Figuring out how to do something.
49. Those rare plants that I don't kill immediately.
50. Finishing huge projects.

__________________

Potato Soup for One

wash and dice 1 med-lg potato
dice a small onion
put both in a saucepan and cover with water, about 1 cup
add salt and pepper
bring to a boil and cook, covered for 10 min, reduce heat.

in a separate saucepan:
melt 2T butter
stir in 2T flour til smooth
pour in 1/4 half and half
gradually add 1/2 c shredded sharp cheddar cheese
stir in about 1 teaspoon spicy mustard

Once the cheese sauce thickens, stir it into the potatoes without draining off the water. Let the whole mix cook long enough to thicken a little. Enjoy.

Can be topped with bacon bits, chives, cheddar cheese croutons, what have you.

bwah!!!

Slovenija

I happened across this photo by way of Google, and have been using it for a desktop wallpaper for a month or so now. I decided, before taking it down, to send it to my friend, Johnny da Priest, because I guessed that the name of the file, "Slovenija" meant "Slovenia" and he is of slovenian descent.

Here, for your coffee break, are the photo and his response.

Yes, that's Slovenia (or Slovenija - j's have a Y sound in Slovenian.) And in fact I was there. They don't allow motor boats out on this lake which is just as blue in person as it is in that picture. So men row you out to this island in boats that look similar to the gondolas in Venice.

The lake is called Lake Bled. Tradition says that a young shepherd boy was treated poorly by the people of the valley and he climbed up on the hill and cried and prayed for the intercession of the Blessed Virgin. Mary, hearing his please began to cry and as the boy slept, her tears filled the valley. Sweet story - but if you think about it, now the kid is trapped on an island and all the people in the valley are dead. Nice. Doesn't pay to think too much.

Anyway, the building is a monastary. (Slovenia is 85% Catholic.) During hte communist era it was turned into a museum (as were many of the Catholic churches confiscated by the communist goverment.) More recently the churches have been given back to the people but this one by and large, though restored, is mostly for tourists still.

While we were visiting the church, a man in a tuxedo walked in, white, sweating, and shaking. He collapsed into a pew. Then a bride came in in full white viel and train looking merry as can be. This was not a good sign for the beginning of a marriage. Well, as it turns out, it was not to be a wedding, there were already married just an hour earlier. However, it is a tradition in these parts that after you marry, you go to this island and the groom (in this case, a little skinny guy) carrys his bride (in this case, a 'healthy' girl) ALL THE WAY up from the shore line, up the hill, to the chapel. Then they ring the chapel bell for good luck. Poor guy.

It's also a tradition that visitors pull the rope for the bell and if it rings, that means you will come back.

Do you see the building up on the hill in the background? That's a castle. It's said that the (Duke? I'll use that term for now) drowned in this lake and that the dutches was so sad she had a bell cast as a gift for the monastary and as it was being shipped across the lake, a storm capsized the boat and the bell was lost. (This lake is sounding like bad news.) She didn't have many resources left and so gave of her jewelry or whatever to have cast into a second bell in memory of her husband. Hence the big connection to marriage and love etc. . .

I was there at night once for a big festival. All the resturaunts saved their egg shells and they put vigil candles in them and the gondolas glided across the lake letting boxes full if these candles out to float about and soon there was little distinction from the lights on the water and the stars in the sky. Then fireworks were set off from the castle. It's one of my favorite memories.

Haha! XD

Regarding Cats

I've always had a way with cats. Once, as a child, I was stampeded by a herd of kittens, giggling my head off the whole time, and it's been a love-affair ever since. I once charmed a feral cat into letting me pet it. Cats who are usually aloof come to me for petting and sit guarding my chair.

Not so, Sophia Loren. I got this cat a year ago January from a shelter. She'd been pretty friendly while we were at the pound, and that first day I brought her home she was very sweet. That must have been panic, combined with the aftereffects of the anesthesia from her spaying that morning. She quickly turned cold and aloof. She would greet me at the door, but not sit on the couch with me. If I picked her up, she'd purr as long as I was walking around, but if I sat down she exited stage left.

She has had rituals where she'll come over and be petted at a distance for a few seconds, but she mainly spent the last year across the room from me, staring as if trying to make me burst into flames. Slowly, she's adjusted. Her little petting rituals have proliferated very gradually. When the weather turned cold in December, she started sleeping on the far side of my queen-sized bed, no nearer.

This has all been in disappointing, stark contrast to my last kitty, who had to be touching me at all times barring the shower. I've felt guilty for comparing them, but at the same time, I really missed having a cat curl up on my lap. Until today, that is. Fifteen months after bringing her home, Sophia curled up on my lap today and purred. So did I.

My clock radio went off at 6:00am and I heard Danny Bonaduce sounding absolutely serious and shaken, saying, "this is the worst thing I've ever seen." I fought to wake up, wondering what he was talking about. "Tragedy", "devastation", "plane hit such a huge building..." I was sifting through the words listening for the "where" and they said "a second plane has hit the World Trade Center". My immediate thought was of Kathleen, my friend in Manhattan. I was out of bed, into the living room and turned on the tv to see the footage of the second plane hitting. They were saying it was terrorism... speculating about the number of dead and injured. I sat glued to the tv until they announced the Pentagon hit. My friend (since age 17) Paul is a White House lawyer and I got really scared that he was there. A little while later, they said the White House was being evacuated, admid phrases like " country under attack", "at war" and speculation that these were just the first of many attacks that we could expect across the nation that day.

I was really scared and worried about my friends, but I kept it together until I got a call from my mom. Hearing her frayed nerves in her shaky voice and knowing she was alone for this (Dad had died 5 months earlier) was really upsetting. I called work and canceled the marketing we had planned for that morning. I went in and spent much of the morning watching the big-screen tv in the activities room and crying. We had an emergency meeting to discuss how to keep patients and staff as safe as possible, should there be a loss of power at the nursing home.

I remember ordering middle eastern food that day at lunch, and wondering how much backlash the local transplants could expect.

When I got home that evening, I had email from Paul. He said he had walked out of the White House, seen the Pentagon in flames and took off for home. It took him hours, as he stopped in electronics stores to get updates on what was going on, and he had to walk the whole way. His email asked that someone get a message to his mom in Ohio that he was ok and for his lover to please call him.

It was 5 days before I found out that Kathleen was ok. She had been in Ohio at the time of the attack. By the time I learned this, I had more or less given her up for dead, and called her mom to find out for sure what had happened. Kath answered the phone.

Another friend was in one of the towers, but went out for a smoke before their meeting and it saved his life. He moved to the woods of "New Hampster" and hasn't worked in the city since.

I had to quit the job at the nursing home, and was unemployed for 10 months, after. I could not get a job in marketing, and when I took the job I have now, it was in desperation. I have not recovered financially from the 10 months with no work. But I consider myself pretty lucky. I didn't lose anyone close to me.

The most important change in my life is that I learned that life can end at any moment, and to make sure that those I love know I love them.

I thought this was hilarious, and just want to save it.


Dear Tide:

I am writing to say what an excellent product you have!

I've used it all through my married life, as my Mom always told me it was the best.

Now that I am in my fifties, I find it even better! In fact, about a month ago, I spilled some red wine on my new white blouse. My inconsiderate and uncaring husband started to berate me about how clumsy I was, and generally started becoming a pain in the neck.

One thing led to another and somehow I ended up with a lot of his blood on my white blouse. I tried to get the stain out using a bargain detergent, but it just wouldn't come out. After a quick trip to the supermarket, I purchased a bottle of liquid Tide with bleach alternative, and to my surprise and satisfaction, all of the stains came out!

In fact, the stains came out so well the detectives who came by
yesterday told me that the DNA tests on my blouse were negative and then my attorney called and said that I would no longer be considered a suspect in the disappearance of my husband.

What a relief! Going through menopause is bad enough without being a murder suspect! I thank you, once again, for having such a great product.

Well, gotta go. I have to write a letter to the Hefty bag people . .

from a blog I kept, 9/1/04

So, I went to happy hour last night with Jenny Down the Hall. We've talked of this many times, but this was the first time we actually went. It was nice to be out, had a good conversation and some tastey cocktails - Gary the Bartender is my hero. We get ready to leave and I put on my Dr Pepper lipgloss while we're talking. I say nothing about it, and my hand was covering most of the label. About a minute later, she says "are you wearing Dr Pepper lipgloss"?? This made me laugh, as, if you've ever worn the stuff, you know it has a distinctive aroma - sweet but not too sweet. It was highly cool to have, circa 1982, either a tube of Dr Pepper, or one of those metal boxes with the antique-type label. I had some then, and when I saw it recently in a store, I had to stifle a yelp of pleasant suprise, and bought some immediately. I pull the tube out of my purse and hand it to her and Jenny inhales deeply, and starts singing "Like A Virgin". ha!! Funny, after a conversation about sex and divorce and careers, the bonding moment was over the Dr Pepper lipgloss.

I've never been much for sweets. They're nice, but after a bite or two, I'm done. And after several bites, I feel sort of nauseated and hectic and I want to melt out of the place.

Even as a child, I never enjoyed Circuis Peanuts or Peeps... all that whipped-up synthetic froth and a taste so overblown that it seemed determined to turn my head inside out, rather than please the palette. Such things made my jaw ache.

I know... I'm weird. My brother used to call me 'Lola Granola', after the Breathed character, because I asked for trail mix in my plastic Easter eggs, rather than candy. I know sugar is supposed to be this amazing thing. I've heard the hype. I have friends who get such cravings for sweets that they'll go out wandering the darkening streets like Lestat on the hunt, until they find the non-pariel of their heart's desire. I'd just as soon not.

When I was a teenager, my idea of the perfect dessert was a slice of bread: 7 grain bread with butter and the merest layer of blackberry jam. Blackberries grew on a single vine that embraced the snowball bush in the front yard of my childhood. They were intrinsic: blackberries knew my most successful disappearances in games of hide and go seek. They were organic: no one fertilized those berries. They grew of their own accord, with no plan and no notion of what a blackberry vine was supposed to be except that pattern buried within the vine itself. Most important to me though: blackberries... taste like blackberries. They're sweet, but they're also tart and sharp, with mellow undertones and they're deep-purple-tasting. Eat one. You will taste the deep purple. All you have to do is pay attention.

My preferencess about love run along similar lines. Oh, I like to taste the pretty confections, the valentines and poetry and all the trimmings. Those whipped up and frothy exchanges are not sustaining for me, though. In short order, the complications cloy and I get that same hectic feeling and I want out.

I want a love like the blackberry vine: not forced, only occasionally pruned, and allowed to grow according to its own internal dictates. I want the love of that person who truly knows and understands me... and loves me anyway. I crave the array of flavors in the deep purple, blackberry, 7-grain love.

Five years later, travel-weary and self-conscious of her own probable irrelevance, the Apology arrived, past a decent hour for visiting, but in such matters, Time holds little sway. Her identity was obscured as she made her way up my path, or I’d likely have sicced the dogs on her.

Along the way, she had acquired small gifts, which she unfolded slowly, over the span of three hours’ conversation. From a dusty scrapbook, she peeled the memory of Tenderness and offered it to me with a tentative hand. My copy had been lost, and hers was from a slightly different angle, but in the familiar lines and bright spots, we shared for the first time our common memories. In a pocket near her breast, she had kept a dog-eared Truth, the cover of which - a hard film of Regret - had worn small calluses on her skin, which she had the Grace to bear not as a blemish, but a battle-scar.

Her most amazing gift was a simple idea she had picked up along the way, compelled by the luminescence of its smooth surface. She’d slid it almost absently into the pocket of her coat, and it had served as a touchstone for her. She couldn’t have known its value to me… how I’d been searching for it and how much it soothed my mind as my fingers ran over the cool surface of the compact Philosophy she passed on to me.

In exchange for these gifts, I offered Admiration for her five years’ journey, but she would accept nothing more than a mention of Gratitude. As we said goodnight though, I slipped a measure of Respect into her bag, and the Hope that her burdens would be lighter for the trouble she took.

from 6/13/03.

My step-dad married my mom when I was 2. We did not hit it off. Our relationship was strained at best for most of my life. I used to dread Father's Day, because I'd have to go read all those cards... "thanks for being there for me, Dad", "thanks for all the times you..." and try to find one that just made a joke about some vague thing. I always felt so gypped. For four years in my 20's, we didn't speak at all.

After that, we kind of started over. We still had our issues, and my friend Robin and I had long talks about our crazy parents. She was working on a play about her relationship with her mom and we were planning to do a staged-reading at one of the theaters in Hollywood. The play was called "Lift" and one of the characters was a little girl who dealt with her abusive mother by retreating to her attic room and drawing horses on the walls. The little girl could never get the legs right though, and they always appeared unfinished. I thought this was a brilliant metaphor for that feeling of not being able to move on that can haunt you long after you leave the abusive situation.

In January of '01, my mom had been having serious health problems and finally was diagnosed as having had a fairly impressive heart attack. She was life-flighted from their home in Az to Phoenix for an emergency quadruple bypass. I dropped everything in LA and went to Phoenix. Even after all the crap years, I couldn't stand the thought of Dad sitting there alone while Mom was in surgery, or if something went wrong.

We stayed with 'internet friends' of mine in Phoenix, and had a lot of time to talk during the week after the surgery. One morning in the car, he asked me about my acting and was saying that I needed to get back to that. I told him that as a kid, I had really needed acting, because it was a way of getting approval from people, but that as an adult, I had outgrown some of that, and I just didn't feel the drive to do it anymore. At that point, he said something unlike anything he had ever said to me. He told me that he knew that I didn't get the approval that I probably wanted from him, but that he had always been proud of me. (I ****** near wrecked the car from shock.) I told him about the play that I was in, and that Robin had been gracious enough to let me play 'her' in it. He liked the horse metaphor, too. He was glad to hear I was going to perform, and that 'approval' stuff.. what do you know? It's ok.

Mom got better, they went home, I came back to LA... and 8 weeks later, Dad was fixing the plumbing under their house and died of a ruptured anneurism. I again dropped everything and went back to Az to help my mom get her things together. I called Robin on my way out of town to give her a heads-up, because this was only 3 weeks before the show. She called me mid-week to see how things were and if I thought I'd still be able to do the show. I told her I thought it was the thing to do.

Going through a box of old stuff, I had found, among Dad's things, a painting of running horses, their legs obscured by the dust, looking unfinished.

Copy: My shoulders aren't dainty or proportional to my hips. Some say they are like a man's. I say, leave men out of it. They are mine. I made them in a swimming pool then I went to yoga and made my arms.


Copy: My knees are tomboys. They get bruised and cut every time I play soccer. I'm proud of them and wear my dresses short. My mother worries I will never marry with knees like these. But I know there's someone out there who will say to me: I love you and I love your knees. I want the four of us to grow old together.


Copy: My butt is big and round like the letter C and then thousand lunges have made it rounder but not smaller. And that's just fine. It's a space heater for my side of the bed. It's my ambassador. To those who walk behind me, it's a border collie that herds skinny women away from the best deals at clothing sales. My butt is big and that's just fine. And those who might scorn it are invited to kiss it.

18. People who yell at other drivers.






I guess U would not like me very much I yell at other "idiot" drivers all the time, but they cannot hear me, so I am not sure why it maters. I only yell at those totally disobeying the law however. Red light runners and people who think the world is an ashtray and throw their butts out the window. The BASTARDS!!!!

__________________

“The gladdest moment in human life, methinks, is a departure into unknown lands.” – Sir Richard Burton

ha! It seems like that item makes more people shift in their seats than any other. I just don't like being trapped in a car with a driver who is coming unhinged over other drivers.

It really has nothing to do with other "drivers" so much as it has to do with people who have no reguard for simple respect. I work hard and I know life is too short to let the "little" things bother me, but God do I hate people with "I am the center of the Earth" mentality....bleh...