It's a Jungle in Here

So, I lugged all the plants indoors yesterday. Including those on Satan's balconey. It's a good thing I've built a little muscle mass on the Bow Flex. It's 34 degrees right now and the forecast calls for lower temperatures tomorrow.

I've learned my lesson. No plants on the balconey before Easter ever again.

Meanwhile, I'm having a sinking spell since I envisioned all my vacation activities taking place with me wearing sandals in balmy spring weather. Not so much in temperatures at the freeze point and below.

Feeling punky, I called Satan just now who speculated that the weather would likely rebound by the time I return to work on Monday.

No! Don't try and make me feel better!

I'm considering cheering myself up by organizing my linen closet.

I know, I am completely wild and crazy.

I was inspired by an article at Real Simple this morning. It is so appealing to think of all my sheets, napkins and towels in neat little rows. With labels! They even know how to fold a fitted sheet over at Real Simple.

I caught on to this website six or eight months ago (and probably several years after the rest of the world) and have even subscribed to the magazine. Just reading about being organized makes me feel better. Also, watching other people get organized in various TV shows like "Mission Organization" or Clean House makes me feel better. And I do watch these shows endlessly (much to Satan's chagrin).

I have to say, it never ceases to amaze me how the clients in these shows never seem to be ashamed of their incredibly messy, dirty, and disorganized homes. I'm not saying I've never suffered from these afflictions myself (because, Lord knows I have and do), I'm just saying that nothing would cure me faster than knowing a television crew was going to be showing up at my front door anytime soon.

I'd be all,

"The 'Clean House' crew is coming to help clean and organize my home! Fantastic!"

And then I'd frantically clean and organize my home before they got there.

Of course, none of the clutter victims profiled ever do this or they wouldn't have a show. I saw an episode early on where they were re-doing this woman's bedroom and, along with an endless supply of empty cat food cans (in her BEDROOM), there was actual cat poop in the floor.

NOT in a litter box, oh no. ON the carpet.

Cat. Poop.

On national television. In her bedroom.

Personally? If that were me? And millions of viewers had just witnessed a pile petrified cat turds next to my bed in the floor of the room WHERE I SLEEP? I would then just go and quietly hang myself in the barn. They would find me swinging from the a rafter with a note pinned to my chest that would read, "Sorry about the cat sh--".

Not this woman, though. She was all giggling and shrugging her shoulders and like, "Yes! I sure do love my cat!"

Ahem.

And here I should point out that I wasn't so upset by all this that I changed the channel or anything. Nope!

Perhaps that's the point of these shows. So people like me can sit sprawled on their couch, eating ice cream out of the tub, congratulating themselves on the fact that, while sure, there are beachball sized tumbleweeds of dog fur blowing about the house, and their fitted sheets are wadded up and stuffed in the closet between an old Twister game and a set of hot rollers circa 1979, and there MAY BE a couch under that pile of clothes the master bedroom (who can remember?), there are CERTAINLY NO CAT TURDS on the floor.

Of course, we don't have an indoor cat, either.

But, that's not the point, now is it?

Let the Vacation Begin

I've just celebrated the beginning of my five-day vacation by enjoying a nice rainstorm on my porch. Which is good since, come tomorrow, I will have to haul all the delicate plants I dragged OUT on the porch two weeks ago back IN since the forecast is now calling for temperatures below freezing beginning tomorrow night and lasting through Friday.

None too happy about that.

I took the most delightful quiz today at the Newsweek site, and I insist that all of you take it too (this means you too Mom and Dad). It's a baby boomer car quiz and I scored a 60%. I quickly fowarded the test on to Satan who claims to have scored a 70%. This from a man who you probably won't be surprised to learn is FATALLY competitive.

Here's where you can find the quiz. E-mail me your score or leave it in the comments. Here's hoping somebody bests Satan!

Have I mentioned I'm working out on the BowFlex?

No?

I'm working out on the BowFlex. Have been since February.

Boy, is it miserable. I think they advertise the program as twenty minutes a day? Not quite. My work-out program took me an hour and a half to accomplish when I first started it due in large part to the amount of time it took to configure the equipment to each exercise. Now that I've gotten the hang of it, I can complete my routine in an hour exactly since I'm much quicker at configuring.

I will say that I'm seeing and feeling results very quickly. I've always read that working with weight is the quickest and most effective way of whipping yourself into some kind of shape, and this is proving to be true. I notice I have way more stamina and am noticeably stronger already. I know I need to incorporate some sort of aerobic training into my routine (Frankentraining, for instance) but, dang, I'm just too whiney right now. Sheesh.

Lastly, I must report that mine and Satan's most exiciting video viewing of late has been, uncharacteristically, had on cable television, a Sunday night series called Planet Earth. This eleven part series took five years to film and is the planetary equivalent of "Blue Planet". Through some HD photographic innovations that would make Marlin Perkins weep, this program brings the natural world to life in a way that I've never quite experienced before. I recommend watching and even buying it without reservation. See a video sample here.

Pwetty!

I came home from work today to find these lovely pink Hydrangeas on my kitchen counter, a present from Christina, who resumed her travels this afternoon by heading east.

I am tired today, too tired. It must be all the pollen in the air.

My Mom sent me a quote today that I enjoyed so much, I have to share it with you:

A woman who writes feels too much, those trances and portents!

As if cycles and children and islands weren’t enough;

as if mourners and gossips and vegetables were never enough.

She thinks she can warn the stars.

A writer is essentially a spy.

Dear love, I am that girl.

From “The Black Art” by Anne Sexton

*sniff!*

And now, I suggest you go ahead on and enjoy the latest writing of her very own from my Mom, Blue Waltz.

[This spacing problem with Blogger is driving me to utter MADNESS! Rest assured I have not lost the ability to know when to add a paragraph break. It's a Blogger glitch. AND A VERY ANNOYING ONE AT THAT.]

Another Gorgeous Sunday

Today could not be a more perfect spring day.

We awoke some time around nine, and ran into a favorite neighbor, Mark, as we took the dogs out for a morning potty. Mark joined us briefly for coffee and conversation.

After that, we lollygagged on the balconies enjoying the breeze. This put us inevitably into the gardening notion, and so we took ourselves off to Wal-Mart where we stocked up on a few necessities such as my soon-to-be-potted herb garden pictured above. The plants are (from left): Lavender, thyme, sweet basil, and rosemary. Also, I could not resist a small hyacinth. Satan bought two Mexican heather plants to be used in his annual "Kill-a-Mexican-heather Ritual". (He doesn't mean to do it, but it always seems to happen that way).

For lunch, I improvised a very spicey chicken taco conconction cosisting of chicken along with tomatillas, corn, and onions served on very righteous low-carb whole wheat tortillas. If only we had some salsa.

Later, we will go to Mark's for dinner.

If only every day could be a spring Sunday.

Oh, also! In a completely different vein! I have recently embarked on a crusade to get William Sledd who is already a utube phenom, and continues to teeter on the verge of world-wide fashion domination, to make a personal appearance at our local neighborhood festival. William has most recently been featured on the blog of Suze Schwartz, who is editor-at-large of Glamour magazine. Wow!

Don't let the picture fool you....

...these two are never this still of their own free will. They are temporarily trying to sit and be good in the frantic, panting hope that they will receive the Milk Bones I am dangling above my head. The Milk Bones, in fact, are what they both are staring at so intently.

Lokie, the black dog (a lab), belongs to Christina, our house guest. You'd think this would be a wonderful opportunity for FurGirl to bond with and play with one of her own kind. But no. FurGirl, in fact, doesn't know she is a dog. When Lokie tries to play and/or roughhouse with her, she looks at him like WTF? Sometimes she runs over to me as if to say, "Mommie! There's this black furry thing with four legs? It sniffs me? What is it and why is it bothering me? Help! Also, do you happen to have bacon?"

Last night, during a particularly aggressive attempt at playing by Lokie, FurGirl startled us all by raring up and giving a loud, vicious big-girl bark. This is a sound I've only ever heard her make a couple of times before in her whole life, in times of extreme agitation, usually when she feels threatened or thinks I am threatened.

You can see FurGirl is freshly shorn and sporting her warm weather hair-do. You can see her actual pink skin through the fur on her chest. She LOVES to be shorn and is, I think, spoiled on it, to the point that she goes around panting pathetically at the first sign of warm weather if she has a thick coat of fur.

Satan is off again out of town again--woohoo! Christina and I, in a fit of christian charity, spent the morning tidying up Satan's balconey and then moving his plants outside for him. He HAS been awfully busy lately.

I continue to suffer through a series of sinus headaches no doubt brought on by the incredibly high mold count coupled with the thick pollen floating through the air.

Ouch.

Special Delivery...

It's heeeeere!

Yep, that is all or most of the loot I ordered from e.l.f. (eyes/lips/face) cosmestics as discussed in my post of March 24th. I speculated that, at a dollar each, the cosmetics would most likely be sample sized. And I don't know if you can tell from the picture but, while they aren't large sized, they aren't sample-sized either. The glosses I would call standard sized.

So far, I've only tried out the lip gloss, but I'm pretty happy with that and I'm anxious to road test the rest.

Only problem is...I can't stop asking myself if, at those prices, did I order enough?

Grey Matters

It's been a while since I've updated in regard to mine and Satan's Netflix queue. And, while we've recently watched some seriously notable movies, among them "The Departed" and "Blood Diamond", my first thought is to share are all about Grey's Anatomy.

Satan and I are SO HOOKED on this show. We're SO HOOKED that, while I linked to the website in my last paragraph? I made certain that I didn't really take in the contents on the index page because, as usual, Satan and I are watching the episodes in DVD time which means we are still a full season behind the rest of the world. I live in fear that I will accidentally learn future plot points.

These are really strong words, but the show is approaching "Thirtysomething" status for me. It isn't there yet, but yes, I'm liking it awfully well. It is so much more than your run of the mill hospital ensemble show, the characters believable (mostly), likeable, relateable. The situations are engrossing and the acting top notch, especially in the come-and-go characters of the patients; the show manages to really excell in those situations, while the regular characters are multi-dimensional and interesting. The on again/off again relationship between the titular character, Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) and Derrick Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey) is incredibly compelling. The show leaves me in a sniveling heap on a regular basis. If you're not into it yet, the back episodes are worth a rental. Trust me.

As for "The Departed". Dare I say...the ending let me down. Still a great movie though, and I do recommend it. "Blood Diamond" is a riveting and brutal movie but SO WORTH SEEING to watch Leonardo DiCaprio, holy toledo, could this guy get any hotter? I don't think so.

Was going to...write more...but getting sleepy now.....

Who knew?

Today's conversation on the cell phone with Satan:

SATAN
Hello?

ME
Hello?

SATAN
Hello?

ME
I have some bad news.

SATAN
Oh yah? What is it?

ME
(*sigh*)

SATAN
Well, what is it?

ME
(deep breath)
Okay. I'm a crafter.

SATAN
You say you're a cracker?

ME
Well of COURSE I'm a CRACKER!

SATAN
Yah, so what else is new?

ME
But also....I'm a crafter!

SATAN
A CRAFTER?


ME
I'm a cracker crafter! I made a wreath today.


SATAN
You say you made a what?

ME
A WREATH. Like you hang on your door?

SATAN
Dear God.

ME
It was, like, the most fun EVER.

SATAN
Well, I guess that's it then.

ME
Yah, guess so. Who'd have thunk it?

SATAN
Not me.

ME
I don't know what came over me.

SATAN
So...I guess we call the lawyers now?

ME
No. I think you can get an annullment under these circumstances.

SATAN
Hmmm. Probably so.

(click)
(click)
***

Anyway, look ya'll, look at my wreath!

My first one EVER!:

Truly, I am a cracker crafter.

(Hold me?)

Spring Fever

Ohmygosh. I think I may have the worst case of spring fever in recorded human history. Whether it's because spring has come so soon this year, or because I've already moved all the plants back to my balconey and begun planting and transplanting new ones, I don't know.

One thing's for sure: All I want to do is plant myself in my flower chair, put my feet up, listen to the birds chirp, and read a good book (and I have several).

Wah!

Does it get any better?

Greetings and saluatations! I'm coming you live from My Perfect Weekend.



Witness:



Satan is out of town. Woohoo!



Yesterday, I got a much-needed haircut, then spent the day with four of my favorite people: Mom, Grandmama, Aunt Pitty-Pat, Aunt Mona. I learned all about Arty's chequered past. We ate fudge.



I awoke, all by myself this morning, at nine a.m. This means I slept ten blissfully uninterrupted hours with my sleep-number bed adjusted to my own favorite sleep-number without ridicule (Yes! Satan tries to control MY SLEEP NUMBER. Feel my pain.)



I rolled out of bed and, due to recent miserable exertions on the Bow Flex, felt Less Flabby. I applied tinted moisturizer, threw on some shorts a headband and sunglasses, and headed downstairs to take a beside-herself-with-excitement FurGirl out for her morning constitutional.



We flung open the front door. The sun was shining. The birds were singing. FurGirl sprang off the porch and began wallowing in Satan's newly-planted patches of grass seed from sheer joy.



My neighbor walked over and handed me this:

The photo was, evidently, part of a display at a recent neighborhood birthday party during which many resident's heads were super-imposed on the bodies of famous old Hollywood stars. Ironically, Satan is a W. C. Fields fan and can do a pretty fair imitation. My neighbor and I shared a snicker.

I walked a block and a half over to my friendly neighborhood coffee shop and ordered my favorite coffee concoction (which is, face it, a coffee milkshake) and a toasted bagel and cream cheese.

I strolled back home and logged onto my computer while enjoying my breakfast with FurGirl snoozing at my feet.

I immediately discovered, through an e-mail from Christa, this website. It is the site of a new cosmetics line, supposedly comparable to MAC, where everything, EVERYTHING is (brace yourselves), ONE DOLLAR. This includes brushes and tools such as eyelash curlers, foundation brushes, along with lip gloss, etc. Yes! After nearly hyperventilating from excitement, I did a little shopping. And, while I'm sure the products I'll be receiving won't be standard sized, still! One dollar!

I'm now off to begin readying my porch for the season and moving my plants outdoors.

Tra la!

Sunday Catch-Up

I don't have any words these days, mostly just pictures. Above is Satan's latest gardening achievement: an orchid. We bought the plant in the discount bin, marked down from it's original crazy $35 to only $5. It looked dead for all the world. A few months in Satan's care, though, and it has roared back to life. I'm impressed. Although...it does look a little indecent in the middle? Sort of O'Keefe-ish is all I'm saying?

In case you couldn't tell by the photos, California took my breath away--what a beautiful place. And I only saw a very small part of it. We covered an insane amount of ground in just three short days. Getting to the amazing places we went to comsumed a huge amount of time. We left the hotel at dawn most days and didn't get back until well after dark. Also, seeing the Sequoias and Yosemite meant driving up and down mountains, where going 30 miles can take better than an hour and a fair amount of nerve.

Satan and I make quite a pair in these situations as I'm prone to car sickness (from the curvy mountain switchbacks) and Satan is afraid of heights. This means I have to drive in order to avoid barfing on the rental car while Satan is forced to just sit there, experience the precipices, and try not to let his terror get the best of him. He's mostly pretty good at it except for the parts where where we get so high up that we're looking down at the clouds.

Once, when we were in Colorado in this situation, I was driving on the rim of a particularly insanely high canyon with no guard rail when Satan looked down and saw two giant aircraft carriers flying below us. He's never quite gotten over that one.

Come to think of it, it still freaks me out a little bit too.

I can't even begin to describe the feeling of being near the sequoias. Such massive, silent living giants, they were already growing up there in the Sierra Nevadas when Jesus walked the earth. The General Sherman, largest of the trees, is taller than the Statue of Liberty, for God's sake. The snow on the ground, so deep that it completely covered the park benches, only added to the unreal, magical quality of the place.

Don't tell anybody, but we may or may not have pocketed a few pines cones and be sprouting a little Shermette of our own.

And then there was Yosemite. Yosemite!

I'd always heard about it, and I'd seen Ansel Adams' prints, but I still wasn't prepared for seeing the place with my own eyes. It's a photographer's dream with a gorgeous shot in every direction almost all the time. I snapped over three hundred shots, eventually just giving up and never turning off the camera. I finally had to force myself to stop looking through the viewfinder as I darn near walked into a few trees.

Though dead now, of course, Ansel has a photography shop named for him in Yosemite Village where they still sell photographs printed off his original large format negatives. This was especially significant to Satan as, on his last trip through Yosemite (in the early 70's), he actually MET Ansel and shook the great man's hand. Satan treated us to a print which should arrive some time next week.

As for the Pacific? Well, I have to admit, it's cooler than the Atlantic.

So, all in all, a great trip. I think I'm still recovering from all the traveling at such a hectic pace, though. I'm off to bed to dream of El Capitan...

(edited to add: No idea why this darn thing won't let me doublespace between paragraphs...argh!)

Ambrosia

Mom gets published for reals! Read an excerpt here.

The Pacific (Mostly at Morro Bay)

We are tired, tired, tired. I have been too tired every day to write, but we have seen some sights. I must take the time to tell you that the seal swam right up to where I was standing on a dock outside a restaurant. I was so excited to have the photo opportunity that I could barely stay calm enough not to drop the camera into the ocean. In all, I have about fifteen shots of him, but I've posted the best two (which aren't the greatest). I talked to him while I was snapping, and I think he understood.

Yosemite!

Dark and Deep

Touchdown, CA

Good morning friends! I'm coming to you live from beautiful California where it is very early in the morning. I am in the hotel lobby in my p.j.'s (NOBODY knows me! Nobody!) with an ice cold diet coke, my cell phone, and internet access. Satan is off doing Satany things. Life is extremely good.

The whole time zone thing has thrown me for a loop and it occurs to me I may be suffering from jet lag. We arrived at some point yesterday when it was mid-afternoon here and some other time entirely for me personally. Because our flight from Nashville was extremely early, we arose at the ungodly hour of 2:15 AM. This had the effect of causing us to keep having breakfast over and over and then eventually become completely exhausted with no internal clue has to what time or even what day it was.

Other than repeated breakfasts (which, let's face it, isn't always bad) the trip and both flights were uneventful. We did encounter two separate women with strange hairdos. One had actual hair antlers and the other an up-do so elaborate that I first mistook it for a stuffed animal perched on her head. Sadly, I was unable to get to my camera to document either 'do. I saw a woman at DFW, over Botoxed and obviously well-to-do, carrying a square purse made entirely of clear plastic. I'm now wondering if clear purses are the Next Big Thing and where I can get one.

I am embarassed to report I haven't snapped a single photo yet, mostly due to my jet-lag confusion issues.

That's all going to turn around today, though, as my zone is now working FOR me. Six a.m. felt like mid-morning when I sprang out of bed feeling completely refreshed.

Satan says he is going to take me to Big Sur today! BIG SUR!

More later.

Forty-Five and Out

Happy retirement to the new sheriff (above center) in town!

The posse (above).

The deputy (above center) and the usual suspects.

Sidenote: I know my photos are kinda dark. But I hate the flash and the unnatural way it makes everyone look ghastly pale. Okay, so we MOSTLY ARE ghastly pale. That's not the point.

Anyway, I'm working on it.

Say Hello to my Li'l Friend

That's right it's heeeeeere! The elliptical trainer.

Or, as I like to call it, the Franken-trainer.

See how it dominates my family room? See how it is large and undead?

Most importantly, see those two giant platform thingy's at the bottom? Those are where your feet go. And, in case the Jolly Green Giant stops by and feels like a little low impact aerobic workout? Our platforms are big enough to accommodate him, too. (Whew! I worry about these things.)

All I can say is it's darn lucky we paid extra for the model that folds away for easy storage! In fact, in the picture? It's folded up to it's smallest possible size! For easy storage! I can hardly see it! Can you see it?

Really, it's hardly noticeable.

Franken-trainer was delivered yesterday in a box the size of a briefcase that weight 200 pounds. It took poor Satan five hours and every tool in the house to assemble.

Finally, at around 9:15 last night, Satan (very unobtrusively, I barely noticed), rolled Franken-trainer into the family room where I was enjoying my ump-teenth viewing of "The Accidental Tourist".

SATAN
Well! Here it is!

ME
(sniff) shhhh...this is the part where he's going to see Geena Davis on a Paris street corner!

SATAN
Yep! This is going to be great for cardio!

ME
(turning to look)
Holy sh**! It's gigantic!

SATAN
(beginning to scale the side of Franken-trainer)
It's quiet too!

ME
(observing Satan now assuming the position in the foot platforms)
Do you even know how high off the ground you are?

SATAN
(beginning to Franken-train)
Yep! I can watch TV while I do this!

ME
Your head is, like, eight feet off the ground right about now.

SATAN
Whew! This is quite a work out!

ME
And if you fall off? You could seriously break a hip.

SATAN
(Franken-training)

ME
And you know what that means. If you, you know, break a hip.

SATAN
(Franken-training)

ME
I hope you don't think you're leaving that monstrosity there.

SATAN

(a little winded now)

It folds up.

ME

Does it fold down? Because did I mention? It's REALLY tall.

SATAN

(Climbing off Franken-trainer.)

(This takes a moment.)

ME

I thought heights bothered you.

SATAN

(Now crouched behind Franken-trainer.)

Okay...there.

ME

Yah?

SATAN
I folded it up.

ME

It's folded up? At this time?

SATAN

Yes AT THIS TIME! YES!

ME

Well. That changes everything.

Weekend Recap

I'm trying to write more even though I still have that problem that I can't write about what's really going on. Not that it's that exciting or anything.

Welcome to my exercise!

Speaking of which, Satan and I have embarked on new exercise regimes. We now have a BowFlex and no excuses. Satan is my trainer (is it just me or should I write a song with that title?) and he puts me through my paces on the machine while I generally whine and get sweaty (hate when that happens) and feel nauseous. I just despise working out with weight, even though I know it's the only way to real fitness.

My upper body, especially, stays sore most of the time since, left to my own sendentary devices, I have the upper body strength of a diseased gnat. Also, Satan recently ordered an elliptical trainer. I am personally very, very afraid of the elliptical trainer, and now live in fear of the dark day when it arrives here at the house. I can only imagine that to excercise on it means pain in direct purportion to its ruthless effectiveness.

Why can't we just eat ice cream and watch Netflix movies? I'm SO GOOD at that.

On that note, I caught two great classics this weekend. First: the 1958 classic, "The Defiant Ones" with Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier. I loved how the story of the relationship between these two men unfolded. Tony and Sidney play escaped convicts who are actually chained together for much of the movie and so must work through their differences, racial and otherwise, in order to survive.

I'm always surprised to see what a honey Tony Curtis was in his day. I'm more familiar with the Tony who is the bloated, pathetic loser and drug-addled father of the otherwise fabulous Jamie Lee Curtis. As for Sidney, well, he was suave and fantastic then, he's suave and fantastic now, and I would imagine he just knows of no other way to be. I've never watched "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" without being reduced to a quivering, sniveling, sentimental heap.

(Hey, look! I posted a photo! I'm trying to to jinx it by talking about it too much).

The other movie was the original 1949 version of "All the King's Men" starring Broderick Crawford.

Broderick plays Willie Stark, a small-time southerner who rises from humble beginnings to become governor of his state (I'm not sure which state, but it's definitely southern). While Willie starts out with good intentions he--GUESS WHAT--loses his soul in the process. A predictable story about politics that maybe wasn't so predictable in the America of the late 1940's? The movie also stars Mercedes McCambridge as Willie's disappointed lover and publicist. Mercedes is an actress I always find mezermerizing, perhaps because she starred in one of my all-time favorites, "Giant", or perhaps because she's just got "it", whatever it is. It's probably her voice. I'm a sucker for a husky voice.

In conclusion, I think Satan and I are the last people on the planet to realize what a gem "Grey's Anatomy" is (thanks Jill!). I added disc one, season one, to the Netflix queue. We are officially hooked and highly recommend.

If only Ellen Pompeo would have a sandwich.

I Won't and You Can't Make Me.

Okay. I'm going to try to stay calm here. I'm going to stay calm and this is not going to happen. It happened once a very long time ago and I swore, SWORE it would never EVER happen again.

It's humiliating. It's embarassing. It's a total and complete invasion of my privacy and human dignity. It will cost me years in therapy. Because...

(shhh.....I'm not going to do it! I'm not! I won't!)

Okay, I'll say it, but just this once. Satan is insisting that we. Um. He wants to have...

YARD SALE!

Run for your lives!

Oh, dear god, I can't take it.

And if you're thinking that doesn't sound so bad? You don't understand either me or Satan. You would be so, SO wrong.

Our last yard sale happened in the mid-nineties. Right after another traumatic event: our wedding (otherwise known as the Event that Cannot be Spoken of).

Anyway. After that, we had to combine our households and move in together. Once we unloaded my stuff out of the moving truck and into Satan's abode, it was clear that we had way too much Stuff.

For a couple of weeks Satan amused himself by actually taking a chainsaw (no, I'm not kidding) to much of my furniture, most of which was located in the garage.

In the beginning, I would notice a stray piece of wood here or there and think to myself something like:

Dang will you look at that? That looks just like my end table! Or I should say a PIECE of my end table! As in the dismembered LEG of my end table! But, it couldn't be my end table, because that would mean someone sawed UP my end table! And, I know my end table is in the garage because I put it there. Hmmm.

And then I would go on about my business.

Until one day I came home unexpectedly and found Satan actually in the garage with an actual CHAINsaw actually SAWING up my stuff.

Well. You can imagine this lead to a serious smackdown situation that could have easily taken a nasty turn considering there was a real live working chainsaw involved. But, ultimately, I was much younger then (read: I still had hope) and I finally yielded to Satan's insistence that we simply had TOO MUCH STUFF and nothing would solve the problem except a...

Yah, a (shhh: yard sale).

[To those of you who are still wondering just what WAS Satan's excuse for sawing up my stuff with a chainsaw? Good question. According to him at the time, all my stuff amounted to a big pile of sh**, and just needed to be disposed of. I have since developed a much more believable theory, the theory of ME MAN. YOU WOMAN. ALL EVIDENCE OF YOUR PREVIOUS SINGLE LIFE AS AN INDEPENDENT HUMAN MUST BE OBLITERATED FROM THE EARTH BY MY LARGE POWER TOOL. Be honest. Which one do YOU think sounds more believable?]

So there we were. Newly married, recently chainsawed, and planning a yard sale. Satan, as it turned out, was the veteran of many yard sales both as a shopper and seller. Me, my only yard sale experience consisted of driving my Grandmother to same and then smoking cigarettes in the car as she shopped, thus not drawing any closer than a good ten yards from the border of any yard sale. Ever.

Satan insisted we actually TELL people that we were planning a yard sale in the NEWSPAPER. I was forced to place an advertisement. Satan made god-awful signs that he placed around the neighborhood.

The nightmare began the night BEFORE the yard sale when, in night-of-the-living-dead fashion, strange pale people knocked on our door and asked to paw through our crusty crap in advance of the actual sale. I don't know how that turned out, because Satan handled it while I pretended the whole situation was happening to someone else back in the house.

It only got worse, however, as the NOTLD people returned in the pre-dawn hours on the Saturday of the sale. Of course, my inclination was to roll over and go back to sleep until the SUN actually ROSE IN THE SKY, but Satan would have none of it. He sprang from the bed like it was a GOOD THING, insisting that I get up too (I'll leave that fight to your imagination).

Ultimately, I somehow ended up on my front steps, pre-sunrise, wearing very little make-up, a tee-shirt, denim shorts, my giant fuzzy Sylvester the cat house shoes (which someone tried to BUY), with a change box on my lap, half a pack of Marlboro Light 100's, and a really bad attitude.

Satan, on the other hand, morphed into Ron Popeal.

He was wheelin'. He was dealin'. He was makin' sales left and right.

By the time he staged an actual DEMONSTRATION, driveway center, with an ancient vacuum cleaner using phrases like, "Gather 'round folks!" and, "I'll even throw in this HANDY SPATULA!", I was ready to die of humiliation.

To make matters worse, our yard sale was somehow POPULAR. There was a constant traffic jam of cars and a steady stream of people. I sold a skillet with srambled eggs still clinging to the edge. Satan, in his frenzied state, may have grabbed it off our stove on the way out the door. I'm still not sure.

An obviously mentally unhinged woman approached me clutching a wadded up sliver of Christmas wrapping paper for which SHE insisted I take a dollar. When I protested this amount as an obvious over-payment even at a yard sale, Satan, evidently smelling blood in the water, rushed over and nearly talked her into giving me $5 for it.

And then. The worst happened. I began to RECOGNIZE some of the cars and some of the people approaching the sale. My humiliation was complete. I tossed aside the change box, grabbed my cigarettes, and spent the rest of the sale crouched in humiliation in my kitchen, but still secretly watching the horror through the blinds. In trainwreck fashion, I was unable to look away.

It was from this vantage point that I witnessed Satan pounce on a nice young unsuspecting couple then HOUND them into taking a piece of furniture that began life as a small, white love seat, but had ended up fourteen tragic shades of gray with a gigantic stain of what may well have been vomit (knowing our kids) on one arm. This poor couple clearly did not want the couch but obviously found Satan more frightening than the loveseat. The hapless souls ultimately gingerly loaded the loveseat into their truck and then I watched as Satan gaveTHEM five dollars.

And then I finally died of humiliation.

Okay, no...NO! I did NOT die! I had to live through this horror!

As the traumatized couple drove away with the gray loveseat, Satan skipped...SKIPPED I tell you back to the yard sale and the rest of our unsuspecting patrons and began demonatrating the wonders of an ancient ironing board, "It folds away for easy storage!"....etc, etc.

So, no. I can't go through that again. My human dignity is worth more than the measly SEVENTY-FIVE DOLLARS we would make.

Seriously.

Portrait of a Writer

I'm not dead, I promise! I just have a lot of unblogable goings-on in my life right now. I've never been one for compartmentalization, so this means I must forego writing all together at times like these, lest I babble on about inappropriate subject(s).

I can report that I got my hair cut, velcro rollers have changed my life, and the portrait above is one I took today of my very pretty mother who doesn't for a minute look her age.

More Movies

My home computer continues to give me fits by REFUSING to let me post photos. I will overcome this problem with Satan's laptop later, but DAMN, is it ever ANNOYING. I continue to lust after a laptop of my own; I'm not sure how much longer I can hold off, frankly.

It's wonderful to be home; as far as I'm concerned, half the joy of vacation is the being glad to be back. This despite the moldering Christmas decorations everywhere around here. So that will be priority one today: De-Xmasing. Right after I quit lollygagging on this here blog entry.

Satan and I, of course, immediately delved into the yummy pile of Netfix movies the postman faithfully delivered in our absence. Last night was quite a surprise, actually.

First up: Lady in the Water, (noise on the link) M. Night Shyamalan's highly anticipated, then largely dismissed, fable that actually began as a bedtime story he invented for his children. Rated at a paultry two stars at Netflix, both Satan and I were surprised to be utterly charmed by this film. I, especially, was skeptical having been utterly unimpressed with The Village after totally loving Signs, The Sixth Sense, and pretty much liking Unbreakable.

LITW is essentially a fairy tale set in an apartment complex in, of all places, Philadelphia, and centers on the resident apartment manager, Cleveland Heep, a stuttering loner played brilliantly by Paul Giamatti. The apartment building Cleveland manages is filled with a cast of characters of all races and creeds: behind each nondescript, identical door lies a different peculiar, colorful world specific to the inhabitant(s). The five-story building surrounds a courtyard on three sides inside which is the swimming pool that contains the infamous water. The other worldly lady in the water herself is played by Bryce Dallas Howard, daughter of Ron (Opie).

While the movie aspires to be on a level with the likes of Princess Bride, and doesn't make it that far, Night knows how to tell a story, and the film is at turns, funny, magical and moving. One simply cannot help but sympathize with Cleveland Heep. Is every plot point tied up in a perfect bow? No, but the story is well told enough to allow the viewer to suspend disbelief and the characters are likeable enough to make you want to. Best of all, the movie is appropriate for everyone (and may even be rated G). I recommend it for the young and the young at heart. Which is, hopefully, all of us.

And so we went from the sublime to the traumatizing. We then took in America: Freedom to Fascism. This shockumentary film, from Aaron Russo, producer of "The Rose" and "Trading Places", is riveting. According to Russo (and others), there is literally no law that requires Americans to pay income tax. Yah, read THAT sentence again. It is an idea so intriguing, to me at least, that it alone was worth my time.

But the movie doesn't stop there. I challenge you, if you watch no other movies this year, to watch this one (hit the link and watch the trailers, at least).

If I had it to do over again, though, I'd watch them in reverse order. After Russo's movie, I was desperately in need of a hopeful bedtime story.

There's no place like home. For movies.

Ah...SO glad to be back home. We arrived after an uneventful but looong (11 hour) drive. Nose to the grindstone tomorrow.

But! Until then, I'm going to post a list of my favorite Netflix rentals of 2006. A lot of people know I watch a lot of movies, and often ask what they should see, so I'm going back through my queue and post a list of those that rated from four to five stars (out of five stars):

(Of course, mostly documentaries. Real life baby, it's the biggest trip of all).

January

Unconstitutional: The War on Our Civil Liberties, doc
Rize, doc
Mad Hot Ballroom, doc
Ben Franklin, doc
Mark Twain (Ken Burns Documentary, a 2-CD series)

February

Festival Express, doc
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, doc
Junebug, drama
Dead Like Me, TV series, seasons one thru three
Thumbsucker, drama

March

Hustle & Flow, drama

April

Good Night and Good Luck, drama
Walk the Line, drama
North Country, drama
Grey Gardens, doc

May

Nine Lives, drama

June

Amandla! A Revolution in Four Part Harmony, doc
Wallace & Grommit: Curse of the Were Rabbit, animated comedy
Transamerica, drama
Howard Zinn: You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train, doc
Country Boys, doc (2-disc series)

July

Thirteen Days, historical drama
Visions of Light, doc
Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, doc
Harlan Country, USA, doc
Weeds, TV series, season one, a two-disc series
Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices, doc

August

Project Runway, TV series, seasons one and two, multiple discs
Jarhead, drama
Curb Your Enthusiasm, TV series, specifically season five HILARIOUS
Liza with a "Z", concert from 1970's
Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills, doc
Paradise Lost 2: Revelations, doc (sequel to above, must see)

September

Stephane Grapelli: A Life in the Jazz Century, doc

Our Brand is Crisis, doc

Water, drama

Lost, TV Series, seasons one and two, multiple discs

The Future of Food, doc

Lewis & Clark: Journey of the Corps of Discovery, doc (two disc series)

November

Street Fight, doc (5-star)

Trudell, doc (5-star)

Sketches of Frank Gehry, doc
The Devil and Daniel Johnson, doc
Who Killed the Electric Car?, doc

December

Neil Young: Heart of Gold, doc
The Hobart Shakespeareans, doc
Terrorstorm: A History of Government Sponsored Terrorism, doc

And there you have it. If you watch any of them on my recommendation, please let me know what you think of them!

And now, I'm off to watch a movie (of course).