Monday, September 04, 2006

Random Thoughts on Labor Day

Steve Irwin, "The Crocodile Hunter" is dead at 44, leaving behind an 8-year old daughter and a 3-year old son...and a wife who, I'm sure, lived every day wondering when she'd get this call. I cried at this news - mostly because he seemed like such an enthusiastic and happy guy and knowing how hard it is to remain enthusiastic and happy and lovin' life in this day and age - it's so unfortunate that this happy person had to leave....not one of the people who live to bring others down. The lone "good thing" about his death - he died when his heart was punctured by a stingray's barb....doing what he loved...in his favorite place - the heart o'nature. What really would have sucked would be his dying of cancer or getting hit by a car or falling down in the bathtub and hitting his head. I'm pretty sure if the stingray had the ability to know who he was - it would be remorseful and wish it had barbed a drunken college student on spring break.

I got my first e-mail from my Mom this morning. It was super cool, but a little "worlds collide". It was responding to my sending her a copy of an article about Victor Garber still being recognized as the star of Godspell...despite his huge fame as SpyDaddy in Alias for the last several years...alas...a very large red afro and Mork-from-Ork suspenders are hard to forget.

If your not signing a pre-nuptial agreement would cause your intended to not go through with the wedding -- would you sign it? What if the roles were reversed?

There wasn't a rainbow, but after Ernesto, under the fallen leaves, was a beautiful day.

Posted by Mel at 11:11 AM  ·  0 Comments   

Sunday, August 06, 2006

Another stupid first...

Postponed from an earlier date (I pulled this from 8-06-06, but after some thought decided I don't have that if my impossible personal standards/self-editing aren't curbed now - they will rule my life forever (as opposed to just having ruled it for the last 44 years and 4 months)...so, without further ado...

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When one goes through major life changes (or at least when this one does) - right up there with the suckier things is the string of firsts - first major holiday in a different house/city/relationship, first birthday is said new circumstances, first Summer Solstice, first cool restaurant ...you name it, really

There are some great classic firsts: kisses, new cars, own homes - the abovementioned, not so much. Though I suppose successfully (whatever that means) getting past any mile marker makes the proverbial "one" a stronger person - more confident in themself knowing that they can make their own happiness/greatness/success - it's also a little sad, like your first birthday without a party thrown by your Mom...you're cool now, but secretly you want to pull taffy and sleep in the tent.

I've been through an enormous number of firsts lately - big, giant ones and seemingly insignificant ones. While most of them have entailed at least a tiny measure of compromise of my Taurean iron-clad will - and some of them have required an arc welder - despite my frequent tears seeming evidence to the contrary, my ability to actually have self-generated firsts that didn't totally suck gives me at least intermittent satisfaction.

Today is the birthday of a good friend of mine - the first birthday in a long time we will not spend together - for which I won't be making a cake - upon which I won't eat ice cream out of the carton - during which I won't get to say Happy Birthday except over the phone...but in thinking about my first, I remembered that it wasn't just mine - and then I felt a little guilty. I'm just one person - a friend, and she's a daughter, a grand-daughter, a sister - so it's likely a bunch of other people's first too - and so, alone but not, I sing into the phone - one part of the two-part harmony at the end...which is a little sad...but okay, I guess. Happy Birthday Bun.

Posted by Mel at 10:42 AM  ·  0 Comments   

Saturday, July 29, 2006

Confidential to EJL:

Your choice of non-dairy butter substitutes is vindicated!!! I Can't Believe It's Not Butter has it's own spokesperson (Aunt Jemina, Mrs. Butterworth and Elsie the Bordon Cow - step off) - her name is Spraychel and she has her own website - http://www.spraychel.com/freespraychel/index.asp - and, currently, contest. And now, during corn season, I can't see a bottle of spray butter without thinking of you. Good stuff.

Posted by Mel at 5:15 PM  ·  2 Comments   

Friday, July 28, 2006

From Whence it Came

I really debated for quite a awhile (though in actuality it may not have been all that long - my perception of time is altered in part because the heat index here in Sweltaware is 105 at the moment - and was 100 at 8 p.m. last night - and my brain is pretty fried - technically, I suppose it's braised since in addition to the very not-dry heat, I'm sweating at least as much as would be required to braise a brain) whether to use titles for my entries or not. Yes, I realize I seem to have too much time on my hands, though somehow, never enough to get anything actually all-the-way-done (my dad was really right-on with this one when he yelled it at me in 1978 along with some reference to my telephone-pole like legs - though *poetic justice* this morning my Mom told me he thought he just rode a trolley in his underwear and was actually in Spain). The titles are pretty meaningless anyway and always seemed sort of too "on purpose" for me - I don't really even like chapter titles in books at all either. I also don't like titling my photographs - though when others do, I frequently find the titles evocative....so, for this one - a title - irrelevent though it may be.

Also a quick note about my writing style which will undoubtedly keep me out of the ranks of "professional" or even "semi-pro" writers.... hmmm....semi-pro writers, more like a volunteer fireman (you really didn't want to be a fireman, but it's a good excuse to sleep a few nights at the firehouse away from the wife and it's not ALL that dangerous) - or like a semi-pro football player (you really, really wanted to be a football player, but your parents/asthma/pregnant high-school girlfriend/bad knees/love of vodka prevented you from pursuing your dream with the zeal required to become a "real" or "non-semi" professional)....anyway...this illustrates my point exactly - I usually do have a point, but sometimes even I lose it on the journey up (or down, if the point is South Florida) the peninsula....hence, a lot of ellipses and a lot of dashes - kind of like talking to me in person - without the voice and the hand gestures (but there are no snacks either...so there).

From whence it came...it came as I sat at my town's newest attraction, the highly marginal Applebee's, in front of a dish of artichoke/spinach dip which I don't even like (note, my dining companion wanted the appetizer assortment and the dip was the only non-liked item on the platter...) So, as I'm sitting there picking at dip with an unsalted tortilla chip and as I methodically raised gloppy chip to mouth, I notice (actually it would have been hard not to notice as the sound system in the restaurant was basically at 9 of 11 - there have been Clubmels that were more subdued) that virtually every song on the soundtrack (pre-mixed by the Applebee's Home Office so as to be inoffensive to as many potential diners as possible) had some historical significance to me...it was pretty much the Garden State soundtrack of my 20s and 30s though, in that case it would be the Sunshine State/Full O'Social Conservatives State soundtrack - I won't co-opt the tag name of a state I've never graced with my residence. Remembering how I felt dancing to/singing with/driving to those songs made me realize how many great things have happened in my life (lately my focus having been primarily on the more shitty things) and how many amazing people I've known (and know). Somehow (it may have been something in the dip) - and for some unknown reason this knowledge lifted a big-ass weight off me -- not sure why -- at all -- seriously -- I just felt it as sure as if I'd lost 100 pounds and my jeans didn't have a big fat fold over the top of them anymore. How that got to this - again - no idea - really - except after a very long time (for me) of not talking - of having nothing to say - I suddenly want to talk again. I NEED to talk...and since it's not easy for me to talk on the phone to all the people I want to (note re: ending sentences with prepositions - I don't really write sentences - so f-it - I'm not going to write like I'm Frasier Crane) - this is what I'm doing. Talking my fingers off - and trying not to sound narcissistic or pretentious or like anybody should care what I have to say - I'm just going to say it with a lot of ellipses and dashes and with a lot of love to those people out in the world who mean more to me than words or food or anything else - including successfully ending a sentence without using a preposition.

Posted by Mel at 11:14 AM  ·  0 Comments   

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Out there

First obstacle, my lack of blog-savvy - my blog/HTML experts are both in other states (literally, not psychologically) so I'm on my own here - which won't be pretty (literally - the words will be here - but they won't be pretty and they likely won't have pictures showcasing my fabulous photographic ability and amazing eye for form and color accompanying them) .

It actually took me almost three hours just to decide on the template - then I didn't like the one I ended up with because one of the dots was melon-colored and I really dislike that color (though I actually love melons). I have several friends/acquaintances whose blogs I look forward to reading for the same reason I like doing regular things (driving around neighborhoods, eating breakfast out while reading the paper) when I travel. I like seeing how other people lead their lives - it fascinates me - especially now as I get older and have lived my own life so many different ways...I always wonder if i just haven't gotten it right yet - or this is how everybody is - constantly reinventing themselves to accomodate life.

Looking forward to a day full of humidity and housework (made for each other I always say) - it's going to be a good one because it's only 8:48 and I've already disposed of a dead mouse in a trap (lured there by a piece of Boston Creme doughnut -- how perfect for this household - if the trap didn't kill him, he would probably eventually go from diabetes anyway seeing as, in addition to the doughnut of death, he's eaten cat food, Samoas & sweet and sour chicken - and that's just what I'm aware of). If you don't know me, let me make you aware of my intense dislike for all things vermin, including mice, rats, bugs & snakes (though, technically, not vermin...I throw them in there anyway) -- which makes my ability to pick up a mousetrap, from which two small, gray back legs and a tail protruded, take it out to the trash can and throw it in - so much more huge than you might normally think. I used to have a someone else who did these types of things for me - but Melanie v.6 is able to dispose of dead mice all by herself - thus increasing her ability to independently handle anything life may throw at her...though, hopefully, it won't throw a mouse or a snake.

Posted by Mel at 5:46 AM  ·  6 Comments