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I know, I know, this post – and the title – are embarrassing lame, on so many levels. But life is busy, so the creative pickin’s are kind of slim at the moment.
There are just SO many smart-alec things and dirty jokes that I could make about this video that don’t require any creative oomph, but that’s probably a good indicator that I shouldn’t make any of them at all.
One quick thought, though… can you imagine if he could go this fast on drums?
“Hey, Heather, this is my brother, Jerry.”
“Hi, nice to meet you,” I said a bit loudly, to be heard over the bad karaoke singer in the background. “I haven’t seen you before. Do you live here in town?”
Jerry didn’t look like someone I’d often encounter in everyday life, which added to his charm. Funky hair, piercings, bold statement-making clothing style… all of it added flavour to what rapidly turned out to be a genuinely interesting guy to hang with for a while.
We quickly fell into easy conversation, and I was entertained by Jerry’s stories and expressions. We discussed the singers and the club, and our individual tastes in music. Somehow that segued into him telling me about his recently failed relationship and his lingering heartbreak. But his voice brightened noticeably when I asked what he did for a living and he talked about his fledgling independent skateboard shop.
“I started it up after I got out of the nuthouse,” he said, then stopped abruptly. I watched confusion and surprise shift in his eyes, then start to become something else. With a decision apparently made, his face relaxed and he grinned.
“Really?” I said. (What else does one say after something like that?)
“Yeah, I kinda went a bit crazy a few years back,” he said with a lopsided smile.
Jerry shifted closer and began to talk very candidly about being a garbage man in the city for several years, and how he grew to loathe the job to the point of violence. “I started to imagine the streets flowing with blood of people I hated – really pictured it all red and everything – so I figured I’d better check myself into the hospital before I did anything.”
I smiled at him. “Smart plan.”
“I’ve never told anybody but my family that before,” he said with a small frown.
“I’m flattered you told me.”
The moment broke when friends re-joined us, and talk turned to the nicely inked tattoos Jerry had on his arm.
I got my first, and only, tattoo a few years ago. A “tramp stamp”, some would call it now. Yeah, what-ev-er. The low back seemed like the logical place to put it since I wanted both body symmetry and the flexibility to reveal it or not. And, too, I’m not a perky little 20-year-old. After bearing three children, I know damned well the effects of age and gravity. It seemed like the best place to put a tattoo that I didn’t want to head south for the winter.
Like most, I wanted a tattoo that would be unique to me and highly symbolic, but I had no idea what I wanted it to look like, save for two specific symbols that I asked to be incorporated into the design. The artist drew a stencil that we approved, but right from the first time I looked at the completed image in the mirror, I’ve been a little… hmm… dissatisfied with it.
I twisted in the bar stool and lifted the back of my shirt, and asked Jerry’s opinion. Just as he had been surprised that he’d been so open with me, I was a little surprised that I was showing my tattoo to a guy I’d just met, in the middle of a karaoke bar, no less, but what the hell. I had been seriously contemplating getting something done to “fix” it for quite a while, so my desire to keep it as a personal and private thing was getting shouldered out by my frustration.
Much like the other half dozen or so people who have seen it, Jerry didn’t have too much in the way of specific advice to offer, other than the recommendation of a local tattoo shop. I nodded and thanked him, and said that I’d look them up.
Just as I’ve said to everyone else whose advice I’ve solicited.
Sigh.
I’ve gone in fits and starts with this tattoo, where I itch to go see someone and get a better design done, to where I couldn’t be bothered to follow through and book a consultation. If I don’t know what it is that I want, what are the odds that any artist – even a really good one – can create it for me?
I was reminded of Jerry and our conversation recently when the subject of tattoos came up again, and I started to try to explain my feelings about the artwork on my skin.
“I want a tattoo that captures who I am as a person, as well as who and where I want to be in my life,” I started, annoyed at how clichéd I sounded. “I don’t know, maybe I’m expecting way too much. The whole ‘picture is worth a thousand words’ thing.”
“What don’t you like about the design you have?”
“It’s not that I don’t like it, it’s just that it’s always seemed kind of… unfinished. Like it’s more of a sketch than an actual tattoo. A start of something, or a work in progr…”
My voice trailed off as the gears turned in my head.
And with that, I stopped being as disappointed with my tattoo. Suddenly, it seems pretty well suited to me, just as it is.
There may be an interesting new development in how Rubber Chicken Disease is affecting me. I say “may” because if I were to describe it to a doctor as a symptom, I would sound like an utter loon. And it’s quite subtle in nature, so it’s pretty difficult to tell if it’s actually a new neurological short-circuit being added to the existing repertoire, or if it’s all just my imagination.
The dress I’m wearing today is the third different dress I’ve put on in recent months that feels like I’m wearing nothing at all. These are just your typical, off-the-rack dresses, somewhat light in material (rayon, nylon) but it’s not like it’s a single layer of see-through chiffon or anything. What’s freaky is that, except in the bodice where the fabric is tightly fitted to me, I don’t have any sense of the weight or sensation of the fabric against my lower body at all.
I keep checking to see if the skirt got tucked into the back of my panties! While this is kind of amusing in the comfort of my own home, I had this same thing going on New Years Eve, surrounded by people, and that was considerably more distracting.
I can touch my body where the skirt is touching and I feel that sensation okay, but I can’t feel the fabric when I’m just walking around.
This isn’t intended to be a pity post, or a salacious one, either, for that matter – I just find it quite fascinating and curious (although a wee bit unnerving, too) and figured I’d share my bizarreness 
I’m the youngest in my family, and when I was a little girl and starting school, my mother was faced with a house empty of children – albeit for only a few hours a day – for the first time in her entire life.
She would be the first to tell you that she didn’t initially handle it well.
For her own sanity, she started a part-time job in a nearby town, and then when I was nine, she went to work full-time in the city. There are two things that stick out for me about that period in my life: one, I had a lot of new chores that were now my responsibility, and two, we started to get the occasional “luxuries”, or “extras”, that my friends had but that we could never afford before.
The Christmas after Mom started working, we got our first colour TV. I think it was the second Christmas that we got the electric Yamaha organ.
We’re not a particularly musical family, as families go. A couple of my brothers had been in the high school band, and my dad would break out his accordion on special occasions with enough encouragement and Scotch, but that’s about it. When we got this electric keyboard, though, I was entranced. I put away my tinny child’s piano from Simpsons-Sears, and had my grubby wee paws all over this expensive new family toy.
My dad could play almost any song he knew by ear, and I thought that was so cool. Unlike my brothers, he didn’t need a metal stand and a bunch of papers to make music – he just made it! That was my goal. So I learned to play by ear. Well, kinda. I would get Dad to play something on the keyboard, and would watch where his fingers landed, and I eventually developed a part-memory-part-ear kind of skill.
But once I was a little older, that wasn’t enough for me, because I’d found I could buy songbooks with sheet music of modern songs – songs I actually heard on the radio, and I wanted to play them instead of the songs my father played, like “The Tennessee Waltz” and “Muckin O’ Geordie’s Byre“.
But I wasn’t THAT great at playing by ear, so I taught myself to read sheet music. Well, again, kinda. It was work to remember what shaped notes meant how long of a count, so I just relied on being able to decide that part by ear. And, too, I couldn’t be bothered to do more with my left hand than the cheater, one-finger, chording that the keyboard offered. And of course the pedals are just for resting your feet on, right?
What evolved over time was an awkward but reasonably effective, weird-ass hybrid ability. I would often start a song by reading the sheet music to get the right initial notes and key. Then once I got into the groove and comfortable, I’d abandon the songbook and just play - a wee bit by instinct, some by memory, and the rest by ear.
The problem was, if I hit a particularly challenging and complicated part of a song, I couldn’t do it by ear and I had lost my place in the sheet music, so I’d have to scramble like mad and fake it until I could find my spot again in the instructions and know how to continue.
Ah, the metaphors that childhood offers for our future adult lives, eh?
Anyway, I could play “Delta Dawn” and “Babe” and the theme from “Ice Castles” and they’d be recognizable, so I was happy.
There is no way in hell, though, that I could ever – then, or now – play like this 10 year old girl. Amazing.
I love how blogs allow us to share in and learn about the realities, and in some cases even the intimacies, of people you otherwise probably would have never known existed. Sharing our humanness. Is there anything more strengthening in life than realizing that you’re not a complete freak and you don’t have to always go it alone?
But when you read a person’s blog for an extended period, you also run the risk of learning things about them that you’re not comfortable with. Of course, this happens in real life relationships, too, but the apparent freedom that blogging gives us makes it all the more prevalent.
I’m assuming that the people who read here are adults. If you’re not… sorry about the language, now stop reading this and go do your homework.
‘Kay, now, talking just to the other grownups, although I don’t write about it much, you may have surmised along the way that I love sex. I love being sexual. I’m pretty “vanilla” in the grand scheme of things, but as long as somebody is acting with genuine good intentions and respect, it’s difficult to offend or disgust me. That’s why one of my long-time favourite blogs to read is ErosBlog: The Sex Blog. I don’t surf for porn or go to forums or chat rooms, but I appreciate looking at beauty in all its forms, and well-written erotica is a delight, so ErosBlog has long been my one-stop shop for exploring humanness.
I want to link to, and talk about, a post there — that doesn’t even have much to do with sex, as it happens — because I found it extremely thought-provoking. But there’s naked pictures on the website (gasp!). And adult language and discussion (oh, my!). And some highly controversial topics (be still my heart!). So, ya know, if you can live with that, and not immediately turn away from the issue just because it starts off with a half-naked girl deliberately urinating in public, then follow me, because I think this REALLY deserves our attention and thought….
I don’t know whether to puke or cry hysterically. My stomach is in knots, so it may decide for me.
It’s been a really busy few weeks, and at 3:30 this afternoon, after I managed to finish off a couple of brain-twisting and exhausting projects, I just didn’t have the heart (or grey matter) left to launch into any more. So I said “screw it” and declared the work day over. I made myself a cup of tea, lit a candle, grabbed a book I’ve been wanting to read, and put on some music that would give me my best chance at zoning out. I was stretched out on our bed, gaining ground on the relaxing concept, until Doc asked me to go grocery shopping with him.
There’s a brand new Superstore opening up next month near us, and Cob really wants to work there. He’s already made it through the first round of the job application, but he had to go to an existing Superstore today to fill out a “hiring package” before he can officially say he’s landed his very first job. Doc was willing to drive him to it, but asked if I would come along to help him get groceries and kill time while Cob did… well, whatever it was they were going to make him do.
But… but… my book… the relax thing… zoning….
Okay, okay, so I didn’t really whine or complain. Doc is a prince when it comes to doing things for us, and me, so whenever he specifically asks me to go along, I try to oblige. I gulped the last of my tea and took a cordless phone to Ari – who was the only other person home and was heavily ensconced in his bedroom with headphones on, drowning out the world (the lucky bugger).
And off we went.
It took for-ev-er for Cob to make his way through all the paperwork, because some stupid asses taught him that he should read documents before he ever signs anything! Once we finally got back, it was a mad dash to make supper and put away the groceries before the new season of Survivor started.
After I watched the ousting of Johnny Fairplay (yay!), I casually walked into our bedroom and my eyes landed on something that made my heart stop and my blood run cold. I’ve heard that expression before, but I’m not sure I’ve ever truly understood it until now.
There, on the table where I had left it, was the candle, still burning. More than four hours later. The only person who had been home was Ari, and he had been holed up at the opposite end of the house in his basement room, where he wouldn’t have noticed or heard anything. Probably including a smoke detector.
Oh, god, I… if it had….
Seriously, I almost WANT to puke in the hopes that it could make this physically ill feeling fade.
It’s going to be a very long time before I ever light a candle during the day again.
I just got another raft of male-bashing joke emails from a friend of mine. It’s amazing that this woman has known me as long as she has and she still doesn’t have a clue about me. Anyway, I went searching for a decent joke to send back to her.
You’re welcome.
Three blondes are on an island and they find a lamp, rub it, and a genie pops out. He says he’ll give each of them one wish.The first blonde says, “I wish I were twice as smart as I am now so I can figure out a way off this island.”
The genie turns her into a redhead, she builds a raft, and floats off the island.
The second blonde says, “I wish I were ten times as smart as I am now, so I can figure out a way off this island.”
The genie turns her into a brunette, she builds a plane, and flies off the island.
The third blonde says, “I wish I were a hundred times as smart as I am now, so I can figure a way off this island.”
The genie turns her into a man and he takes the bridge.
Super busy, so will just post a video for now, but it’s well worth the 33 seconds of your time.
If you’re like me, you’ll have to watch it several times, and stop it and move back and forth through frames, to notice all the subtleties.
But that’s what makes life as cool as it is, isn’t it? Subtleties. I wonder what we’d do different if we could pause and rewind it just as easily.
