25 things

Hey, it was kinda cool trying to come up with 25 things to say about myself. Feel free to try it yourself.

1. Here are some of my favorite things, in no particular order:
Long afternoons of sunlight, a new song I can listen to 25 times in a row, a wicked knitting pattern, making people laugh, those moments when I suddenly become aware of everything, Erte prints, solving a tricky puzzle, a bottle of wine with a friend

2. Some days I go all day without talking.

3. I used to be convinced I would be famous. I still think it's likely.

4. I make my biggest mistakes when I'm trying to be helpful.

5. If I could have a superpower, it would be super-hugging.

6. I love T-shirts with funny sayings, and sometimes dream of having 100s of them in my closet, but I never actually buy them.

7. I hate to clean the kitchen. I hate a messy kitchen. It's a problem.

8. I could stare for hours at a beautiful blue glass bead...except that I get distracted by the red bead next to it.

9. I love that my middle name is Grace.

10. I firmly believe that everything in life can be explained by a Saturday Night Live skit.

11. I tried being a professional organizer, and found out all my clients were freaks...and not in a fun way.

12. I love Johnny Cash, my cat, and baking cookies.

13. I've never been in love.

14. I adore trivia, especially useless trivia.

15. I procrastinate to a ridiculous degree.

16. I sing just well enough to wish I could sing really well.

17. I laugh at bad smells.

18. I live in a swamp, but the desert feels like home.

19. I grew up listening to people tell me I'd never make it because I can't spell. Discovering spellchecker made me cry with joy.

20. I'm stupefied by the bravery of people who have kids.

21. One of the coolest things I ever did was learn to play the cello, which I totally miss, because I can't find a teacher and don't have the money anyway.

22. I was always the last around the track/picked last for the team, except for tennis.

23. I know calligraphy.

24. My dissertation was totally bitchin'.

25. My favorite word is "iguana." Say it out loud. That's so cool.

Cool fact

The U.S. Capitol has 365 steps from the basement to the top of the dome - one for each day of the year.

Dave Barry is Hillarious Sometimes

Dave Barry Year in Review: Bailing out of 2008

::whine:: Why can't I write like this??

Fave bits:

In politics, Barack Obama addresses the issue of why, in his 20 years of membership in Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, he failed to notice that the pastor, Jeremiah Wright, is a racist lunatic. In a major televised address widely hailed for its brilliance, Obama explains that . . . OK, nobody really remembers what the actual explanation was. But everybody agrees it was mesmerizing.

and

In economic news, the price of gasoline tops $4 a gallon, meaning the cost of filling up an average car is now $50, or, for Hummer owners, $17,500. Congress, responding to the financial pain of the American people, goes into partisan gridlock faster than ever before, with Republicans demanding that the oil companies immediately start drilling everywhere, including cemeteries, and Democrats calling for a massive effort to develop alternative energy sources such as wind, the sun, tides, comets, Al Gore and dragon breath, using technology expected to be perfected sometime this millennium. It soon becomes clear that Congress will not actually do anything, so Americans start buying less gasoline.

and

. . . Congress passes, and Technically Still President Bush signs, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, and everyone heaves a sigh of relief as the economy stabilizes for approximately 2.7 seconds, after which it resumes going down the toilet. As world financial markets collapse like fraternity pledges at a keg party and banks fail around the world, the International Monetary Fund implements an emergency program under which anybody who opens a checking account anywhere on earth gets a free developing nation. But it is not enough; the financial system is in utter chaos. At one point a teenage girl in Worcester, Mass., attempts to withdraw $25 from an ATM and winds up acquiring Wells Fargo.

Nose

Do you suppose
That those
With a rose
In repose
On their nose
Knows it shows
When their nose
They blows?

I want to live here!

Kitteh House!

One of the most impressive things I've seen ever.

Steven Greenblat on The Cobert Report!

Hey! How cool is that? I wonder if I should get his new book. Shakespearean Negotiations was great, so I'm guessing Will in the World has gotta have something going for it. Hmmm, Amazon has a lot of good and bad reviews, and I've certainly had my fill of Renaissance biographies. Still, this might cure the indigestion I've had since Shakespeare in Love.

Anyway, go Stephen! Nicely played.

Zen and Bugs

It's been a while since I posted, and I blame it on the bugs.

One of the main problems with being "mindful" and "achieving oneness" and even "going to your happy place," is that pretty much all the techniques I've been able to find involve withdrawing from the world -- physically, mentally, emotionally. We're supposed to find quiet within and without. This works fine, IMO, for somebody on a mountaintop, or in a temple, or someone like, say, a long-distance runner.

But my life is full of little bugs. Yesterday morning, for example, I was feeling pretty good, making my morning cup of coffee, when there was a GIANT COCKROACH in the damn sink. Ew.

Just.

Ew.

It is simply beyond me to look at all those legs and that little head and those long feelers and feel at one with the universe. Instead, I got the hand-sprayer and turned on the disposal and tried to shoot it down the drain. It didn't want to go, frantically jumping up and away from the drain. I was reminded, because I'm a big ole nerd, of the giant pit in the Star Wars movie where our heroes were to be slowly digested.

Eventually, I got the roach down and the disposal ground it up. So much for zen.

I work from home mostly now, which is wonderful, but requires that I actually put in the hours while surrounded by all my toys. The only person watching out for me is me, which isn't the greatest thing in the world when you're a world-class procrastinator. I even put off putting things off.

I'll be working hard, and a little bug will come buzz in my ear, "The kitchen is so dirty. You should take a break and wash up." or "Hey! Deadliest Catch is having a marathon! Let's watch!" or "It's been forever since you went to Ravelry."

Stomping on these bugs is particularly difficult, since they only quiet down for a moment, instead of dying. Frankly, like the real cockroaches, they play possum for a while, then spring back to life with a reminder that I have some of the yummy yogurt in the 'fridge. Just a little push, and I can be a mouse potato all day long. If I could only be paid to sit around on my spreading butt all day, I'd be a millionaire.

But the biggest bug is fear, always fear. Movies make fear glamorous, exciting like an amusement park ride. But the bad fears aren't of monsters, they're of all-too-ordinary little bugs, like failure, disappointing others, making mistakes, achieving nothing. Sometimes, reading Dilbert just depresses me.

And the worst thing about bugs is that you can just be sitting there, minding your own business, being good, and one comes doodling along, getting in your stuff, nibbling at your ear, crawling up your nose. Perhaps the only worse thing is when you have to go looking for them. Open one drawer and -- Yipes! Hundreds of the little crawly things.

Zen tells me to embrace the bugs, to recognize that they aren't evil or deserving of being sprayed down the disposal. But my hatred and fears are instinctive, even, I have to say, healthy.

Bugs are full of germs, you know. Embrace the wrong germ and you die -- the ultimate non-productive act that leaves you food for more bugs.

As a knitter living in New Orleans, I have been waging a war against wool moths for some time now. I know, as long as I value my wools and mohairs and alpacas, that the wool moths will never really go away. At least the cockroaches are just disgusting. The wool moths cost me money. If I try to embrace them, they'll eat my sweater.

My idea of a zen temple always places it on top of a rocky mountain far above the world. Not a lot of wool moths or cockroaches on top of a rocky mountain, either.

It's raining outside now, and I have a damp spot on my ceiling in the closet. I have a friend coming over for dinner tonight who's allergic to my cat, and I have cat hair everywhere (which the wool moths also love to eat) that I need to vacuum up. I think I'll make raspberry tilapia, so I'll have to buy some more raspberries. Bugs got in the last ones.

Good One