Month: January 2007

I dreamed that I was subbing at an old job of mine to help out a friend. The place had changed drastically in both size and color, but some of the same people were there. I completed the work she had for me and decided to check at the front desk to see where they would like me to put my work away. As I approached the front desk, I remember having to duck under some wiring and to avert my face and squeeze my eyes closed as I passed a group of police officers who were all carrying fishing poles with wildly swinging hooks and lures.(C’mon now, this is one of *my* dreams so you knew something had to be odd!)

The front desk looked like a long counter, similar to the front desk in a large hotel. Just as I was approaching, a gust of wind came from nowhere and blew some papers about. Little slips of paper and shrieking women went scuttling across the desks. I waited for a moment at the desk while the blond haired girl began to get her items back in order. When she looked up at me, I said that I had finished my work and was wondering where she would like me to put it, because I know how it can be there. She just looked at me with a blank stare. I introduced myself and told her that I had worked there previously. Before I could finish my sentence, she said in a clipped tone, “I know who you are.” I was not upset by this. In fact I was in a jolly good mood. The girl looked back down at her desk and I got the impression that my query was the least of her problems. I could feel someone else behind me in line and I noticed a friend leaning on the counter where it ran adjacent to the wall. I decided to step aside and allow the person behind me to speak with the girl.

He stood there in a chocolate colored suit with a tan turtleneck. His hair was dark brown, almost black and a little long, but not effeminate. He turned to look at me and had the darkest blue eyes and a truly devastating smile. Wow! At the time, he just seemed to be a nice man, so I smiled back at him and joked about the counter help since they were still having issues. He turned his head to look at me and I felt faint because he was just so beautiful. He said to me, “You could introduce yourself.” As I did, someone said something to him and he looked away. I didn’t find this offensive, in fact I laughed about it and decided to tease him about it as he looked back my way. I was still laughing when I asked him if he was going to introduce himself. He just stepped slightly behind me and to the side so that his arm snaked around my midsection and pulled me close. He was so warm. This was not a sexual contact. This was a contact that seemed so real that I could still feel him when I woke up. As he stood there, holding me, I felt calm and secure and happy. When he stepped away, the warmth stayed with me. He smiled and started to apologize and I told him not too. I remember saying that the experience had been like an intimate body kiss, without lips or sexual intention. It had been a soul touch and I thanked him for it. He just smiled at me.

That’s when I noticed the spies. Eighteen brilliant red spies alight in my Mulberry bush. (Ok, it’s a freaking 25 ft tree, but a landscaper told me it was a Mulberry bush and until it’s otherwise identified, that’s what I’m calling it!) I got my camera to prove to the world that the Pope really did care about what I was doing on a snowy Sunday afternoon and the above picture is the best I could do from 40 feet away, in my house, through a glass door covered with dog drool, with a digital camera that has a cheesy optical zoom and my stability help was the door-frame.

Suddenly, it was a deluge of birds!! The more it snowed, the more showed up! Beyond the 18 male Cardinals, there were about as many brown females. And then this woodpecker showed up!!

Yesterday was the big Ravens Vs. Colts game. Not that I really care about football, I just mention it because it became a large part of my day. In the early afternoon, I went to a baby shower for the daughter in law of a friend. I know the friend well, I barely know the daughter in law. The relationship between the two of them is best described as tense. Given that, I still had fun. I won a few games (I beat out 8 other woman in draining 2 ounces from a baby bottle… I guess I suck!) and tried to keep my friend in the buffer zone by being the “friendly one” of our little group. (The concept being that if you are already on the outs with your in laws, why give them more fuel for their feud by being dark, brooding and making loud commentary about what annoys you- even if you have good reason to be annoyed) So, I tried to make light of many of the barbs and smiled a lot. My friend is a big football fan and wanted to be home in time for the big game, so as the baby shower continued to creep closer to 4:30, my group got more and more agitated and wanted to leave. (I guess now would be the place to mention my friends son had basically ordered my friend to stay for the whole shower before he left, no matter what. And can I just slip in here that he made it a point to make his intense displeasure known that my friend had worn her Ravens shirt to the party?) Needless to say, I was a bit rundown from all this pass interference I had been running all afternoon, so when I was being dropped off at my door and saw that my husband (who had told me earlier that I didn’t need keys) was not home and that I was locked out of my house, I was not happy. So, I gathered my loot and sat on the porch until he came home.

By this time the Big Game had been going for awhile and it didn’t seem as though the Ravens were doing so well. The big fear my husband had planted in my mind earlier in the week was that if the Ravens lost this game, Baltimore would be a town over run with madness and mayhem and angry fans. I guess it’s not out of the realm of possibility, but I didn’t think it would happen. Nevertheless, I didn’t want my evening plans (or the people I was going out with) jeopardized by FAN-atics. I was supposed to go downtown with Jenny and Dave for dinner and the comedy club but because of the impending doom of the Ravens, we decided to stay around here and then check on the news after the game ended to see if we could make the late show at the comedy club. We decided on Chinese for dinner and went to a local restaurant where we had a lovely dinner and Jenny opened her gift. ( 1 hot tub, 1 laser vision correction kit, 1 pony named Faux, some lo carb food that tasted good and 80 Maryland quarters with a chance to make them a bazillion, all wrapped up with a balloon tied to it.) The biggest stipulation for the evening was that she keep her balloon with her for the rest of the night! After dinner we returned to my house to catch any news on the downtown conditions and caught a few minutes of NCSI, in which their murder victim was a stripper who was cooking on a searchlight. They had her complete with smoke and a sizzling sound. For some reason, this was hilarious to Jenny and I – could it have been the drink we had at dinner?- and for the rest of the night we cracked jokes about it.

Seeing no murder and mayhem in Baltimore, we decided we would try to go to the late show at the comedy club. Jenny had some All You Can Drink coupons she wanted to use. We got to the club with no problems and it was pretty neat to see the town all decked out in their purple lights. It was almost leery. After waiting in line for a few minutes we were ushered to the FRONT ROW CENTER of the club. Now a huge fear of mine is to be front row center of anything that might generate attention on me by large groups of people, so front row center at a comedy club starts to make me feel hotter than a stripper on a searchlight. (szzzzz) We take our seats, place our orders and Jenny decided that she’d like her balloon tied onto her wrist so that she doesn’t obstruct anyone else’s view. Happy to oblige I helped her tie one on… in more ways than one.

The comedians were pretty good and one made fun of Jenny’s balloon saying that the “special kids” would get one. But he followed that up by asking her if she felt that the guy sitting next to her was her soul-mate (oops! it was her brother). Having that backfire, he asked if she would be number 51 in his harem of wimmenz assuming her brother would let her…. to which Dave motioned that he was welcome to her!! Once the show was over, we came to the realization that since I had tied the balloon to her wrist, there was no way for Jenny to put on her coat, but no matter, it was January in Maryland, so it was balmy and warm out. (hasn’t the weather been NUTS?) We walked back to the car and rode the garage-go-round (Frank thought the exit was at the top of 10 floors… how silly of him) and then started home. Jenny and I were more than a bit tipsy and Jenny was making commentary about all the things she couldn’t do since she had a balloon tied to her wrist, emphasizing each word with a jerky motion of the balloon. Just as she uttered the words, ” Because I have this stupid balloon tied around my wrist!”, the balloon came free of its ribbon and floated forward to bounce next to Dave in the front seat of the car. It was classic. Jenny and I just couldn’t stop laughing.

Today, I was playing the album Risotto, by Fluke, a heavy beat dark electronica that’s great to dance to for most of the album. I had just finished the dishes and decided to close my eyes and just go wherever the music took me. Once I get moving, I am an energetic dancer, lots of hip shaking and bouncing going on there :)!

Imagine my surprise, as I was grooving in my trippy zen state of dance, the shock of a loud CRRRAAASH bringing me back to the present. I opened my eyes to find shards of Pfaltzgraff pottery completely surrounding me. And I’m not kidding, I was standing in a little oasis of clean tile floor in my bare feet surrounded by an ocean of pottery bits which were the remains of a HUGE platter I had on display atop a shelf approximately 5 feet off the floor. Imagine the impact of this heavy platter as it fell 5 feet and exploded it’s energy and various sized pieces of sharp earthenware flying everywhere. I found large chunks behind me (I was about 5 feet away from impact) and I found some on the other side of the kitchen island in the dining room. (a good 8 feet from impact)

Thank you!

I just took a nice brisk walk one and a half times around my double block. Gotta start somewhere. I put on some bouncy music and stepped in time (I feel like I need a chimney sweep in hand when I say that) to the beat. Now I’m all sweaty and I FEEL GOOD! I think walking like that every day would be good. I’m certainly not going to post a photo of me in a bikini, the way a brave friend of mine did, but if I don’t do something, then I have no one to blame but myself if I develop an awful disease or get too stiff to move. As it is, my 19 year old delights in telling everyone that I’m getting “so old” and “can’t do anything anymore.” He’s referring to my recent trip with him to an amusement park where I only went on a few roller coasters with him. Better luck next time, Sean!! (Of course he forgets to mention how we cut the day short because of the fight that broke out in which one person picked up a large metal bar from a clothing shop and slammed it into another guys face and then all kinds of mayhem ensued with guys and girls all duking it out. After which, I humbly begged to be taken home because the behavior was more sickening then the rides were.)