This new compulsion started when I joined Amazon Prime on a trial basis last year, for xmas shipping. I stayed enrolled and let them bill my credit card because friends were raving about the service. Even though I’m not much for online shopping and couldn’t find many things on Amazon that: 1) I needed to buy, 2) that made sense to buy online, and 3) were priced competitively.

But recently I realized what the service actually is: an instant gratification machine. I blame a coworker: Every time we hold a “virtual meeting,” she constantly searches Amazon Prime for whatever we’re talking about and then sends me links. (Kinda like “There’s an app for that!”) She influenced me to order washable post-workout car seat covers while we were talking about hot yoga, and I don’t even do hot yoga. (But I did start doing regular yoga since that purchase, so… That’s good, right?)

The other day I was at a Big Box Retailer and my husband texted “See if they have those bamboo plate holders.” They did not. But I went home and saw that Amazon Prime did. Click–ordered.

Also at Big Box, I saw a child’s toy that I liked, so I bought it for myself. (I deserve the occassional cute plastic horse because I work hard, and I don’t care what anyone thinks about it!) The brick-and-mortar environment killer only had one such toy left, but Amazon Prime had all of them, so I ordered my faves and I’m getting them TOMORROW.

It’s kind of terrible. I feel kind of bad about starting this shopping-based habit, just when I’d gotten my compulsive shopping habit under control. (Hours of therapy talking about that unpurchased plastic horse = success!) But not really. I don’t really feel bad about it yet.

1. Dressed myself in workout gear, knowing full well that I probably wouldn’t work out today.

2. Decided to lie in the grass with my husband for an hour instead of shopping.

3. Ended up shopping… for expensive dog food.

4. Hurried home to watch a soap opera about football.

As I did each of these things, I imagined Teenage Me seeing and scoffing. And I had to laugh, imagining it.

This book’s release is similar emotionally, for me, to that of the first book I wrote, which was a short prose collection, because:

1. It’s made up of small works, so readers delve into it faster and give feedback faster.

2. Reader feedback contains disclosure of favorite pieces, and so far, everyone has different favorites. That makes me very happy. (Because if everyone liked the same few, I’d assume it’s because those were the only decent ones.)

3. I imagine that other people read collections the way I do – flipping through and stopping on the pieces that resonate with them, skipping the others for “later.”

4. The pieces display comparable levels of horrifying intimacy and therefore vulnerability. So I’m afraid for people to read them. But, because of points one through three above, I can tell myself that people are only thoroughly reading the parts they relate to. And they wouldn’t relate to my intimate thoughts unless they shared them on some level. And realizing that others share your thoughts is the purpose of writing and reading. Therefore, I am safe and should stop worrying.

We are moving.

I sold my house and we bought another one, and we’re moving in three weeks, and we’re very excited about it. We believe that the new house represents a higher level of happiness in our lives. It will usher in a new era for us, basically.

I’m a tiny bit sad because, during the pest inspection, we found out that the new house had carpenter ants. Not termites, but carpenter ants. No, not carpenter bees–carpenter ants. At first I was disgusted by them. But then, as I learned more about carpenter ants in general and our population of them in particular, I came to admire them. Apparently, the ones who live at our house are pretty good at property development. They built a subdivision (in our walls) walking distance from a crape myrtle tree that contains particularly tasty sap and fat aphids. We were joking that they advertised it as “convenient to excellent restaurants.” They also built a little cemetery in a corner of our ceiling, because burying their dead is something they do. Their leader is a queen, and she lives in a tree in our yard.

We’re going to have them all killed. I asked if it was possible to remove them from our house without killing them, but I was told no.

I feel bad about killing them, but that’s real estate. And our new era of happiness requires some sacrifice in order to keep balance in the universe, apparently. So I’m honoring the carpenter ants now, in my mind and on this Internet. Raise your glass to them, if you happen to be drinking. I’ll raise a few later at our bitchin’ new wet bar.

Our Sad Pets

We don’t have babies or toddlers to worry about, but we have these cats, who are almost worse when it comes to a move. They don’t understand anything. They live in constant fear that we’re going to suddenly stop caring for them and turn to murderous sadists. We had to day-board them several times throughout the house-selling process, and that scared them to death. Starbuck, in particular, thought she was in mortal danger and went postal on a teenaged kennel worker.

I can’t explain to them what’s happening. We keep trying. We tell them we’re going to a new house and they’re going to be happy there. But they don’t listen, or they don’t understand English, or something. They won’t be reasonable. They refuse to understand.

There are two more car trips planned for them: one to a new boarding place, near the new house, so that they’ll be safe during the move. Then there’s the trip to their new home. I get stressed just thinking about because I know how they’ll cry in their carriers in the backseat. But then I think about how much they’ll like the new house, and I know it’ll all be worth it.

Guys, I’m getting older. I’m slowing down. Thinking maybe it’s time to wind things up. Finish the book I’m working on now and then start work on the last book I’ll ever write, and then I’m done.

(I say that every year. Ha, ha.)

I’ve been watching TV like it’s my religion, lately. I watched Breaking Bad and True Blood and I’m still watching Louie and So You Think You Can Dance. I’m waiting for New Girl and Mad Men and Game of Thrones and Girls to come back.

I’ve been reading a little and now that it’s fall, I’ll start reading a lot. Right now I’m reading the books my youngest son was required to read for school this year, plus a book about a video game he plays. I always read what my kids are reading.

I haven’t been knitting at all. I’ve been making jewelry, instead.

I’ve been looking at the Internet while sitting on my bed with my cats sitting next to me.

I’ve been buying some new music, but mostly old music that I used to have on record or cassette 20 years ago, because I was inspired by Yacht Rock on YouTube. I love Yacht Rock, and I love Steely Dan.

That’s about it. I hope y’all are doing fun stuff and absorbing lots of good pop culture.

1. I have awesome in-laws. My brother-in-law Teil is my dentist, and my sister-in-law Van is my optometrist, so you know I’ve got the hook-up as far as teeth and eyes go. But I also have to say that my brother-in-law Daniel has saved our lives a million times this year, because he has experience fixing the kind of things that randomly break in houses that were built in the ‘80s, like ours was. He’s helped us fix our shower, our water heater, our dryer, and all kinds of other stuff within this past year alone. For that, I thank him and pledge to continue doing shots and karaoke with him at all Teil and Van’s future parties.

2. I’m so thankful that the Internet exists and that it contains kind people who are willing to share their experiences in order to help others. This year I decided to start riding a bike, after 21 years of not having done so. And I had so much drama trying to find the right bike and the right bicycle seat. Drama and pain, literally. So I took my problems to the Internet, read a bunch of forums, and found out that: a) I probably have a fractured tailbone, and b) I needed a split bike seat.  I bought a cheap split seat and it changed my freaking life, and now I’m enjoying riding my bike so much that it makes me want to cry (almost as much as the tailbone pain made me want to cry before I bought the new seat). So: Thanks, helpful strangers on the Internet.

3. I’m glad I’ve had extra time to spend with my family this year. Particularly with my cousins Andrea and Helen, my brother Erik and his family, and my dad. And my kids, too. I mean, I live with my kids, of course, but I’m grateful that working part-time this year has given me a few extra hours with each of them. And I’m grateful that my family members are generally awesome and value the same things Dat and I do: good food, good drinks, and standing around telling funny stories. Is there anything more important in life?

4. So I’m working from this list I’ve kept on my iPhone throughout the year – a list called “Thankful for” on the Notes app – and one of the items says “Pocket Frogs.” Apparently, at one point, I felt grateful for an iPhone app game about colored frogs hopping around on lily pads. I can’t explain why now, but I’m guessing it has something to do with OCD and stress relief, so let’s just leave it at that. Thanks, little frogs of varying colors and designs.

5. The list also says “Cats,” and I’m guessing I wanted to say something about how Starbuck and Toby, my cats, brighten up my life. I think it’s because they stayed by me (literally, pressed against me on my bed) while I was finishing up my last novel.

6. I’m grateful for my husband, as always. Not least because he spent a really long time very patiently helping me find the right bike and bike seat.

7. You’re always supposed to be thankful for your job, if you have one, and for your good health, if you have that. And so I am.

8. Something not on the list: The other day, my oldest son Paul (not a pseudonym, not anymore) was complaining to me. He was, like, wearing a tie and drinking a cup of coffee, driving his car to work or to the University. (No, he wasn’t, but that’s how you can imagine him with 75% accuracy now.) On this recent day, he was actually in the back seat of the mini van, complaining to the rest of us about the crappiest Christmas he’d ever had. What was so crappy about it? I only gave him three gifts, and they were all books, and one of them was a book he already owned.

I was embarrassed by that story at the time. Also, I was a little annoyed by my son’s spoiled brattiness in bringing it up. He was talking about one of my first years as a single mom, when I had every reason to be frugal and forgetful. But, thinking about his story the next day, I was grateful. You know why? Because, if that’s the worst Christmas he has to complain about, I must be doing a pretty good job as a parent. Right? And thank God I’m able to do that.

On the way to excitement, we texted one of my fave cousins (Andrea – not an alias) to see if she was down for some culinary adventure. As usual, she was, so we picked her up and then headed to the nearest farmers’ market.

At the farmers’ market, I was happy to find someone selling Texas persimmons, just like the ones I used to have on a tree in my yard when I lived in Austin. You can’t get those at the grocery store here. They only sell Asian persimmons, which are hard like apples or bell peppers. Texas persimmons are soft like overripe tomatoes. We shared one in the street on the way back to our car.

After that we took Andrea to this restaurant called Feast, because she hadn’t yet tried it. You can google Feast if you want, and you’ll find a lot of glowing reviews if you do, but suffice it to say that the owners are mainly British and they cook “snout to tail,” meaning they cook the cuts of meat that most Americans wouldn’t think to eat, but in an awesome gourmet way. They also do various British and French stuff. So we had cock-a-leekie and Bath chaps and crispy pork belly and Welsh rarebit and French onion soup and grouper on ratatouille-esque vegetables, and it was all very good.

After that we wanted frozen yogurt, because we’re all frozen yogurt addicts. We drove to the new frou-frou froyo place everyone’s been raving about, and it wasn’t as good as you’d think it would be, but they had a nice patio so we sat there and people-watched and discussed in great detail what was wrong with the frou-frou frozen yogurt. And my friend Ashley was supposed to meet us, but we finished our yogurt before she could get there so we told her we’d meet her at a bar, instead. Then my son Josh called and told me a really effed-up story about how his job interview with a reputable retailer turned out to be a multi-level-marketing scam with a disreputable bullshit firm. So I told everyone what happened and we all vowed to get vengeance on whoever was responsible for doing that to my child.

We drove to Boheme and were happy to see that Christopher was the bartender that day, because he makes their red sangria the best. So we drank red sangria and beer while Rory looked on, a little annoyed that we intended to sit on couches and do more talking. We wondered if it was strange that we were drinking at 2:30 PM, but decided it was okay as long as we drank a bunch of water at the same time. When Ashley got there, she ordered some quiche. She let Rory try it and that made him feel better.

We talked and talked, and then we decided to go to the zoo. It was Ashley who convinced us to do it, and then she said she had to go home. So we left her and went to the zoo, and it was hot as hell but we said we’d only see our fave animals and then leave before we died of dehydration. Andrea hadn’t been to the zoo in 19 years, she said. We showed her the aquarium and the bird house and then the primates. I showed her my very favorite monkeys, who will climb up the side of their giant chain-link enclosure and take tree stems from your hand. (I’m not telling you to feed the monkeys at the zoo, because that would be wrong.) Then we went to the goat petting zoo and petted the goats, which is always basically my main goal in visiting the zoo, meaning I basically pay $11 to pet a bunch of goats and my friends say Dat should just buy me a goat to keep in our back yard and it’d probably save us money in the long run. But half the fun of the petting zoo is watching little kids interact with the animals, so he’d have to buy me a little kid to keep in the back yard, too, and I’m pretty sure that’s illegal. Before we pet the goats, I actually got to pet the brahma cows for the first time ever in my life, which was nice. (Usually they’re haters and don’t come near enough for petting.) After the cows and the goats, we looked at the one sad deer in the Houston Children’s Zoo, and we probably did not feed it stems from trees it couldn’t reach, because feeding animals at the zoo is wrong. And it wasn’t even grateful for the tree stems, anyway. The monkeys at least look you in the eye.

After that we were going to leave, but then we went to see the Small Cats, instead, and then we went ahead and saw some big cats, too, and one of the leopards peed right in front of us. And then Rory realized that it was 6:15 and we needed to get the hell out of Dodge if we were going to make it to our concert on time.

So we dropped off Andrea and peeled out to the Woodlands (some suburb) where Rush was playing at 7:30. And we got there just in time, and Rory saw Rush play for the first time in his life, and so did I, actually. I never got to go to concerts when I was young, but this was Rory’s second concert. (His first was Depeche Mode, just this past year. His third will be the Gorillaz, in October.) Rory plays percussion at school and bass at home, so he of course admires Neil Peart very much. I thought the show was okay… until the encore, when it suddenly turned awesome. It ended at 11:00 and Rory fell asleep in the back seat on the way home. I texted Josh and ascertained that he was at his friend’s house, being just as good and responsible as college kids always are.

The cats got into bed with me while I checked on my Pocket Frogs and played my turn in eleven games of Words with Friends. Then I went to sleep and probably had pretty decent dreams.

Everything is good, which means everything is boring. I mean, too boring for me to describe to y’all here, or to my cousins or my hairdresser when they ask me how everything’s going. Who wants to hear “Hey, another awesome thing happened in my career,” or “Yeah, I’m working on another few projects” all the time? No one. I don’t even want to hear myself say it, you know? So I don’t say anything. I just go home and do work. Or do emails about work. Thankgodfully, I have a lot of projects going on now. I’m working like a mad man and am, in fact, about to go part-time at my day job in order to get more work done. If y’all know me in real life or have read this blog for a long time, you can probably imagine what a big deal that is to me and how happy I secretly am.

All that said… Let’s talk about the next project you’ll see. I have a new, real live novel, Lone Star Legend, coming out in January. Launch party is here in Houston, on January 28 at Brazos Bookstore. With wine -– they said I could bring some wine, and I definitely will.

I’ll also do a signing in Austin (at BookPeople) on February 5, I think the date is. And one in San Antonio, don’t know when yet. And I want to try to go to Dallas and then Los Angeles later in the year. But that’s about it, I think. As you’ve probably read by now, publishers have figured out that book tours don’t make as much money as they cost, and that’s why I never do them. So don’t hold out for signed copies, anybody. Instead, buy my book in January. Then, email me and tell me you bought it. Then, I will email you back, making the email say the words I would have written in your book if I’d flown to your town and met you at a bookstore table. And then you can print that email and Scotch-tape it to the inside cover of your book! Or, you know… you could always order a signed copy from Brazos Bookstore, and they’ll ship it to you. They’re nice like that.)

(It kills me to write all that, all presumptuous about the possibility of people screaming for signed copies. But I kind of obsess over signed copies, myself, so I’m typing all that for my fellow OCD’ers.)

What is the book about? you might ask, because I’ve never yet told you. Is it about lone star legends? A little, yes, but that’s not the only thing.

It’s about a woman named Sandy Saavedra who lives in Austin and is super happy and proud of herself because she’s putting her journalism degree to work for a site called LatinoNow. And she’s scored a handsome grad-school-poet boyfriend. And even though her mom doesn’t understand anything Sandy writes, or even what she does for a living, it’s okay because they still have a pretty decent relationship, considering, relatively, since her mom drove Sandy’s dad away.

And then… bom bom BOM… a gossip-blog conglomerate buys LatinoNow. And they ask Sandy to stay on, but as a gossip blogger of the “bitch, pleeeeease” sort and not a Real Journalist.

All that’s in, like, Chapter One. So what do you think Sandy does, at that moment and for the rest of the book? Oh, and also, what do you think would happen if Sandy had a blog on the side, all along, into which she spilled all her uncharitable, secret, anonymous thoughts? And also, what do you think professional bloggers think of their fans and the people who comment on their sites? And how does it feel to make fun of people online for money? You know that I know, because I used to do that years and years ago, back when people were first learning how. And what happens when people don’t want to expose themselves on the Internet, but suddenly find themselves there, exposed? And what’s up with people who don’t even have Internet connections, or even want them – how do they live? How is that fathomable? That part I had to imagine, since I’ve been on the Internet since cavemen first drew cybersex hieroglyphics on Usenet walls, and now I only eat e-food and drink virtual gin with virtual diet cranberry juice.

That’s what my next novel is about, and Publishers Weekly says Sandy is a smart, funny heroine that y’all will root for. So I hope y’all will consider picking it up in January, maybe with the gift certificates y’all will receive this month from people who love you.

Grackles

Did y’all see how Heidi Klum took my grackle costume idea, before I could even get the chance to implement? My costume was going to be better than that, and I wasn’t going to paint my face black.

I said this on Twitter a while back, so I’m recycling it here, but it’s important and bears repeating. Y’all will be relieved to know that, whenever I get the time, I continue my grackle research on patios throughout Houston. And recent studies at La Madeleine on West Gray have yielded important results:

1. Female grackles will eat butter, not just bread. They dip their beaks into it and it stays on them for a while afterwards.

2. Even if you put the bread near the butter, though, they will not dip the bread into the butter. They do not instinctively know that it tastes best that way, like I do.

3. Some female grackles like La Madeleine’s red jam, and some don’t.

Future research will focus on grackles’ (of both sexes) reactions to La Madeleine purple jam and orange jam. I suspect that they might like the purple, since it contains seeds.

In Lieu of a Christmas Newsletter

My family is doing well, despite my semi-regular bitching at them. Dat is steadily composing music and has about an EP’s worth of synth pop completed now.

Rory is studying multiple musical instruments and has been collaborating with his stepdad (aka “Pep-Pep,” for you fans of Tim and Erik). Rory has also remained on the Almost Honor Roll all year.

Dallas, who still lives with his dad, made First Chair in his instrument, which is pretty good considering that his high school’s band is super hardcore and competitive. They subsequently demoted him to Second Chair as punishment for losing his sheet music, but I’m content to ignore that completely. Dallas is also on Almost Honor Roll, in all advanced-level academic classes, which is pretty freaking good, considering that he spent half of junior high in “alternative” classes because of “distractions” caused by his Asperger’s.

Josh is about to get his first car, y’all. First car! And a nicer one than I’ve ever owned (but not new), due to a rare collaboration of his dad’s campaigning and my fiscal cooperation. Josh is very good and quiet and tall in general, although he did rebel against me mightily this year by shaving his head. I was upset and took to my bed, yes. But, in the end, I came back into the living room with newfound respect for my child. Josh is not on Almost Honor Roll and never really has been, but he passed Physics last year, when he was a junior, and I never even took it, so I’m satisfied with his academic achievements. Send him good vibes for his SATs next month, y’all. He wants to go to the University of Houston or University of Texas.

Toby has moved into his own little apartment. You might think it’s just a bunch of moving-box lids that we brought home from my work, thrown on the floor in my office, but rest assured that it’s his apartment, with different rooms (lids) for different purposes. He has his Resting Room, his Brooding Room, his Watching Room and his Room of Violence. You can tell the difference by the way he’s marked up the corrugated cardboard in each.

Starbuck rapes our Christmas tree and steals its water.

See? Life is good. In the words of the immortal Joe Walsh: “I can’t complain but sometimes I still do.”

I hope y’all have the best December holidays you’ve ever had, peeps. I hope y’all are happy and warm.

I’m about to go into Super Hyper Overdrive Lockdown in order to meet my writing deadlines. What does that mean? It means that if I don’t answer your call, respond to your Facebook quiz, or agree to participate in your latest entrepreneurial venture, it’s not (necessarily) because I don’t love you.

My next novel is due on May 1. Before that, I have one kids’ book draft due on November 1 and another kids’ book draft due on… March 1, I think? So it’s time to buckle down. Wonder Write Powers, activate! Form of: getting pages down!
Even the knitting’s on hold now.

In other writing news… I think it’s okay to tell y’all now that I’m going to do Inprint’s Margaret Root Brown reading, here in Houston, in May, along with author Oscar Casares. Exciting, is it not?

Before that there’s another thing, but I’m not supposed to talk about it yet. But let’s just say that I’ll be visiting Austin around Halloween. I don’t yet know if I’m going to wear a costume. If so, I might be Minnie Mouse. So much is still up in the air….

domestic front

My sister-in-law gave birth to two awesome twin girls. Which is fabulous! But then, of course, it makes people ask Dat and me if we’re going to have a baby, too. My other sister-in-law had a baby girl a few months back. Her sister is pregnant right now. Two sets of our friends are announcing their plans to try to have additional babies.

I see babies. I think of babies. I dream I’m having babies. The other day I made the mistake of taking a nap and, in my nightmare, I had given birth to twins. They were dangling out of me, still attached to their cords, and I was juggling them as we made our way to the hospital, where they didn’t want to give me a wheelchair and they asked me to have the placentas removed in a slummy housing project so as to score the hospital some kind of grant.

In this dream, my twins were boys. I don’t think I’d even know how to have a girl in my uterus, at this point.

Which is not to say that we’re thinking about having a baby. Because we’re not. I’m just telling you that the babies are all around us.

My real kids started school this week. Aside from some special State of Texas Vaccination Drama, everything ran smoothly. The kids have plenty of nice new skull- and electric-guitar-emblazoned t-shirts to wear, you’ll be happy to know.

My oldest is a senior this year. That brings up, to me, a lot of questions that are way more pertinent than the “Are y’all going to have a baby, maybe?” one. There are questions about college, after-school jobs, driver’s licensing and insurance, freaking prom, freaking class rings and yearbooks, girlfriends, curfews, Facebooks, the future…

You know. You know where I’m at with this, right?

That’s literally all I have time to say right now.

Isn’t that sad, kinda? More when I can.

I have rigid ideas about what’s right and proper and just and polite. Like I said earlier, the role of daughter-in-law is coming back to me now like riding a bike, and I’m intent on doing it the right/proper/just/polite way. That’s just how I roll.

I’ve been dating Dat for 6 years now and it’s funny to see how marriage changes the roles, in my mind. There are ideas and roles that I never bothered to analyze until now. Like this one:
It’s okay for a bachelor son to tag along on someone else’s Mother’s Day plans.
However, once that son marries, the couple formed must take responsibility for themselves by planning their own Mother’s Day observance.

Do you agree? You know what I mean? I’m wondering now if that’s kind of sexist, if it means that once a son marries a woman, the woman has to be responsible for that stuff.

But no… I’m imagining that bachelorette daughters are also allowed to tag along on coupled siblings plans, aren’t they? And if a son married another man, I think that couple would also have to step up their game, gender notwithstanding.

Really, there’s what’s polite, and then there’s individual family tradition. I think that politeness dictates respecting the traditions of individual families. When in Rome (i.e., your partner’s family), do as the Romans do (i.e., eat or pretend to eat Aunt Lucy’s Jell-O cake and don’t bitch about it).

I like the idea of working within the other family’s traditions and adding positive contributions that reflect your own personality. (Eat the Jell-O cake, plus bring your sage flatbread for everyone to try). I’m always struck by the attitudes of the people who post complaints to Yahoo Answers and such, who say stuff like, “Help me deal with my horribly rude mother-in-law! She is forcing everyone to do a White Elephant gift exchange! My family always does Secret Santa and I told her this and I told her I would not participate in the White Elephant and now she has the nerve not to answer the phone when I call her because I need babysitting!!!” I don’t know how people can live like that. Isn’t it difficult? Isn’t there a simple rule you can follow to get out of those situations… It has a catchy name… Gold… Golden Something? The “Don’t Treat People in Ways That Would Piss You Off” Gold Plated Rule? Google it — it’s a good tool.

(I’m not trying to brag on my own awesomeness here… I’m trying to brag on that of my family, who raised me to be tolerant and appreciative of difference, and to be brave about trying new things. That attitude has helped me in more ways than one.)

So, anyway. I think I’m telling y’all this so you can know what’s up with Capricorn women. Did I ever tell you that every woman in my immediate family sphere, when I was growing up, was a Capricorn? (Capricorn with Taurus moon, to be exact.) You’ll either think that’s fabulous or frightening, or else you’ll disregard it entirely because you don’t believe in astrology.

I don’t know if I really believe it or not, but “Capricorn” is good shorthand for “headstrong, slightly obsessive control freak who likes shit to run right.” And I come by those qualities honestly, through nature and nurture, and I like what they’ve done for me in life.

gross story for you

I woke up last Saturday to find that Toby had thrown up on my bedroom floor. No biggie – he has a sensitive stomach but its results are generally pretty solid and easy to clean.

Armed with a wad of toilet paper, I picked up the catfood-colored mass in one fell swoop. Under it, there were feathers.

“Oh, Toby,” I thought. He’s eaten a cat toy, or part of a pillow. He often eats things he shouldn’t. I felt a little guilty for buying toys that resembled mice with bird tails. Apparently, they were irrestible.

I used the edges of the toilet paper to pick up the bits of feather, which were all brown and wet. They held fast to the carpet, but I was persistent and plucked them out one by one.

The last piece poked my finger through the tissue. Poked it hard. Hurt.

“What the hell kind of feather is this, that stabs your fingers? This isn’t safe for inclusion in cat toys!”

That’s what I thought. Then I bent farther and looked harder to see the feather closer.

It wasn’t a feather.

What do you guess it actually was?

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Did you guess “piece of plastic or metal”?
Wrong.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Did you guess “piece of bone, like maybe from a bird”?
No, but closer.
.
.
.
.
.
It
was
an
em-
effing
ROACH LEG.
A giant, nasty, effed-up roach’s leg. Legs and smashed roach wings, sticking in the carpet. Wet from Toby’s mouth and spit on the floor.

Although I was completely disgusted, I was also glad (feeling glad while shuddering and pouring alcohol over my poked finger) that I can count on Toby to dispose of giant roaches that try to attack me in my sleep.

(Long-time readers know my experiences and fictional nightmares about roaches, and will therefore have even more insight into the role that Toby’s character plays in the story that is this blog. :))

You know? I want to live in a house that I built and cook food that I gathered or raised myself. I want to sew my own clothes and knit my own blankets. I want to take care of myself and my family, and only occasionally have to weave baskets to trade for the things I don’t know how to make. That’s just a different way to live… a way that isn’t based on spending 8 to 5, every week day, dealing with other people’s egos. I don’t like working with or around other people’s egos. Not so often, you know?

The problem with being Amish is that you have to conform to their ideas about good taste, and you can’t use electricity. Maybe I want to be a Mennonite.

Or maybe I just want to be a farmer. In the movies, when times get tough, farmers always say “Well, we’re fine here — we have enough to feed ourselves for the rest of our lives. It’s the other people [their neighbors or love interests] I’m worried about.”

I want to be like that — where I rely on myself, and I’m completely reliable.

Really, I think all of that just means that I want to start my own business. Because I don’t really know how to slaughter anything, and I’m too finicky to sew whole wardrobes out of calico.

Or else I’d be happy working in a room by myself, maybe. Making widgets according to written specifications. It’s not the working that bothers me — it’s everything else.

It’s not even about people being jerks. I could be in a building where every single person is competent and nice, and it’d still exhaust me mentally. I’m an introvert, okay? (People who know me in real life, stop telling me I’m not. I am! I want to live on a farm or work in a room alone!)

spring time

Every spring I feel restless. I want to get up and run out the door.

Last night, though, me and Dat and the kids put together one of those patio structures that Target calls a gazebo, but which is actually more like a canopy with mosquito netting on the sides. Dat and the boys put it together, actually, while I trimmed the pear tree above them. We got a new lopper (is that what it’s called?) a while back and this was my first time to really use it, and it lops off the branches very beautifully. I did the pear tree so it’d be out of the canopy’s way, then started on the oak tree on the other side of the back yard.

Tonight I want to finish those and then do every tree and bush in the front yard. I’d been planning to do that anyway, but now that I’ve felt the power of the new … loppers… I’m excited. I love trimming the trees — giving them little haircuts and making them feel lighter.

We have a bunny living in our front yard, randomly. When he was smaller, he fit through a gap in the garage door and so spent his nights there. Now he’s bigger and we’re guessing he just lives in the nandinas. We get home from work and he’s there in the flower patch, eating weeds. He just watches us. We watch him. We say “He’s growing.” Then we go inside.

It’s okay with me that this entry might be boring.

Sometimes it has to go down that way.

Life’s just plugging along. Like the bunny, our wedding is growing. It’s still an informal wedding in our house, but now Dat’s parents are getting even more into it, and so they’re inviting extra people. Which is fine — I want them to be comfortable and stay the whole evening, and having their peeps next to them will make that possible. I’m starting to think the wedding might spill over into the front yard, though. We still have physics in which we have to work, you know.

We’re gonna… transform the back yard into a fairyland or something. You know how people do that for weddings, sometimes. It involves Christmas lights, mostly. It’s not difficult, I don’t think. I feel confident in my fairyland transforming abilities.

At first I didn’t think we were going to buy flowers, but then my cousin said she wanted to buy them for us, and now I’m thinking of many ways in which flowers will be called into service. See? It’s a tumor. Weddings grow faster than rabbits.

That’s all. Back to work! Happy spring.

Oh, one last thing, just to annoy my kids….

My kids didn’t know that Ozzy Osborne was the lead singer of Black Sabbath. Really, now that I think about it, how would they have known?

They found out the other day because they wanted me to look for MP3s of Black Sabbath songs, and I searched for Ozzy’s name. And the kids were like “No, Mom….” and then I told them, and then they were like “What? Oh. But…. I thought he was just a guy on TV.” And I was like “That’s why that World of Warcraft commercial shows him as the Prince of Darkness. Right? Get it?” and they were like “Oh-h-h-h….” and I saw their minds reconfigure around the world.

They’re also learning which musicians are dead from ODs and which are dead from suicide, and which were ever called “the best [guitarist or drummer] in the world” and which dabbled in black magic or were rumored to have done so. That’s important history, I think. Kids should know these things. Don’t you agree?