Because I do have a lot to tell y’all – stories of adventure and danger, plus a bit of exciting new news.

In the meantime, feel free to check out our pics from Oahu on my Flickr page.

Us.

Monument.

of me and my dad.

Sometimes I’m in the mood to show y’all stuff instead of telling y’all stuff, and sometimes pictures are worth at least a paragraph or two.

See the empanadas I just destroyed, the fetish-y shoes I found at Ross, and exactly how fat/thin I am now.

Know that I’m reading all your comments and agreeing with them/ being educated with them/ appreciating them/ loving them. I just haven’t had time to comment back lately.

(It’s one thing when you have a job that you learn to do very well in the first year, and your boss refuses to promote you because you’re just a silly girl and not a good old boy in a suit, and so you spend 4 years working for 2 hours per day and then goofing off online for the other 6 hours, every week day of your life. However, it’s a whole other thing when you have a demanding job with a boss who respects you and people who appreciate your abilities. On the one hand, I no longer have as much time to respond to each of your comments. On the other hand, I no longer feel like calling in sick every other day for no reason at all. )

For now. It’s me and my kid.

Y’all don’t forget to come see me at the poetry workshop next week. Seriously — if you’re in Houston, near the Heights, come on down. If you have books of mine you want signed, we can do that, too.

I used to never drink red wine but now I only drink red wine. I’ve gone from merlot to cabernet and chianti, and next must be shiraz.

We bought our cat a water fountain. She likes to drink the water right from its trickle source. Some people would say it’s a waste of energy, to keep it running, but I think it’s such a small thing to make a small creature happy, and therefore worth doing. You know?

I think I’m gonna be a fairy for Halloween. Maybe. I’ll have to make the costume myself, though, because I don’t want to be a slut fairy, and therefore there’s no suitable costume in the stores. (All the women’s costumes for sale are slut costumes. Remind me to complain about that later.)

This is what I have time to do, between my long commute home and bed time:
1. monitor homework
2. monitor everyone getting fed, one way or another
3. nag about the chores that should’ve been done before I got home
4. clean up only the very messiest messes, concurrently with one of the tasks above
5. exercise with Gilad
6. nagging the kids to brush their teeth and wash their faces
7. the reading of the bedtime story
and that’s about it.

Every single other thing — dentist bank groceries bills boyfriend oil change tires laundry — I have to do over the weekend. Or during my lunch hours. Or in my dreams.

I’m glad we got a cat. This one doesn’t tear up the furniture or make a big mess, and I feel fleeting joy whenever I see her little cat face. She always has a funny or cute expression. She walks around in a constant state of “Hey guys,” or “Am I interrupting?” or “JESUS, A SQUIRREL!!” or “In my fantasies, everyone is chasing me. Look how clever I am, running away from them. Oops, sorry.. smashed into the plant again…”

Back to the Halloween thing.

Not a slutty fairy, and not a pink or purple fairy, and not a gothic fairy, and not an overtly glittery fairy. I want to be a nature-based fairy, in shades of green or aqua with brown, and only a little bit of magic in evidence. In my mind, as I design it, I think the words “pond fairy.” I’m a pond fairy, dammit. We’re going to a party where I always feel a little insecure. No, strike that — I always feel insecure at any Halloween party we go to, because I feel like there’s this giant expectation that all the women must be dressed promiscuously, and they all must be thin, and the whole purpose of the holiday is to put them on display to the men serving them liquor.

And that’s fine — I’m grown-up enough to ignore any bullshit that I don’t want to take part in. But at the same time, I want to get all into it and make a nice costume. Yet I feel there’s no use in wasting my creativity on such an event. You know?

I guess I could go to the Ren Fair, because the people who go there are more appreciative of creativity. But we’re bored of going there and seeing the same exact stuff year after year. So I tell myself to make whatever costume I want, and then to photograph it and put it on my Flickr, and that’ll make it worth the effort. But then I feel silly about that. How vain, to spend money and effort on photos meant to show off, right? (Same way I feel, now, about doing any creative thing for which I don’t already have a fee negotiated. )

Worst part: I get envious of my boyfriend. He loves to work hard on his costumes and come up with something awesome every single year. And people appreciate it, and they compliment him. Then, they look at me and think, “Not sexy enough,” and move on. And I feel… whiny because I haven’t received enough attention, I guess. Hate to admit such a weakness, but that’s how I feel. Creativity should trump plain nudity, in my mind, but it never will. Will it?

I was looking for inspiration online. (Fairy costumes, I mean.) I found this Flickr set called Convention Costumes Pool. Look at it. What do you think? How many of the women pictured here enjoyed making their costumes? And how many enjoy displaying their bodies to a bunch of convention guys? And how many women here enjoyed making their costumes, but got completely ignored in favor of the convention guys and the women displaying their bodies?

There were some bad-ass costumes among the social experiment, though. Check it:
1. Final Fantasy = awesome piping
2. meshy mer-person
3. Final Fantasy hangover?
4. Awesome Color Scheme Woman
5. I need this woman’s wig.

And you know what?

Screw it, while I’m there, I’ll just link y’all to some of my favest Flickr faves:
1. shoe fetish
2. If I had to date a non-human, it would be Relax Bear.
3. I want to eat this (then follow Jackie around and eat everything else she eats, too.)
4. Stained glass is always good.
5. So is just about anything that Jagosaurus photographs.

That’s all.

LOL Avian Flu.

New Year’s Eve 2005/2006:
The story. And a little bonus footage.

(Remember, you guys. NEVER AGAIN.)

This year I am particular thankful for the following:
1. I’m not poor.
2. I was born in America and not, say, Afghanistan.
3. I was born in reasonable good health, with decent DNA.
4. The same is true of my kids.
5. I was able to buy a house this year.
6. I now have good credit.
7. I have a nice boyfriend.
8. I have good friends.
9. My family loves me and they make me laugh, too.
10. I have a decent job.
11. I don’t have any health problems that can’t be fixed.

Yay. Life is good. I give thanks.

Christmas

I’m thinking I’m not going to buy a tree this year, after all, since my kids spend xmas with their dad in even-numbered years. So I’ll save the money and spend it on things that last longer.

I thought I wanted to decorate my house like crazy this year, but now I see that it’s pretty much all I can do to keep the lawn looking decent for my neighbors. You know? Mowing, edging, raking – I think that’s all the decoration I can do. Not even to mention that I haven’t knocked down the wasp house yet.

I don’t want to staple a bunch of lights up. I especially don’t want to take them down again.

Maybe I can buy just a tiny, tiny string of lights, and staple them to the wasp house.

Ha.

Houston Zoo

We went to the zoo today. I had to force everyone – my kids and my boyfriend say they don’t like the zoo. What’s wrong with them, I wonder. How can anyone say that?

“It’s the same animals every time,” says my middle son Dallas.

“I know. We’re going to check on them and see how they’re doing,” I say.

I forced them to go and they liked it, after all. Just like always.

My favorite part this time was the octopus molesting the toy boat. Check it out.

If I ever get rich, I’m totally going to buy a membership to the zoo.

Look at my Flickr page.