Photo Credit:pazsnewyorkminute

The other day, while exiting a subway station, I saw a random shady character climbing the stairs and yelling after another guy: “It’s balsamic, baby!”

Either slang has taken to a new low or salad dressing has gotten a lot more exciting.

They talk about a double dip recession and I, having been lovingly adopted by this country, say: Not here, not on my watch!

The following is a list of what I did this weekend to help us all.

1. Watched Predators.
Dear Topher Grace: You’ll always be Eric Forman to me. Can’t be scared of you even when I try. They should’ve asked the guy from Dexter to do it.
2. Watched Despicable Me. So cute!
3. Purchased Barney.

He seats on the table by the reading area. Do you see the “issue” with his feet?
4. Purchased a game chest with two poofies.

I LOVE having a chest with all my games inside! Don’t really care for the poofies but they came with the chest so whatever.
5. Ate out.
6. Bought a desk for Nate.

The one we got is like this one but:

• The return is on the other side
• It has an extra little cubbie for the computer.
• It’ll be lighter oak (to match the shelves).
• It’ll have a hole for the computer cables.

Because of all those modifications, we have to wait 30 days until they finish it…
Oh well! I guess we’ll practice patience in the meantime.

And since I’m being patient…ummm…what can we talk about?

You guys were enjoying the book club and seem to have continued to read the books even when I didn’t say a word about them.
I can take a hint, so I’ll resume the book club properly, in August.

What else?
Happy-song Monday is sorta there but not really.
Would you like it to be back?
Did it make you happy to get to work on Monday morning knowing that a happy song was waiting for you?

Also, I have a blister on my tongue.
Care to share any remedies to get rid of it?

About the baby.
I’m happy to announce that I will soon be an aunt again.
My lovely sister is due in January.
Her fibromyalgia combined with the pregnancy is taking quite a toll on her.
As her older and only sister, I wish I could run to her rescue and wait on her hand and foot.
Which probably proves I have a heart, after all.

Due to some crazy re-scheduling by a third party, I have the day off.
I slept in and then went to the MVD (previously DMV) to get a new license from this lovely state.
I liked Georgia’s better. With the peaches and all.

I have no plans for this afternoon, but as soon as I’m done writing this, I’ll go lie down by Barney and finish reading “Stranger than Fiction” by Chuck Palahniuk.

Boy, this post is disjointed. But then again, so is yours truly.
Have a good week and if you wanna cheer me up, leave a comment.

After carefully considering all your suggestions, I went to the store and bought a bunch of flowers.
I walked straight to the neighbor’s door and knocked.
When the door opened, the conversation went something like this:

Half naked teenage boy: Hello?
Me: Hi, I’m your next door neighbor, is your mom home?
Half naked teenage boy: I think she’s sleeping.
Me: Um, can you check? I’d really like to thank her personally.
Half naked teenage boy: Yeah, come in.

So now I’m standing inside a pitch black house with a video game blaring out of some huge speakers.
I’m thinking of “Alien” and “Predator” and the terrible “Chronicles of Riddick".
I’m hoping my eyes get used to the darkness quickly.
I hug the flowers closer to me.
As soon as my eyes adjust a little, I see a man flanking my right side.

Man that materialized out of nowhere: What’s going on?
Me: Oh, hello! I was hoping to talk to your wife. I brought her some flowers.
Man that materialized out of nowhere: Oh, she’s not my wife. She’s my sister.
Me: Oh, I…

And then what I perceive as a woman dressed in towels flanks, my left side.

Me: HELLO!

She has long hair and is covering/holding half her face, and her skin looks… I’m no specialist, but it looks like leprosy. I’m so taken aback that my “nurturing voice” comes out and asks: Are you ok? Cyndy?

Cyndy: Yes. It’s a long story.

Quickly my focus returns and I remember why I came here in the first place.

Me: I’m your next door neighbor and I wanted to thank you for…
Cyndy: For filling up your pool the other day. Yes. It was making an awful noise.
Me: Oh, my goodness, I’m so embarrassed about that! Terribly sorry to have bothered you. I assure you it will never happen again. Ever. Never ever. Again.
Cyndy: Oh, I didn’t really mind…
Me: Yes, yes! It was absolutely terrible of me. I’ll take excellent care of it and it won’t happen again. Here, I got you some flowers to thank you for your kindness.
Cyndy: Oh, I really don’t mind checking on it in exchange for…
Me: No, no. That won’t be necessary anymore. Again I just wanted to thank you and apologize and assure you that it’s taken care of.
Cyndy: But I really…
Me: I’m appalled the grinding noise caused such a ruckus! I guarantee it won’t happen again. Well, I better get going. So nice to meet you!
Cyndy: Bye.

As the video game sounds fade behind my back and my eyes adjust to the sunlight, I wonder what the heck happened to her skin and mostly if it’s contagious.
Maybe I should fill up the pool with acid after all.

I also wonder if I was gentle/subtle enough and if I drove the point home. And if I locked it behind my gates so future trespassing will be avoided.

I spend the rest of the day researching flesh eating diseases that could propagate through water.

The pool people will be here in the morning.

This is how everyday of my life looks, as of late.

Cruising down some freeway, as always, with these two guys, we arrived to the Arizona desert. It looks like this:

Since we are people of culture, we decided to stop along the way and see what the land has to offer.
Other than the heat one feels at the doors of hell.

Montezuma’s castle, a National Monument, from the outside:

We believed them when they told us it used to look like this, inside:

We also saw a lizard.

This is me about to drink water while trying to keep an eye on the lizard. Thank you, buddy, for taking such a great photo.

We encountered extravagant wild boars.

And other interesting creatures:

And that was my fourth of July weekend.

Upon my return home, I found my hose inside the pool and this note taped to the glass doors in the backyard:

It says:

Hi! (smiley face)
My name is Cyndy. I’m your next door neighbor to the north.
I heard your pool pump grinding away because your pool water level was too low. I put water in the pool- took a dip didn’t think you would mind.
I’m available for pool upkeep in exchange for a swim if you are possibly interested. Great physical therapy for me.
(Phone # that I scribbled over)

Awesome.
Now I have trespassing neighbors who open my fences and come into my yard to take dips in my pool when I’m not home.
What would you do about it?

I’ve been reading Gift from the Sea by A.M. Lindbergh and The House by the Sea by May Sarton.
Both of them are introspective books about the changes we go through as individuals, as we grow older.
I’ve also been reading my journals. Not as good, but of particular interest to me.

My niece celebrated her 8th birthday last January.
My son would turn 9 in a few days.

Very thin lines are becoming permanent residents of my forehead.
About personal changes…there’s been a few.

I read somewhere that at 50, you have the face you deserve.
I don’t know anything about deserving, but I look forward to seeing my face in the mirror in a few years, and finding old gestures, old laughter, old winks scribbled irrevocably on my skin.

“Landslide” by Stevie Nicks. Time makes you bolder.

A friend told me today that as she grows older, she finds herself talking less and less.
Words do tend to bite your unmentionables and judging becomes much harder with age.

Luckily, given enough time, one can walk off almost anything.
Ironically…well, you get it.

I grow old . . . I grow old . . .
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

- T. S. Eliot “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”

No need to roll them.
Yet.