stuck inside

I want to be in a car, with my feet dangling out of the passenger window, my light cotton skirt ebbing and flowing, dancing with the wind. I'll sit there with my hat placed loosely atop my head, shoulders fallen back, reading the next Martin Millar or something that makes me glad to be out, like On The Road. And I'll let the wind and the occasional dead insect tickle my bare feet.

Or maybe I want to be someplace else, someplace that involves a lot more green. Palos Verdes, perhaps, or Mendocino County. Ireland's more like it, but even my dreams have become more realistic. I'd lay down and face the sun and let the small of my back sink into the soil. No, I wouldn't accept sunglasses; it has been too long since my eyelids have felt the heat. And somehow Mellow Candle would be heard, a universal sound being hummed by the birds and the critters and the trees. I'd take deep breaths, and count each one so that they'd all be remembered as individual moments outside of my norm.

I have got to get out. It's tugging me again. Thankfully this time I've managed to steer clear of Frances Mayes, but it certainly doesn't help that today I've been listening exclusively to Sandy Denny.

Sigh.

cake pops

I spent most of yesterday morning obsessing over this idea, so last night, free time and energy be damned, I made cake pops. Red velvet cake/cream cheese icing/white chocolate coating.

decision day

I think my lack of anxiety/optimism about the imminent Prop 8 ruling is just a defense mechanism against being sorely disappointed, hurt and offended as has been the case many times before. This is probably a bad thing. Well ... hope we're still legally (but only within a 300 mile radius) married by 3:00pm.

i always feel like ... somebody's watching me

pippin

We got a new kitten!

World, meet Pippin. Our newest/cutest, and Linus's current arch-nemesis.

the silver lining

I can't even talk about what happened this morning, y'all. Italy lost to Slovakia so bad I almost cried. I hereby declare today International Fail Day on behalf of the Azzurri and Italians/Italian-Americans everywhere. Just ... whatthefuck.

On a happier note, I got a belated anniversary gift from the wife, and it is so cute it almost makes up for Italy's miserable loss.

A cupcake pan and kitchen aid necklace!

marriage v1.0

Two years ago today, soggy and sleepy from sitting on the grass in front of a courthouse all night, I married the love of my life ... the first time. We spent the night playing cards, doodling, listening to music on our iPod speaker and exchanging stories with the couple behind us in line; and at 4:30am we all rose to start the overwhelming process of "forever changing history" with TV reporters, L.A. Times journalists and NPR writers.

As we ushered ourselves into the tent to have the registrar make it official, our spontaneously-appointed witness pulled us aside and said, "It's hard. Good luck." We giggled and agreed that we'd be up for the challenge, having no idea what exactly we'd signed ourselves up for.

In the last two years, I have loved like I've never loved before, I have laughed, I have cried, I have given up and I've been given the strength to keep going. There've been moments here and there when the "it's hard" advice didn't even touch on the real intensity of our relationship, times that I actually suggested we separate for a time to think about things because we were on the brink of calling it quits. The amount of work required to sustain a marriage is something you can't even conceptualize until you do it (of course, for our community, the word 'marriage' extends to couples who are committed at heart and not necessarily on paper), and we've both had moments of weakness that threatened to tear it all apart.

But in the last two years, I have grown from a stubborn, impatient, slightly manic person into an open-minded, even-tempered woman with strength I never knew existed. Aside from my mother, my wife is the single most influential person in my life. I owe everything I am to her. And so we get to a point now where we no longer fear the imminent doom; we no longer threaten divorce at every obstacle, because these last few years have taught us that with love and the willingness to persevere, we can do anything. Everything.

I love you, baby. Happy anniversary.

forza forza

BFF and me, being swallowed by a fiery Italian mob on Mulberry St.

Last World Cup I was vacationing in England. People shouted out of every pub along the highway and the red and white flag adorned every home and vehicle. And then I moved to New York where we watched Italy completely p0wn France, and we celebrated in the streets of Little Italy screaming, "Siamo Noi! Siamo Noi!"

This year, I'm waking up an extra hour early every morning to catch the early games, and missing the second half of each so that I'm not too late for work. I'm catching the first half of the later games on my lunch break, and sneaking in the second on shitty-quality earphones.

Bad life choices indeed.

But I digress. Today is finally here. Today Italy plays its first game against Paraguay. I've got my laptop set up at my desk and my earphones nearby for some ESPN-streaming. I'll try to keep the screaming to a minimum.

Forza Azzurri!

voila

My spumoni cupcakes came out surprisingly decent! I gotta admit, I was half expecting them to taste like ass; I improvise on my cakes pretty rarely, and I experiment with different extracts even less frequently than that, so the fact that they got such great reception was kind of shocking. The old ego was definitely boosted, and I am adding them to the menu of my up and coming cupcakery.

1 part chocolate fudge cake with chocolate chips

1 part pistachio-flavored cake

1 part cherry-flavored cake

1 cherry, halved

Pistachio icing

better be better

I really really want to thank all of you for your heart-warming comments on my last post. Since that post, life has been pretty wonderful, and so I've found it kind of hard to go back and revisit the issue. Let me just say how grateful I am that, in one way or another, you're all a part of my life. It's good to know that when the real world lets us down, there's a little place in the blogosphere that's overflowing with unconditional love and support. Thank you.

Life has been too much fun lately. After having opened up a gargantuan can of worms on myself, it's actually been pretty pleasant. I'm releasing a lot of that hidden trauma and have been slowly letting myself be free of it. When I'm not doing that, I'm being well distracted and surprisingly productive.

Probably the most exciting thing I've done, the thing that makes me 80 bajillion years old, is completely redecorate our apartment so that it looks more like a place where adults live and less like a collection of mismatched furniture. I've dreamt of a Moroccan-themed living room for a long time, and I'm finally getting it! We replaced our nasty ass blinds with rusty orange curtains; took away our old couch cushions and added throw pillows of orange, gold and deep purple; bought a beautiful Persian rug, and have placed matching candles and things about everywhere. We've got a lot more to add/change, but things are really looking good, and I am *loving* coming home to a bright Moroccan paradise.

We also recently bought Jess an Xbox which, you guessed it, has meant a lot more time to myself. I am not complaining: I recently bought myself various flavor extracts (pistachio, hazelnut, cherry, lavender, blueberry) for baking experiments of all sorts. My next project is spumoni cupcakes and I'm thinking about making them for the BBQ we're having on Saturday.

Also, speaking of baking (this has got to be the most boring blog y'all read. Seriously, why are you still here?), I got myself a new apron from Anthropologie:

It is just as amazing as it seems. And I'm convinced that it has superhuman housewife powers, because I cannot. stop. cleaning.

I just re-read that sentence and looked at myself like ... who are you?! I think I'm actually an adult, finally. And I'm kind of loving it.

abuse education

Doing my usual rounds yesterday, I read Greg's most recent entry about Rape, Abuse and Incest. It's interesting that I happened to read it yesterday, after having just experienced a huge realization on the same subject the night before. While watching What's Love Got to Do with It (a movie I've seen a hundred times before) on Wednesday night, I saw something in Tina Turner's story that I'd never identified with before. For the first time in my life, I saw myself in her misery.

It's strange. I had no idea before that I was one of those girls, the same as the ones you see in films, who 'yes sir, no sir', get beaten halfway to death and then cry themselves to sleep in a locked bathroom. It's like I've been asleep for the last 16 years or so, having completely blocked out all recollections of the things I had been through with my father. As I watched that night, though, and noticed my internal commentary on her actions in the movie, a wave of revelation hit me. All of a sudden, my memory had been restored. And now I remember. I remember the way I used to look at myself in that bathroom mirror, hair a mess and face ridden with self-hatred, telling myself it was all my fault. I'd cry and cry for hours, and my family would look away and continue believing that there was nothing wrong going on because I had no scars to prove any of it.

Since then it's like I've unlocked the door to all these unwanted memories. Scenes keep flashing in front of my eyes of the multiple-hour long yelling fits and rage sessions where he would sit there and scream at me for being a disgrace, a disappointment and a good for nothing, poor excuse for a daughter, while all I was allowed to do was cry. And he would beat each topic to death like I just couldn't hurt enough for him. I couldn't just get in trouble for ditching school with my friends one day; I was a terrible person for it and I had to sit there and be told all the reasons why I was a terrible person. For hours. Sometimes days.

I remember the time I got in trouble for one thing or another, and my mom wouldn't let me come back to her house until he'd had his turn with me, so I deliberately slept for an entire day, just dreading what he was going to do and say. I'd wake up, notice the time, tremble and cry for a bit, and then force myself to sleep for another few hours.

I remember the time he called me dirty, which was right after I got raped the first time (though he didn't know) and I was acting out because I had no idea how to deal with the consequent feelings. I remember wearing an extra large Silverchair shirt and these dingy, beat up burgundy corduroys around everywhere, because I didn't want to see my form. And I had just started using pot, which helped me bury some of that anxiety. I had gotten in trouble for something small, I seem to remember, but he beat me like a horse for it; he would be wound up abusing me for a few hours and would break intermittently for jokes with the rest of the family. He said I was disgusting and he made me take a shower. He wasn't satisfied with the first shower, and he smelled my fucking hair, telling me it wasn't clean enough, and when I washed it again he still wasn't satisfied. He eventually made my grandmother wash my hair and then comb it and put it up. I was fucking thirteen years old. I remember sitting there in that chair with grandma's hands in my hair, watching him tell jokes about my stepmom's dad to the rest of the family, and after half an hour of sitting there, my eyes finally dried up, I cracked a grin at some asinine thing he said. And I remember him looking at me and being like, "Nuh uh, don't you dare laugh. I'm not done with you yet. You disgust me."

And I remember the time he said he wished I wasn't a part of his family, when he was driving me home from his house, and the complete powerlessness I resented bearing as he dropped me off and then told me to give him a kiss goodbye.

I remember the way he stood there and watched when my stepmom beat me with shoes and with belts and with whatever the fuck else she could find, and the way he didn't care to defend me from her wrath. I remember trying to explain myself the first time she beat me (I had gotten in trouble for talking back to her, and I think all I really said was, "don't worry, sister, we can show dad your dance when he gets home"), and the way she asserted that I was a liar on top of being a fucking brat.

And then I fast forward to being 18, after the second rape happened, and I remember picking up the phone when my stepmom called to say she was sorry to hear about what I'd been through. After a couple minutes she passed the phone to my father, who spoke coldly and sternly when he bluntly told me that that's what I get for going to parties.

Rape, he said, was what I deserved for going to parties.

Some of these memories I remember pretty well, and I've told a few key people about them when it's been appropriate. But some of these I'd completely blocked out of all knowledge, and I'm only now really seeing them as real, serious abuse.

For some reason, I've known intellectually the meaning of emotional abuse, and I've known that it's applied to me and my situation, but it never actually sunk in that I've been dealing with an abuser; it never actually occurred to me that it isn't that we just "have a strained relationship" or even that my father is just a giant dillhole, but that I was actually abused growing up, and that that puts him in a completely different light.

This doesn't seem like good news, but oh my god it is. First, it's just the acknowledgement that it is NOT this relationship that I have to salvage or repair; I do NOT have to find a common ground with this man. Rather, I have to defeat the hell out of him and what his abuse means for who I've become. I have to refute this idea that I am partially to blame for our dysfunction and that he's right because he's older which seems to be what everyone in my family believes (hell, I've lost the support of absolutely everyone in my family because of him and the way he either fools or scares them into submission). And secondly, it means that now that I know what I'm working with I have so much more to gain.

I have a lot to explore now, with regards to the two rapes. But this is heavy enough, and a giant step in the direction of reconciliation and peace.

As personal and as scary as this is, it's important for me to write it here. Very few of us have any voice at all, and even fewer are aware that emotional abuse is still abuse. Those of us who didn't have scars to hide and wished we did, both so that it'd weigh on our hearts a little less, and so that people would believe us when we said it hurt, need a voice too.

It took me 26 years to be able to identify with someone who had been abused. It's my hope that the more stories like these that are told, the more young women and men will be saved from the dangerous route to self-discovery that I took.

***

A big thank you to Greg for being courageous enough to share her story and for inspiring me to talk about mine.

day 045

Piña Colada Cupcake. I may need better lighting. And a tripod.

13 April 2010

day 044

Choices, choices.

12 April 2010

project 365

Much to my befuddlement, I am still playing around with Project 365. If words continue to fail me, at least my shutter won't.

Day 043: Earl Grey tea cookies.

times like these

It's usually in times like these, when the end of a loved one's life is near, that a family comes together in support and compassion for one another.

It's usually in times like these that people decide that what's more important than pride is unconditional love.

It's usually in times like these when all members of these families can be counted upon to keep everyone abreast of the progress and life state of the elder who's ill.

For my family, though, it's in times like these that they distance themselves even more; it's in times like these that they act the coldest, that they show their greatest weaknesses, and prove that even when it's a life or death situation, they will choose ignorance and bigotry over acceptance and love.

God help us all.

you can usually tell

You can usually tell I'm enjoying life by the way I tend to thoughtlessly neglect my blog. Not as much to rant about, not as much to say. I hate that; I'd much rather look back at this place three years from now and read happy things about life and love and marriage and things. Instead I'm probably going to end up with 300 posts about apologizing for not being dedicated.

I ask myself on a daily basis why I bother keeping this thing at all, if that's the case. I've come up with two answers: 1) I paid for this bitch, and it's good for another year at least, and 2) I'm still holding out hope that a motivational speaker in fairy form will come find me, wave her magic wand, and grant me the gift of storytelling.

Well ... till she shows up, you're getting bullet points:

• It's been 30 days since I've started putting a certain philosophy into practice, and life has been overwhelmingly blissful ever since. It's a little freaky. Not only am I happier, more compassionate and self-fulfilled, I also find myself saying things like, "I love my job," and, "no, honey, let me do the dishes." I'm telling you ... freaky. I'd clue you all in, but I'm still sort of experimenting, and I want to see where it takes me before I propagate (in case you're wondering, it's not religious), but if you're curious, ask and ye shall receive!



• Wife & I are going to Seattle in 29 days and counting. Squee! It'll be a year since I've been there, and I'm nearly dying of withdrawals. Looking forward to showing her around and stalking Dan Savage.



• I've embarked on a photography project, (Project 365 for you fellow Flickrers). I'm no good at finishing the things I start, and I'm giving myself till about mid-May to punk out, but for now, it's a lot of fun and I'm learning a lot of things about photography. For instance, did you know that the timer option can usually mean the difference between a point & shoot picture and a professional-looking shot? Of course you did. I'm habitually slow on the uptake.

Here is the picture I took today. The beauty of living a block from the beach is that I can usually make it there before the sun sets each evening.

transformation/transmutation

I can almost physically feel the hurt and the anger being extracted from within right now. Such a drastic change from the last couple months of my life.

I won't recount all that has happened in the last few days; I'm much too unstable to relive it all right now, and anyway, the purpose of the extraction process is to allow things to be released, not harp on them. But in an oddly shaped nutshell, I have embarked on a journey that is extremely different than the one I've been on for the last 8 or so years. Actually, eh, scratch that; the path is similar, but my approach has completely changed, and the things I'm confronting/experiencing/working through as a result are phenomenal.

Phenomenal.

Craziness and bouts of bawling abound. But I'm finding beneath them a sense of peace I have never - ever - experienced before in my life. Conviction in its most humble form, unwavering resolve and a burning desire to succeed are among the gifts I've found in the process. And it has only just begun.

I promise to be less cryptic when I'm not being faced with a blogger vs. dinner conundrum. Suffice it for now to say that I am feeling a ton better from my last entry. Thank you all for caring enough to encourage me to light things on fire. (Always an immediate way to tell a friend from apathetic witnesses, for sure.) I promise, whenever it is you need it, I will do the same for you.

Wishing you peace beyond all understanding,

Billie

oh my GOD, you guys

Life is SUCKING right now!

Has that ever happened to you? Those days when you're just thunderstruck at the capability of everything and everyone in your life to suck so hard?! Oh my GOD!

I've tried taking things in bit by bit, prioritizing and chiseling at each problem a little each day. But for some reason, today, every problem has decided to quadruple in size; each person I've come in contact with has chosen today to be the assiest asshole alive; and I can't do a fucking thing about it.

I am closer than I've ever been to throwing a gargantuan temper tantrum and I have no idea how to stop it. My only ideas for a change in life condition right now are to a) eat the rest of my chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, right out of its carton, b) chant (which always works, but I don't even WANT to feel better right now), and c) light some shit on fire.

Please don't respond with words of wisdom or encouragement. It will not help. Proceed with commiseration only, otherwise, just pass the Ben & Jerry's.

rain i don't mind

plumber's here
he's expecting chaos to ensue from the phenooooomenal rainstorm we're having
coworker nods: yes, it's terrible!
mother nature! poor us!
meanwhile i
just want to go outside
and play.

wrong way

Begrudging my life for 40 hours a week and spending the rest of my time recovering from them is absolutely no way to live. I've been up since 2:30, enjoying some much needed time alone, but also dreading the work week that awaits me.

It's easy to identify the beauty in the world at 4:00am; much more difficult to see it in a corporate office being faced with the likes of my lazy coworkers.

Maybe that's my mission. Maybe I'm supposed to be using this experience as an opportunity to learn compassion. Calling them twatwaffles and things of that sort doesn't make them any easier to deal with, it only allows me to blow off some rage. The rage will keep appearing as long as I continue occupying a passive position.

I feel like I've had this realization before: I really need to play the active role in my life. I keep letting these situations have their way with me.

goodbye, tp

I was always a big fan of Teddy's. I can't really say why. I think it started as appreciation for his absurd, sometimes frightening sound, and eventually turned into sincere admiration. He's one of those artists, like Ella or Frank, that I always go back to when the newer stuff just isn't cutting it.

WTF, 2010. Isn't the Year O' Death over?

progress, maybe

I've spent the last couple hours completely redoing my Safari bookmarks. The list of sites I frequent daily has changed dramatically over the last six months.

Sign that I'm undergoing transformation, or proof that I lead an uneventful life? Hmm.

Today has been the worst fibro day this season. It's really strange, and I'm not sure why it's getting so bad, aside from the change in weather. I've spent the last couple hours transferring the heating pad from one arm to another, which has helped considerably, and now I'm just trying to decompress before going to bed.

The Jacksons' A&E show is on. It's absolutely terrible and I can't get enough. I've decided that Jermaine is more scary than narcissistic, and Jackie is by far my favorite. Not surprising, as he reminds me so much of Uncle Randy.

My cousin just texted me telling me how happy he is that I'm in his life. He's been drinking Irish car bombs. Not gonna lie; I am pretty convinced that he suffers from alcoholism. It hasn't gotten bad yet (...?) and I know he's doing a lot of self-discovery in his sober life, but it is worrying nonetheless. I have no idea how to approach him about it just yet. I feel like I'd know how to intervene if it was worse, but right now it just looks like party time all the time; no 'harm' is being done.

There's something so dishonest about that last sentence.

I think I've improved since my last update as far as my emotional condition goes. I'm not crying and I'm not worrying as much about what to do next. Every few hours or so I'll replay the situation in my head; I'll hear my dad yell, "don't ever come to this house again" and be filled with much of the same rage and disappointment as I was on Christmas Eve. But for the sake of survival, I shake my head as if to knock the memory out of my brain and try to move on.

I'm learning to confront these issues gradually instead of waiting for a breakdown and working my way up from there. I have no doubt I'll persevere. In the meantime I'm still a little eh about life in general, and that'll just have to do.

trudging

Being in this office during the three days between Hellsmas and New Years is depressing. 4 of the 7 people who work in this office took these three days off because they're smart or have vacation time to spare; the rest of us have sat here in silence for hours with our thumbs up our asses, waiting for the bell to ring. The phones are completely dead; there are no visitors. I haven't gotten an email since 8:54am and the very important project I was working on was submitted yesterday evening. It is miserable.

There's not much one can do during the wasted time at the office. I've watched Lord of the Rings, I've watched Paris Je T'aime; I tried reading 'What the Dickens?' which Jess bought me for Christmas but I found myself dozing off. I wanted to write thank you cards for the wedding, but I can't find them anywhere at home.

Indeed. Our house is that dirty.

Instead of decorating cakes or writing nice notes, publishing a decent blog entry or doing anything productive whatsoever, I've been looking at t-shirts online, daydreaming and getting all sorts of down. I'm sure to snap out of it soon, but in the meantime I just feel... feh. I was going to write a lot more, but then I got lazy and gave up. Till next time.

in the last five days i have:

• told off my piece of shit father for the first time in my life
• been banned from my family's house and banned from seeing my siblings
• rearranged my living room furniture (looks quite nice now)
• heard my wife bitch my father out and watched her bruise her wrist punching the wall in anger
• baked pumpkin cupcakes (they were quite delicious)
• eaten undercooked meat
• pretended to be straight
• had pizza
• received the evenstar as a christmas gift (it's quite gorgeous)
• had a beautiful and insightful conversation with my father's brother for the first time in my life
• decided not to go back to school this year
• bawled like an idiot off and on for roughly 96 hours

Happy Holidays? I sincerely hope Baby Jesus Day was more kind to you and your kin than it was to us.

ugh

I don't even know how to feel about this weekend. I ask you: how would you feel if you heard someone scream the N word in a kitchen full of your closest friends and then noticed that not one of them flinched?

first step

Today is the day I sit down with my boss and ask him to cut my hours. I'm a little petrified. I've been trying to gauge his mood over the last 4 hours and it looks like he could be better. He could also be a lot worse, though. He's yelled at one coworker once but has also sung the five dollar foot long song to me, so... yeeeah. (Do you see? Do you see the asshattery I have to work with on a daily basis?)

Ever since having the "wait, maybe I do want to bake bundt cakes for the rest of my life" epiphany last week I've been considering my options. The first option is to bake cupcakes at home and sell them wholesale to catering companies. My second option is to open my own bakery and serve people whatever the hell I want.

I've been pretty disciplined lately with gongyo and have chanted in the car on the way to work every morning. Monday morning I chanted an extra twenty minutes while stuck in traffic, and when I got to work, the only thought that entered my mind was, "next step." I hate this place, yet I've been here for 3 years and have only taken one additional semester of classes. It is far beyond the time to take the next step. I need to be moving forward, even if it takes me another 3 years. So I looked up classes at Long Beach. Their culinary arts program seems pretty fantastic, if not downright sensational. The intro to baking course would require me to leave at 3:30 two days a week, which isn't too bad at all, but I know my body and I know that the lack of sleep (class lets out at 10:00 each night) combined with the hours on my feet and the lab work would render me achey and anxious. I also have a certain amount of lab hours to accrue. So I will probably need Fridays off to rest and work on homework. Depending on what this looks like for my salary, I will either have Fridays off or have an early dismissal.

I figure this'll give me ample time and experience to see whether or not baking really is something I can make a career out of. If it turns out my passion for Italian (or for photography) is actually greater, I will at least be able to finish my education in that while working a job I love.

Such is the life of a fickle young woman in her 20's.

things i want out of life:

Pizza night
I want to start eating better, including lots of fruits and vegetables in our everyday diet, and then save room for a pizza dinner once a week.

More time to read
The list of books I’m dying to plow through gets longer and I’m starting to wish I could stop the world for a couple or forty days to read them.

More time to write
Blog what?

Wife’s happiness
She should be afforded more time alone to chant and work through karmic blocks.

Once-a-month dates with Mom
Remember when we used to go see a movie and then grab a bite to eat in the Century City Mall food court? I can still taste the Rice Krispies treats and grasshopper pies.

No more coughing
Cause, really, it’s disgusting. I started coughing the day before our wedding, an entire month ago.

The ability to finish everything I start
Cause halfway through this I felt the urge to erase it all and start something else.

Bundt cakes
They make me happy, which I know sounds sappy, but it’s true.

Direction
Do I want bundt cakes for the rest of my life? I thought I wanted be an Italian teacher. Or a photographer. Or a conceptual expressionist. Today I heard myself say, "If I could bake all day everyday, I would be happy." The idea isn't new to me; in fact, I've said that very thing as much as 20 times this season. But it just now occurred to me: I could do this forever. Hm. And I mean, hey, no degree required! But... don't I want to speak Italian for a living? Don't I want to be around kids? Maybe I could teach a baking course to children at the elementary age in Italy, then take photos of my new neighborhood on the weekends. Are you there, God?

A Christmas tree
Stupid cat.

More of the wife
She's changed. All for the good. I want more of her. I can't get enough.

People to own up to their shit
Admit it: you can be a giant asshole. It's ok; I can be too. Apologize for it, learn from it and let's all move on.

Booooooooooks
The Wicked series ~ Gregory Maguire I've heard more bad reviews than good but each time I read a back cover I get more and more excited about reading it.
Photo ~ Sammy Davis, Jr.
This Book Does Not Exist: Adventures in the Paradoxical ~ Gary Hayden
Water for Elephants ~ Sara Gruen It's the circus.
Smashed, Squashed, Splattered, Chewed, Chunked & Spewed ~ Lance Carbuncle His last name is Carbuncle.
Suzy, Led Zeppelin and Me ~ Martin Millar Still not quite sure why I don't own everything he's ever written.

Music
It's not that I want more CD's, I just want the time and space to be able to explore and listen to new music. I'll never tire of my Charlie Mingus and Sam Cooke albums, but of the 25 artists included on NPR's best music of 2009 list, I'd heard of 6.

Make more care packages
Who wants one? It has been a while and I miss the fun in assembling the goods.

*
*
*

Sharing is caring and I've been bored shitless at work.

I feel like taking pictures. I want to take more pictures. I bought this gorgeous $1300 camera and have taken... meh... 5 shots I'm actually proud of? I'm really just waiting for someone to come along and teach me the wonders of Photoshop.

Any takers?

In the meantime I am baking cakes, smaller cakes, biscuits, bars and cookies for the holidays; I am running out of time to buy Jess a birthday present; and I'm watching Mean Girls on DVD.

Somehow my life seems so much more interesting in my head.

done and done!

seventeen days

Our wedding website tells me there's 17 days until our wedding.

...I may be on the verge of a mental breakdown.

Life has been treating me well in all other areas, though. Work's been boring, which is always a good thing; I was recently reconnected with my estranged cousin/best friend after a couple years of no contact; I've been spending lots of quality time with my closest friends, and wifey and I couldn't be happier.

Actually, that last part's not true; we could be a lot happier. We just need this wedding to be over before that happens.

And that may be all I have to say until I'm able to reclaim my brain.

honesty

I sometimes wish for the opportunity to arise when I'm asked specifically how I feel about someone and get to answer completely honestly. I wish I could ask people to ask me how I really feel about them. But I guess the world doesn't really work that way. Few are prepared to hear such honesty without also feeling attacked and consequently defensive, myself included. And while I fantasize about it being a healthy experience wherein each of us would get to learn about and improve ourselves, it's pretty easy to see that it wouldn't happen that way.

I'm not talking about anyone in particular; I'm just thinking. And that may be a sign of weakness on my part; like I'm not fearless, upfront and/or douchey enough to just offer my opinion of someone without being provoked, so I fantasize about getting to let it all out and fantasize about making people feel good with the positive remarks/explaining my actions and interactions with them with the negative. I think a part of it is also the little Buddha in me wanting to make peace with everyone by creating an open forum for dialogue. And part of it is me being curious about what these people would say in response and what I'd have to learn by what people think of me.

I don't know. What do you think? Could such a thing ever work if put out there, and if so, would you be interested to know?

I posed this question to a couple people in my personal life and got some great feedback, but I also want to know what the rest of the world thinks.

same ol'

I ended up doing the same ol'. I made the red, white & blue cupcakes again. Though this time I did do something a wee bit different: I tried to make it look like an American flag. Had it been a little bigger it would've looked like one. Heh.

4th baking

I really want to bake something for the 4th of July, but for once I have no idea what to bake. I took a look around all my favorite baking sites and found lots of cool ideas, but they all seem too time-consuming. I usually expect all my baking endeavors to take me a while, and if I wasn't planning on doing most of my moving this weekend I'd do something like this:

Courtesy of 17 and baking.

But I really have no time, and I know I'll end up washing cupcake pans at 4:00am and hating life if I tried doing it after we move all of our stuff in.

I did this for our Memorial Day BBQ this year, and they went over great:

But I also don't want to do the same ol'. ::shrug:: I'll let you know what I come up with!

Happy Fourth, everyone!

creative depression

I miss my blog. I am aching to write. And there's so much to write about! Jess & I are not going to the east coast this year after all (sorry, guys, for taking so long to admit that -- I didn't want to believe it myself), we're moving into a new apartment that's literally 2 blocks away from the beach, we're frantically planning our wedding, and life is improving on all fronts. Yet I still have no inspiration to say or write anything. I think it's creative depression, if there is such a thing. Generally speaking, I am quite happy. Life's been treating me well and have little to complain about. But when it comes to creativity, I'm drained.

I'm hoping that one day soon I'll re-awaken my desire to blog and start posting entries that say more than just, "sorry, everyone, life is busy gtg!"

sister # 2

Saturday morning: long before the rest of Los Angeles woke up.  I took my other sister out to both practice on the camera and indulge her in her vanity.  This was the result.

...it's no wonder I'm so insecure; my sisters got all the family looks. ;)

sister

I took my sister out to a park this weekend to take photos of her. I guess I never notice, when I see her every other weekend or so -- usually dressed in pajamas and tank tops, that the girl is truly a work of art. Part of me is proud of the young beauty she's become; another is a little sad to see the little girl in blue tights and pigtails go.

Such is adolescence.

working it out

My life has been ridiculous lately. A lot of amazing things have happened since my much needed trip to Seattle, and a lot of scary things have happened as well. I don't have time to think lately, it seems. And I'm aware that that's always the case. My time is totally mismanaged. To remedy this I've decided to pull out some index cards, paste them to our bedroom wall and let them dictate when and how much time I devote to everything that needs my attention.

Until then, I'm gonna have to continue ignoring my corner in cyberspace. It makes me sad. I hope you all are well.

seattle

For whatever reason, this picture comes out horribly blurry. Trying now to fix...

new camera

I got a new camera!  Thank you, what-turned-out-to-be-a-$2300 tax refund!  This'll probably mean that you will see even less of me while I'm off trying to figure out what all these buttons do.  But I will stop by often to post the photos I've taken.  Most of them will be of Jessie, of course.

adulthood & constipation

I have no motivation. To write or think or talk or do anything at all. Except for maybe sleep. Despite this, I have been very happy the last few days. Jessie getting laid off for some reason has made me feel a lot better than I've felt over the past few months. It's a combination of 1) her not being stressed which both directly and indirectly affects me; I'm just really really happy that she gets to live life the way she should now, 2) knowing I'm going to be supporting us with my salary makes me feel a lot more responsible and a lot less careless with my money, which in turn makes me feel like an adult, which totally boosts my self esteem, and 3) our laundry is being done, my errands are being run, our cat is less of an asshole and our home life has generally improved.

Still, I haven't been able to write anything or talk about anything with anyone. I'm constipated again. Nothing wants to come out... or rather, nothing's really there. Tuesday was one of the best days of my life and I can't get myself to write about it. Oh, well.

an unsatisfactory update

good news:

• we are going to NYC in june (13th till the 19th... ahem, east coast bloggers...)
  
• things with my father have miraculously improved
• george harrison got his star on the walk of fame
• i stood ten feet away from paul mccartney, jeff lynne, tom petty, eric idle, tom hanks, dhani & olivia harrison and joe walsh
• i stood ten feet away from paul mccartney, jeff lynne, tom petty, eric idle, tom hanks, dhani & olivia harrison and joe walsh
• i stood ten feet away from paul mccartney, jeff lynne, tom petty, eric idle, tom hanks, dhani & olivia harrison and joe walsh
• i died due to an overabundance of awesome but managed to rise again
• i'll be getting a $1700 tax refund this year

bad news:

• my jessie was laid off yesterday
  
• my car is making some horrible noises and i'm a little nervous about the money it's going to cost to fix it

but the good news is:

• i'm thankfully making enough to support us while jess takes some well deserved time to de-stress, relax, live life and look for a job that she absolutely loves
  
• we've saved enough to keep us safe should anything happen to my job
• our NYC tickets are non-refundable so we will still have to enjoy a much needed vacation (i know, right? damn!)
• i stood ten feet away from paul mccartney, jeff lynne, tom petty, eric idle, tom hanks, dhani & olivia harrison and joe walsh

testing again

Well, yay, it looks like my new blog is finally set up!  Rawr.  I am testing the new layout out, making sure there's nothing else to change (aside from the links in the sidebar, but I'll get to that later...)

I'm tired.

I had a beautiful, lazy weekend.  I don't remember most of it.  Probably just because there wasn't much to remember.  I stayed in my PJ's all day Saturday, ate some Mexican food Saturday night with my sick wife, and woke up early to bake on Sunday.  I bought these decorating bags, decorating tips and baker's icing a couple weeks ago and I was really excited to use them.  I also had a bunch of pumpkin hanging around from my last spice cake, and I'd found my blue sprinkles, so out of that came this:

I used a Martha Stewart recipe for the first time too.  Now I can see how it's impossible for some to hate her.

...not that I'm one of those people, but I can understand it.

This was also my first time dying my own icing, and even though it looks like salmon cream, I'm still pretty pleased with the outcome.  These might've been my best cupcakes thus far!

Seriously, why am I not doing this for a living yet?

For my long lost, or cyber-found sister, Tina, here I am.  This was fun!  (More the looking at pictures of the other hot blogging women in their own cowboy hats than my own...)

This hat is actually Jessie's, but hey, what's hers is mine. :D

No. 2

Dublin

testing just to see if my feed works...

I'm still waiting for some good samaritan to come over and revamp my new .com blog for me.  Until that happens, and until I have a hangover cure effective enough to pull my brain out from the toilet bowl (seriously, I drank so much last night that I woke up this morning and it took me 45 minutes to be able to open my eyes), there's this.

No. 1 in a series called "Places I'd Rather Be":

Montmartre

to [try to but probably end up forgetting to] do:

• visit my mom, give her starbucks and show her my gown
  
• laundry. lots and lots of laundry.
  
• reorganize dresser
  
• do tax return
  
• see sgi/unicef lecture w/ orlando bloom at wcc
  
• beardiversary III
  
• post-beardiversary III partying @ casa nostra
  
• have girl date with kay (!)
  
• have real date with wife
  
• watch "i love you, man"
  
• watch new netflix movies
  
• start getting my insurance claim together
  

I wanted to go to my dad's house and show off my gown to my grandma/stepmom, but in light of our new plans to be in a loving father-daughter relationship, I'm gonna wait till Dad gets back from the Virgin Islands so he can be the first to see it.

It's fucking crazy how things have immediately improved.

(I realize I haven't said anything about this extraordinary breakthrough with my father here, so I fully intend on enlightening you all shortly; this weekend's just going to be a pile of ridiculous)

I also really, really wanted my sister to come over and play with us now that she's allowed to, per my dad, but it just doesn't look like I'm gonna have time. Seriously, who the fuck thought it a good idea to work 5 days out of a week and only get 2 days to live? Boo.

I am a happy panda these days.

Today I decided to log in to 311.com to make sure I still had time before the presale went on, and it told me my password was incorrect. So I logged into my old AOL account, the one I have all my spam directed to, to retrieve my information. Upon viewing the 533 unread messages in my inbox, I noticed I had one from David's Bridal. Title: Your order has arrived!

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My dress is HERE!

I'm so ridiculously impatient I just took my lunch hour to drive down to Long Beach Towne Center to pick it up. I'm so scared that anything will happen to it that I brought it into the office with me, for fear that the car might get too hot and melt the plastic covering.

Dude. I have my wedding gown in my hand. Today is a MASSIVE success.