Oh My Aching Head

or I have one year to get technically saavy..yeah, right..

Okay, so Mary Ann, Howard, hopefully Geo and I are planning to dive into the quagmire of SXSW next year. As an attempt to get a taste of what to expect, I've been tracking the goings on, schedules... madness via Twitter which has the official SXSW schedule updating every nano second.

OH MY FREAKING GOD!!!???!!!!!!!!

There is SO MUCH of EVERYTHING!! The list of musical acts alone is, like three miles long. And they keep adding to the "Unofficial Music" list every ten minutes. It started off with 1800 acts...who knows how many there are now. They also have this MailChimp site on which you can create a personalized events calendar. I'm thinking this is going to be essential if we have any hope to organize and optimize our band plan.

Of course, someone in our party better figure out how to use this thing before we go or we are screwed...and not in a "that was a fun five minutes" way. I'm guessing taking a Blackberry or iPhone would be helpful, too. Or maybe dragging a 15-year-old, uber computer literate, internet socially hip lad/lass to lead us dinosaurs around is the way to go. But wait.. this is supposed to be fun, right? Oy....

Watch out SXSW... the Flintstones are coming!

Friday Photo(s) #17

or a lame attempt to recreate Wyeth's Christina's World  

Okay, so last year Geo and I went to Maine with my sister and brother-in-law, the land baron and baroness. It was beautiful. We walked the rocky coastline, ate loads of fresh seafood including a truly delectable lobster roll and drove to the Olsen farm. THE actual Olsen farm of Andrew Wyeth painting fame. How cool is that?

Naturally, since I'm such a goober, we attempted to recreate Mr. W's painting. I believe I could hear him spinning in his grave....

In Which I Admit I Am A HUGE Bonehead...  

This is shaping up to be a really. shitty. week.

First I get a speeding ticket on Saturday morning (yes, I'm lumping Saturday into this week-Saturday is snowball X in the avalanche of bad ju ju) heading for work, a little late. Okay, so I was going 53 in a 35mph stretch, but it was the ramp to the parkway which should be a 50mph limit. Plus I really, REALLY had to go to the bathroom. Seriously, I had a turtle head going on there. 

The cop slowly strolls up and taps the window. I try to act normally even though I'm desperately clenching my sphincter and starting to sweat a little, because you know, that puppy wants to come out. He asks the usual... is there a reason why you were driving at the speed of light in a negative mph zone at 4am when there is absolutely no one else on the road, but I had finished my third donut and was bored sitting there so I figured I'd piss on your cereal flakes. 

What was I going to say to him? Please sir, I urgently need to drop a couple kids off at the lake, if you know what I mean. Otherwise there will be a stank in this car so foul it will send the earth rotating backwards. (that doesn't even make sense...whatever) So I tell him I'm late for work. He could care less, takes my info, strolls back to his cruiser, talks to his Mom, calls his bookie, plays a few games of solitaire, sends for back up (yes, a SECOND cop car actually pulled up), finishes his book, calls in a song dedication to Delila, polishes his shoes, rips a branch off a nearby tree to scrape the shitz from is teeth and thumbtacks a $155 ticket to my forehead. 

Have a nice day, Ma'am. Drive safely.

Great. I get to work late, have to scurry... if you call clenching your butt cheeks and wobble-running with your knees together scurrying... to the ladies room before things get ugly and then have the honor to work a 12 hour day. Plus, as an added bonus for calling now, lose an hour of sleep because of the stupid, stupid daylight savings time thing.   

That's right. Saturday was also the night we "Spring Forward" as every weather geek likes to cheerfully proclaim. Don't even get me started about that daylight savings crap. I don't see the point of it anymore, except that it messes up our collective internal clock twice a year and makes the equipment at work convulse. I mean, some states don't even bother with it, so why should the rest of us have to suffer. A link to an interesting site explaining DST is here. 

All I know is this is kicking my ass. I get so confused in the evening. It's bright and sunny, yet it's 8pm and I still haven't had dinner yet!? WTF, mate?

Then I download a music file last night and get our computer trapped in a major "pop under" Hell. OHMIGOD!! It would not stop. Geo rightfully got ticked with me. Thankfully he managed to correct the issue after a couple of restarts. Ugh! I am such a bonehead!

Then Geo throws an enormous cannon ball of honesty at me (which I totally deserve) in an attempt to right my ship which has left me splintered and listing a little. Now all I really want to do is stay in bed, but I can't because I have to do, like, 2,000 PT exercises every day to try to strengthen and straighten my cantankerous 80-year-old back.

Perhaps it's the lingering effects of the bloody time change, or the full moon, or my inability to make sound decisions lately, but I am just waaaay off kilter. 

I feel like Seinfeld, "I'm dating a virgin. I'm in this contest. (There's a naked girl living across the way.) Something's gotta give, BABY!"

Tomorrow is Friday the 13th. I'm staying home.

Trick or Tweets 

or I think this new techno crap is going to make my  head explode  

Today I had this overwhelming sense of ... overwhelming. 

Seriously. My entire drive home I felt a pressure enveloping my entire being along with a sense of ennui bordering on depression. You know what it was from? Technology. Mainly the technology of excessive connectivity through Facebook, MySpace and especially Twitter. 

Seems like it's not good enough to just hang with coworkers, friends and family anymore. Now you have to make a connection with every person on this bloody blue planet!?!! And if you aren't spending every waking moment sitting your fat ass down in front of the computer tweeting or updating your status on that mocking bar from Facebook, you're just a big fat loser. Even though sitting in front of your computer every waking moment tweeting and facebooking and blogging about insipid shit without actually getting out and living your life is the very definition of a big loser. (Hey wait a minute... I resemble that last bit. Aaaaaaa!!)

Like today at work, I logged onto Twitter--okay I really shouldn't be doing this at work, but the boss was away so I had some time to kill in between duties, don't judge me--because I was going to cancel it since I really don't understand this 140 character blurbing thing. I mean, come on. Nobody cares if I had cereal or monkey balls for breakfast. Seriously. Most people's entries are deadly dull and mundane to the point of making others wish for the sweet release of death. 

That said, I signed on originally out of curiosity and to follow this interesting woman, Cindy Royal, who is really into the music scene in Austin. We've been talking about heading to Austin 

next year for the SXSW festival and she's imparted some very helpful advice. She's actually really cool, and has totally embraced the whole tuned-in-through-technology lifestyle. I don't know how she finds time for everything...she teaches at the large local college, interviews musicians for a Texas music mag, goes to clubs multiple times a week, blogs about the local music scene (including videos), is on Twitter a LOT and will be podcasting interviews all throughout SXSW. And she's like my age, which makes me feel old and Jurassic and want to eat infants and Super Heros. 

Next thing you know, I'm finding notable folks in which I'm actually interested. Pete Yorn, YA author John Green, Germaine from Flight of the Conchords, Stephen Colbert and then I see it... the divine Rhett Miller! And he replied to me...

Oh Man! I can feel myself being sucked into the vortex. 

And that's when my soul imploded. 

The overwhelming weight of constant communication was too great for my little bone structure. I had this horrible thought... Is my life so empty I need to frantically run through the interweb, arms akimbo, so as not to "miss out" on anything? Do I not have a wonderfully witty and fulfilling social network right here, within arms length?  

Sure it's easy (especially on Twitter) to start to believe your little suburban, nine-to-five life sucks because your not out there doing cool shit and hanging with celebrities like a witty author, or a huge television personality or a totally hot rock star. 

That's the time to take a deep breath, step away from the computer and phone somebody real in your life. Hopefully they won't be too busy "tweeting" to answer. 

Friday Photo #16 

or is it safe? 

Okay, so we're in a Best Western hotel in Hackensack, NJ getting ready to go see Rhett Miller, when Geo walks into the bathroom and says to me, "Soooo... do you think we should be concerned the smoke detector has char marks on it?"

Yeah... burn marks... on the smoke detector... 

Then we notice the toilets, which you can hear flushing through the walls because hotel rooms are paper thin, sound like shotgun blasts when flushed. The whole next morning was one shotgun blast flush fest. It became a joke with us... is it the toilet or real gun fire. You be the judge. Oh, no screams... must be the Urban Fecal Blaster 2000.

So then we notice there is no coffee pot to go with the coffee maker. What's up with that? On the way out we tell the desk clerk about the pot

Geo: Oh by the way, there's no coffee pot to go with the coffee maker

Clerk: You make one cup at a time

G: Yeah, but there is no coffee pot

C: You make one cup at a time

G: But there's no coffee pot

C: Right. You have to use your cup. We took all the coffee pots out because.. wait for it...  people were using it to make drugs.

??!!??? *blink* * blink* We obviously lead a sheltered life.

So, I'm guessing that's why the smoke detector has burn marks on it.

Welcome to Hackensack! Enjoy your stay.  Ka-BOOM!!!

Anniversary Celebration Road Trip, Part Deux

or Francis + Phoenixville = our coolest day EVAH!

Okay, so our morning after Rhett began with a surprise phone call to our good bud, Confabulatin' Bill. He lives northeast of Philly, but works about one hour east of his home essentially putting him halfway between Teaneck, NJ and Phoenixville, PA. 

We don't get to see Bill nearly enough. He's a great guy and so much fun to be around. He's smart and hip and quick-witted and just... delightfully ... goofy. He's always making up shit...long, drawn out, circuitous declarations which are always highly entertaining, hence the "Confabulatin'" moniker. We miss him immensely. 

So we both we're pumped by the the opportunity to lunch with him. Billy gave us a tour of his work digs--he's an uber talented graphic designer--then we set out to dine on some really kick-assed sushi. The conversation spanned such varied topics as how religion and science are related through their cousin wonder (what the?).. to starting up an online t-shirt shop called "I Eat Edamame" with a bumpy cartoon blow fish as its logo.. to the Japanese name for the long trail of poop often spotted on oblivious goldfish--King Yo Nic Yo or something. I'm sure I've butchered it. Anyway...big fun! 

After getting refueled on Sushi and Bill-isms, we set out for Phoenixville. I thought P-ville was going to be some drab, Hicksville in the middle of nowhere since we had such difficulty booking a room. Turns out it's quite lovely. The main street is in the middle of a restoration which has lured a number of really cool, off-beat shops, art galleries, loads of upscale pubs and restaurants and one groovy coffee house which happened to be hosting our dear Francis. Who knew? The lone, single screen theater is the same theater where "The Blob" starring Steve McQueen was filmed. Every August the town hosts a Blobfest where patrons watch the film and enact certain bits like fleeing the theater and screaming in the streets. Sounds like it could be fun to do some day. 

We had several hours to kill before the concert, so Geo and I roamed around shopping, drinking beer and Cosmos at the pizzeria and chatting up the locals. I'm not sure if it's because we're from the Burgh or it's our age (or both), but we seem to always find ourselves yakking it up with strangers. 

Anyhoo...

So we finally set out for the concert. Geo was heading for the car to retrieve Steelers Super Bowl shirts for Francis and Tony, the merchandise man who travels with Francis. 

(Okay...short back story about Tony. We're in our first house concert hosts' kitchen when Tony

-who's from NJ but is wearing a Pirates shirt--walks in, points at Geo and says "Hey, I know you". He remembered Geo from the last club date at Club Cafe. We kibitzed with him for a while, took pictures, yadda yadda... Then when we headed to Philly to see Francis at The Tin Angel, Tony recognized us again and took a jump photo with us.) 

Okay, now back to the story...

There was a lone figure walking towards us. It was, you guessed it because I totally broadcast this whole bit so now it's not a surprise anymore, Tony!! He looks at me and says, "Hey, Pittsburgh! You're the guys that made me jump. Kate said you might be here." He gave us both a huge hug (a man hug for Geo of course) and asked if we wanted to join him while he retrieved Francis from the restaurant down the street.  

HELLS YEAH!!!

So there we are, in the middle of this restaurant shooting the shit with Francis Dunnery! How cool is this!! Francis greets us like we're long lost buds, big hugs and smiles. Geo was beaming from ear to ear. Seriously. Then we get invited to tag along for the sound check as their guests. So we plop ourselves down and Francis launches into Geo's favorite song, "The Only Thing". 

Are you kidding me? A private performance of our favorite song? Double Cool! It's like this whole day is turning into one big Cosmic Kiss on the mouth...with tongue. The beauty is Francis did his "Tall, Blonde Helicopter" show, so "The Only Thing" was a bonus for us only. I like to think of it as the Cosmos rewarding Geo for tolerating yet another Rhett Miller show. At any rate, the show was fan-freaking-tastic--almost like being at a house concert. 

I couldn't find "The Only Thing" on YouTube, but here's a great concert video of "Hometown". Enjoy!

Afterwards we helped Francis pack up his car, said our thanks and goodbyes to him (more hugging--I do loves the hugging--it's the Italian in me) and headed to a pub to shoot the breeze for a couple of hours with Tony. We had such a great time. Tony told some fabulous stories about life on the road with Francis. 

One of the tales revolved around a guy I know who refused to let us into his house concert. I was really pissed at the time, because, you know, we're such huge Francis fans. I couldn't believe he wouldn't squeeze us in. What a tool. 

Aaaah...but karma took care of him. 

So Francis is doing his thing...singing, telling stories, engaging the crowd which Tony says was perhaps the best audience vibe they had in a long, long while, when the dude shouts from the front row, "Hey, how about you stop talking and just sing the songs." 

For reals. Can you believe it. Seriously. Dude...that is soooooo wrong! What an ASSHAT.

What happened next made us love Francis even more. He ended the concert right then. Said goodnight. Gave back the money. Packed up his stuff and left. How awesome is that?!

So this cat is begging him to stay... apologizing... calling Tony's cell phone constantly... Too late! You suck! You're done. Ahahahaha!!! How beautiful is that? You gotta love the karmic payback. Needless to say this guy is persona non gratta to the MAX!

Next thing you know, it's 1:15 am and Tony still has to drive to NJ. We say our goodbyes (more hugs) and part ways. As Geo and I strolled back to our hotel, we could not wipe the smiles from our faces. We looked at each other and giggled a bit. 

What a cool, cool day....

My Heart Goes Out Isabel...

it's a hard world for the little things 

Sometimes life is cruel.

You know the Internet is a very strange and wonderful thing. Yes, it's generally a ginormous waste of time, but it also allows you to connect with people through this crazy blog 'o sphere whom you never would have met otherwise.

Last night I read some very sad news. One of my Internet blog "friends" (for lack of a better term), Isabel who was around 16 weeks pregnant, wrote she lost her baby. It broke my heart. I don't even really know her, except for what she has shared via her blog... but it broke my heart just the same.

She and the King (her husband) are blessed with their son, little Babboo who is maybe... three? Turns out she had two miscarriages prior to Babboo, and now the universe is forcing her to deal with a third. And this is the peculiar thing... because of her track record, she only spilled the beans about her pregnancy to her Mother and a few close friends, but she felt comfortable sharing her happy news with us readers. 

And now we all share in her sadness. 

She turned off the comments because she can't deal with the sympathy right now. I can respect that... and I totally get it.

You see years and years ago, Geo and I tried to have children. And although I never had to bear the grief of losing my child halfway through pregnancy, the return of my period every month was as painful as a white-hot sword thrust threw my heart. All around me were beautifully glowing women with round, fruitful bellies pushing a cavalcade of carriages filled with cooing cherubs. God...it was so painful, like being surrounded by some twisted clown-car, cruelly belching babies, constantly mocking me. Or so it felt.

For two years I wrongfully blamed Geo. He didn't deserve that. I was angry at him. I was angry at the world. I was angry with our friend's wife who was miffed she was having their FIFTH kid...  I was inconsolable. Nothing anyone said to me offered comfort. In fact, all the niceties and the "Don't worry, Honey. Having kids isn't all it's cracked up to be" really sort of pissed me off. The worst part is I KNOW Geo would have been such a fantastic Dad... far better than me as a Mom. Now he has to wait until his next lifetime to experience fatherhood. It sucks.

It's the only thing in my life I regret, but we made the best choice for us at the time. Fortunately, we made it through and became closer. I was able to put that enormous desire and disappointment aside and enjoy the life we have. It's a very good life, too--filled with love and laughter, friends and family... but I knew one day the sadness would hit me again. 

For the last couple of months I've been feeling really sad about being childless. Maybe it's the whole fact my eggs are drying up signifying the end of my baby-making days. Maybe it's the fact I'm home alone a lot and the house is sooo quiet. Maybe that's why I started writing this blog... to fill the gaping hole in my heart. I don't know.  Maybe I just need some Prozac and a cocktail chaser. Ha Ha! 

Hey! I'm still laughing. That's a good sign, right?

Sometimes Life just feels like kicking you in the nuts and leaving you in a crumpled mess on the side of the road with a dead cell phone, you know for grins. It's not fair, but you gotta get up, adjust your package and keep moving forward. I'll get over my mental mess in time.

To my Interweb friend, Isabel... during this difficult time may you be able to find solace in the arms of the King and comfort in the eyes of your darling Babboo. I'm rooting for you, sister.