Happy Halloween

Good Samhain, everyone!   Have you ever looked at someone on Halloween and had to think "Costume, or bad sartorial sense?"  It's going to be that kind of day.  The holiday kind of snuck up on me, so the only decorations we have up this year are pumpkins carved by Chris and Jenn.  We have some candy- the kind we LIKE so if we don't get any kids we won't have to eat BAD candy ( oh the horror of that!)

I am wearing my vintage John Foggerty "Eye of the Zombie" t-shirt as my nod to the day.  I no longer work in the public sector, so I don't have to go in costume.  I was thinking about how my mom would make our costumes and she kept the old ones in a big barrel in the garage to sort thru and reinvent every year.  One year she made matching Raggedy Ann and Andy costumes for me and the girl next door who was my best friend at the time.  It was fun.  I wonder if she liked sewing or if it was just something she did because she grew up in the Depression. In elementary school, most of my clothes were handmade by my mom.  It was only later, when she went back to work that we bought clothes.

Whatever you do today, however you celebrate the season, have fun and be safe and remember; Life's too short to eat bad candy!

Reaction to Magritte's "empire of light"

"Dominion"

Night begins in the street

Daylight moves skyward
Then follows the sun
To it's western conclusion

Night begins in the house

The sound of children's laughter
Bare feet slapping on wooden floors
Gives way to the warm scent of dinner
Plates ringing
The evening is a soft comfort

The sound of a woman
Murmuring in her kitchen
The sound of a man
Answering her with a low laugh

Night surrounds the house

Outside
The street lamp
Pushes away
A small bit of the darkness
In a soft circle
Lighting the house
And the street below

Trying to find my happy

Things have been a little hectic lately and I feel like I am just going through the motions, trying to get through the week and into the weekend.  Tired and achy.  Complaining?  Yeah I guess I am.  I am working on my "attitude of gratitude"   so despite the difficulties we are facing I will try to remember the following good things

1-  I am married to my best friend. 
2- I am loved
3- I have wonderful friends and family
4- I have a place to live
5- I have food in the refrigerator and the pantry is full
6- I have a job I love ( most of the time)
7- The only constant is change.

My mom was a worrier and I got the "worrying gene" in spades.  I am working on NOT worrying about things I have no control over.  Chris can do that and I am learning from him.

In November, I will try to think of one thing each day I am thankful for.  It will help me focus on what is important and what is not.  I will try not to default to what is called "automatic negative thinking" and flip it to a positive.  It's work, but good work all the same.

Watching old movies, Falling down stairs

I have been watching old movies from the 40's lately, specifically I watched Casablanca a few weeks ago and the Maltese Falcon this weekend.  The thing I love about old movies , vs today's films, is that they are more character and dialogue driven.  Not so much  about special effects and action, like car chases, but more about the storyline.  I must confess that I didn't like the Maltese Falcon as much as I thought I would.  Bogie's character is discussed as a sympathetic man, but he's cheating with his partner's wife, stringing along his secretary and "charms" the Mary Astor character into believing he has feelings for her.   He takes his partner's name off the door before the poor guy's body is cold.I wondered how the homosexual reference from Mary Astor to Peter Lorre slipped past the Hayes Office.  If the movie were made today, we would have seen car chases and explosions and the inevitable sequel, with Sidney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre in a classic  "buddy" picture, with them cavorting all over the Middle East in search of "the black bird".  I will have to watch it again and maybe read the book, as I understand the novel is MUCH darker.  I much prefer Bogie's Rick from Casablanca, a seeming hard boiled, world weary sort, who has a soft spot;he helps the young couple win enough at the roulette wheel to escape Casablanca without the wife having to do something with that horrid police captain. I like Rick.  For Sam Spade, the jury's still out.

On Saturday, I fell down the stairs at McGroarty Arts Center.  Lucky for me, I know how to fall, so there is minimal damage to my knees.  It hurts and I am pretty sore, but unbroken.  It ruined my night, somewhat, as I was planning on homemade pizza and I couldn't do it.  Still I enjoyed the Roundtable pizza my husband picked up and watching the ball game with a friend was a lot of fun ( it would have been MORE fun if Boston had won and the game not ended on that weird call.)  Ah well, as they say "That's baseball!"

Tuesday mornig ramblings.

I've decided I don't like taking Tai-chi classes.  I am not looking forward to going.  Ugh.  I have paid for the class but I don't think I am getting out of it what I thought I would.  The instructor is nice and the people in the class are nice,  I just don't feel it.  There is a series online I am going to look at and BOOK time with my husband to do this.  That means we put it on the calendar and DO IT.    It might be better here at home.  I missed last week's class due to INSANE Dodger playoff traffic.  I was trapped for an HOUR on Sunset Bl.  I HATE that the City has eliminated the third lane on Sunset- it's BUS ONLY now.  There aren't THAT many buses, unless they know something I don't about the increase in bus-lines on Sunset.  Oh sure, there is the Stadium Shuttle, but that's only during the season. Now that the season is over ( WAHHHHHH)  Maybe they should go back to giving us all the lanes and increase traffic flow.  Los Angeles is not known for great transit.

I posted the following on the website for my Union;

Election Ballots were mailed out and by now, most of you should have received your ballots.  I am asking each member to do one thing. VOTE!  Take a few moments out of your busy day and look over the candidates, make your choices and MAIL IT BACK.  It’s that simple.  Please don’t ignore the ballot or think that your vote doesn’t matter.  Each vote counts.  The last election, only about a quarter of the eligible voters cast a ballot.  It’s easy and sometimes popular to sit back and complain about the way the Union is run.  You ARE the Union.  EAA is a MEMBER DRIVEN organization; the Board of Governors is responsible to YOU.  I urge you to become more involved in your Union.  Take this small step.  VOTE!

I wonder what kind of flak I will get for it!

EARLY Saturday Morning. UGH

Why am I up at o-dark-hundred, you ask?   Well, I promised to make my Mother-in-law's FAMOUS oatmeal fudgies for some people and FORGOT I wouldn't be home until LATE last night so here I am.  The fudgies are setting up on the dining room table.  I am thinking about going back to bed.   We promised to meet early this morning.  Why do I do this?

They are still working on my plumbing.  There are HUGE holes everywhere and a pipe in the downstairs bathroom wall that is not connected to anything and I think it should be.  I have NO idea- at ALL- if they are coming back today or it will be like this until Monday.  It's got to be done, so we will live with it.  I know the holes will be patched as soon as it's possible ( unlike the LAST manager who fixed the leak but left a gaping hole in my kitchen ceiling that my son-in-law finally fixed ( he told me HE was tired of looking at it and thought I deserved better)

So, my beloved Dodgers are out.  This means only one thing.  GO BOSTON!!!!  Not rooting for the Cards.  BLEH.  Besides, my Mom was a Sox fan ( well Ted Williams at any rate)  You know the rallying cry of Dodger fans is "WAIT TILL NEXT YEAR" anyway.  I really thought they had a chance this year.  That's baseball.

But it's going to be a beautiful day out there.  I need to get my act together for the day we have planned.  I may drown my Dodger-less Series sorrow in a Fudgie or two.

Friday morning, A rant I have held in draft for a while.

I really don't mean to just write a rant but these are the things that are bothering me.

Now that the stupid shutdown has been lifted and we have three months until this crap happens AGAIN, I have to say this;  I am SICK of politics.  I am SICK of the finger-pointing and posturing and misinformation being oozed out by every side of the non-debate debate.  If they spent MORE time working and less time being gits, this would have been solved a LONG time ago. The fact that they are blaming OBAMA, when according to the LAW, only the HOUSE has the power to cause a shutdown just plays more to the misinformation and shadow games in American Politics.  My cousin is here from England and when we were talking about it, I had to confess I didn't really get everything that was going on either.  It made my head swim.

I have been trying for TWO DAYS to get my prescription refilled.  It's cheaper if you do it online, but the online system says I can't order the meds.  My doc wrote the prescription at the beginning of October, but as I still has some left, we adjusted the dose and I NOW need to refill.  No Can Do.  I was on hold for TWENTY MINUTES and still got nothing.  Computers.  A new way for large corporations to piss you off!  The website is a JOKE.  I can't even FIND the number for my pharmacy ( there are a zillion of them) without jumping through a bunch of back doors.  Seriously?  I am a semi-professional researcher.  What would the average person do?

Why do people in cube-farms think that other people can't hear their conversations on the phone?  I have an office mate who constantly uses the hands-free speakerphone and SHOUTS.  I was trying to concentrate yesterday- working on something fairly detailed, and I just COULDN'T  Normally, it's ok.  Yesterday was just a really off day.

I am looking forward to the weekend.  I came home to a kitchen full of plaster dust and a broken kitchen fan.  It was a small cheapy one so I have no idea if the plaster dust was the problem or it just gave up the ghost.  Small price to pay for rust free water and no leaking toilet!

Playing tourguide and meeting with friends

It's funny, but I usually think that people come to LA in the summer.  In the last week I have met up with friends traveling from Australia and my cousin from England.  We met up with our Aussie friends in Santa Monica for lunch.  These are the type of friends that you have an instant connection to, conversation can go on for hours and even if it's been several years since you were in the same room, it feels like just moments.  One day, we hope to visit with them in Australia.  It's on my list of places I want to see.

I was SO excited when I heard from my distant cousin that he and his partner were coming to LA.  I found this branch of the family via Ancestry.com, as I have found most of my recent family connections.  I think his father and I share great-great grandparents.  It was wonderful to meet them; they are the nicest people.  I dragged the two of them on a walking tour of downtown LA which included Central library ( well I took them to two, just because we were there in Little Tokyo)  We went to Olvera St and has taquitos  at Celito Lindo.  We went to Little Tokyo and took the DASH bus past the Music Center and The Disney Hall.  We skipped Angel's Flight.  I heard the operators were cited for some irregularity recently ( the story goes that they were using a tree branch to slow it down- YIKES!)  I ALMOST talked them into posing with the stuffed donkey at the entrance to Olvera St.   ALMOST!  We agreed that they would have needed a bit of tequila to do that one.  It was a beautiful, if a wee bit warm, day.  I really enjoyed myself and hope they did too!

The owners of my building are going to be replumbing our unit, starting this morning.  I have NO idea what I will be coming home to, but I trust I will have water of some kind.  We will deal with whatever it is.  The water in the pipes comes out rusty right now so ANYTHING is an improvement.  This is an old building.

I missed my Tuesday Tai Chi class.  I got caught in hideous rush hour Dodger traffic, no matter where I went I was in bumper to bumper traffic.  What I want to know is WHAT GENIUS has designated the right lane as a BUS LANE?  This forces all the CARS into two lanes.  THAT'S working out real well, I can tell you.  I blame AnVil , the "transit mayor"  he had more cockamamie ideas than anyone in the last few months of his term; including "every lane a bike lane"  which is just foolhardy if you've ever DRIVEN in Los Angeles. It's dangerous enough in a car!

Oh GREAT More books I haven't read yet.

I got an email from a friend yesterday afternoon asking me to join her at an ALOUD program at Central Library where I work, to hear one of her favorite auathors. I had never heard of Alice McDermott, but the theme was "the joy of NOT writing for the movies" and I hadn't seen my friend in a while so I stayed at work, completing a project, until it was time to go grab my car from the lot where I park and go to the program.

I am glad I was in the office, as there was yet ANOTHER plumbing emergency at one of the branches.  Honestly, these things are cyclical.  This week it's plumbing, next week it will be windows or doors.

I got to the program and saw a few actors I recognized from television; Fred Willard and Joanne Whorley  Remember her from Laugh-in?  I sure do.  She was nice and polite and waited in line with the rest of us.  There were probably a whole bunch of writers there, but I never recognize anyone anyway.  It was an interesting talk.  McDermott's current book "Someone" is set in pre WWII  Brooklyn, centered around an Irish family. I will have to read it, as MY Irish family lived in Brooklyn- pre-WWII.  Apparently most of her books are Irish-Catholic themed.  She read an excerpt and it was compelling.  The talk drifted to poets and authors she admires and she mentioned a book by Yeats in which he explores mystical themes in Celtic literature. Like most people, I love Yeats.  His work as a poet has a disarming simplicity that resonates with me. I tried to reserve the book last night, but the system was down ( at MIDNIGHT- go figure) and I need to do that this morning. If it's IN I might just go find it, although I have about five or six books I am reading right now.  I am greedy when it comes to books, or maybe that's needy.  Like any English major, I need to have several books to pick up depending on my mindset.  I really don't know if reading books like "Anna covered in Blood" is the best for my nighttime reading!

McDermott never really got around to the theme of the talk.  She touched briefly on why, for her, fiction is better.  I do get kind of tired of people slamming the movie industry.  In some cases I wonder if it's not "sour grapes"  Still I enjoyed her enough to look into her fiction and maybe try to see the film based on her novel "After this" ( I think that's the one, anyway I need to  Google it.)  She did tell a funny story about meeting director Milos Foreman.  She was genuinely charming, when the moderator said she was going to read something that McDermott had written about writing, then handed McDermott the paper, McDermott took the paper and read the passage to herself. "Did you write that?" The moderator asked "No, but it's lovely" she responded.  The moderator flushed and snatched the paper back only to realize it was a critique of McDermott's book written by someone who was in the audience who waved and laughed.

I was nice to get out for the evening and have a catch up conversation with my friend.  We need to do that more often!

Books and Movies

So many books, so little time.  I have not been sleeping well, AGAIN and by the time I get home from work, get dinner done and things tidied up in the kitchen I am one whipped puppy.  So I haven't been reading.  I wonder if I could take an entire day just to lie around reading?  hmm, my idea of a nice day, I suppose.  It's not going to happen and I don't think I could do it unless there were no one in the house.  "Certain" people distract me ;)

Saw "Oz the Great and Powerful" the other day.  It was a huge flop theatrically, but it was a thought provoking movie and we had quite a discussion afterward.  Most of it centered around the books of L. Frank Baum and what the character of the wizard was like in this film.  It was beautifully filmed, although we all agreed that as the "wicked Witch"  Mila Kunis' makeup COULD have been better.  James Franco was passable as the wizard.  I wonder if it were not meant to be seen in 3D, the effects were pretty cool, the story rather predictable but what do you expect from a Wizard of Oz themed film.  You can't re-invent the basic character of the wizard, a carnival con man, and make him a long lost prince or something.

I have about seven books I have to read.  I am enjoying them, I just keep falling asleep after about five pages.  But there IS hope for me.  MONDAY is a holiday!!!!

Breast Cancer Awareness month

I found a lump in my left breast last week.  I admit I kind of freaked  me out.  About eight years ago, a routine mammogram ( my first EVER) found THREE lumps in my left breast.  The biopsy deemed them "suspicious" and I had the surgery to remove them.  They were NOT cancerous, but "Suspicious" enough to require me to have mammograms every six months for several years.  I am thankful for that first mammogram, as my doctor said they could have become cancer, if I hadn't caught it so early on.  I have had several more scares, each time including this one I have been fortunate to have been given a clean report.

The point of all of this,is I suppose, that you should remember to check yourself monthly.  This includes men, BTW.  We forget that they too can have breast cancer.  I posted a heart on my page, a sign to other women to remember to check.  I was reminded by a wonderful blog post from my friend Cindy Alexander, herself a cancer Warrior,(I think of people who fought Cancer as Warriors, not survivors, because it's a FIGHT you are in, a battle and you come out the victor)  that we need to be vocal about it, not cute and silent.  Society sexualizes women's breasts to the point where bathing suits that barely cover the nipples are acceptable but public breastfeeding is considered obscene. 

So remind a friend today.  Breast cancer is not the killer it once was.  With research and education, we CAN fight back and win this battle.

The "Cult" of Celebrity

A conversation with friends got me to thinking about how I feel about people who are "famous".   Being famous is like an addiction for some people, they crave attention and the spotlight and will do anything to get there and STAY there.  Growing up in Los Angeles, you learn early on that being in "the Industry" is a job just like any other job.  I am not impressed with  tv actors or film stars simply because of their appearance in my home or in the theaters; and while I am sure they are nice people for the most part, my happiness does not depend upon them.  The same goes  for musicians and supermodels. The only musician on whose daily life my happiness balances is my bass player husband, Chris.

I have had dinner, or drinks with authors and musicians and actors. We have had some wonderful conversations, so I don't mean to imply that people who work in the entertainment industry don't have something that interests me.  It's just when I see someone on the street, I don't rush up to them and gush and tell them how wonderful they are.  I don't want to be their new best friend.  Some of them, I couldn't care less about.   I was playing that game with myself "If you could invite anyone who ever lived to dinner, who would it be?  I came up with my great-grandmother, who was a midwife in the 1880s  and my great-great grandfather, who was a soldier in the Civil War.  That would be an interesting conversation, far better than any current celebrity.  Who would YOU have at your table?

On a side note, Happy Birthday to my Big Sister Joanie!  Love you!!!

Friday morning

I know it's been a busy week when I haven't had a chance to sit and collect my thoughts much.  I have been running like crazy and am looking forward to resting this weekend ( By  a show of hands, how many of you actually think I will rest? Yeah, me neither)

On Monday,I had the chance to see my favorite film of all time, the Wizard of Oz, on the big screen.  We squeezed it in around doctor visits and other things, but it really helped to see it. I felt better and the visit to my doctor reassured me as well.  I finally have a doctor I can trust who talks to me as if I were a person, not a medical record number.  Seeing the film, restored and in 3-D was amazing.  The makeup on the scarecrow, was terrific.  You could see where his face was supposed to be a burlap bag.  Dorothy had a spray of freckles across her nose.  I wanted to see it with two of my friends who are fans as well, but we just couldn't arrange time together.  If it is still playing anywhere and we can "road trip" to do it, that would be a lot of fun too.

Monday night  we went to Maria's Italian Kitchen in Encino. They have been real supportive of my cousin Robert Zorn's book, Cemetery John ( and if you haven't read it WHY NOT???)  Robert was here in Los Angeles on business and we finally got the chance to meet and talk.  What a wonderful evening it was!  The hosts of the party, George and Jenny were so nice, lively conversation about books and movies and  life in general.  We closed the place down and talked way into the night. I am sure the staff thought we would keep them there until dawn.  I tried to make a note off all the books they were talking about.  I did get a copy of "Will in the World" about Shakespeare.  I started it last night.  I am now reading FIVE books at a time.  

Tuesday, I started a Tai Chi class at Kaiser, and while I am an uncoordinated mess, I think I will enjoy the class.  I hope I am not a hopeless student.  The instructor is a nice gentle person.  Tai Chi is supposed to help with balance, among other things and I am feeling a little more off balance these days. 

Wednesday, I had a board meeting at McGroarty. It went fairly well and I am hopeful for new beginnings there.  We have a lot of events coming up and I will be inviting you all to all of them!  Next up is a Volunteer Day and The Big Draw.  More about them later.

Last night I had dinner with two good friends who make me laugh.  It was nice to see them and have dinner at the Eagle Rock Sizzler, although I will tell you this, the ribs were way overcooked.  Talk about movies, baseball and current events mixed in with catching up on our lives was a wonderful way to wind the day down.  Tom always complains when I don't write this blog, so I am glad I provide some entertainment for him ( comment away Tom!)

So that's my week, but I can't get away from this without making ONE political comment.  I  am SICK to death of the finger-pointing and the crud being flung around.  Shut up and solve the problem.  Don't try to spin it.  I have friends who think Obama is to blame for all of this. Nope I blame CONGRESS-- ALL of Congress. The Republicans seem hell-bent on having a hissy fit, still pissed because they lost the election .  Both sides have dug in their heels and the American People are the losers in this game.  We need NOT to re-elect any current member of Congress.  I know it won't happen, but it should. Throw them all out!