this wasn't actually my dream, but I need to occupy child 2.0 by letting him write his, so here.

I went flat, and I went up a staircase and I got this golden thing and then this guy named Zugel came up and almost killed me, and then I almost killed him too, and then I got outside to my team, and then we did a real battle, and one power's thunder, one power's earth, and one power was laser, and one power was God power.

goodbye to this blog

Thank you, dear reader for your loyal endless support.  But now I must let you know that I have decided to officially close this blog.  One reason is because I never write anything.  The reason for that is becaue I realized I reached my limit for what I am willing to post about myself publicly!  And let's face it, anything interesting that anyone would actually want to read, would be the really good stuff, that I ain't gonna write about!

It's been a good experiment in memory. Bringing them up is a bit of a pandora's box as well however, and perhaps at this point in my life I need to focus on the present more and a bit less on the past.  Maybe I'll try again at some point, or use some of this material for my dream blog. We'll see!

my cats

Being a stay at home mom, it has occurred to me that I probably spend more time with my cats than with any other living being, even my kids, if you count the hours that they sleep with me.  All this time has enabled me to learn to speak "cat."  This is good and bad.  Good because I can tell what they are feeling and what they want, but bad because it can be hard to ignore, very similar to whining children.  "I said i want OUT!!!  Wake up and feed me now, or I will smack your face!!!  This food is horridly substandard, I prefer fresh caviar" etc etc.

One cat in particular, we call "Super," has devised a fail-proof method of being let in and out of the house.  We have an outer door with a screen on top and glass on the bottom, and with a loud dramatic thump, he flings himself to the top of the screen, holding himself in place, stretched out, with his claws attached to the screen holes, like Spiderman.  This has attracted much attention from passersby, even causing minor traffic jams as people stop and stare in amazement.

Janis

There was an angel on tv, and her voice sang everything in the world that could ever be expressed and suddenly I never wanted to hear anything else and I had to find out who she was?  "Oh,"  said my mom, casually, "that was Janis Joplin.  She's dead."

That feeling again.  Growing up in the 80's, I felt like I had missed the boat.  We read the books and listened obsessively to the music of 15 years ago, most of them dead or done making good music.  Seeing Julian Lennon was a search for what his dad must have been like (sorry Julian.)  Seeing Jimmy Page's band "The Firm,"  where he at least did his cool bow/guitar thingie, but he explained he was getting old and they had to bring a chair out to the stage for him to sit down during one of his guitar solos.  There were some exceptions of course, like the actual Grateful Dead, thank goodness I managed to catch the tail end of that.

I think I must have felt like that until I heard my first U2, the "Unforgettable Fire" album.  Then people like the Talking Heads and Sting, real quality stuff.  And now I know that I was really wrong, there has always been so much outstanding music, then and now, if you know where to look for it.

I really hate New Year's Eve

Or, I should say, rather, that I used to hate New Year's Eve, until I realized how much I was hating it, and then somehow, gave myself the permission to stop caring about it so freakin' much.  And now I can relax and admit that right now I would much prefer staying home with my kids watching Star Wars instead of trudging out to some local performance in town and having "fun."

God I sound like such a Grinch!  Let me explain.  It's all the pressure to have some kind of amazing experience and get more wasted than one's usual judgement would allow.  And for what?  So I can prove to myself that my life is fun and worthwhile?  That I am loved and cherished?  The worst is the countdown.  God forbid there is nobody there to kiss! 

There have been many ups and downs of life, some truly wonderful times and dark and lonely ones, but I have never felt worse about myself than on some certain New Year's Eves.  You know what I mean.  Looking back, I think if I just could have relaxed and remembered that "all things must pass,"  it would've seemed at least okay.

My first memory of New Year's angst was at some point in adolescence, and I was staying up to midnight with my father and grandparents, in their old haunted hoarder house.  (See the "barbie head" post.)  Just that alone......I was celebrating with old relatives.  At midnight my father uncorked a bottle of something and shouted "Happy New Year!"  with so much embarrassing glee I wanted to melt into the floor, afraid that some of my peers, hundreds of miles away, might find out about this.

How sad is that.  I want to go back and kick my adolescent butt.  My dear father, gone now for almost 20 years, and I couldn't even appreciate a nice moment with him.  I suppose that's typically how adolescence goes, but still.  If I could have just halfway accepted the circumstances....I might not have been so miserable on New Year's Eve.  Well, hopefully now I've finally learned my lesson!

throwing cookies to meet boys

No, I am not talking about anything metaphorical here.  Just this--freshman year, way up on the 7th floor, large window that looked out to the quad, where roving bands of lonely males from the local engineering college would wander.  Those Entenmann's chocolate chip cookies, remember those?  My perky blond roommate put two and two together, and soon those cookies were being dropped, one by one, like bait to lure in those dudes all the way up to the 7th floor.  Soon our dorm room was filled with males, nowhere even to sit down.  It was instantly the "cool room."  Mostly they turned out to be rather nice decent guys, and sure enough my roommate ended up with one of them as her steady before the week was over.

the catsitter

Well I am just appalled at myself in retrospect but I have to say, maybe it's not the best idea to hire a teenage girl to LIVE with your cat while you are away.  I mean, living in your apartment, sleeping in your bed, so your cat won't get lonely.  Unless you don't mind her going through all your private belongings, and eating every scrap of food.  Cutting school and making prank phone calls all day long.  Sampling every bit of makeup in the cabinet.  Considering every piece of clothing you own, to see how it would look and does it fit.  Private letters from old boyfriends?  Don't leave them around.  Any reading material on the bookshelves that might be a bit inappropriate?  I mean, what was she thinking!  And does the White Album really say "Paul is Dead" when you play it backwards?  She's going to really work on finding that out, using your very expensive turntable!  But at least the cat wasn't lonely, and certainly got alot of entertainement.