Forgive me, Father.

My daughter has her first confession next week. I think she's nervous. It's going to be a family reconciliation mass, so we all get to go to confession. Sweet. That's sarcasm, by the way. However, because we will all be saying the Act of Contrition before going into confession, I won't have to worry about remembering/ forgetting it in front of the priest, which is basically where all my anxiety lies in going to confession. I don't go to confession often. In fact, I can't tell you the last time I went to confession. It doesn't really bother me to bare my soul to the priest, but I feel like a fraud in some ways. I feel sorry for my sins because I'm supposed to but not because I really, really, personally feel sorry for my sins. I know when I'm doing something that's not nice or good before I do it. I've already had the opportunity to change my behavior before the fact and I've chosen to do the "wrong" thing, regardless. So to go in after the fact and confess seems two-faced to me. Plus God knows what the real deal is. The priest doesn't. Am I really forgiven? I don't know. However, I am going to go to a priest that's not assigned to our church. The priests I see every week don't need to know my business.

Of dead spiders and pinkies.

There was a big grey spider crawling on one of my computer wires so I rolled up a galley and smashed it. I don't know if I killed it, though, because there was grey smudge on the back of the galley, but no spider anywhere. I couldn't find its body anywhere. I hope it doesn't surprise me by climbing up my leg or something. I hate spiders. We were at the pet store last night picking up a pinkie to feed to the kid's snake and they had these huge birdeating spiders there. Ugh. It creeps me out just to think about it because, really, they were HUGE. Spiders aren't supposed to be that big. That's all there is to it. They had something interesting at the pet store I've never seen before, however. It's a degu, which looks like this:


It's from South America and is part of the squirrel family. At least that's what the very large boy at the store told us last night. Anyway, my daughter got one look at it and had to investigate. The thing I really love about my daughter whenever we go to this pet store to buy the pinkie every week is that she always says, "I'm going to go check out the mammals, Mom," while I'm waiting at the counter. I find it hilarious. Anyway, this degu looked kind of like a gopher to me. It was cute and everything and my daughter was trying to get me to pet it. But I said no. I knew she was trying to sucker me into buying it. I was strong, though. I resisted. Anyway, I'd already told her that she's not getting anything new until Christmas, so that was that.

Oh, and you'll be happy to know we took the pinkie home and the snake ate it.

I'm never going to eat again.

I ate a lot this weekend. I ate a whole lot this weekend. I ate a whole lot of junk this weekend. I'm never going to eat again. Well, that's a lie because I have eaten, but you get what I'm talking about. Why do we feel compelled to overeat at Thanksgiving? It's because there's too much food, obviously. I didn't cook this Thanksgiving because we went to our friends' house, but I still managed to eat too much. It was all good, though. After we'd all eaten, we sat on the floor and looked at the sales flyers for the next day. Wal-Mart opened at 5 a.m. to kick-off their sale and I asked, "Who gets up at five in the morning to go shopping?" And then my friend answered, "Ooooh, I can't wait. I've been really excited for the sales to start." I said that's why they have such good deals that early in the morning because it's the crazy person sale. They figure anyone crazy enough to get up that early deserves to get their merchandise for practically free. Anyway, I did go out and do my bit the day after Thanksgiving, however, I didn't leave the house until 1:00 in the afternoon and it was to get a dress for my daughter to wear to her Christmas concert. What's interesting about my daughter now is that she is beginning to develop very definite opinions about what type of clothes she will be wearing. She pretty much picked out the dress we bought, even though it's two sizes too big, it was the only one left and she had to have it because none of the other dresses were "her style." Luckily, the dress is intended to be ashort, empire waist dress, so it looks natural enough one her because the waist is actually at her waist and the bottom of the dress comes down to her knees. I do have to hem up the sleeves, but that's not too big a deal. Oh, I bought her shoes, too. And pajamas. But that was it. We only went to two stores--Kohl's and Target. So I was civilized and all.

Karaoke gobble.

Even though I won't be posting for the next four days, you didn't think I was going to leave you hanging with no new song, did you? Today, I have the great pleasure of bringing you the soothing sounds of my daughter's Christmas concert solo, which will be performed next month. She's been practicing awfully hard and I think you should all feel honored that she's giving you this sneak peek. So here is my daughter singing whatever Christmas song she's singing.

Happy early Thanksgiving, you turkeys.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, so I hope all of you get nice and stuffed...with food. My family will be enjoying the day at our friends' house. I'm going to make this brussel sprout recipe I got from my sister where you saute shallots in butter and then saute in lightly steamed brussel sprouts. Then you let the stuff simmer in cream and white wine for a little bit before spreading gruyere cheese all over the whole mess and then baking it for an hour. It is goooooooooooooood! Take my word on it. Anyway, have a great day and travel safely.

Well, I tried.

Sunday, we bought a pinkie to feed to my daughter's snake, as we do just about every Sunday or Monday or Tuesday. Basically, whenever we can get to the pet store to pick up the pinkie. Anyway, we bought the pinkie on Sunday and threw it into the feeding tank with the snake and it decides he's not going to eat the mouse. I don't know why. It had been a week since he'd eaten last, so he should have been hungry. We left him in with the mouse about an hour or so, but he didn't touch it. So we put the snake back in his tank and I kept the pinkie in the feeding tank, thinking maybe I'll try to tomorrow if it's still alive when we get up. I threw in some bedding just to help keep it warm during the night. When we woke up Monday, the pinkie was still alive, so I put the snake in with it to see if anything would happen and nothing. I tried feeding the snake again after I got home yesterday, but he still wouldn't take it. Meanwhile, my husband is saying he's just going to flush the mouse down the toilet and I'm like, "No, I paid money for that thing. The snake is going to eat it." However, I realized we didn't have a lot of time on our hands before the pinkie expired, so I thought maybe I can keep this thing alive until the snake decides to eat it. So I warmed up a little cream and tried feeding the pinkie with a medicine dispenser. I think I got it to drink some of it. I fed it again before I went to sleep and covered it with bedding and everything, but when I woke up this morning, it was dead. So now I have to go and buy another pinkie to try and feed the snake. But I think I'll wait until this weekend to make sure he's nice and hungry. I'm not wasting anymore money.

I've offically crossed the line.

This past weekend I did something I never thought I'd be crazy/stupid enough to do--I got up at 5:30 a.m. to go to a sale that started at 7:00 a.m. What about this sale was inticing enough to get me up at the butt-crack of dawn on a Saturday? Well, the flyer said they would be selling the Sharper Image Ionic Breeze for $150, plus with the 15% coupon that was in the flyer, it would be even cheaper. I've wanted a Sharper Image Ionic Breeze for about as long as there has been a Sharper Image Ionic Breeze. These things cost about $350. That's a little steep for my blood, but I've never let go of the dream that one day the Ionic Breeze would be mine. Anyway, I get up, get showered, drink my coffe when I realize that the sale is probably for the small Sharper Image Ionic Breeze because that is just too good a deal. I looked at the flyer and there's no mention of size, of course, because they probably know most people want the big size and aren't going to schlep to the store at 7:00 a.m. if they know it's just the small one. So I say to my husband, "I bet you that's going to be the small Ionic Breeze." He says, "You're probably right." So there I am thinking, damn, I got up and that's probably not what I want, but I'm up, I can't take the chance of it being the full-sized one and letting this opportunity pass, so I finish my coffee and walk out the door.

I pulled into the store parking lot and there's a line outside the door. I'm thinking, "Holy crap! Why are all these people here so early?" One of the reasons I got up so early was because I didn't want to deal with a lot of people. As I've gotten older, I really hate shopping when there are too many people around because this sort of Lord of the Flies thing starts to happen when there are too many people crammed into a finite space looking for deals. People lose their freaking minds. They dive for stuff like they're diabetics grabbing for the last vial of insulin on the planet. So anyway, I get out of the car and stand in line and ask the lady in front of me if the store is opened yet and she says, "No." I didn't have to wait long, though, because I pulled in at about five after 7:00. They open the doors and as we're all shuffling in, we're handed a little scratch card that apparently will reveal an additional savings amount of either $10, $15 or $25. I hear a girl on a cellphone telling someone, "We're one of the first 500, so I got a card." I didn't know anything about this first 500 business and I can't believe that all these people came so early just to get the scratch card because you know everyone's going to get a card for $10 because there's only one card for $15 and one card for $25. The store is not trying to give away money. So I go and find the Ionic Breeze and surprise, surpise, it's the small one. They've got couple of the large ones and I drag it over to a cashier and ask if the large one is on sale, too, because it's got a price tag of $350 on it. She scans it and my 15% coupon and my $10 scratch card and says that neither one took, so it's not on sale. I really expected it, but I'm crushed nonetheless. The cashier asks if I want to buy it and I say, "No. It's not on sale. Why would I buy it?" So I went and bought a couple of Christmas gifts and a pair of boots and gauchos for myself to wear to a benefit dinner I have to go to with my husband in a couple of weeks. I also got my husband a few shirts and ties for work and some some shirts and a pair of jeans for my daughter. In the end I spent something like $300, which would have pretty much been the Ionic Breeze anyway, but it was about the principle, man.

Oh, we also went to watch Goblet of Fire Friday night and left in about the last half hour because our daughter got freaked out. She's very familiar with the book because she's listened to it about 50 times, but I also knew that it might be too intense for her because of the PG-13 rating. We told her that this movie was probably going to be scarier than the other movies and even though she knew the story, she should let us know if she was getting too scared and we'd leave. So right as all the champions enter the maze she turns to us and says, "I want to leave." So we did. Kind of a bummer, but we know what happens and the DVD will be out soon enough. My daughter said in the car that she thinks she won't be so scared when she watches the DVD because the picture is smaller and the sound isn't so loud. However, up until the point we left, I thought they did a pretty good job with this one. I was really disappointed with Prisoner of Azkaban because I felt it was really choppy and that they left some really important information out. I was skeptical about the success they'd have with Goblet of Fire because it's an even longer book and they were still going to try and fit it all into two and a half hours. I really thought they should do a Matrix sort of thing and make it a long movie released in two parts. But, considering the limitations, I thought they did a good job. I wish they would have shown at least a little of the quidditch world cup game. Maybe they'll have some of that on the DVD.

Let's get karaoke!

When I was a girl, I really liked Olivia Newton-John. She was so cute in Grease and I wanted to be a muse after watching Xanadu five hundred million times. This is not an exaggeration. When I was in the sixth grade--which was about 1981 or so--my parents bought our first VCR. This is while we were living in Germany. They also bought two movies for us to watch on the VCR: Flash Gordon and Xanadu. I kid you not, my brother, sister and I watched Flash Gordon and Xanadu after school everyday for about two years. My sister and I recorded the songs off Xanadu by holding a tape recorder up to the television speaker so we could listen to the music anytime we wanted. I used to draw pictures of the muses. I really wanted to be Olivia Newton-John. All of this was before the time of Remington Steele, however, when I then became obsessed with Stephanie Zimbalist as Det. Laura Holt, and then wanted to be her. Not Stephanie Zimbalist, though. I wanted to be Laura Holt. Anyway, back to Olivia. Let's just say, I used to like her a lot. So here I am singing Physical.

Must sleep. Eyes drooping.

I am freaking TIRED today. I didn't get much slepp because I took a nap for a couple of hours before I had to go to this reading at a local coffee shop and then when I got home, I took my codeine and for some reason that kept me awake even more. I didn't go to sleep until about midnight or so. I wake up at 5:30, so I really, really want to sleep right now. It's snowing. AAARRGH!!! I hate snow. Whine, whine, whine. Of course, my husband hasn't raked the leaves yet, so those are now being covered by snow and slowly turnin into large ice mountains in our driveway and yard. Great. Love it when that happens. We're supposed to go to the game this Saturday. A friend of ours gave us her tickets at the last minute. It's supposed to snow this weekend. I really don't like going to football games when it snows because it basically sucks. My husband is really keen to go watch football in the snow because he has this completely warped idea that it's going to be fun. I've tried explaining to him that it's not fun. You sit there freezing your ass off, getting soaked as the falling snow hits you and melts into your clothes. Plus you're sitting on that cold metal bleacher seat. You know, that's how you get hemorroids? By sitting on cold surfaces. At least that's what my mother used to tell me when I was a teenager. I used to freak out if I had to sit on cold concrete because I was SURE I'd end up with huge polyps hanging out of my ass. Of course, my mother has told me the reason I have large nostrils is because I stretched them open by picking my nose all the time as a child. So maybe Mom's a little off on this one, too. The only time I've ever had hemorroids was after I had my daughter and that basically because you end up pushing out all your internal organs with the baby. Of course, that includes turning your rectum inside out in the process. It can't be helped, I've realized. I don't remember them lasting too long or giving me too much discomfort. Of course, I was so bothered by the itching from my episiotomy, that I don't think I'd noticed much of anything else. Which makes me want to point out that Britney Spears must be crazy for going out braless. Isn't she worried about her boobs leaking? I had to wear a nursing bra and pads for about a year after my daughter was born because of milk leakage. I even had to wear them to bed. The only assumption I can make is that Britney must not be breastfeeding the little tike.

Codeine is good.

I have found out over the past few days that codeine is amazingly easy to get addicted to. Not that I have, mind you, but I can definitely see how people get hooked on the stuff. I've been developing a chest cold over the last half-week or so and I started taking some of my leftover codeine cough syrup from a similar bout of phlegm-producing coughing a couple of months ago. Anyway, last time, I think I only took one teaspoon of the suggested one-two teaspoon dose. This time I figured, hey, let's kick it up and notch and I've been taking the two-teaspoon dose for the last couple of days. The first time I took it, I could feel it. I was high as a kite, as they like to say. Yeah, it was fun. Last night I took the two teaspoons before bed and while I got a little sleepy, no high. No goofy desire to spin around in the middle of the room a la Jodie Foster in Nell screaming, "Flyin in tha wiiiinn." Nothing, nada. Just sleepiness. So I started thinking, "Damn, how much would I have to take now to get that same giddiness as before?" I wasn't going to try, but it just made me realize that there's probably a lot of people who just go ahead and take more. I've developed that level of tolerance in only a couple of days. A couple of days. That's amazing to me. I also see why they don't give you refills on the stuff. However, I do believe my husband has a leftover bottle of his own codeine syrup lurking in the medicine cabinet. Hmmmm.

How I got my Blue Heron pen for free.

Here is my Blue Heron pen, which I got for free.
If you'd like to know how I got it for free, I'll tell you. This past weekend my family went to Frankenmuth, MI, which touts itself as Little Bavaria. It was an alright place, but kind of disappointing because it wasn't really a Little Bavaria; although, my husband did buy a cuckoo clock which he's apparently wanted his entire life, so at least he's been able to fulfill that dream. At any rate, Frankenmuth didn't really create a little snapshot of Germany because they didn't sell bratwurst on brotchen, I couldn't find a decent pair of lederhosen anywhere, and there was no gingerbread to be found. However, I did have the best egg noodles I've ever tasted at the Bavarian Inn Restaurant. So, while we're in Frankenmuth, we stop by the St. Julian winery store where they offer free samples and whatnot. My husband bought a bottle of brandy and I picked out a nice bottle of cherry wine which was really tasty. While we're checking out, the manager says something to the register boy about giving away the postcards to whoever wants them. I noticed there was also a selection of pens by the register and I said, "What about the pens? Are those free for the taking as well?" And the manager said, "Uh, no. But you can have one for a dollar." I said, "But I'd like one as a free souvenir." At that time, my husband asked the manager if they can ship to Indiana. While the manager was looking through the book I said, "Tell you what, ask me a question, any question, and if I get it right, you'll give me one of these pens for free." So he said, "OK, do we ship to Indiana?" And I said, "No." And he said, "Go ahead and pick out a pen." I did a little happy dance at the register and told the manager he was a cool cat. And that's how I got my free pen, which doesn't even write well, by the way. I would have been really pissed if I'd paid a buck for it.

In other news, my sexy American girlfriend has found a sexy Italian boy toy. Figures. Figures she'd turn her back on our love for a little peck and tickle from some buff, overly-athletic Casanova from Tuscany, to boot. How can I compete with Tuscany and the accent? I can't, dammit. I can't. Oh, the torment. Oh, the woe. What ever shall I do?

A karaoke by any other name...

The summer before my freshman year of high school, I attended a summer camp for the performing and visual arts. I was there for drama. Every year camp organizers ended the summer's activities with, what else, a talent show. While we all were required to perform some "class" project, we could also perform other solo or group efforts. A girl I new from middle school was there for piano and asked if I'd like to sing The Rose while she played the piano. I said sure. I always liked The Rose and thought singing for the talent show would be a nice diversion from the entire theatre thang. So I practised and sang for two weeks getting ready, but at the last minute she decided she didn't want to do it, so that was the end of my grand moment in the spotlight. Because, of course, I imagined everyone would reward me with a standing ovation. Our drama project was some improv on the Salem witch trials. I don't know how we came up with that one, but I don't remember it being particularly interesting. So here I am for my close-up Mr. DeMille, singing The Rose.

George, we hardly knew you.

George the parakeet is gone and Fred the parakeet has taken his place. I decided that George was too timid and shy and that he'd never make a good pet for our family, so we exchanged him last night for a more lively and curious bird. My husband had picked out George on his own and based his decision primarily on looks. However, after reading parakeet pages on the internet and leafing through the parakeet care book that my husband brought home, I came to the realization that George was just too frightened of life to ever feel cozy with the seven other living creatures using up air in our house. Plus, the little fucker clawed the hell out of my wrist and nearly bit my pinkie off when I tried to get him back into the cage after he managed a brief breakout.

While we were picking out the new parakeet last night my husband said he was sorry for doing a bad job of picking out the first bird. I said I was just surprised since my husband is an avid birdwatcher and has had birds as pets for many years of his life. He said he makes up for it though by having immediately recognized that Fred was a good-tempered bird. I said I recognized immediately that George was a bad-tempered bird with no experience with birds at all and my husband said what I immediately recognized was insubordination and that's what soured me to George. I don't know what he's trying to say by that.

Fred looks like this parakeet.




George looked like this parakeet.


















In my opinion, George was the prettier bird, but as we know, looks don't count for much. I also think Fred might actually be a girl because her cere is more brownish than blue, and that's apparently one way of distinguishing gender in the noble parakeet. Why does it not surprise me that the boy ended up being the pain in the ass?

My pants are really loud today.

The party's over.

I announced at my social life commission meeting that I want to step down as the committee chair person because I need a freaking break and a half. I've done it for two years and it's time for someone else to dot the i's and cross the t's. The only reason I originally agreed to do it is because my friend said we'd basically run it as co-chairs. I was really just agreeing to letting them use my name for figurehead purposes. Anyway, that friend quit the committee some months ago becase she was completely overwhelmed by the many responsibilities she has on her plate, and utterly underwhelmed by the level of support we were enjoying from the pastoral council and parish. There have only ever been a handful of us on the committee anyway, but there are really only two other members we can rely upon in a fairly consistent manner in terms of attending meetings and taking on responsibilities for planning our various social events. Even while my friend was still on the committee, it seemed like my life was dominated by church social life planning because most of the other members were very relaxed in their participation. I took care of thing because it needed to be done, but now I'd like to be one of the people who just shows up whenever I like and just stands around waiting to be told what to do. Actually, not really. I don't want to be chair person anymore, but I still plan on working on the committee. I'm just tired of having to keep track of everything. However, the thing that sort of broke the camel's back for me is that I happened to reschedule the meeting that should have taken place Monday to Tuesday because I'd forgotten about having the meeting on Monday and scheduled something else for that night. Anyway, one of the other people on the committee called me and complained that it wasn't right to change meeting dates since she had sent out an e-mail a couple of months ago with the schedule for all the meetings for the upcoming year and I said, "Well, I already sent the e-mail to everyone rescheduling so there's nothing to be done about it now." To which she replied, "We shouldn't do this."

I said, "If you still want to hold the meeting, go right ahead. I don't care, but I'm not going to be there because I didn't make arrangements for it."

Then she said, "No, that's fine. I won't be there tomorrow."

Fine, great, like it really makes a difference in the whole scheme of things. But I have to say I really resented the implication that I was somehow interfering with the group's progress by rescheduling, like I'd committed some grave sin. Anyway, that was the end of the line for me. I'm officially tired of running around like a chicken with my head cut off while others take a more leisurely approach. Someone else can worry about the details now. And that's all I really have to say about that.

In other news, it is girl scout cookie time again. The official sale begins today; although, I've sold a few boxes already. This morning my daughter informed me that I "have chosen the wrong path" by selling early. I tried to tell her I only sold boxes to people who have no other connection to girl scouts, but she wasn't impressed and it made me realize that my kid is smarter than I am. I'm proud of her for telling me I broke the rules. It gives me confidence in thinking she'll continue to do the right thing as she grows up and won't be easily swayed by the ne'er-do-wells (like me) floating around her.

Welcome to the zoo.

The zoo being my house, of course. I'm not quite sure how it happened, but yesterday morning we woke up with three pets in the house. However, by the time we went to bed yesterday evening, we had five pets in the house. In addition to the chinchilla, rabbit and snake, we now have a hamster named Smokey and a parakeet named George. It's kind of a blur, but I firmly blame the lazy workers at Meijers. We were at Meijers (which is a large department/grocery store here)and we were looking at the pets when I decided I just wanted to check out a hamster that looked particularly cute because my daughter was pining for a new hamster since Snoozer died. Anyway, I wasn't really thinking let's get a hamster but I wanted to check out the personality of the hamster we were looking at. Anyway, there was no one manning the pet department so I caught this one kid walking buy and told him I needed help. He said to pick up the red courtesy phone to get someone there, which I did. That phone rang like thirty times and no one bothered to pick up. So I walked over to where that same kid was leaning against a tower of boxes drinking a soda, talking to another kid stocking the dairy section.

"No one is picking up the phone," I said.

"Ah, man," he replied in an annoyed manner, "they're just being lazy. I'll go get someone."

I'm thinking as he walks away, I didn't see you doing anything to help me. I don't know how you could be calling someone else lazy. Anyway, after a couple of minutes he comes back and says he put in a call and someone should be there to help me. Well, I waited. I waited a long time. I waited so long I even picked up the red courtesy phone again just to see if that could speed things up a bit. It didn't. I saw that the keys for the animal cages were lying by the sink in the pet department and I asked my husband if he'd get upset if I opened the hamster cage myself. He said he didn't think that would be a good idea. So I searched down the boy that had been stocking the dairy section and grabbed him by the arm and led him back to the pet department and said, "I just need you to open the cage. I'd do it myself, but I don't want to get my husband all bothered."

So we get to the cages, he unlocks it and I get the hamster out and I told him he could leave the keys with me and I'd lock everything up again. He said OK. At this point, I was very annoyed and I was thinking, "I'm buying this damn hamster because I went to all this trouble to get it out of the cage." Anyway, as I locked up the cage and we started looking for a box to put the hamster in, the actual pet department boy comes running over saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but they've got me running all over."

I said, "Well, I took care of the situation myself. I just need you to write the price on the box."

As we left, I walked up to a manager and said, "You know, I'd like a discount on this hamster because I basically did everything myself to get it. I waited a long, long time for assistance, but it never came so I took matters into my own hands. I'm thinking lets take two dollars off the cost." And she said OK, go right ahead. So I did. The hamster ended up costing $7.99. I'm thinking I should have asked for at least three dollars off, now.

My husband said if I get that hamster, he's getting a parakeet, which he did, and that's how we ended up with two more pets. Now I think I made a mistake getting that hamster.

In Memoriam

Bryce
Jan. 1991-November 2005
(rescued from Missoula Humane Society, Dec. 1991)



My sexy American girlfriend lost her poochy pal Bryce a couple of days ago. Of Bryce she says: "Bryce's name, when I got her, was Lady Belle. I came to understand that Bryce had spunk and personality in addition to the grace of a lady. She became my father's dog and would paw him in the car if he stopped for too long in any location. Bryce had part of her left ear chewed off by coyotes and whenever she heard them howling she went and hid under the bed. She had straitions of color on her fur ranging from tan to grey to black and each leg and foot looked like she wore old-fashioned women's shoes because of the tan color. I had a dream about Bryce the night before I adopted her and I had a dream she went to doggie heaven a few days before she died."

A BRYCIE POEM

By Tyler, age 6

Octopus on Bryci's necklace.

Doggie on her head.

2 and 5 more dogs.

Keisha, Max, and Truffle

and the spotted China doggie

in the tree. Brycie is cute.

Brycie is beautiful. She wears

a red gingham bow. She copies

whatever letter I do.


Rest in peace, Bryce. Look after Snoozer for me.

Karaoke Fame!

When I was a kid I loved the show Fame. I loved the movie, too. I wanted to be one of the kids in Fame. I wanted to go to a performing arts high school. At the time that I really, really loved watching Fame, we lived in Frederick, Maryland, which is a suburb of DC. I heard that there was a performing arts high school in the city similar to the one in Fame. I begged my parents to let me audition so I could study drama. My father asked, "How are you going to go to school in DC?"

I said, "You can drive me."

"No, that's not going to happen," my father informed me.

"Why not?" I demanded. "It's only forty-five minutes to get there."

"It's not going to happen," my father repeated.

I hated him for refusing to drive me to school in the city. Of course, hated him in the way 14-year-old kids hate their parents when they won't let them do something they want to do. I couldn't understand how my parents could intentionally stand between me and Fame. Didn't they know how important it was to me? Didn't they know that I was meant to live my life on stage? Didn't they know that being an actress was all I wanted in life? They didn't know anything about me. They didn't want to see me live my dream. I should have been Coco, except for the dancing part. I was never much of a dancer. But, I'm not going to say I should have been Doris because she was so, you know, dumpy. If only. If only my parents would have let me go to school in DC. Why? Why? Why? OK, I'm too overwrought to go on right now. Here I am singing Irene Cara's Out Here On My Own.

Li'l four-eyes.

My daughter has started wearing glasses. She's quite excited and proud about the entire thing, but I feel guilty. I feel guilty that I've passed on my malformed eyeballs. In many ways it was inevitable that she'd need glasses because both my husband and I had to start wearing glasses as children, but I hoped. I hoped with all my might that she might be spared the back-breaking hassle of having to deal with glasses and contacts and bad vision. I've got very, very, very, very, very bad astigmatism. I imagine my eyeballs look something like a deformed grape. Anyway, my daughter has very slight astigmatism and, right now, she probably really only needs to wear her glasses for things like reading the chalk board. I'm encouraging her to take her glasses off when she doesn't need them so that her eyes don't become dependent on the glasses too quickly. I don't know that doing this will mean a hill of beans in the long run, but I have hated, HATED, having such messed-up eyes. I think about having lasic surgery but I'm a little afraid of it because if they screw up your eyes, that's it. There's no turning back. You have fucked-up eyes. End of story. I can't think of anything worse than going through something like lasic for nothing. Also, I've been told my pupils are too large, but that was a few years ago and, supposedly, they have better techniques for dealing with large pupils. I'll probably still look into it a little bit more, but I don't know. I did find out something I hadn't known: If your eyesight causes you to have headaches, it's probably due to astigmatism. That's what the eye doctor told me after she examined my daughter's eyes. In all my years, I'd never learned that.

Sexy American girlfriend.

Here is a picture of my sexy American girlfriend. However, her identity will have to remain a mystery to all of you because I don't want you to get any smart ideas and try to steal her from me. Because she's mine.

No candy for you!

Since I spent so much time complaining about my life in yesterday's post, I forgot to talk about how my husband has declared we will no longer pass out candy on Halloween. When I got home Monday night with my daughter, his first words as soon as we walked through the door were, "That's it. I'm done. I'm never passing out candy again."

"Why?" I asked, assuming he hadn't much appreciated the rain.

"Because they're all ungrateful little shits, that's why."

He went on to explain that just about everyone who came to the house was rude and ill-mannered. He said kids just plunged their hands into the bowl instead of waiting to be given candy and that only a couple of children said thank you. "They don't deserve candy," he said. I told him that as long as we're sending our kid out to collect candy, we're giving it away. But he's pretty riled up about the whole thing. I agree, though. Kids today are shits. At least a lot of them are. Obviously, there are good kids too, but it seems like an awful lot lack even the most basic in good manners. Is that the parents' fault? Yeah, of course. The kids can't learn what they've never been taught. Which makes me wonder why so many modern parents don't seem to think it's important to teach good manners.

Oh, and in my neverending quest to humiliate my siblings, here's a picture of my brother from his bachelor party weekend. This man is 31 years old, believe it or not.

Can someone gimme a break, I say, gimme a break?

Today, right now at this very moment, I feel stressed and completely out of sorts. I know a lot of this is just me feeling sorry for myself but I feel like there is just way too much going on right now and it's just getting harder and harder to keep track of things. Yesterday was Halloween, so we did the trick-or-treat thing, which was fine until it started raiing. But that's really neither here nor there. Only that it takes up valuable after work/ school time so there's no time left to do the sorts of things that need to be taken care of bathing my child, going over homework properly, paying bills. You know, normal stuff. Tonight I have to go with my husband to pick up stuff for a memorial mass at church tomorrow. My husband volunteered to buy food and whatnot for the reception afterward. Then, of course, I'll have to go with him tomorrow to help set the thing up. That in and of itself is not that big a deal because my husband always helps out with social life stuff I take care of at church. Part of the stress of this entire situation is that the person who is supposed to be in charge isn't doing what he's supposed to be doing and he's basically leaving everyone floundering to take care of things. This is the first thing my husband has done for this new committee he just joined and he's pretty sure it's going to be the last thing he does if the leadership is this fractured. So that takes up tonight and Wednesday night. Then Thursday night, my husband and I have to go to some charity dinner for his job. Again, that's fine. I don't mind getting gussied up for a nice dinner every now and again, but it's difficult doing this sort of thing in the middle of the week when your kid has school the next day and you have work and you have to try and find someone to watch your kid in the middle of the week. In the meantime, you notice, there's no time to clean house, make a decent meal, take care of the kid's school business, etc., etc. Like I said, mostly just me bitching about nothing of any great importance, but it's so interesting how all these relatively inconsequential things clump together into major baggage. Is that life or is that just me? Don't know and don't really have time to figure it out right now.