Tag: friends

Hump Day Happy

You know those moments in your life that you look back on and remember exactly what you were doing when you heard about [fill in the blank]. I’ve got a few of those in both happy and sad columns But Tuesday night…

I did try hard to stay away from the news. Tim even made appointments for us to get our hair cut with Larry, because that’s always a happy couple of hours with someone whose company we enjoy.

 


Tim, during the process… 


Pile o’ Tim hair.

 

Yeah, I know you want “after” photos, but I can’t give you all the good stuff at once.

I did some errands and drove by several polling places hoping to get photos of voters in long lines. However, that early voting thing really works out for Houston, because there were no lines. Later, Tim and I went back out with the dogs, and as we drove down West Gray, I got this shot of some people who caught me in the act and seemed okay with it.

 

I read and enjoyed your comments about your voting experiences on my last post, then I started cooking dinner to stay away from the TV. I began having all kinds of computer issues, so obsessively checking for news online wasn’t an option. I also had my news-avoiding movie selection at the ready: My Best Friend’s Wedding, because I haven’t watched it for a while and Julia and the so-hot Dermot Mulroney are always a good diversion.

We ate. We watched our soap, a little CNN, a little Fox, a little MSNBC. I took some phone calls. I couldn’t forget the last two presidential campaigns, so I refused to be lured into anything like confidence and especially not complacency. I was more than willing to watch the one-hour Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert special, because I figured it would be at least a couple of hours before we were anywhere near hearing an outcome.

Then arrived that moment, the one I’ll always remember, when after goofing around and trading barbs, Jon Stewart quietly said: “At eleven o’clock at night Eastern standard time, the president of the United States is Barack Obama.” It took me a minute to realize he wasn’t kidding, and I immediately started crying, and it was quite some time before I could stop. I’ve never felt such a profound sense of history. I know many of my friends are skeptical and don’t feel the way I feel, but this is a day I didn’t think would come in my lifetime, a moment when everything seems to move forward and stop looking back, and I wish my parents could share it with me.

Both my phones were ringing, I knocked my can of Dr. Pepper over, the dogs were crazy, and Tim arrived to say that John McCain was expected to give his concession speech within minutes. And when he did concede, I was so proud of him. It was exactly the kind of moving and gracious speech we hope for from a statesman. I looked at that crowd of disappointed McCain supporters, and I understood exactly how they felt. However, in my heart, I truly believe what President-Elect Obama promised in his speech. He will be a president for ALL of us, he will listen to ALL of us, particularly those with differing opinions. This will be such a dramatic change from the last eight years.

Thank you to everyone who called and commented and sent e-mails–from all over the world! We have a lot of work ahead of us, and if there’s anything I could wish for, it would be that instead of divisiveness, we’d all start acting like friends and neighbors again. The following is my best attempt to use what I had on hand to represent a spirit of unity and to show that happiness is NOT a partisan issue. We can always use more happiness and more than a little silliness, so please comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25, and the elephant and donkey will work together to find your answer.

 

Button Sunday

Back in late July when I went out to visit my friend Pat in Small Paradise, she gave me a button that she’d gotten many years before when serving as a delegate. Do you know how torturous it was to wait until the Sunday before the election to share this?

I wasn’t born into this world as a Yellow Dog Democrat, so I must thank Nixon and his cabinet and conspirators, the Reagans, the Bush family, and especially Dick Cheney for transforming me into one. Good job!

The Ford family gets a free pass.

Randomusing

There are some nights that I like to go exploring the Internet wilderness, and by exploring I mean venturing into new blog territory. Some weeks back, I became aware of a blogger connected to someone in my family, and I have to say that reading her blog and those of other people she knows has probably made me happier than I thought could happen this year.

On another blog I read (not the blog of a gay person, which I tell you only because of what follows), I left a lengthy comment about politics for someone with whom I disagree. (Fear not: I was my usual civil self.) As a result, someone else responded to me positively, and when I went to check out his blog, he’s a gay Canadian living in the U.S. Figures. I always get along with gay men Canadians. 😉

Something on his blog led me to look for something else, which landed me right in the middle of the blog of someone I know in Houston (who I didn’t know blogged). And THAT took up lots of time, because he’s quite entertaining, and I like him a lot. In one of his blog entries, he was remembering the first cassette tape he ever bought for himself with his own money (the Bangles). That reminded me of a recent conversation I had with Rhonda when I was recalling My First Albums. Which sent me to the photo archives for this:

Now normally I wouldn’t show you a blurry, scratched picture of me being all surly and turning my head away when my mother is trying to take my photo first thing on what is apparently Easter Sunday morning (a guess because I appear to be holding a rabbit). It’s not ME you’re supposed to be looking at, but that olive drab green box (note the arrow) on a faux wooden cabinet against the wall. It’s not a box. It’s the record player my mother bought me when I complained because LYNNE had a record player and whatever LYNNE had I had to have. That poor woman. But I digress.

My father was overseas on the birthday when she bought me the record player. (I say that because it meant he made a little extra pay, which is probably why I got a record player at all. Seriously, there weren’t many luxuries in those days.) It folded up into that little box thing like you see there, but the front pulled down to access the turntable, and the speakers were hooked on the sides but you can’t see them here because they were detachable and connected by SIX FEET of speaker wire so they could actually be in different parts of the room–stereo, woohoo! I would stack way too many albums or forty-fives on that thing, and you just know what kind of damage was done to my records from falling down on each other.

I had a few records I’d inherited from my older siblings, and my cousin Bruce (the one who threw a penny into my mother’s grave on behalf of his late father) had given me some records, too. But when I got the stereo, I also got three albums–brand new albums owned by no one before me. I was the one who got to tear off the cellophane and pull out the pristine vinyl that bore not a single scratch or smudge. And even though I was only like, um, minus two years old or something, I still remember what all three albums were:



Apparently, I was very loyal to Columbia Records.

I wore those things out and can still sing every word of every song on all three of them, I’m sure. Though they are stored with a few hundred others in a window seat in my house, I’m betting they’re unplayable.

And just to bring this full circle, the other arrow is pointing to a bassinet with my Betsy Wetsy doll sitting in it, but it was actually the bassinet of the family member I was talking about in the first paragraph of this post.

Good memories.

Hump Day Happy

Dear Readership:

I know the only way to keep you coming back is to give you something to actually read–well, that and post photos of Tim, but I think he retired from my LJ in late 2007, and I haven’t yet found a good enough bribe to lure him back into camera range. I’ll try to be better about posting, because I miss your comments. And your fondue.

As you may have surmised, this woebegone Compounder has been sick and demanding my attention for a few days:

 

 

Guinness has been as poop-shy as Tim has been camera-shy, which means I’ve been spending a lot of time outdoors cajoling her (with an equal lack of success). When I went out this morning, I noticed the tiny, TINIEST, little bits of green on the part of The Compound lawn that had been nothing but dirt on Sunday, when I last posted a photo.

 


Look HARD for the brand new baby grass testifying to Tim’s hard work. 

Throughout the day, I’ve returned to find that each time, there’s a little more green. There are some other nice sights, too.

 

Last January, Lynne gave us a potted azalea, and it has suddenly bloomed:
 

The morning glories are so in love with the newly moderate weather that they’ll stay open most of the day:

And there’s this beauty, blooming outside Tim’s apartment:

 

While shooting those for you, GREAT HAPPINESS arrived at The Compound when Guinness finally, FINALLY left a gift on Tim’s new grass. Because I cherish you, I won’t force you to see a photo of that. Instead, I’ll give you an odor-free skunk:

 


and the opportunity to comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25, so the skunk can give you something to be happy about. (Please feel free, as always, to keep commenting for as many days as you wish. Happiness has no expiration date.)

 

LJ Runway Monday, Final Collection

RIP, Mr. Blackwell

At last, I present my final collection for LJ Runway Monday. It amazes me that this all began because I bought a Summer doll to use in a promotional photo for my forthcoming contemporary romance, A Coventry Wedding. It’s been wonderful to do this with Mark and Timothy, and amazing fun the way Marika supervised it all as Heidi Gunn, Greg and Rhonda took on the roles of permanent judges Miranda Priestly and Michelle Hors, all the guest judges treated it with a wonderful blend of respect and humor, and so many loyal and new readers checked our blogs every Monday to see what was new and maybe a little crazy. LJ Runway Monday was done with respect for Bravo’s Project Runway, and I think my fellow designers and I have a new appreciation for the creative processes of PR’s contestants.

I love Mark’s art-influenced and Timothy’s fashion-forward designs, and I’ve been surprised every time I won a challenge because I think they take bigger risks than I. So often when I’ve seen their posts on Sunday nights/Monday mornings, I’ve gasped with admiration. Every week, their knowledge and creations have inspired me to learn a little more and try a little harder.

Since this did all start with my novel, I wanted to finish it that way, too. So this week, my inspiration is my characters in A Coventry Christmas and A Coventry Wedding. Rather than try to create couture, I had fun imagining how these characters would dress in ways that reflect their personalities and lifestyles.

A look into ‘The Tiny Town with the Big Heart’

Gorgeous Day

The Brides invited us to the Bayou City Art Festival today. I was doing some editing that was interrupted by the migraine last week, and I wanted to get back to it, so Tom went without me. But the day was so beautiful that I didn’t want to be stuck inside. First, I spent some time outside with Margot, Guinness, Rex, and Sugar. I got a photo of Margot sunbathing that I really like:

Then I took my work to one of my favorite restaurants, Baba Yega, where I haven’t been in a long time. This was the view from my table:

After eating and working, I did a tiny bit of Christmas shopping, then got a call from the art-gazers, who invited me to meet them for ice cream at the Marble Slab Creamery. It was a lovely way to spend an afternoon.