Here is new kitty, Renee. Will you look at that tail? Her nickname is squirrel.

Here's sweetie Kira.

What price youth?

Checked out a book from the library, "How Not to Look Old." Some of the advice it had was interesting, some of it was so unrelated to my lifestyle I had to laugh. I can see where tight, knee-length skirts and four-inch spike heels look good, but get real. I'm a librarian. I have to do a LOT of walking, plus bending and getting books from low shelves, climbing on stools to get books on high shelves. Low, stable heels and longer skirts just work better for the physical aspects of my job. Now if I worked in an office, and the most energetic thing I did all day was type and answer the phone, that look would work.

And when did pantyhose go out of style? I hate the damn things, but most office and store clerk jobs require them. Besides, what nut is going to wear a skirt and bare legs in the winter? Not this one.

Where the author lost me completely was the pantie advice. Evidently anything but thongs is "old lady."

Not gonna happen. Give up my comfy cotton granny panties for butt floss? If that's what it takes to be young and hip, then call me an old lady and give me my walker! I tried on a pair. It felt like a permanent wedgie.

Just goes to show, when reading beauty advice, use your common sense and take it all with a grain of salt.

Here goes nothing

I have been trying to sell a novel since I was twenty. I'm now 54, and my file of rejection slips is over an inch thick. I think I'll burn them. Of course, it's entirely possible that my writing just isn't good enough. I think it's just bad luck and the increasing shrinking of the publishing world.

I was going to self-publish with my income tax refund, but thanks to my husband, all that money just vanished. I'm not sure what happened to it, but I sure didn't see any.

I have 5 finished novels, and am rough-drafting a sixth. I guess I'll attempt to write synopses and get them in the mail again, though I just don't think it's going to help. And it takes half a year to hear back! What's up with that? Do all the publishers think writers are immortal? Geez.

Moving sucks

My dad wasn't in the military, yet I once figured out that by the age of 21, I had lived in 17 houses in 5 states. If you count that I lived in Kansas twice, that's six. That doesn't count the college dorm rooms. I moved from one room to another during my freshman year, and again had to switch rooms my junior year. Each year, of course, I had to pack up everything and schlep it home, then schlep it back the next year. Let's see, that's six more moves. At least they were only a roomful, not an entire household.

Then, after college but when I was still living at home, my folks moved again. Okay, 17 + 6= 23. So that was my 24th move. At the age of 23. Yikes!

Then my first apartment, move 25. Then back with my parents when my dad was dying, 26. Then to graduate school, 27. Then to El Paso: 2 apartments and one house, bringing my moves up to 30. Then to Albuquerque: 2 apartments, 1 house, and 2 duplexes: my grand total of moves at age 54 is 35.

Sweet God in heaven.

Every single move, stuff got lost, stuff got broken. Friends vanished into the past, favorite places are seen no more. But you get new stuff, new friends, and new favorite places, so it balances out.

I'm still damn sick of packing.

Able-bodied? Ever park in a handicapped spot?

There is a special place in the afterlife for able-bodied people who park in handicapped spots, and it isn’t a good one. Those of you who’ve done it know who you are, and SHAME on the lot of you! I don’t care what your excuse is. “I was only going to be a minute.” Sure, and in that minute a handicapped person got there and couldn’t use the spot. “I’ve never seen anyone park there.” So you’ve been there 24-7 since the place was built, huh? “I left my wife/husband/kids in the car so it doesn’t count.” Oh, yes, it does, and the fine is upwards of a hundred dollars. “I didn’t park in the space, just the cross-hatched area between spaces. That’s just wasted space anyway.” Not if you’re trying to deal with a wheelchair, it’s not. “Most people who use them aren’t REALLY handicapped. They sure don’t look handicapped. Why do they need the best spots?”

Many reasons. I doubt you’d argue with someone in a wheelchair or using a walker, would you? Just realize that a lot of mobility impairments are invisible. Someone with crippling arthritis wouldn’t be immediately recognizable. Someone with an artificial limb might not be able to walk far without pain. Someone with a heart condition might just be able to shop, but if they had to walk farther from their car, might not be able to manage.

At any rate, the judgement isn’t yours to make. Laziness isn’t a handicap, neither is being in a hurry. Park somewhere else, and look on the extra steps as exercise. I’ve seen some of you schmucks, and you need it.


Ignorance is not not knowin' - ignorance is knowin' what ain't so.
--Mark Twain

The worst news I've had this year

For most of my l ife I couldn't pick one author for my favorite. I could give a top five, or top ten, but not one single author whose work I loved above all others. This year I found one: Terry Pratchett. His Discworld series should live forever. It has a seamless blend of subtle social commentary, humor that ranges from the wry to the laugh aloud, and dazzling, character-driven fantasy. I can reread them a hundred times and always find something I missed, and laugh at the humor all over again.

Just before Christmas, I read the 59-year-old Terry Pratchett has been diagnosed with a rare form of early-onset Alzheimer's.

There aren't enough swear words on the entire planet to express how I feel about this. This horrible disease, which steals the mind and then the personality long before it kills the shell of the body, has come to one of the best minds on the planet. His brilliant books will cease, long before their time. It makes me sick. It makes me want to scream. It fills me with rage that has no outlet.

There's no punchline here, folks. No resolution for this one. Just sorrow and anger, and helpless frustration.

A solitary fantasy can totally transform a million realities.
Maya Angelou

Not often do I stop reading a book before it's finished

...But once in a while there's one that's just so completely god-awful that I just don't want to waste my time. This time, the culprit was Real Vampires Have Curves - I forget the author.

Now, I barely read chick-lit anyway. The variety with vampires or other occult characters is mildly more interesting, but frankly I just can't relate to big-city twenty-somethings with fluff for brains who spend 1K on designer shoes on a regular basis. They just have absolutely no relation to my life, now or when I was twenty-something. I find them pea-brained and annoying. I picked up this one because it had a vampire, she wasn't living in New York City, and she was a Large-Size woman. As she was 500 years old, I figured she'd have her shit together.

Not so. Even though as a vampire she'll look like she does forever, and she had men telling her constantly how beautiful she was, and she had 500 YEARS to come to terms with her body - not to mention that size body has been stylish up to the last century - she whined and moaned and obsessed on every single page about her weight. Over and over and over. Yawn city. Hell, if I can accept the fact I'll never be smaller than a size 18 for the rest of my life in less than a century, how come she couldn't do it in five? Especially since she had plenty of men telling her they liked her body! That's just stupid. And I don't read books about stupid people. There are enough of them walking the streets.

I read 40 pages, and put it on the freebie shelves at the library I work at. What a waste of paper.


Quote of the day: Of course truth is stranger than fiction – fiction has to make sense.
Mark Twain