Ok, maybe not Julia Roberts, but COME ON!

I was reading this chick's blog and she posted this awesome morphing "thing" where her face is morphed into Julia Roberts, and you can clearly see the similarities! Wouldn't that be the cat's meow to look like Julia Roberts? I would like to look like either Tia Carrere or Tea Leoni, but I know I don't. Rather, I've been told I look like Sigourney Weaver. EWWWWW!

In any case, I followed the link and uploaded my best picture, eager to prove that I did NOT look like Sigourney Weaver while being a little scared that maybe I did. I clicked on the button and watched as the face recognition program scanned me up and down a few times, then I watched as the program counted down to TEN MATCHES FOUND. I look like ten famous people? Coolio!! Hopefully at least a couple of them are better-looking than Sigourney Weaver.

Of the ten closest matches, 7 were guys. As in male. Apparently, I look more like Robert Ludlum, Carlos Santana and Charles Darwin than I do any famous women, Sigourney included.

I hate myself. And I'm not overly-fond of Robert, Charles or Carlos anymore either...

Bah.

Handle With Care

Sometimes the most beautiful things in life are the most fragile. And sometimes... they're not.

On the list of nots: the Grand Tetons, the moon, and would-be dragons eggs.

On the list of not nots: newborn babies, hopes of love, and glassworks.

And on the list of one of my favorite places to visit: Starfish Glassworks in Victoria, BC. Don't take me to Victoria if you don't have hours to spend in this tiny studio. Once I walk through the doors, I don't come away without a fight in the form of a pouty lower lip.

The studio consists of a tiny upper level where visitors enter and peruse the blown glass products. Prices vary from $$$ to $$$,$$$ and I will never ever be able to afford even the smallest $$$ piece. I'm not that sad, though, as it isn't the result I am so fascinated by - it is the fiery journey to fully blown that fills my soul.

That upper level is made tinier still by the fact that only half the square footage is walkable. A railing sections off the other half which is open to the working studio below. Four kilns, all on, line the far wall; directly beneath the railing are the benches and blowpipes and tongs and mitts and paddles and, of course, the artistes fascinants.

How could anyone not be utterly enthralled? These people take something halfway down Mohs scale of hardness and, with a blow, a twist and some heat (extreme heat), turn it into a gasp. And then they slap a pricetag on it and sell it to some VP who lives in Medina and has likely never even seen the process that brought him or her this work of art. sigh.

The temperature of the upper level is about 90 degrees. Duh. Heat rises and the furnaces below are notched up to a few farenheits below 2000. People are sweating afte 10 minutes in the store. I could care less about the heat; I am hanging over the railing eyes glued to what's happening below. Blowpipes go into furnaces and come out with globs on the end of them; the most sensitive fingers twirl the pipe and round the glob, sensitive lips blow in the end of the pipe and the glob expands. Furnace doors open again and the glob is reheated. Then it is paddled and twirled and snipped with the hugest pair of scissors ever, then it is tweezed and paddled and blown and heated and twirled and paddled again and again.

And then other pipes dip into globs, and globs touch globs and paddles and tweezers are used again. And just when you think you see what the artist is shaping, a sharp tap takes off half the glob united and the other half is stuck back into the furnace and you are completely and utterly baffled by what is going on.

And so it goes, and the people on the upper level come and go like time-lapse photography, and still that silly fool remains hanging over the railing watching the drama unfold. Heat, paddles, tweezers, repeat. And only one thing is certain anymore and that is that the store is damn hot!

At this point, I begin to think the artist below knows I'm there and he is determined to outlast me. He shapes a vase but it's not a vase; he adds color that changes into something completely different when cooled; and finally, finally, he makes a final snip, a tiny one on the edge of what is certainly the lip of A VASE, and, taking the pipe, he gives the swiftest of spins and at the end of the pipe is a plate.

A tap and the plate falls gently into the hands of a mittened assistant who takes it and places it in a box and the creator takes a sip of water and closes the furnace door and steps outside for a quick breath of fresh air.

And I remember to breathe again and turn to find I am the only one left in the studio, my traveling companions are next door at the candy shop. Strangely, I am already sated.

Light

Al Otro Lado Del Rio

Clavo mi remo en el agua
llevo tu remo en el mio.
Creo que he visto una luz
al otro lado del rio.

El dia le ira pudiendo
poco a poco al frio.
Creo que he visto una luz
al otro lado del rio.

Sobre todo, creo que no todo esta perdido.
Tanta lagrima, tanta lagrima,
y yo soy un vaso vacio...

Oigo una voz que me llama,
casi un suspiro:
¡Rema, rema, rema!
¡Rema, rema, rema!

En esta orilla del mundo
lo que nos es presa es baldio.
Creo que he visto una luz
al otro lado del rio.

Yo, muy serio, voy remando,
muy adentro y sonrio.
Creo que he visto una luz
al otro lado del rio.

This Thanksgiving, Slapping is Optimal, I mean Optional

Guess what I'm doing! Go ahead, guess, my horde de lecteurs.

Ok, fine, I am sitting in my living room smoking. With my new hookah. My new PINK hookah. That Jody got me for my birthday :)

We are smoking cherry shisha. It smells very good and doesn't hurt when the smoke gets in my eyes. Which is a good thing cuz my eyes already burn today for some stupid strange reason.

In any case, Gerry, Linda and Zap, if you are reading this, I HAVE A HOOKAH! So, after we eat our way through six pounds of Prime Rib, 20 pounds of turkey, 8 pounds of honey-baked ham, 32 pounds of mashed, roasted and baked potatoes, 2 kinds of green beans, caramelized carrots, candied yams, bacon-wrapped asparagus, AND 13 kinds of pie, we can smoke hookah. And then we can eat the stuffing we forgot to eat when eating all that other stuff :)

Hookah goes by other names as well - Arghile, Narghile, Shisha and, my favorite, hubbly bubbly. According to tradition (aka WIKIPEDIA), when the smoker is finished, the hose is handed from one user to the next, folded back on itself so that the mouthpiece does not point at the person receiving it. While taking the pipe, the receiver taps or slaps the giver on the back of the hand as a sign of respect or friendship. Slapping, of course, is a sign of other pleasant emotions, but that is something that comes later, after the hookah pipe is set aside and another pipe is brought into play. It is important to remember that, with both types of pipes, the tip of one's tongue should be wet to enhance the experience.

Holy smokes rings, I just blew four in a row! Rings that is.

Puff, puff, pass....slapping optional.

Moody Blues

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Odyssey

Life isn't measured by the number of breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away. Is it possible to experience such a poignant moment that you lose your breath and never get it back?

I went to the beach this weekend. First it sprinkled, then it rained, and then the sun broke out and brought blue skies with it. Then it hailed. Then the sun came out again. Then it got dark. In other words, a typical weather pattern for Seattle and the surrounding areas. Kind of like the Mariners. Consistently inconsistent.

Which means, of course, that you have to like Seattle (and the Mariners), for something other than perfection.

I grew up in southern California and I remember going to Disneyland once on a cloudy day and we were worried that it might rain, so we turned around and went home. Wouldn't that just suck? To go to Disneyland in the rain? There is just no way you can enjoy Tom Sawyer Island if it is overcast. How could life get any worse?

In Seattle, we dart inside only when the raindrops are the size of golfballs. And, in the end, we get to see and experience some amazing things because we don't hide from the crappy weather. In fact, that very weather paints a picture vastly different than the one painted the day or week or year before. Past and present - they are different and one is infinitely more preferable to the other.

If you go to the beach, and it's sunny, strip down and let the rays soak into your skin. Store the heat deep, take it home, draw it to the surface when next you are freezing cold. Like a solar panel on the roof of a house in Enatai.

If you go to the beach and it's raining, then what's the point in running from the waves anyway? You are already wet and there is something magnificent about the waves crashing with fury then wrapping themselves gently around your ankles, knees, waist. The ocean knows how to love and how to drown. Pick your poison.

Is it possible to experience such a poignant moment that you lose your breath and never get it back? Probably not, but it is possible to want that moment to remain so badly that you forget to breath again.

We capture perfection in the past. We dream in the future. We live in the present regardless of inclement weather.

To Drink or Not To Drink, That is the Question

I'm a little concerned about what I drink.

I drink diet Coke from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. and sometimes in-between. I take a drink of diet Coke on average every 5 minutes. At work, I drink diet Coke while I wait for my computer to catch up with me; at home, I drink a diet coke as soon as I put my purse down, while I am in the bath, while I am drying my hair, and just before I go to sleep. The only place I don't drink diet coke is in my car.

In bars, I drink fru-fru drinks and/or diet coke. I like lemon-drops, margueritas, and ameretto sours. Oh, and Scooby Snacks. Alcohol does NOT make my clothes fall off; however, if I've been drinking, I'm a helluva lot less worried about my tummy-roll when they do.

In my car, I drink lattes. Specifically, a venti, nonfat, sugar-free vanilla latte.

Now, I know diet Coke has aspartame. But I'm not a Phenylketonuric, so I don't give a rip. It also has phosphoric acid, and I hear that makes awesome swiss cheese of strong bones, but it takes a thousand years. I really don't plan to live that long.

And I know that alcohol kills brain cells. Hopefully, they are ones I don't use anyway. And I do feel smarter when I drink; in fact, my friends think I am smarter when they drink, which is more than me, so I probably seem downright brilliant to them most of the time. Well, they don't really think I'm smarter; but they do think I'm funnier and cuter, and that's more important anyway, right?

The latte, however, has me a leettle concerned. I have one a day, Monday through Friday. Usually, I pick one up on the way to work; lately, though, I've been making them at home to save a few bucks. That's where the worry began.

So, a latte is like 2 ounces of coffee and 16 ounces of milk, plus whatever crap you put in it to make the coffee and milk flavors go away.

Coffee, of course, makes us younger. I got no beef with coffee, although it does seem a crime to use a meat-related word to describe interactions with a bean. Yes, coffee is made from beans, and beans are good for you, high on the food pyramid and we will ignore the fact that the coffee bean isn't really a legit member of the legume clan, more like a dotted line relationship, but oh well, not the point.

Milk on the other hand...there's a concern. I've heard the pander; Milk Does a Body Good, Milk Rocks, Milk The Other White Drink (I made that last one up, but I bet it made you think! :)

Here's the thing, though - as I was making my latte the other day (October 17th, actually), I decided to check the date on the carton of milk just to make sure I wasn't gonna be a little surprised at the exotic taste of my nonfat, sugar-free vanilla flavored coffee. And the date said "December 7, 2007."

October 17th to December 7th. You see the problem? I checked to make sure I had not purchased some Super-brand of milk - nope, just regular ol' Darigold 2% pateurized, homogenized milk. With a shelf life of two months.

Perhaps the alcohol has killed some memory cells, but I remember once upon a time when milk was good for two weeks from the date of purchase. After that, it got a little lumpy and smelt like baby pooh. So, at what point did cows start leaking non-perishable fluids from their teats? Was this in the news and I didn't hear about it? Is this why my boobs are bigger???

I'm gonna need someone to either google this or tell me microbiologically speaking why this is an ok thing. And I'm not talking about the bigger boobs. Until then, I'll just have to flavor my coffee with the other white drink...

Would You, Could You, SAM I Am?

Let's say you are sitting in a bar downing scooby snacks like they are milkshakes - luscious green alcoholic milkshakes, not the crappy milkshakes you get from Jack-in-the-Box where they aren't cold and aren't even milk. And you are seriously thinking that you could do a fair imitation of The Fun Loving Criminals. You know that the last time you sang Scooby Snacks in a bar, they took away your Bud bottle-cum-microphone, but you are certain that your voice has improved since last week and your friends all look like they really do want you to sing it again.

But first, you have to pee.

So, you hitch up your pants, or your skirt, and all the dignity you can muster and you saunter off to the "blokes" or "sheilas" bathroom, where you find the facilities to be in their usual state of cleanlinot.

Previous visitors have splashed water all over the counter, there are soggy paper towels on the floor and in the sink, and the faucet handles are coated in something you hope to high heaven is soap. The trashbin overflows and has a strange smell to it, and the extra rolls of toilet paper are stored on the floor in the stall next to the porcelian God you will be talking to later that night.

And there is something floating in the toilet.

Oooooh, it's a ten-dollar bill!!

What do you do?

Turns out that depends - on two things:
1. What you do for a living
2. Whether you are male or female

If you are illegal, you plunge and splurge. Ten bucks goes a long way when you make $4.50 an hour raking leaves for a guy that could care less if you have a green card.

If you are male and a developer for some big software company in say, Redmond, then no thanks, you literally piss away $10 every hour. It would take at least a hundred to make you stick your hand in that filthy cesspool of germs. Once you've rescued Ben, though, you pee on him and your hand cuz urine is antiseptic and kills germs on contact. (Does that mean Golden Showers is really more of a cleansing ritual than a fetish?)

If you are female and an admin, then money's money, and that's what the tweezers in your handbag are for, right? You pluck the buck and somehow manage to hold it with the tweezers while you fumble into your coat, grab your handbag and toodle across the street to Mickey D's where you order a cheeseburger and fries and pay with a slightly soggy ten-dollar bill. You even let the non-English speaking clerk keep the tweezers, she needs them. Seriously.

Irish Breakfast at Fado's: $12.95
Entrance to Seattle Art Museum: $15.95
Conversation at Kells: Priceless and strangely disturbing

Scooby Snacks

Why The Turtle Crossed The Road

I was recently challenged to come up with the Most Romantic Place I'd Ever Been. And guess what? I can't think of a single one! I am trying to determine if that is because:
1. I've never been anywhere with anyone who fostered a sense of romance
2. I've not been to any romantic places
3. I'm not capable of romantic feelings

Wow, put like that, it's a bit depressing...

But NOT the point of this blog. The point of this blog is to assert that I do, INDEED, have a sense of direction. Hold on! I know you are all going, "What the hell is she talking about?? She can get lost walking from the living room to the bathroom!!" And that is true.

However, in reviewing herstory, I appear to have emotions-more-closely-linked-to-romance-than-any-other-feelings more often when there is water involved. This is interesting to me because I already know I was a sea turtle in one of my past lives. I was a rabbit that got eaten by a hawk in another.

(Pst! Vicky! Focus!!) Oh, yeah...yes, I am directionally challenged. I ride the same elevator every day, get on and off at the same floors, and still turn the wrong direction when I get off.

I take the same route to and from work and other places and when the seasons change, I lose my way.

I miss my own driveway 72% of the time. Ok, I made the statistic up but who the hell else misses their driveway AT ALL?

Yet, when driving down a road that is anywhere near the ocean, I can point and say, the ocean is just over those trees. Cool, eh? Near as I can tell, this is worth nothing more than a party trick, kind of like being able to feel and point out a gray hair on the back of my head. Still, it made me think and I've concluded that the ocean fills my soul with something as big and as small as the sound it makes.

The Bay Cottage, the backyard of Pueo House, the Lighthouse at Kiln Point, the magnificent Sand Dunes. I could stand for hours and stare at the ocean or any body of water that is destined for the sea. Is that romantic? Maybe, maybe not, but my Honu soul now longs to be somewhere other than under these flourescent lights.

I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden in the shade
He'd let us in, knows where we've been
In his octopus' garden in the shade

I'd ask my friends to come and see
An octopus' garden with me
I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden in the shade.

We would be warm below the storm
In our little hideaway beneath the waves
Resting our head on the sea bed
In an octopus' garden near a cave

We would sing and dance around
because we know we can't be found
I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden in the shade

We would shout and swim about
The coral that lies beneath the waves
(Lies beneath the ocean waves)
Oh what joy for every girl and boy
Knowing they're happy and they're safe
(Happy and they're safe)

We would be so happy you and me
No one there to tell us what to do
I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden with you.

Who Needs Kodak When You've Got Driftwood

I cleaned my house today. Ok, that's not true...I cleaned one very tiny corner of it, The Kitchen Table.

Every house has a junk drawer; mine is The Kitchen Table. Mail goes on it, pens gather there, and traces of the last few meals eaten remain there like an historic trail. Once in awhile, an actual person sits down at The Kitchen Table, but not very often.

But I had two months worth of bills to pay and Jody made me pay them and the end result was an urgent need to clean The Kitchen Table. Why? How the hell should I know.

I worked my way from top to bottom, moving through layers of bills to get to sales receipts, store catalogs and celeb magazines that I have no recollection of buying; I gathered up all the Free Panty cards from VS and stuffed them in my wallet; I put all the pens back in the pen jar; I moved the wedding pictures to the coffee table.

Finally, I arrived at the crumb-and-dust layer. A sweep of my hand across the surface of the table and I was done! Cleaning up isn't such a hard thing, really, it's more a case of just being able to figure out where else to put something than it's current location.

The only thing I really couldn't find a better place for was the small bag of driftwood pieces I'd collected from our summer vacation, a.k.a. The Road Trip. Each small piece looked so beautiful lying on the beach; each shape twisted into something I thought was unique that day. In the bag on The Kitchen Table, they look...well, less.

To be honest, I wish I hadn't taken them. Not because I don't think I will ever get around to making that windchime I planned, and not because they aren't beautiful still. I wish I hadn't taken them because they are such a teeny part of that day, without backdrop - the sound of the waves, and the powder-fine sand and Jody sitting next to me as we burned our faces and froze the rest of us. And while they are unique and beautiful to look at, they aren't as beautiful as The Whole Picture.

Yet, at the same time, I'm GLAD I brought them home - they inadvertently exercise my mind. I hold them and admire them while absentmindedly searching for that day in my memory until my eyes drift half shut and I see that tiny piece of My Past again. I can feel the sun on my upturned face; I can hear the roar of the ocean; I can see my beautiful daughter sitting on a HUGE piece of driftwood, contentedly reading her book.

I put the pieces of memory back in the bag and set them back on The Kitchen Table. Turns out that is the perfect place for them after all.