Added a new photo album, mostly from this weekend and the Diva's first haircut. The yarn harlots among you will enjoy 
at least one of the snaps, which was taken at the Farmer's Museum in Cooperstown. The wool is dyed with cherry bark, fyi, and was nice and soft, if a little crunchy.
Today marks the end of Sandy's Secret Knitting Pal program. My sendee was: Jayme P, in lovely Cali. It's been fun to send packages to strangers.
Still waiting to hear who my sender was...and there are gifties in the post, I hear. Waiting should answer all question. Thanks secret pal!
You're a Speak & Spell!! You nerd, you. Just
because you were disguised as a toy doesn't
mean you weren't educational, you sneaky
bastard.
What childhood toy from the 80s are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
I've had the pleasure of attending Ms Parton's theme park. I've done so a number of times, frankly, simply because the Hub designed lights for a couple of shows there and passes were part of the deal. It's a wacky place and comes complete with a restaurant called Aunt Granny's. It's fun. It's a piece of America. And it is a veritable shrine devoted to big boobs, fake hair and sequins.
This past weekend marked Gay Day, the same sort of event that Disney sees each year. It's a good time, by all accounts. Of course, not everyone thinks it's OK for queer folk to worship at Dolly's red laquered toes while eating fried dough. A tiny subset of the local KKK made an appearance this year, which had the opposite effect from what their head wackaloon had intended. Rather than scare people away, attendence surged.
The Hub and I caught Ann Richards (best governor ever) on Larry King last night. The Hub watched much more than I, simply because watching Ann can get me all verklempt sometimes, especially when I consider that the Chimp in Charge wouldn't be in charge if he'd never been elected governor. But what really gets me is how smart and sensible and awesome Ms Richards is and how this country will never have her as a president, simply because there are too many who fear a) the idea of a president who isn't a white male and b) fear a president who isn't bland. Which isn't to say I won't vote democratic in this election--to quote these guys, I'd vote for a hamster if it'd get Bush out of office--but I wish there were enough ballsy folk out there to give Ann a real shot. Ah, well.
Massage is one of my addictions. I don't mean "massage" as code for body shampoos and happy endings but rather as it was originally connoted before the dawn of the parlours that can be found near almost any airport or truck stop. Think Swedish. Think Shiatsu. Think Deep Tissue. Real massage.
Every time I move, I have to hunt around for a massage therapist, like Goldilocks searching for her perfect bowl of porridge. In Austin, it was Joy Sablatura, whose first name was apt. In Knoxville, Annie O'Dowd Gray, who was a great boon not only when I was great with child but for a few years before and after. (An aside: the interior decorating scheme of Well by Nature, where Annie now has her table, is truly amazing to behold. You know, that's hard to type with my tongue so firmly in my cheek...).
In Oneonta thus far, I'm therapist-less. Today I had massage #3 from therapist #3. It was OK--technically competent but just lacking in the warmth department, which plagued therapist #1 as well. Therapist #2 was personable, but not all that good at the hands-on stuff. I may be a victim of my own fussiness here. I enjoy massage so much that I went to massage school--some in the Friday Five ring may remember my homework--but stopped just short of my practical clinic thingy because I had a revelation and realized that rubbing naked strangers just wasn't my thing.
My point is that my searching/schooling has made me an educated consumer, so much so that I frequently ponder renting myself out to would-be masseusists. But it also means that I'm a bitch to satisfy. And while each of my Oneonta appointments to date has been terminally OK, this town is small enough that I'm running out of options. Number three may be the best I can do, which is still pretty good, but I know perfection must be out there. And so I press on, stripping my clothes off and jumping on to the tables of strangers.
Addendum: I know this is a totally minor issue reserved for those with the luxury of disposable income. I gripe merely because I can, which is also a luxury reserved for those with disposable income, come to think of it.
Addendum the Second: Just after typing the above, I was cleaning out my bookmarks folder and found this Slate story about having too many choices and learning to settle for good enough. I am not certain it applies in this specific case, but signify something about our culture of copious choices.
A brief update--Spring classes are done, done, done. My grades are in--except for one last final that is currently in the college's intercampus mail system somewhere. Once that catches up with me, tho, I can close the book on Spring. Woot!
While I had grand plans to do absolutely nothing this summer, save a couple of road trips (one to my family's annual beach fling in South Carolina and a Knoxville and/or Austin run) and nights drinking gin-and-tonics in the backyard, that pesky need to not simply live my life on the back of Mr Visa and Ms Mastercard has intruded. Plus, a couple of offers came up that I couldn't really turn down. First, I'll be teaching during the first summer session at SUCO, which starts June 1, and filling in part-time for the daily paper's features' editor while she's out on maternity leave, which starts today. So much for a responsibility-free June.
July is looking more promising in the lazing-about category. August looks better still. I'm sure this will change. Maybe by then I'll have sold a blasted book. The odds are about as slim as my taking a real vacation, so I wouldn't recommend holding one's breath.
Thus ends the news from the land of many vowels. Pictures anon.
It's a Bird! It's a Plane! It's Greasy Petroleum Jelly Man!
If anyone out there managed to finish Jonathan Lethem's Fortress of Solitude, please tell me how you did it. I can't get past the first hundred pages, which is odd because I adored Motherless Brooklyn and Gun, with Occasional Music and As She Climbed Across the Table. Fortress, tho, is just boring the pants off of me. How is it the pinnacle of modern literature, as its (paraphrased) back-jacket romance copy asserts?
Right idea, wee child, wrong source...
