dogearedgirl

Bigness

I have this desire lately to be better than I am. To live harder than I have lived. To be more present in everything, every moment. This doesn't necessarily mean doing more, though I imagine that will come along with it. Rather, it means showing up with my whole self, with all of my attention- wherever I go, whatever I do. Being one hundred percent present. All of me engaged. Thoreau wanted to suck all the marrow out of life. It's like that. I want to live hard and well, and play and laugh often. I want to give as much as I can, and still keep myself intact. Not only intact, in fact, but awesome and happy and healthy and whole. I want to come to the end of my days having no regrets- having given my whole heart to the living. Having shared in all the love I could possibly share. Having put my whole effort into realizing my dreams.

so far today

It is 10:56 a.m.

So far the borrowed dog has not pooped, the borrowed dog has not eaten.*

I had a delicious muffin made by a friend for breakfast.

I spent half an hour sitting on the living room floor with a brush and treats, coaxing Ming-cat-of-specialness towards the "small dog" sized crate, left over from the Salchicha days. (That cat nearly died every time we transported her. At least in the dog crate she didn't seem to hyperventilate quite so earnestly.) Ming, of her own volition, went halfway into her crate without prompting. I could not convince her to go the rest of the way in. After a solid thirty minutes, I did a half-hearted chase-around-the-house attempt, which caused her to howl like I was beating her, and hide under the couch. I did not have it in me to fight her for it, just said, "I'm trying SO hard!" At which point, I started to cry. Just sat down on the couch, all forlorn, and cried for
a few minutes.

Moments later, I heard the street sweeper. Realized it was the first Monday of the month. Realized that I had parked on the street last night. Looked up in time to see the sweeper skirt Babba's truck. Ran out to
find that I had received a ticket two minutes before, while chasing the cat.

The driveway was empty. Our tenant left for work at 8:00. I could have pulled the truck in, but thought Ming and I would be out on the town, vet bound. Instead I have a cat with worms, a $46.00 ticket, and the
desire to snuggle in to some cuddly, comforting person, or sit in the dark somewhere. I have no cuddly person, and I am not going to sit in the dark. I am, however, having quite the trying morning.

Thanks for listening. I think I'll make some coffee now, and perhaps tonight my friend who is coming over can help me cat wrangle, and we can administer the home pill. Not holding my breath, and not caring very
much at the moment.

Oh, look at that. It's Monday. I never bought in to the whole Monday suckitude theory. This morning might sway me.

*She kindly ate while I composed this post. And somehow, that makes me feel a lot better. Small victories.

Such a downer post, after prolonged silence. I'll ruminate on frisky, upbeat stories for next time. Promise.

My cool friend wrote a book. I cannot think of a better title for this post, I'm sorry.

If you want me to blog, you should write a book. Yep. That is what got me here, FINALLY, after eons of mild thoughts of blogging, sans action. My friend wrote a book. Okay, not only did she write a book, during NaNoWriMo, no less, she got it published. Yep. Like in the real, find-me-on-the-shelf-at-your-nearest-big-chain-bookstore published. Not a street sheet. Not a zine. A novel. WOW.

I highly recommend surrounding yourself with successful, bright, gorgeous friends. This has been my approach to life, and WOW, I have some awesome-rad friends. Indeed. But I digress...

So. Rachael Hehu* Herron wrote a book, entitled, How to Knit a Love Song. It's good, people. I don't just say that because she is my friend. Though I likely would have, had she buttered me up properly. No need, however. This book holds its own. It is interesting, descriptive, flows well, and has a cowboy. A cowboy! I love that. It is a great read. Cozy. Better with a hot beverage in hand, and warm socks on. As all books are.

Really, I recommend doing what I did, though you probably can't swing it. (Neener.) I went to the bookstore a few days after the book came out, found a copy that The Knitter had already signed, bragged to the cashier about my friend being a rockstar as I purchased it, and took it home. I read the first few chapters, but didn't rush.

A few days later, I went to Rachael's reading/kick-off in San Francisco, where she kindly chose to read an excerpt a mere five pages out from where I had tucked my bookmark the day before. Hearing an author read their own characters in their own voice is the best. The best, people. The reading was a huge success, with hoards of folks standing in the back of the bookstore, for want of more metal folding chairs.

I purchased a few more copies of the book, and got in queue in the winding line of eager knitters, writers, lovers of cowboys, friends of the author, random passersby, and waited my turn. 

Rachael was all a glow, signing book after book, following the spellings of names written out in all caps on yellow sticky notes by the store owner, who had wormed his way in and out of the line, asking for our names. It was a lovely evening. 

I then came home, and parceled out the remaining chapters over days. How often does your friend write a book, after all? I wanted to savor the experience. And savor I did.

I don't want to give away any of the juiciness, so you'll just have to trust me, and run out to your nearest big chain bookstore, and purchase said book. You will not be disappointed. Nothing this lady does is disappointing. Reading her book, the complete opposite of disappointing. Which I guess would be "appointing." I hearby appoint you to go read it. What are you waiting for?

What's more, you'll want to get reading soon, so as not to be behind when her second book comes out. Which it is already slated to do. Did I mention that Rachael is a superhero-rockstar? She is. She did not only write one book that got swooped up for publishing, oh no. Girl wrote one book that was so chalk full of goodness, the publishing house told her to go ahead and split that into three. A trilogy of knitting-romance-cowboy books, friends. So much good writing. How lucky for us!

Now, run on out there, and buy, buy, buy. Read, read, read. It looks like this:

 

*I do not believe Hehu will appear on the info screen at the bookstore, or in your Google search. 'Rachael Herron' will work excellently, however.

Seriously?

Hello, faithful readers. Rest assured, I haven't forgotten you. You know how we left it- one hour, forty two minutes on the wait clock. Now, I'm not going to do the math, it would be sad, but let me tell you, that wait clock? Stilll tick-tocking away. The ultimate practice in patience. Here's hoping beyond hope that we hear something today.

I'll let you know. Don't worry about that for a minute.

In the meantime, feel free to entertain me, distract me, give me busy work. Tell me woeful tales from your youth. I'll take whatever you've got.

Yay for cooler weather. We gingers do NOT do heat well. We turn to puddles with a prolonged touch of the suns rays.

Waiting is hard

One hour and fifty minutes remain. We are trying to remain calm. I had the best morning. Just one of those good good mornings that you fall into once in a while. It is wicked hot today, so everything feels a bit subdued- squelched, sunburned. My brain melted for the entire middle portion of the day. It is attempting to re-solidify now. I'm sure a phone call from our super fantabulous realtor would help. I heart her. She emailed at 3:30 to say, "I'm waiting, too! I called and left a follow up message." Love her.

Thanks for all of the positive thoughts that you are sending our way.

One hour, forty two minutes.

That was Sunday

Hello there.

If you read the post prior to this one, you'll know that we were pre-qualified for a home loan a little over a week ago, and have hopes of buying something, and ideally moving before the end of the summer into our very own home.

Well that was way back last Sunday, almost too long ago to remember. Today, this Sunday, we wrote a bid on a place. We put in an offer before noon today, and should hear something by tomorrow evening at 8:00 p.m. A mere twenty-five hours from now. It is possible that we will go from getting pre-qualified to having a bid accepted in less than two weeks. We figure when you've spent years talking about it, and you finally decide to propel forward, why waste time? That's tends to be our style for the big stuff- mull over for what most would consider far too long. Mull  some more.  Discuss. Decide. Jump.

If you would be so kind, please send some positive mojo our way, in whatever form your personal mojo takes. Hope that our pre-qualified, ready to go, good-looking-on-paper selves will charm the agent as she peruses our offer, and in turn appeal to the hearts of the selling party. That the best thing for us is what will transpire. Thanks.

We are beyond excited. Hubby has been kind about the intermittent squeaks and squeals that my throat keeps involuntarily omitting. If we get this place, with it's adorable little rooms, built-ins, original fixtures, lovely windows, nice yard and sexy hardwood, we will be so delighted. There is even ample room for a pony. A pony and appliances.

I can't write too much about it now. I'm so amped up that I might implode or explode at any time. Still, it all feels secretive and special. I'm just going to try to take it all in for now. As soon as we get news, rest assured that I will explain every detail of every corner of the place.

Gaaaaaaaa!!!!!! Sweet and utter gaaaaaaa!!!!!!

Life is spicy and the spice is life

Hello, Dear Readers. It's been a little minute. Let's take a moment to go around the room and see how everybody is doing.

How are you?
Aww, that's nice.
We should really have coffee sometime.

Oh, me? Well, I've been just fine, thanks for asking. Life has been humming along- I've been doing such wild things as working lots of hours, fighting the seasonal allergy/sinus/cough/cold plagues, adjusting to "husband," as everyday vocabulary, and doing my taxes in February, *that's right, as in the February prior to them being due! That, my friends was unimaginably divine.* Playing nurse after hubby nearly lopped off his fingertip. Cleaning things. More fighting plagues. Paying off credit cards with great diligence. Oh, and last week we finally got around to getting pre-qualified for a home loan.

Ahem.
Indeed. That last item has been the cause for heightened levels of excitement around our house these past few days. You betcha. We are so ready to be homeowners, that we started packing a few peripheral items yesterday.* Of course, we do realize that this process will likely take a few months. We'll have to do things like, say, look at some places. Make some offers. Buy some house. So we didn't pack the dishes or the cat food or anything crazzzy like that. Just things like our wee-one reading section, which sat dustily in  a corner upstairs, and now sits markedly less dusty in a few bankers boxes in the same corner. Our apartment is huge, with gigantic closets to boot. Everywhere. Closets. Now, we had a healthy amount of stuff when we moved in here some seven plus years ago, and the reproduction rate of accumulated crap in an old rental victorian? Exponential. I worry for the day we uncover some small lost child, hidden away in one of our two thousand closets. Having never seen the light of day, a copy of The Onion, or a fresh avocado.

Really, we should turn our place over fully furnished to a youth home establishment or something. We should run away and start fresh without baggage. Feng Shui as real life. Instead, however, we will pack it slowly and methodically over time, sifting through and making many a donation pile along the way. That way once we do have the keys to a place, we can load our (neatly packed, color coded and efficiently organized,) life directly into our new home, and go straight to puttering around our very own property. Oh, I do dream of puttering. So much.

That is our big excitement this week. We went and drove past several places today**, none of which were open, but it was an good start. We already learned that;

a) when the posted picture doesn't match the house, it feels like a bad internet dating connection. Why the lies? Why the betrayal? You don't know me. You may photo enhance your rusty siding to make it appear "Spanish style," and you may super impose a very old, very wide tree just so into your front yard. You may mention hardwood and other alluring features in your bio. When I come to meet you for the first time, however, I'm going to open my eyes all the way, not just the squinty way you're hoping for, and I'm going to see the reality that is rusty siding and a wire coat hanger stuck in the edge of the lawn. I will be on to you then, so why do you waste my time luring me in in the first place? Tease.

b) the two beautiful bounding black labs that you spot in the yard next door when pulling up, will make for booming loud ass barky neighbors. They made that quite clear. Until today I had only considered desirable/undesirable qualities in human neighbors. (Desirable- quiet, clean or neutral smelling*** maker of prolific baked goods. Writer or tow truck driver an extreme bonus. Undesirable- loud, malodorous maker of some less superior category of goods.) I hadn't pondered the wayward unicorn, which will poop where it likes, (not even where it likes, really. I don't know that thought process enters into it at all with unicorns...) the car parked on the lawn, or the yappy dog. 

c) when you can see BART tracks in the sky in the backyard, you know you'll have a good sense of the train schedule if you hang out very long.

d) houses are much more exciting in real life than on the interwebs.

e) big yards and wrap around porches do in fact make me salivate, much as I suspected they would.

The learning curve on this house assessing thing is steep. Much fun awaits.

In the meantime, I have dreams about organizing and color coding our move. Mmmm, systems. And of our three to four bedrooms, two baths, wrap around porch, and backyard with ample room for a pony****. Possible studio out back. Quick walk to BART and an awesome coffee shop.

Counting fantasy home features. Much less mundane than counting sheep. I'm going grandiose  in my head, even knowing that we'll likely land a cozy, adorable two bedroom one bath charming older home. Maybe a breakfast nook. And we'll be OH so happy about it.

*There are soo many peripheral items.
** And by today, of course I mean yesterday. Silly. It's 2:00 in the morning. Too early for drive bys.
*** Which is to say, either smelling clean, or smelling like nothing stinky. Actually being clean is very much desirable.
**** Mind you, I don't want a pony. Just ample room for one.

3 January

no inspiration

clever has left the building

so I write haiku

Hooray! Wait...no... bleh... no... hooray!

Last month my friend Sha Blau coined a new illness- congestion and inner turmoil. We both had it, as did many others in our midst. It was a wild ride. Today I seem to have acquired it's cousin-condition, euphoria with a side of melancholy. I have a noticeable hum about me- an elated sort of glowy happiness. Newness. Simultaneously, I am all kinds of weird on other fronts. Since I sat down at the dining table only moments ago, I have been through a good four or five episodes of emotion. Schizophrenia, you ask? Nah. Hormones? Maybe a little. Really, though, I think it's the euphoria/melancholy affliction. It toys with my memory and my emotions. It leaves me confused, yet happily so. It is a harsh mistress.

For instance- I do not currently recall what it was that was so brilliant it demanded blogging about at the onset of this log-in. Perhaps that's a sign to just let it go. (Happily, even.) If I enter another post in a minute, you will know that the infernal pendulum has shifted, once again. (Moooo.)

Blast!

The times, they are a changin'

Hello, faithful readers. If you are here, wow, thanks. You, my friend, are a trooper. I haven't given you much to look forward to lately. Life took over, and all of a sudden it's a *whole different year* than it was the last time I blogged. Sheesh.

No excuses. I'm back now. Lucky you.

Life, she has been full lately. Many complex and wonderful things have transpired. I have been very, very busy. We did Eugene for the holidays, and spent a lovely new years eve at home, with our lovely friend Camille. I woke up elated at the prospect of a fresh start, and in love with life all over again.

Today begins a new leg of the journey.

Here's to a thrilling 2009.