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I was excited to know that the Goddess Festival CDs were on the way and thought about how happy my mother would be to know that I’m on it. And that got me thinking about a time in fourth grade that not only shows one of my favorite sides of my mom, but also kind of explains why I am the way I am.
One of my fourth grade teachers submitted me for the school’s gifted and talented program. I got to sit in a little side area and fill out a test that, in retrospect, would have said more about me if it asked what the test had to do with being gifted and/or talented. Because I still don’t know. The man who was in charge of the program then looked over my test and called me and my mother into a conference.
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Last weekend I got to join my buddies Jori Costello and Niki O’Brien on a Big Bad Gina tour of Kansas City, Missouri. Jori was looking at playing five shows in three days so we were determined to have some fun while we were at it. We drove down a night early and checked in to the Super Inn Hotel.
It looked ok from the outside. In the dark. Late at night. So we entered.
The first thing we noticed was the smell in the unheated hallway. I’m not sure what it was, but it wasn’t pretty. Still we thought we’d give the rooms a shot. Maybe one of the other guests had simply had way too much barbecue.
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My mother loved Carolyn Wagner. Just loved her to pieces. Back during their days of gay activism, when they rode to various places trying to make the world a better place, mom collected a variety of Carolyn stories she loved to tell. Her personal favorite involved a time when they stopped at a restaurant and someone was being less than nice to Carolyn’s son. So she calmly walked over with her purse and said, “I just thought you oughta know, that’s my son, you son of a bitch, and I’m packin’.”
According to mom, this was quite effective, and when Carolyn returned to the table she calmly said, “they didn’t need to know all I’m packin’ is a jar of peanut butter!”
That’s the Carolyn I’ve always known. You just didn’t mess with her kid. She was a PFLAG pioneer and a human rights advocate par excellence. And one of the funniest damn people I have ever come across in my entire life.
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So me and my djembe came up with this just now. I hope there aren’t people in the two hotel rooms on either side of me, because it got pretty dramatic. I guess I’ll find out in the morning if they liked it or not! At least no one banged on the walls!
“On The Other Side”
(c) 2010 Christy Lindsay, all rights reserved.
I’d been desperate, looking for a healer to take me
Back to where I had my sanity
I’d been reaching out, bloody fingers clawing castle walls
Beggin’ out of all the things I used to love
I’d been sinking down, struggling to find my inner censor
To tell me when I’d gone too far
My mother said I was an artist in need of inspiration
And then she left and now my passion’s gone
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There’s part of this that will only make sense to my cousin Stacy, but believe me, if you’d been here, you’d laugh.
On Sunday, I grilled a week’s worth of chicken and pork chops so I could just warm stuff up for dinner. When I got home I put some stuff together and thought to myself, “if Stacy was still here I could just sit in the living room and food would appear.” As if to put an exclamation point on my misery, the microwave decided to shoot sparks.
It only scared the crap out of me the first time. The second and third time I expected it. I can be a little slow sometimes…or maybe I’m still a little pyromaniac at heart. Regardless, it became obvious I’d have to take the thing back to Wal-Mart, so into the car we went.
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My neighbor has two wonderful, spoiled Basset hounds. This week his mother-in-law is staying over and with her came her itty bitty wraith of a dog, Cookie.
Cookie might be eight inches tall. Maybe. She appears to be some sort of bug eyed breed and often bounces when she barks. She’s also quite adorable in her “I really want to be a dog” way. The best part about her though is her bark. She opens her little mouth as wide as she can, and she goes, “ret!”
Picture that in the smallest and brightest font imaginable. Ret. Not arf. Not woof. Ret. What I love about it is what happens when I come home and Barley and Bella, the lovable Bassets, see me get out of my car. They always feel the need to let me know they see me, because they love their auntie Chris (and her once a month goodie bags from Petco). Well Cookie is not to be outdone, so now I get treated to the Hilarious Bark Brigade, as the dog wraith tries to match wits with the Thunder Dogs:
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Posted on October 10, 2010 in Poetry | Comments: zero
(c) 2010 Christy Lindsay, all rights reserved
Do you say it just to hear yourself speak again
Everything you say you hate you’ll do again
The ones who hurt you you’ll embrace again
You want it, you don’t, you do and you break again
Thought I could bring a touch of clarity
But the creek’s so muddy there’s no sanity
You said I bring you some sweet sanctity
But back you go, so quick to turn on me
You leave me nothing but confused anymore
You say you want to stay while you charge for the door
You hate the person that you’ve been before
That you insist on playing forevermore
I know you’ll hate me for a while just for writing this
But I’ve seen how self destruction steals the passion from the kiss
I watched another live his life like he couldn’t escape the burn
And while he died I was so scared I never said a word
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Customer service at Google is obnoxious if you’re a webmaster. First they direct you to a specific page in order to make contact with them. On this page you can’t write a single thing, you just pick a bunch of options somewhat in the vicinity of your problem, wait for them to respond with the wrong answer, and then email back with your complete question.
It would be fine if they then actually answered the question. But they don’t. They may answer a completely unrelated question, or tell you to do the things you just told them you already did. It would be like emailing Disney and having this conversation.
Part one: submit form letting them know you have questions about Mickey Mouse.
First response: “Thank you for contacting Disney. You can see Mickey at any Walk Disney store or theme park.”
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I’ve ranted before, sometimes in an amusing way, about those long side effect tirades you hear in drug commercials. Stuff like, “some side effects may include headache, nausea, hives, exploding eardrums, purple skin and loss of hearing.” Of course, your left eye will no longer itch, so it’s all good, right?
Well tonight a Chantix commercial came on and I know I heard the guy say, though not in these exact words, “do not take Chantix if you’ve experienced a previous adverse event while taking Chantix.”
What he just said is, “don’t take this if we’ve ever screwed you up before.” Him saying it is one thing, but they obviously believe they have to, which means they think their users are people who would honestly say, “well, the last time I used this I got severe hives, migraines and suicidal thoughts. Hmmm. I think I’ll take it again.”
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For years I have owned one wearable semi-decent button-front shirt. This is partially because I apparently have a body shape that no one else has, and partly because of my absolute loathing of all things clothes shopping. I do have one other nice shirt, but it’s in storage until I lose 40 more pounds. Usually my limited wardrobe is not a problem, but two events conspired to force me into a department store:
1. My second cousin’s upcoming wedding
2. My one decent shirt ending up as one of Buddy’s new favorite chew rags
A word to the wise: if you purposely clean one room so your shepherd/corgi/husky mutt can’t possibly find anything to chew on in the whole four minutes he will be left alone there, he will invent ways to find something other than the toy you provided for him. In my case, Bud found my one shirt and proceeded, in less than 60 seconds, to shred it for me.
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