The Special People Club

Some have asked what to send me, so here are ideas. This is not a solicitation, by the way, it's a list for those who have asked. I can live without any of this...people all over the world do every day, they just don't realize they're living lives half-lived. Tide with bleach Adams Peanut Butter (chunky preferred) Dill pickles Crystal Light cds crafted by your own two hands Caribou Blend Video tapes of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart People magazine coverage of the Oscars Mr. T's Bloody Mary Mix Hints on favorite places to visit in England (and the continent) That's enough for now. I'll think more and get back to you.

I am sitting in the departures lounge for Air Canada's business class travellers waiting for my flight. I love flying business class. You're suddenly someone important...someone who people want to please. In fact, the woman at security actually said, "OH! You're special! Go to that line over there!" Note, the line she sent me to did not say "Business and First Class, invitation only," as it does at Heathrow. No, it said "Special Service for Disabled Patrons." Hmmm. I spent some time trying perfume in the duty free shops. I was sure NOT to put on too much (see blog about my seat mate on the flight back to the UK.) But I tried spicy french fragrances in hope of finding a signature scent. No luck yet though. My days here have been good. I was travelling with a customer, showing her the city and helping her decide if this was the right place for her to bring her group. Since I love it here, it was an easy task. She's convinced. We ate g...

Vancouver BC - Just because I left Seattle 7 years ago, it doesn't mean I didn't love it. We just couldn't make it work at the time...we'd grown apart. We'd stopped communicating. It said LUSH GREENERY, I said MOSS BEHIND THE EARS. It said HIP, LIBERAL, FUNKY TOWN. I said POSERS AND EGOTISTICAL SLACKERS. We needed some time apart. But MAN I miss my folks from there, and when I come back for visits, I miss the land, too. I'm not quite in Seattle, but I'm in Vancouver, which is mighty close. And I tell you, I've got a warm spot for the place where I finally grew up. Here is the list of the warm-spot inducing idiosyncracies I've found in the last two days: People go out in the rain because, well, not doing so would mean staying in for 6 months. People recycle everywhere. People wear comfortable shoes, so no inferiority complexes occur...no one is running on cobblestones looking fabulous in tall boots. Floating gas stations Neon, neon, and neon Big, beau...

Truly random thoughts of no particular significance... Follow-up to the Spongebob Scandal...the story has broken here now, and it's been juxtaposed with the popularity of "Desperate Housewives" in the red states. (Are they mentioning in the US press that the states watching the most suburban housewife debauchery are all "moral voter" states?) Seems our friends here in the UK find banning a kids cartoon and going nuts for sexy sexy behaviour in exurbia is somewhat hypocritical. Go figure. I love my new house. I have space to walk around. My walled garden needs work (deadheading plants and planting bulbs), but it has great potential. I have a convection oven. Now that I bought a proper chef's knife I can cook everything I could want in my new kitchen, though the fridge is small and I have to really start thinking about which veggies and fruits we chill without having to. My queen sized bed is comfortable, especially so with the high-threadcount pink shee...

So it's my lunchbreak, and I'm spending some time on US news sites to stay current on what's happening in my homeland. There's lots of inauguration coverage, though no mention of the fact that John Kerry was booed at the ceremony by the audience of loyal GOP faithful, as was reported by the BBC last night. (Boy, Randy Kelly, thank god those kind, decent Republicans who care only for the good of the country and harbor no ill will won this election.) And there's an excellent op-ed on social security privatization by Paul Krugman. But the item that caught my interest the most today is the call to ban Spongebob Squarepants and Barney because they promote homosexuality. Basically, here is James Dobson's argument: Spongebob (along with his immoral cronies Barney, Bob the Builder, and Winnie the Pooh) appears in a video for a remake of "We Are Family" that promotes tolerance for people who aren't necessarily like you, including people of different ...

In my last post, some have gotten the impression that I didn't enjoy my time at home. On the contrary, I enjoyed my time very much, especially when spent with my friends and family. I have generous friends who let me stay in their spare room for weeks. I got to watch stupid tv and relax with people I love. I was able to join my bookgroup for their holiday celebration. I had dinners with friends who make me laugh. I got to play lots of Scrabble with my mother and got to hang out with my nephews. My brother and I got to talk smart. My sister-in-law and I got to belly laugh. We made kolaches with my dad on Christmas Eve. My friend Vicki got married in a beautiful little church in the hills of Iowa, and we had a rousing good time at her dance and reception in the Alamakee County Fairgrounds Pavillion. And, since we travelled to small-town Iowa for the wedding, I got to have a fabulous dinner at La Rana in Decorah with 5 of my favorite people on the planet. I even got to see a fri...

I had dinner at my friend Anne's tonight. Anne, my friend Soni, Anne's housemate Gillian, and I drank wine, talked smart, and ate great chili. (Thanks, Anne.) Soni brought a little electronic game called 20 questions . It's vaguely magic 8-ball shaped, but instead of shaking it for wisdom you play the kid's game 20 Questions with it and it guesses your answer. Sounds pretty gimmicky, right? No way it could guess correctly, right? Wrong. It's like this thing is a mindreader. Things it has guessed correctly so far: door. sushi. curtains. cat. leopard. dacshund. boxer. (like the dog...yes it can differentiate between small breeds.) It's not perfect. For tight pants, it came up with rubber ball and basket (which is insightful, if you stop to think about it.) Tight pants lead to cameltoe (as they usually do), and it got close...with belly button. (Sorry Mom. I know you don't approve of talk like that, but a few glasses of wine and the girls get bawdy. F...

One of the things I miss most while I'm in England is a good, rousing game of Scrabble. Brits aren't big board-gamers, and even though anyone who's truly intimate with the finer points of the game will be gasping about now, to the average person in the UK, Scrabble is exactly that...a board game. This is a big disappointment to me. There's nothing so satisfying as a good "pixies" with a triple X - double word configuration, or a chance to play "waxy" on a triple word score. (I'm a big fan of the x tile. And cut the jokes about the triple-X pixies. You know what I mean.) I was really looking forward to finding some pals who would spend long hours drinking wine and memorizing two letter words like "nu". Unfortunately, I spent six weeks in Scrabble oblivion. Talk about a bummer. I just don't get it. Scrabble is mesmerizing. Endless possibilities of spelling and strategy. Figuring the opportunity costs of playing the Q tile immedi...

Happy Holidays to you all. Yes, Happy Holidays. God bless you, my conservative family and friends. I've specifically avoided discussing world events and other controversial topics in this blog so as not to offend any of you. Even though I strongly disagree with your politics, I love each and every one of you anyway, and out of respect I refrain from demanding explanations for all sorts of things that frustrate and annoy me. (Unless, of course, we're in person and can have a reasonable discussion, in which case you might want to be prepared for, "WHAT ARE YOU PEOPLE THINKING???") Anyway, back to the point. I try to be respectful of you. So please show ME some respect and stop giving me crap about saying "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" when I'm talking to non-Christians and people I don't know well. WARNING..... I'm going to rant here. Mom, you should stop reading and just wait for another entry in a few days. ...

Two entries in one day! I should stay home sick more often. I go to a lot of movies. I'm not all that picky...I'll see my share of "Films", but I also enjoy kung-fu flicks and stupid teenage romantic comedies and Julia Roberts vehicles...I just really like movies. And I see a lot of stuff that I'd say is good or enjoyable or thought-provoking, but it's not all that often that I see a movie that really resonates. Well, I've found a new film that inspires me, and that film is "Napoleon Dynamite" (available on DVD December 21st.) Now, I'm not recommending that everyone in my personal blog-o-sphere rent this. For example, my mother would HATE it. And I admit that I have unconventional taste in films. Last year, I was one of the people who thought "Lost in Translation" was a beautiful story of pure love, and I this year I'm bucking the trend by asserting that "Garden State" is uplifting and sweet; trust me when I say ...

Okay, so. Saturday morning I woke up to some nasty banging at like 630. Not happy. Furthermore, I was puzzled. What on earth can someone be doing at that hour that sounds like steel poles raining in the street? Answer: constructing the booths for the Christmas Fair, an all-day flea market/eat fest/dancing/singing/parading event that culminated in the official lighting of the Christmas lights on the high street at 430 that evening. By the time I got out of the house, the party was in full swing. I registered to win a VW Beetle, then met the girls at the Swan Revived , where they were staying. We intended to give the watery eggs another go, but the restaurant was full. They must not get a lot of requests for breakfast there, though, so they were very accommodating and settled us in the sitting lounge. This was MUCH better as, immediately outside the window, we had the back of a girls choir from the local school. They were singing lame Christmas songs that we didn't know (and a few...

I have returned and recovered from my travels around the neighborhood with The Girls. I was giddy, I tell you. Giddy to have guests! Dinner was, in fact, at The Moghul Palace (see previous entry for the link), and the food was delicious. I even managed smooth parallel parking on the wrong side of the street. We feasted on prawn balti, chicken tikka masala, and all sorts of delicacies. We lived it up and ordered the Banquet for Three. It was Thanksgiving, after all, and what kind of Americans would we be if we didn't eat to the point of bursting to celebrate the occassion? Stopped in a little pub on the way back to the car for a quick pint. There was a great band playing. We knew that karma was on our side when the first complete song they played after our arrival was the Helen Reddy classic "Angie Baby" (with a celtic lilt, of course.) Note to those of you who have not been part of our LP dinner parties in the past...I am obsessed with this song. Basically the creepy...