Zest

That would be my word for the day. I was told last night by a good friend that I have it. Probably sometime after I got off the stage dancing with the band that was playing. And I take it as a very serious compliment. Zest. Mainly because it has been on my mind a lot lately. A sense of adventure. Lust for life. Don’t you just want to scream and bounce up and down whenever that Iggy Pop song comes on? That crazy drumbeat intro? It reminds me that we are never fully in control. When you leave yourself open to wherever the day takes you, it will take you to some very interesting places, and mostly to some very interesting people. And that is such a good thing in getting the most out of life. I love my zest. Zest is where it’s at.

By the way, The Port in Studio City is a very fun and groovy place. Our bartendress had a heavy hand and a very sweet and attentive way about her, and the bouncer, this huge Native American dude named Black Bear, had the coolest tattoos all over his head. And the band, Dirty Pictures -- awesome. You can’t help but get up and shake your ass.

The Port
12430 Riverside Drive (at Whitsett)
Studio City, CA 91607

Let's Talk About The Weather

Let’s just say I’m not one for small talk. I absolutely LOATHE small talk. If someone starts in with the small talk with me, my eyes totally glaze over and I start running a mental grocery list in my head of things I need to get on my next trip to Trader Joe’s. I friggin’ hate it. Tell me about your DAY. Tell me about your drama. Give me your dirt, your fears, your latest conquest, whatever. And I will happily divulge you mine. Small talk, ew.

But I must begin today’s post with the cliché, worst stereotype of small talk EVAR, which is: “So how about this weather we’ve been having?”

I’m not going to lie. I like it warm and springy and sunshiney. After living in L.A. my whole life, I realize I am quite spoiled. When people come here from other states and they complain that it’s oh-so-predictably boring and nice and sunny here all the time, I want to punch them in the throat. Say what? Exqueeze me??? Are your frigid freezing temperatures you’re accustomed to really something you would like to go back to? No? Then shut the hell up! Boring and sunny, my ass. Sunny rules. I'm so sure.

And we all know that lately it has been unseasonably warm and nice. Just this past weekend, I was delighting not only in being able to eat breakfast on the back patio, but mostly in the return of my little chubby bird friends that I feed, and watch them merrily kick dirt and dead leaves out of our patio awning and set up house. I love waking in the morning (well, I hate waking in the morning, but since I have to WAKE, this is what I love) -- to the sound of my little bird friends in the trees and bushes all around our backyard, singing my praises (they call me She Who Fills Our Bird Feeder With Heavy Hand) and just getting that sweet happy feeling like old friends have returned. Sitting on the patio, I could watch a whole tree-full of birds, twittering at one another about all things bird-centric, and I felt… happy. Every morning, there is a regular occurrence in this one tree that I like to call “Chirp O’Clock”. Sometime around 7:00, completely out of freakin’ NOWHERE, every bird in that tree chirps its head off like it’s going for a world record, like they are trying to totally out-chirp each other, like they’re going for the gold in the Chirp Olympics. I love it! Chirp O’Clock is becoming my favorite time of day!

And then. The e-mails start coming from Mountain High. We’re going to get new snow! Yay! Then the rumblings are heard around the office and at home: Our warm weather front is coming to an end and it’s going to get wintry-ugly. Oh. Ew. Even the birds know something is up. They are pensive, restless, agitated. I woke up this morning and it was fah-reeeeezing. And strangely quiet. I looked outside. The dialogue went something like this:

EXT. VALLEY GIRL’S BACKYARD -- MORNING

A harsh, wintry landscape. Grey skies, clouds gathering, a chilling wind blows through the air. Chubby little birds sit in a mushroom-shaped tree.

BIRD
(bitterly)
Cheep.

BIRD
Cheep?

BIRD
(turns up his beak)
Eh, cheep.

BIRD
(sighs)
Cheeeeeeep. Eh. Yeah. I got nothin'.

CUT TO:

Valley Girl looks out the window. Turns to Derek.

VALLEY GIRL
I speak Bird quite fluently. I think they’re saying they came back from Down South for this shit? Hell naw!

THE END

Curves Effin' Rules!

I had my second real Curves workout last night. I was supposed to have my second workout this past Friday, but came in there after a stressful, psychotic work day with such a violent rotten headache, thinking that working out would help make it go away. No. The throbbing just became more intent on splitting my head in two, and after only my first circuit, the poor trainer there, viewing my pathetic watery-eyed head rubbing was like “Bitch, please. Please, you’re killing me. Please. Go home. Lie down.” She gave me some plain wrap pain reliever, and halfway home, the pain finally went away and I was able to enjoy a nice girl's night out.

But anyway! Since I was snowboarding all day Sunday which is its own gnarly workout, I gave Curves a rest until last night. And it was so awesome. How do I explain why it’s awesome? Now that I know what I’m doing, I jammed through the workout, kept my heart rate up, asked questions of the trainers only when I needed a little clarification on my form, and was otherwise just not bothered. I kinda got into this zone of realizing that I’m only going to be here a half-hour, so keep the form good, don’t get lazy, and let’s do this kind of mentality. I love me some Curves!

Cops: Mountain High

So let’s say you decide to schlep up to Mountain High with your buddy Craig to go snowboarding whilst the rest of the natural world judges Super Bowl commercials and eats chips and beer all day. You’re up on the mountain in the AM, it’s sunny, and the conditions, for having been no new local snow lately, are pretty darn good. You’re warming up, getting your groove back. It’s your first day out this season, so you don’t want to kill yourself, but you hit a bunch of tasty runs. You and Craig decide to take a break for lunch, and sit on the picnic benches by the outdoor BBQ pit and take large chunkfuls of your cheeseburgers between mumblings about this or that knucklehead on the hill, listen to Craig discuss proper jump form, chastise Craig for not putting sunscreen on his neck and tell him that his neck will end up looking like a cancer-ridden wrinkly argyle sock if he doesn’t take care of things. All is peaceful and right with the world. M’kay? When suddenly there is a loud and vicious scream, and not 5 feet from you and Craig, a woman, deranged and irate beyond all human logic, is screaming her head off like a victim of Tourette’s Syndrome. Two unfortunate security guards (yeah, who knew Mountain High had security guards? -- when we first arrived and saw someone outfitted with “security” boldly emblazoned on his shirt as we were parking the truck, Craig turned and remarked that he felt much more secure now. He had been feeling rather insecure, but now all was secure and so he felt better and I laughed and thought this was funny and this was kind of our little joke for awhile was all like “oooooh. Mountain High Security: now we are secure.” Little did we know what was to be….)

So where was I before the Parenthetical From Hell? Oh yeah -- two unfortunate security guards were attempting to wrestle this spaz-attack under control whilst she quite vehemently attempted to snap their shins in half with her vicious kicks, eye-poking-out flailing arms, and her trucker-esque language. All while some other poor (let’s call him unfortunate too) some poor unfortunate dude who I can only assume was her love interest is standing in front of her, pleading with her “Heather, PLEASE CALM DOWN. Heather, PLEASE. Heather, THEY WILL ARREST YOU” all of which pissed off Psycho Heather even more and sent her fury into a total tailspin. A third unfortunate security guard arrived and helped the other two security guards finally wrestle her freaky ass to the ground and somehow, by some defiance of the laws of physics, manage to get handcuffs on her. How they did this, I have no clue -- it was like watching someone try to diaper a lubed, epileptic pig. It was scary. Very scary.

It harshed our mellow for a minute, I have to be honest. But then we got back up on the mountain, and everything was okay. But I can’t help but wonder what has become of poor Heather. Where are you, Heather? And why were you so steamed, Heather? Geez. Inquiring minds wanna know.

Minibar

It’s not often a stay-at-home mom can book time for girls night out. But there was Debbie, super cute with a little flower in her hair, saying goodbye to the kids and the sitter on Friday. She took my smokey-eye-made-up, big-hair-havin’ butt out to this awesome place she knows called Minibar. I came in with an open mind, and was so pleasantly surprised and impressed with this place.

It’s like tapas, only not really Spanish tapas. Just several little tasty dishes and holy crap, the best mojitos EVAR. We had pomegranate flavored ones and ordered a few dishes. But the best part of the experience was our adorable server, Lola. This woman could not have been any more warm, hospitable and charming. I wanted to fold her up, put her in my purse and take her home with us. She was pretty like Sonia Braga, and told us that when she put in our drink order with the bartender, she barked at him "AND THROW SOME ALCOHOL IN THERE, BE-OTCH!" How can you not love that?

It’s considered to be on the border of Studio City and Hollywood. I will def be making the trip back there just to see Lola.

After dinner, we danced our asses off at Coda until it was time to go relieve the babysitter at 1:30. Aaaahhhh, I love Fridays. And I love me some girl's night. And I love Lola at the Minibar.

Minibar
3413 Cahuenga W. (at Barham)
Los Angeles, CA 90068
(323) 882-6965

Goin' Curvin'

So I had my first Curves workout last night. I can tell already that this is going to be something I can stick with.

I was measured and weighed, and since they are kind souls, they offer you the option of not knowing what your stats are. I am a firm believer in the "Ignorance is Bliss" mentality, and so my numbers are still a mystery to me, but they will be able to re-weigh and measure and give me an idea of my progress down the line.

I was taken around and shown the proper way to use every piece of equipment in the circuit by Jody, my adorable trainer. [It should be noted that she is a state-certified trainer, and also certified in the Curves system of circuit training.] Jody, while very nice and lovely and pleasant, with a VERY enviable figure, is a total stickler for proper form, and I was constantly, endlessly reminded to breathe, relax my shoulders, pull in my gut. Mildly annoying, but you realize how quickly bad habits can creep up on a workout since you’re doing the bad habits every 2 seconds, and this will cause you to take two steps forward, one step back. The constant reminders are necessary. The chicks at Curves want you to take THREE steps forward, zero steps back. This is their hallmark, and they are bent on helping you achieve success. You periodically monitor your heart rate to be sure you are working hard, but not too hard. They want to keep you in the fat-burning, gut-busting zone.

It took longer than it usually would since I was learning everything, but once you get going, the workout takes a half hour and you’re outta there. This is what I like. I have never understood these gym rats that come to the gym, wait in line to get on equipment, dangle around and chit-chat with people, spend a monotonous hour on a treadmill staring at the TV while their muscles get used to the same motions over time and so it loses its effectiveness. Heyall naw! I have better things to be doing, and that is just not for me. Get me in, get me out. The only workout in which I will lolly-gag about is if I am hiking (I’m in nature and me and God are having our little talks) or rollerblading. And even then, I usually have to pee, so I have to cut it short anyway. But dangling around in the gym? Forget it.

I'll keep you abreast (chick pun intended) of my progress...

I Love This

In the spirit of the approaching Valentine's Day:

"Love yourself first and everything else falls into line. You really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world." -Lucille Ball

Curveaceousness

In my ongoing quest to lose the No-Baby-Weight caused by the STUPID MO-FO pill, I have done the ultimate chick thing. I joined Curves Gym last night. It’s the rage that’s sweeping the nation in women’s fitness. Yes, that’s right. Can you feel the estrogen? That's right! It’s like The View meets Hans and Franz. They want to pump (clap!) you up, while being sensitive to your needs as a woman. There are locations all over the world that members may utilize, but I was particularly pleased to discover a location exactly 1.7 miles from my house. There are no mens allowed. No sweaty lunkheads hogging the equipment. Personal training is included. The vibe in there was totally unpretentious and nice. So what’s not to love? There was no hard sell, and none was required since I couldn’t see anything wrong with this arrangement. I go in Wednesday night for my first session. I’ll keep you posted on the status of my curves. And my efforts to keep them pumped (clap) the hell down.

Curves For Women
17627 Ventura Blvd. (just east of White Oak)
Encino, CA 91316
(818) 986-7212

Other Crappy Movies I Simply Have To Watch Whenever They Come On (The Patrick Swayze Edition)

1) Roadhouse. I adore this movie, 95% because of the blonde ho-bag in it. She is repulsive, yet you cannot look away from her and her slutty antics. At least I can’t. She was Anna Nicole before there was Anna Nicole. And 5% because Patrick Swayze totally busts some sweet Chuck Norris-style roundhouse kicks to the bad guys' faces. And I just love that.

2) Dirty Dancing. “Nobody puts Baby in a corner.” ‘Nuff said.

3) Ghost. In fond memory of the days when starlets vehemently denied they had boob jobs, despite the very plain and obvious proof (on film!) that they somehow very recently had fried eggs for boobies and flaunted them braless whilst tearing up over a penny climbing up a door and floating toward you in a ghostly, yet touching, fashion. [Future "duh" post: Other Crappy Movies I Simply Have To Watch Whenever They Come On (The Demi Moore Edition). On second thought, that may take up too much of my time.]

Yeah. I’m bored today.

Los Crapos

So I wish I could say we had a great trip to Rosarito, but honestly, I have to say it was just pretty good. The desired effect of spending three days chillaxin’ was definitely achieved, but at the cost of discovering the hard way that my fave place to stay down there has gone downhill. It has become dumpy. Schlumpy. Frumpy. I started visiting this particular hotel about 13 years ago, so obviously it was a place that was nice to visit and kept me coming back for more. Not so anymore. Sure, the fabulous ocean view from the room and the pool is still fabulous. Sure, it is still a place of which not a lot of energy needs to be expended and one is free to loll about and read, drink, chit-chat with others, drink, and eat. And drink. And I’m not a neat freak or germophobe by any stretch of the imadge, but a jacuzzi so murky you couldn’t see to the bottom? Lounge chairs by the pool completely covered with layers of dirt? “Authentic” food in the hotel restaurant that I wouldn’t spend $1.50 on at El Pollo Loco? Being provided with only half a roll of TP in our suite and no spare so we were forced to call down for it and then wait five minutes in MST (Mexican Standard Time) which roughly translates to FIVE HOURS to receive the TP? WTF?

Thank God for the little hidden places where I knew there would be great food. The eyes-rolling-back-in-your-head-foodgasm at these places made up for a lot of our lodgings’ shortcomings. And thank God for Oscar at the El Nido bar, who made the best margaritas I have ever tasted. And thank God for the recently-erected Big Giant Jesus atop the hill behind the hotel (a la Rio de Janeiro) that greeted us every time we left the hotel and would send Derek into yet another fit of giggles over the fact that hey, there was a Big Giant Jesus hovering above our hotel and that's just funny.

Next time, we’ll be staying somewhere else. I don’t think even Big Giant Jesus could save this place from its downward spiral.

Tic. Toc. Tic....... Toc.......

Today in Rosarito, sunny with a high of 71 degrees. Whilst I freeze my ass off here.

Why does time have to go by so slow when you're about to have a groovy long weekend? In the sun? Visions of shrimp tacos and Puerto Nuevo lobsters dancing in my head? Yeah. It's a long day.

I'm having my niece and neph over tonight. I can't wait. They're spending the night. We're going to build a fort. And make cookies. And torture Babe and Rufus by making them wear stupid outfits. Should be a good time.

Consequences Teach Better Than Concepts

Moral concepts are personal; consequences are universal.

What one culture, religion, or nation prohibits, another accepts as moral behavior.

What may be wrong in one situation or circumstance may be right in another.

Unchanging, unquestioned rules of right and wrong relieve us of thinking.

But life is not so simple.

Prisons are full of people who understood the concepts, but didn’t grasp the consequences.

~Unknown

Day Five

You guys, I know, I am in shock myself. I have made it to Day Five of The Cleanse. No food, no alcohol, no coffee, no nothing. Just large amounts of water, water, water, organic lemon juice, pure organic maple syrup and cayenne pepper. Oh, and more water. Here are my observations thus far:

1. It's not as hard as I thought it would be. I have had no major hunger pangs or moments of caving in. This has been the biggest surprise of all.

2. In the absence of food, alcohol, or even a nice cup of joe, one becomes bored easily. This boredom is remedied by looking around the house and noticing all the crap you were too lazy to do because you were cooking/chowing down/hungover/too tired. You start doing it.

3. When all that stuff is done, you start noticing the things that were an ugly beige color and really should be jazzed up with some paint. I painted the kitchen step-stool. Yes, I actually painted a step-stool, but it has sentimental value. It belonged to my grandparents, whom I dearly miss, but it was this ugly-ass barf-beige color. It is now a jazzy green color with metallic blue sponge shapes. I got really into it. I also took this stark white little table that we put our keys and junk on, and transformed it into a nice, distressed denim blue. Now it’s purty. I like that.

4. You really do have energy to do stuff once the initial detox mild headaches and blah feelings go away (for me it was two days, and again, not that bad). I hiked Runyon on Sunday and Caballero on Monday, and felt awesome the whole time.

5. There was a point in one of my hikes where I caught a whiff of something sweet in the vegetation that reminded me of Mrs. Fields chocolate chip cookies for some reason. At that moment, I would have cut off a limb in exchange for 50 of those particular cookies, an item that I don’t seek out or consume with any sort of regularity. Of course I was prepared for this from the material I had read about The Cleanse -- while you’re doing it, certain toxins will be running around and causing intense cravings of sweets or salty things or whatever you normally crave. INTENSE?! I now understand the severity of the word. This INTENSE craving lasted about 15 minutes, and I was able to talk myself through it, and it was over. Of course, I was out in the middle of freakin’ nature. There was no Mrs. Fields to be had. So I was kinda screwed anyway.

6. You really notice how many food commercials are on TV. Almost every other commercial has savory some such thing, or luscious decadent item that you absolutely must eat, IN YOUR FACE in all its glistening, buttery-looking, perfectly cooked glory. Every other commercial, I swear! Thank God for TiVo and the ability to fast-fo through that crap. It was my saving grace.

7. Your sense of smell becomes very acute. On my way to one of my hikes, I caught a whiff of someone cooking. They were making carne asada with a side of refried beans and what I thought to be a tomatillo sauce in there somewhere. I knew all this by driving past. Is this what it’s like to be a dog? They have total bionic smellers of food they never get to eat? No wonder they beg all the time. I considered banging on these people’s door and begging, but resisted the urge.

8. You can breathe better. Seriously. You can take in more oxygen because nothing is sitting around in your insides getting in the way. And that feels very satisfying.

9. Sometimes, when I just needed to be a little bit “bad”, while measuring out the maple syrup, I would lick the spoon afterward. This made me feel very dirty and sly, but I kinda liked it. Tee hee!

10. Whenever I felt the slightest bit icky or headachey in the first couple of days, I could just go to bed and it would go away. This was a fabulous excuse to get oodles of sleep that I wouldn’t ordinarily get to indulge in. And I like that, too.

11. My dogs know something is up. A couple of times, Rufus has come up and sniffed my breath like he often does (he is snoopy, he likes to know what I’ve eaten). Then he will give me this quizzical look as if to say “Bitch, what? You have total access to all this food, of which we are denied. WTF?”

12. I consider The Cleanse the lesser of two evils. It was either this, or do the Hollywood Starlet Diet of Throw-Up With a Side of Cocaine. So far this one is working for me, so I’ll keep it, thanks.

Ms. Clean

You know how you get that feeling after the New Year of wanting to clean? I don’t necessarily mean houseclean, but really feng shui hong kong fuey your house -- cleaning old clothes out of your closet, reorganizing your filing, dumping out all your old pornos that you never watch anymore. You know -- clean. Well, I have that feeling. But I want to clean my insides.

See, I’ve been on the pill for the last six months or so. And though it evened out my female problems quite nicely as was its intended purpose, it has wreaked havoc on my body in other ways -- namely, by dumping an extra 10 lbs. or so on my person. Of course I am guessing at the number because I am scared poo-less to step on the scale for fear that it will send me downward spiraling into a Krispy Kreme bender just to numb my chub-pain. It feels like I am carrying an innertube full of Jello around my waist at all times. Try cramming that into your jeans sometime! As it is, I consumed enough nog and rum over the holidays to feed and inebriate a small country for a year. I kind of had the pounds coming to me anyway. But the pill -- blast that stupid pill! -- has effed with my hormones in such a way that I don’t feel like myself anymore. I have been off the pill for over three weeks now. I want my regular girly cycle back, problems and all. I will work them out, but those fake hormones ain’t for me.

So! I have decided to do a cleanse (hereafter referred to as "The Cleanse"). A Master Cleanse, if you will. This comes at the recommendation of a couple of friends and actually myself. I did one some years ago and had great results. You dump all the synthetic hormones from the pill that would otherwise stay hanging around rent-free in your person, and detox your bod. This gives a nice, fresh start to starting a new eating plan or whatevs. And that’s what I need right now.

Of course, in a couple of days, I may be willing to sell my soul to Paris Hilton in exchange for a nice, fat burger. I’m ready for that. But I am told that after the first couple of days, it gets really easy and you start to feel really good. I plan on doing it for nine days before we go to Rosarito. Then I will re-tox when I get there. Just kidding. But I will, in all seriousness, have to have a few margs. It’s illegal in Mexico not to, right? That is the image I will keep in my head to keep me going: mmmmmmmmmmargs and tacos......

Tonight for my big send-off before the start of The Cleanse, I’ll be making some meatloaf, homemade mac and cheese, and asparagus. After that, it’s lemon/maple/cayenne country for a long-ass time. I’ll let you know how it goes. Lord, help me.

Non-Morning Person Getting Up In The Morning and Other Awful Things

So I was supposed to get up early (horrors!!!!) and go running with Bec this morning, but she flaked as she is on deadline and pulling a lot of late nights. Whatevs. So in a fit of complete insanity, I decided to go by myself. The Thai food we had last night was most certainly loaded with MSG I am now convinced, since I woke up with one of those obnoxious MSG headaches that dry out your throat and make you feel like someone shoveled fiberglass insulation-wrapped sawdust into your cranium. It always feels better to get up and walk around rather than lie in bed and wallow in it, so this prompted my lazy non-morning-person ass out of bed to do the run on my own. It was also the guilt over consuming so damn much pineapple fried rice last night.

I got my clothes on and proceeded with the big giant dog out the door. Dudes, I am being honest when I say it was pure, unadulterated HELL. Torture. Sheer shitdom. For starters, it was like, ten zillion below zero outside (yeah, New Year’s Resolution to not exaggerate going really well, but I mean! The grass in Balboa Park was completely frosty! Where the hell are we, the Arctic???) And not only that, but my legs kept up a steady protest of the following: "Bitch, WHAT???? Are you completely and totally INSANE? What in the mother-EFF are we doing out of bed, for the love of all that is holy? Excuse me, Brain? Is that your name? Brain? Get our Leg Agent on the phone, this is total bullshit! Go ahead, we’ll wait. God! This sucks!"

But I persisted in spite of the protests and was very happy I did, because not only did it warm me up and get the blood going, and I got to witness the sheer joy of watching Rufus haul-ass completely balls-out (if he had balls) after a squirrel, but I feel super chipper-perky-bubbly-happy today. And that is a good feeling.

But we’ll just have to see about doing it again tomorrow.

Less is More

Continuing in the vein of crappy-ass movies that one has to watch, I have a confession to make. I'm turning into a Bush Bitch. Here is my story.

Recently I was paging through the cable channels on a weekend evening, drinking cocktails, being thankful for the fact that in America, it is a perfectly acceptable pastime to watch crap-TV whilst imbibing for the sole purpose of poking fun at said crap-TV. It's very relaxing. I couldn’t find Showgirls anywhere, so I was looking for other crap to watch, and saw something very intriguing called "Busty Cops". I know, it sounds awesome, right? It was, however, on the Cinemax channel, which we didn't get. I was super bummed. I imagined all sorts of taglines of badness in my head: They’re busty. They’re cops. They will bust you if you’re bad, because they are the Busty Cops. Whatever Busty Cops was, I wanted in on it. So Derek heard my cries of despair over being denied what was most certainly a gloriously crappy chunk of time wastage, and on the sly the next day, he ordered Cinemax. Though I believe he secretly wanted to know the joy that was Busty Cops as well. So we're watching Cinemax the other night over the weekend. No Busty Cops to be found, but one of those cheesy soft-core pornos was on, called "Emmanuelle In Space". This fine piece of cinematic gold was crafted circa '89 or '90, and is so bad, I can’t even find it on IMDB in order to confirm its ancient date of creation. So of course, Derek and I were ripping on the hairdos and clothes and lame plotline and stuff. After one of the 27 or so sex scenes, the guy rolls off the girl after their simultaneous fake orgasms to reveal her super-bushy crotchal area. Derek and I erupted into peals of laughter -- "Hi, Tufty!" "Oh my god, hi Brillo Crotch!" “What’s up with the Chia Pet, Pseudo-Ho?” Still giggling, I went to the bathroom and happened to examine my own special area and jumped back from myself in horror. I hadn't realized how out of control it had become. The holidays haven’t exactly afforded a lot of time to do maintenance. I felt bad for poking fun at the Skinemax actress. It's not her fault. She's not alone. But she had the jabs coming, if only for the distracting gap in her teeth.

I called up my friendly neighborhood waxer (aka my sis-in-law, who always does an outstanding job of nether-region maintenance) and told her she may need a machete for this one. Thank the Pube Gods she had a spot available this weekend. But in the meantime, I’m thinking of buzzing it into the shape of some busty cops. What do we think? Hot, right? Awwwwwyeaaaaah.

Mom! Quit it, you're embarrassing meeeeeee!

Yeah. Some of us are super stoked the holidays are over. Rufus won't even acknowledge my presence in this shot. He is Super-Aloof-Teenage-Bad-Ass-Dog.

And behold the following, in which it appears that Babe wants to suck the very blood of the person taking the photo. Oh yeah. That would be me.

It Was The Best of Times, It Was The Worst of Times

After doing all the fun Christmas stuff at our new home for Christmas this year, we schlepped over to southern Utah to do Christmas and New Years with Derek’s family for four days. I love me some Derek’s family, so I was ready to rock. We did Christmas on New Year’s Eve morning, and I got to ring in the New Year drinking champagne and playing cards with Derek’s 101-year-old Grammy. She stayed up with us until at least 1:00 a.m.! Have I ever mentioned how much she rules? Well…. she rules. There was nowhere on earth I would rather have been. The only bummer to the whole affair was that I am violently (and I mean mafia-revenge-violently) allergic to their cat. Which is weird, because I have never been allergic to any cats, but there I was, wheezing and barely able to breathe, with nowhere to go since it was butt-cold outside. Then the real fun started when my whole head clogged up and I started sneezing every 2 seconds. I took some Benadryl and that was really special. I was still sneezy and stuffy, but now I was dopey and drowsy on top of it! Neat!

When not doing the celebratory stuff, we took in some of the sights of southern Utah, and more specifically, Zion National Park. This was also a nice break for me from the Snotfest that had become my existence throughout our stay. Anyway, I had no idea this place even existed, but I sure do now. It was absolutely stunningly beautiful, everywhere you look. Really cool plateaus and rock formations, gorgeous desert landscape, interesting wildlife. I can’t wait to go back in the spring to spend more quality time with D’s parents and check out the hiking around there.



Driving home, we had to pass through Las Vegas along with every single other person on the entire planet (New Year’s Resolution: Ease up on the exaggerating) AND deal with the rain. But all in all it was a really fun trip, and the valley welcomed us back home with open arms and rain-soaked dreams.

The next day I took down all the Christmas crap, put away presents, and swept up the pine needles. I am SO ready for 2006. Bring it on, bitches!!

Get Your Bad On

Sigh. Christmas won’t officially be over for us until we visit Derek’s fam in Utah this week. But I already feel so full and happy from Christmas joy. It has been a really wonderful, peaceful, sweet holiday season for me this year, even with a minor sickly curve ball thrown at me before Christmas Day. Bam! I knocked it out in a day and a half and was done. But now I’m just tired and want to lie down. For about three days.

Which brings me to my latest blog confession, dear readers. You know when it’s before bedtime and you’re tired, but not tired enough to sleep, but too tired to read or do anything semi-productive or even focus on a movie you haven’t yet seen? You know what I like to do? Besides that, you pervs.



I will hunt around the tube until I find the movie Showgirls. I know! I know. It’s almost always on some channel or another, and it is quite possibly the worst movie ever made, but dammit, that’s what makes it so good. Especially watching the edited for TV version of it, where you can make fun of the dubbing where there should have been overly-passionate, righteously indignant cusswords, and make extra special fun of the skin-colored bra thingies that they digitally add over any exposed boobies. It rules! I swear, I never get tired of watching that stupid-ass movie! What is my problem? Is there a 12-step program for this? I love listening to Elizabeth Berkley grunt and gasp during her dance solos, and violently whip her head around when she is pissed off (which is practically every scene). I love making fun of Kyle McLachlan’s super-sissy hairdo. I love the cliched, over-the-top, cocaine-induced Star Is Born type story line that even a 3-year-old could navigate and find cheesy. God! It’s just so good!

There are other movies that are also terrible, but when they come on, it is a moral imperative: I simply have to watch them. In a lot of ways, I think they make me a better writer because the writing is bad, but obviously there is something compelling about it that makes you watch, right? There is something to be learned from this, though I’m not sure what that is. Does anybody else do this? Here is my list:

The Cutting Edge (Rich girl skater meets bad boy hockey player and they must learn to skate together. Sparks fly and bitchy jabs ensue.)
Center Stage (Bitchy bitches at the New York Ballet Academy. Backstabbing dancers, eating disorders, male ballet lotharios. Oh, it’s all SO serious.)
Flashdance (Duh. Every little girl on the planet wanted to be Jen Beals with that white-hot off-the-shoulder sweatshirt. Finding out that she didn’t actually do any of the dancing was like finding out there was no Santa Klaus.)
Striptease (Demi Moore takes it off, but only for a noble cause people! And she rips those clothes off with righteous, fierce anger because she has to keep custody of her daughter away from her mean, mean, drinking, asshole ex-husband! Featuring Burt Reynolds, in perhaps the most embarrassing role of his entire career.)

So what are your guilty movies? Come on. Confess. Confess. You know you want to tell me.

It's the MOST wonderful time... of the year....

This time of year always gets me thinking a lot about traditions. What I mean by that is, a few years ago, I realized that with all my protracted family members and the consumerism frenzy that is foisted upon our psyches every year, my holidays were becoming WAY too convoluted, stressful (most stress being entirely self-imposed) and commerce-oriented. This is not good. This is not what the holidays are all about. So in the last few years, I have made more of an effort with each year to remember the good, in-the-spirit-of-celebrating, meaningful traditions that fly in the face of crazy-making and depressing attitudes that accompany this time of year. I would like to share them with you now, and hope you will share your traditions with me as well so we can make this a great holiday season, people. I'm always up for new ones.

1) Go be with your God in your own way. You don’t have to be “religious” to get into the spirit. Most of my friends aren’t remotely religious, but are definitely highly spiritual, and find meaning in the season by climbing a hill and admiring the view, or finding God through riding a snowboard down a sweet run, or in the selfless giving of donating one’s time to help those less fortunate. It’s all very individual. If you’re bored out of your mind and feel nothing at church service, for God sake (literally!) don’t go to church. Why on earth would God want you there? Find a special place where you feel your spirit connect with God and the season. That is the way to go, and don’t EVAR let anyone tell you different. That’s someone foisting their own issues on you, and that’s not allowed.

2) Make stuff. My past personal favorites are homemade soap, cookies, Christmas ornaments, wreaths, and girly crap like aromatherapy body scrubs and the like. You can get pretty much all the stuff at Michael’s and/or a good health food store. (For really good aromatherapy and soap-making supplies and all the pretty stuff to wrap up your homemade stuff in, go to Soothe Your Soul in Redondo Beach. That place rules.) It doesn’t matter what you make or how 3rd grade it looks, so long as you sit your butt down, hang with some girlfriends, drink a little nog (I like mine with spiced rum and nutmeg), and focus on letting your creative self be free for awhile. Laugh, talk, be dorky. Don't fret if you have dried toothpaste crust in the bathroom -- your friends won't care. They will just be happy to be there with you. I couldn’t have the holidays without making stuff. It just wouldn’t work.

3) Get a tree (or Hannukah bush, Kwanzaa harvest stuff, whatever your thing is) and have a few close friends and Mom over to decorate it. I like to heat some spicy cider (from Trader Joe’s, of course), serve nog, and have a few munchies, and let everyone help you put on the lights, hang the ornaments, and decorate the house, all whilst playing some groovy Christmas tunes. It’s so relaxing and fun, and spreads around a LOT of warm fuzzies.

4) Go for a walk or drive specifically for the sole purpose of checking out everybody’s lights and lawn decorations. (Bonus points: bringing kids along for this)

5) Just enjoy the season for all its unexpected (non-material) gifts. That is a tradition worth keeping.