So the eye is healing. the blobs that were bouncing around and obscuring my sight are receding back to blobland where they can be called upon to bother someone else. i'm told it's going to be a few months before everything is okay, but i am cool with that. I can drive, i can write, i certainly can eat, i can kiss my doggies and chat with my friends, so they are not interfering one bit with my life.
And i love my new earrings. snicker.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Still Waiting for the Earrings
As pitiful as i tried to appear, my significant other did not come up with diamond or any other kind of earrings. He is not the kind of person who gets hints. Even if they are painted on billboards and say "JUDY WANTS THIS FROM YOU. BUY THIS AS A GIFT FOR HER!" he will not see it, if he sees it, he won't understand it, if he understands it, he'll forget all about it by the time he takes his next breath. Clearly I am going to have to treat myself.
I'm getting tastefully big ones.
I'm getting tastefully big ones.
A High Price to Pay
Chimps are cute. Baby chimps are high on the cuteness scale, up there with puppies and kitties. They don't do it on purpose, they are just cute because they are small and cuddly and our brains are hardwired to respond to that. And it's okay. The result is that we take care of our young and have long domesticated puppies and kitties. All of them, kids, dogs, cats, fit into our homes, our lifestyles, our beds. What doesn't fit are wild animals who are forced to give up their natural behavior by nutcases who think they can turn them into the cyootest pets around. The outcome is sooo predictable. The darling little chimpie, or tiger, or cuddly bear matures and becomes - well - what it had always been, a large, powerful, aggressive WILD ANIMAL! Sah-prize, sah-prize!! A chimp has the strength of five men, grows to about two hundred pounds (don't take my word for it, check out the Jane Goodall site) and has very specific needs to be a healthy, well adjusted animal. And i don't mean pink diapers and pizza for dinner.
So, of course, some clodbrain raises a chimp and after years of poor diet and confinement, the poor chimp isn't doing so well. What does clodbrain do? Does she take the animal to a vet? NAh - that would be - gasp - responsible, but we know she isn't because she's house raising a chimp! So she gives him Xanax, even there is no veterinary evidence that it's even good for this species, and duh - the poor creature goes insane and eats the face off her good friend. Guess who dies in the end? Guess who pays for clodbrain's poor judgement.
Hint: It wasn't clodbrain.
So, of course, some clodbrain raises a chimp and after years of poor diet and confinement, the poor chimp isn't doing so well. What does clodbrain do? Does she take the animal to a vet? NAh - that would be - gasp - responsible, but we know she isn't because she's house raising a chimp! So she gives him Xanax, even there is no veterinary evidence that it's even good for this species, and duh - the poor creature goes insane and eats the face off her good friend. Guess who dies in the end? Guess who pays for clodbrain's poor judgement.
Hint: It wasn't clodbrain.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
The Great Clam Caper
I really want to be a total vegetarian, I really do, but occasionally I have been known to lapse. And when i lapse, it's because of clams. I love clams. I love them fried, in chowders, I love them stuffed, steamed or raw. I excuse it by thinking: of all the things I could cheat with, clams strike me as the most innocuous. Maybe because the no-face issue doesn't really apply to them, and I eat them once in a while without all the guilt and ethical dilemmas that the other stuff seems to present. So when they were featured in a local supermarket last week, big mesh bags of clams sitting resolutely and stoically in their black shells on mountains of ice, I dithered for a few minutes in front of the fish department before I finally bought them.
The cashier put them in a separate bag, away from the skim milk I also bought, the butter substitute. the Greek yogurt, and the no-flavor-no-color- puffy wheat thingies-the-size-of-hubcaps-but-only-12-calories that i snack on, and home I went. I had visions of clam chowder, of stuffed clams, of fritters. After all, there were over three dozen, all waiting to be turned into a culinary experience.
Except I don't know a thing about clams.
I know nothing about keeping them - uh - alive- until you ate them. And i had been strictly warned by the fish monger to keep them alive or they would poison me, a sort of clammy revenge. Keep them on ice, I was told, until you are ready to cook them. Be very careful, I was told, because if they open their mouths, that's the end of it, it's too late. It all sounded quite nervewracking. I had never considered that there would be handling problems, but that was because i had never prepared clams. When i want clams, I just go out to a restaurant and order them and they appear a few minutes later, all done up with cocktail sauce and little round crackers and lemon. I didn't know you had to be a clam wrangler.
So, I put them on the kitchen counter and stared at them. They stared back. Or at least it seemed that they did. I started to worry about them. I felt like I had brought home three dozen pets and I was responsible for their welfare. I decided they looked too dry, too thirsty, and put them into a big pot, filled the pot with water and went on the internet to find out how to keep them happy and healthy until - uh they were - uh - you know - cooked.
The first thing i learned is that they are not fresh water animals. They needed salt water. What had I done! What havoc was i wreaking upon their poor little salt water bodies with my well water.
"Oh no!" I shrieked and raced into the kitchen to quickly brew something more habitable.
My daughter, Robin, was watching me. "Are you sure you're up for this?" she asked. "Remember the lobsters?" Indeed I did.
When she was about twelve, her father brought home several huge lobsters for dinner. Following his instructions, i put them into a big pot and put the pot on the stove to boil. A few minutes later, they had lifted the lid and climbed out of the pot, leapt off the stove, a la Annie Hall, and were skittering across the floor, pissed as all hell. At least it seemed like that to me. I remember staring down at them too, like I had with the clams and feeling the same kind of sympathy and guilt. But dinner was dinner. I picked them up and put them back into the pot, they climbed out again. I had come face to face with a moral dilemma. Did I have the right to end their lives like this? It was cruel. I grabbed them around their waists and carefully put them into a shopping bag, ordered the kids into the car and drove to the Long Island Sound, which at the time, was a mile or two from our house. We stood at the water's edge as I opened the bag. The lobsters crawled out slowly, waved their whiskers in the air, maybe smelling the fresh sea air and dashed for the open water. My kids cheered. The lobsters were cheering - I'm pretty sure - and i was crying as some one hundred dollars worth of dinner disappeared into the undertow. We had spaghetti that night, but i knew i did the right thing.
Which leads me back to the clams.
They were looking a little peaked by now. Some of them had their mouths open. I poured the water out and filled a shopping bag with ice and picked them up, one by one, and put them on the ice.
"They're pretty sandy," I commented to my daughter.
"I think you have to run them through water," she said, "like giving them a bath. And you have to scrub them."
I looked at them doubtfully. "Scrub them?" I repeated.
"With a brush," she said. "To clean them."
It was like a clam spa. I brushed them very gently, even their undersides, and patted them dry with my best fuzzy kitchen towel and put them on a bed of ice to nap the night away while I considered what to do with them. I put them to sleep in the fridge.
The next morning they all had their mouths open. It was the end of them, it was too late. I had a mass clam passing on my hands.
"Did you tie the plastic grocery bag shut around them?" my daughter asked.
"Of course," I said. "I wanted to give them some privacy in the refrigerator. You know, i have about a dozen eggs in there. You know how eggs are. Nosy. They're into everything."
"That's what went wrong," she said. "They suffocated. They need air."
Clams need air? Is nothing simple?
"You may as well put them outside for the raccoons," my daughter said. I did.
Apologizing to them one by one, I tossed three dozen clams, over the garden fence so that the wild raccoons that live out there somewhere could have clams on the half shell, maybe with those cute little round crackers and coctail sauce. I had been responsible for the untimely demise of three dozen innocent sea creatures. It was awful. They had spent the night cold and airless.
But at least they were clean.
The cashier put them in a separate bag, away from the skim milk I also bought, the butter substitute. the Greek yogurt, and the no-flavor-no-color- puffy wheat thingies-the-size-of-hubcaps-but-only-12-calories that i snack on, and home I went. I had visions of clam chowder, of stuffed clams, of fritters. After all, there were over three dozen, all waiting to be turned into a culinary experience.
Except I don't know a thing about clams.
I know nothing about keeping them - uh - alive- until you ate them. And i had been strictly warned by the fish monger to keep them alive or they would poison me, a sort of clammy revenge. Keep them on ice, I was told, until you are ready to cook them. Be very careful, I was told, because if they open their mouths, that's the end of it, it's too late. It all sounded quite nervewracking. I had never considered that there would be handling problems, but that was because i had never prepared clams. When i want clams, I just go out to a restaurant and order them and they appear a few minutes later, all done up with cocktail sauce and little round crackers and lemon. I didn't know you had to be a clam wrangler.
So, I put them on the kitchen counter and stared at them. They stared back. Or at least it seemed that they did. I started to worry about them. I felt like I had brought home three dozen pets and I was responsible for their welfare. I decided they looked too dry, too thirsty, and put them into a big pot, filled the pot with water and went on the internet to find out how to keep them happy and healthy until - uh they were - uh - you know - cooked.
The first thing i learned is that they are not fresh water animals. They needed salt water. What had I done! What havoc was i wreaking upon their poor little salt water bodies with my well water.
"Oh no!" I shrieked and raced into the kitchen to quickly brew something more habitable.
My daughter, Robin, was watching me. "Are you sure you're up for this?" she asked. "Remember the lobsters?" Indeed I did.
When she was about twelve, her father brought home several huge lobsters for dinner. Following his instructions, i put them into a big pot and put the pot on the stove to boil. A few minutes later, they had lifted the lid and climbed out of the pot, leapt off the stove, a la Annie Hall, and were skittering across the floor, pissed as all hell. At least it seemed like that to me. I remember staring down at them too, like I had with the clams and feeling the same kind of sympathy and guilt. But dinner was dinner. I picked them up and put them back into the pot, they climbed out again. I had come face to face with a moral dilemma. Did I have the right to end their lives like this? It was cruel. I grabbed them around their waists and carefully put them into a shopping bag, ordered the kids into the car and drove to the Long Island Sound, which at the time, was a mile or two from our house. We stood at the water's edge as I opened the bag. The lobsters crawled out slowly, waved their whiskers in the air, maybe smelling the fresh sea air and dashed for the open water. My kids cheered. The lobsters were cheering - I'm pretty sure - and i was crying as some one hundred dollars worth of dinner disappeared into the undertow. We had spaghetti that night, but i knew i did the right thing.
Which leads me back to the clams.
They were looking a little peaked by now. Some of them had their mouths open. I poured the water out and filled a shopping bag with ice and picked them up, one by one, and put them on the ice.
"They're pretty sandy," I commented to my daughter.
"I think you have to run them through water," she said, "like giving them a bath. And you have to scrub them."
I looked at them doubtfully. "Scrub them?" I repeated.
"With a brush," she said. "To clean them."
It was like a clam spa. I brushed them very gently, even their undersides, and patted them dry with my best fuzzy kitchen towel and put them on a bed of ice to nap the night away while I considered what to do with them. I put them to sleep in the fridge.
The next morning they all had their mouths open. It was the end of them, it was too late. I had a mass clam passing on my hands.
"Did you tie the plastic grocery bag shut around them?" my daughter asked.
"Of course," I said. "I wanted to give them some privacy in the refrigerator. You know, i have about a dozen eggs in there. You know how eggs are. Nosy. They're into everything."
"That's what went wrong," she said. "They suffocated. They need air."
Clams need air? Is nothing simple?
"You may as well put them outside for the raccoons," my daughter said. I did.
Apologizing to them one by one, I tossed three dozen clams, over the garden fence so that the wild raccoons that live out there somewhere could have clams on the half shell, maybe with those cute little round crackers and coctail sauce. I had been responsible for the untimely demise of three dozen innocent sea creatures. It was awful. They had spent the night cold and airless.
But at least they were clean.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
The Friday Nite Movie gang
It started about five years ago.
My Friday nights had been solitary ones.
And Friday night, to me was always a night of anticipation. The end of the work week needs to be celebrated because a nice, fresh weekend is on the horizon. There is only so much creative juice one can manufacture in the course of a week, so writing another chapter for my book didn't appeal to me. I wanted to be entertained. Sitting alone Friday nights and eating the remains of lunch while watching telly reruns that I never liked in the first place, wasn't cutting it, so I grabbed the newspaper, checked out the local theaters and set off for the movies. I bought a medium popcorn and a bottle of water for my dinner and i was blissed out. It didn't matter what the movie was about, the screen could have been blank, for all I cared. I was away from my office, out of the house, and freeee.
Two or three years passed this way and I was happy.
Enter my daughter. "Mind if I come?" she asked. No problem. We hit the early show, she ate M&M's and shared a medium popcorn with me. We drank water and we blissed out together .
Good things like this catch on.
First, my friend Maria asked to join us. Then my friends Richie and Jackie, soon followed by Larry and Estelle, and Alex, and Gene, and occasionally my eighty-nine year old mother (who thought the actors looked very thin in Avatar. "That's Hollywood for you," she sniffed. "They have to starve themselves for their roles." I didn't have the heart to remind her that it was an animation.)
Of course, things have taken on a little more structure over time. Evolved, you might say. There were a lot of us, and now I send out emails addressed to the Movie Gang, detailing the movie i have chosen for the week - my word is law - though I do consider special requests. I sign my emails "Queen of the Cinema" and add an ominous and unoriginal "Be there or be square" at the bottom. We have added dinner to the evening's activities, usually meeting in the food court next to the cinema, and happily stuff in on the awful junk food to be found in malls. Diets go out the window, our Movie Gang members (which have gone as high as nineteen) take up entire tables. After food, we troop off to the movie in giddy spirits. When the movie is over, we caravan to the local diner for post-movie analysis, drink buckets of decaf coffee and order diner snacks which rival food court food in its gastronomical incorrectness. Finally, tired, satiated and completely entertained, we bid each other adieu, head off in various directions for home and career, and wait impatiently for another week to pass.
Anyone is welcome to join us. They are forewarned that they may get bombarded with an errant popcorn missile if the plot lags, chocolate snacks have to be shared, and an occasional snarky comment is not only tolerated, but encouraged. Maria howled through the entirety of the last werewolf movie, it was that bad. Shutter Island gave us all the creeps and we are still picking apart Inception, though the general vote is that he's still asleep and we all need to see it again. We loved Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and loved almost as much, discussing its symbolism. When you've got a writer or two (or sometimes three) included in the group, along with a pathologist and an internationally renowned forensics expert, an engineer, a doctorate in psychology and one in molecular biology, dissections are inevitable.
It's now Tuesday night and I'm deciding on my next opus. As usual, I will let you know Friday morning before noon. You'll get the email, so
Be there or be square.
My Friday nights had been solitary ones.
And Friday night, to me was always a night of anticipation. The end of the work week needs to be celebrated because a nice, fresh weekend is on the horizon. There is only so much creative juice one can manufacture in the course of a week, so writing another chapter for my book didn't appeal to me. I wanted to be entertained. Sitting alone Friday nights and eating the remains of lunch while watching telly reruns that I never liked in the first place, wasn't cutting it, so I grabbed the newspaper, checked out the local theaters and set off for the movies. I bought a medium popcorn and a bottle of water for my dinner and i was blissed out. It didn't matter what the movie was about, the screen could have been blank, for all I cared. I was away from my office, out of the house, and freeee.
Two or three years passed this way and I was happy.
Enter my daughter. "Mind if I come?" she asked. No problem. We hit the early show, she ate M&M's and shared a medium popcorn with me. We drank water and we blissed out together .
Good things like this catch on.
First, my friend Maria asked to join us. Then my friends Richie and Jackie, soon followed by Larry and Estelle, and Alex, and Gene, and occasionally my eighty-nine year old mother (who thought the actors looked very thin in Avatar. "That's Hollywood for you," she sniffed. "They have to starve themselves for their roles." I didn't have the heart to remind her that it was an animation.)
Of course, things have taken on a little more structure over time. Evolved, you might say. There were a lot of us, and now I send out emails addressed to the Movie Gang, detailing the movie i have chosen for the week - my word is law - though I do consider special requests. I sign my emails "Queen of the Cinema" and add an ominous and unoriginal "Be there or be square" at the bottom. We have added dinner to the evening's activities, usually meeting in the food court next to the cinema, and happily stuff in on the awful junk food to be found in malls. Diets go out the window, our Movie Gang members (which have gone as high as nineteen) take up entire tables. After food, we troop off to the movie in giddy spirits. When the movie is over, we caravan to the local diner for post-movie analysis, drink buckets of decaf coffee and order diner snacks which rival food court food in its gastronomical incorrectness. Finally, tired, satiated and completely entertained, we bid each other adieu, head off in various directions for home and career, and wait impatiently for another week to pass.
Anyone is welcome to join us. They are forewarned that they may get bombarded with an errant popcorn missile if the plot lags, chocolate snacks have to be shared, and an occasional snarky comment is not only tolerated, but encouraged. Maria howled through the entirety of the last werewolf movie, it was that bad. Shutter Island gave us all the creeps and we are still picking apart Inception, though the general vote is that he's still asleep and we all need to see it again. We loved Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and loved almost as much, discussing its symbolism. When you've got a writer or two (or sometimes three) included in the group, along with a pathologist and an internationally renowned forensics expert, an engineer, a doctorate in psychology and one in molecular biology, dissections are inevitable.
It's now Tuesday night and I'm deciding on my next opus. As usual, I will let you know Friday morning before noon. You'll get the email, so
Be there or be square.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
AN INCONVENIENT ELEPHANT
Hello my dumplings,
It's out. My new book, book number three, i'm happy, i love it, and i know you will, too. It's the sequel to Still Life with Elephant, although the new book stands alone as a novel.
You'll meet Diamond-Rose Tremaine, a gal from the African bush who never quite gets the hang of domestication after she gets back to the states. And you will accompany her and Neelie on another rescue mission, this time a magnificent tusker (a male elephant) to its heartwarming conclusion.
And if you order this week, i may get a chance to make it on the bestseller list. Now, wouldn't that be something!
An Inconvenient Elephant
It's out. My new book, book number three, i'm happy, i love it, and i know you will, too. It's the sequel to Still Life with Elephant, although the new book stands alone as a novel.
You'll meet Diamond-Rose Tremaine, a gal from the African bush who never quite gets the hang of domestication after she gets back to the states. And you will accompany her and Neelie on another rescue mission, this time a magnificent tusker (a male elephant) to its heartwarming conclusion.
And if you order this week, i may get a chance to make it on the bestseller list. Now, wouldn't that be something!
An Inconvenient Elephant
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
An eye for an eye and my new book
So the eye is healing, thank you to all of you who wrote me an enote either on facebook or my email and wished me good vision. I am down to just a few lonely black specks floating around the nether regions, still lots of blurriness and one spider web. I've been good about taking care of myself, doing only the heavy lifting required of holding my new book, An Inconvenient Elephant, which is coming out the end of this month. How's that for a segue? the cover looks great and i am grateful to Robin Stears of WildAss productions for designing it and putting it together. My understanding is that Robin used to rescue wild horses and donkeys, etc and named her company after those wonderful creatures. It's a delightful cover of an elephant being ridden by a woman,you can check it out up there somewhere if i didn't mess up the URL.
As you know, the weather has been beyond hot. I don't dare step outside my air conditioned office for fear of bursting into flames, it's that hot. I fully expect all those who poo-poohed global warming to immediately issue a full apology to the rest of us and jump on the band wagon to help do something about it.
Hope all your eyeballs heal, the hot weather breaks and we can get on with summer.
As you know, the weather has been beyond hot. I don't dare step outside my air conditioned office for fear of bursting into flames, it's that hot. I fully expect all those who poo-poohed global warming to immediately issue a full apology to the rest of us and jump on the band wagon to help do something about it.
Hope all your eyeballs heal, the hot weather breaks and we can get on with summer.
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