Scratchings and Jotlings on Books, Houses, Pets, Art, the Exigencies of Daily Existence, and Other Ephemera
It’s Seattle.
We’re moving to Seattle.
Steve came up for Christmas and jaunted up there for the second interview. They gave him what he asked for, and want him to start on the 19th.
Moving is going to be a logistical nightmare, but I’m very excited. I was resigned to the prospect of moving to L.A., but not utterly thrilled.
Funny thing: Dana and I were walking, and she said, “I knew you’re moving to L.A., but I see you living in Seattle.”
Twas the day before Christmas, and all through the kitchen
Zia was stressing: chopping and mixing.
The groceries were bought, with veggies and a ham
But Dana just told her she hasn’t ordered the lamb.
It’s dinner for fourteen, and possibly fifteen
so back to the store for more grocery lifting.
We’ve got pie and ice cream, meat and potatoes
Gotta get salad stuff with lots of tomatoes.
What was she thinking? Is she insane?
Of Mike’s existence she is the bane.
But all will work out, all will be fine
Since everyone’s bringing plenty of wine.
I would like to quote Tom Ridge in his recent remarks on putting the U.S. on Code Orange for the fifth time since 9/11:
And finally, no matter your faith or your culture, we know that now is the time of year for very, very important personal and family and community celebrations. So I encourage you to continue with your holiday plans. Gather with your family and friends and enjoy the spirit of the season.
There is no doubt that those of us fortunate to live in this country have a lot to be thankful for, not the least of which is the opportunity to live in the greatest country in the world.
America is a country that will not be bent by terror. America is a country that will not be broken by fear. But instead, America is a country blessed with citizens marked by goodwill and great resolve.
We will show the terrorists both during this holiday season goodwill toward our fellow men, and readiness and resolve to protect our families and our freedoms.
Yeah, the season’s important if you come from a Judeo-Christian background. Screw Hindus, Buddhists, Shintoists (is that a word) and Wiccans. Especially screw the Muslims. We’re fighting against them anyway, right?
And the greatest country in the world? I’m getting really tired of this patriotism-turned-rabid-nationalism that has overtaken the White House, and, indeed, the whole country. Especially since it seems to rely on a simplistic fundamentalist viewpoint.
How can anyone possibly say that we will not be “bent by terror” or “broken by fear.” Give me a break.
On my regular jaunts to visit Steve, it takes me longer to get through the damn security than it does to get to L.A. (Plus, anyone who WANTS to can get something through. I travelled to Indianapolis this summer with an unsheathed deadly two-pronged wine opener in my backpack–and no one said a thing.)
There’s a sign at the library that informs patrons that their records can be searched by government officials–and that library staff are not permitted to disclose whether they have been or not.
Visas are being denied to students and workers from certain countries.
And now, visitors to the U.S. will be fingerprinted as though they’re common criminals.
If that’s not showing we’re buckling under fear, I don’t know what does. And what puzzles me is that so many people are FINE with all this.
Does anyone else see the contradiction in the fact that it appears those who are FOR the Homeland Security Bill are also those who tend to be anti-government control, or, in other words, Republicans?
How much better would this country be if we spent some of those financial resources into something that could make a tangible difference, like nationalized or subsidized healthcare?
The fact of the matter is that the 9/11 attack worked: We are absolutely terrified. So terrified, in fact, that the majority of Americans have offered up their privacy and civil liberties on a platter. The voices of those who object don’t seem to matter.
(It IS the majority, right? That’s something to ponder, right there.)
And about Christmas tree lights. Dana and I have been walking at night looking at the displays. Some are pretty, some are incredibly tacky. And far too many people have those horrible head-moving deer …
Well, just finished Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake. It was good. It was an interesting read. I enjoyed it thoroughly. BUT. There was something missing, and I’m not sure what.
I have a purely subjective way of determining whether I thought a book was important. Some books, you close the cover and rarely think about again. Others, you find yourself sitting ruminating on what you’ve just read. The former are those I rarely think about again. The latter, I come back to.
I was surprised to find that I just closed the cover on the book. There were some v. interesting themes–themes that resonated with me–and the writing was beautiful. But I felt that halfway through the book, she somehow lost the thread of who Gogol was. He bumbled his way through the second half of the book, and the ending itself was too neatly tied up. She writes most convincingly about the parents; with them, she is on solid ground,. However, when it comes to the adult Gogol her own blurred identity starts to seep through.
All in all, I would recommend this book for the writing alone, but it really can’t hold a candle to Interpreter of Maladies.
Just finished reading Gregory Maguire’s Mirror Mirror–and while I enjoyed, I have to say that Wicked remains my favorite.
“Nickel and Dimed” still out–but managed to pick up Jhumpa Lahiri’s new one. I can’t wait to dive into that one. I’ve read mixed reviews.
Ode to a 404
Thou still unravish’d page of stillness
Thou foster-child of a missing link
Intrepid Explorer, which canst not express
A web page more worthy on which to think.
What page were your efforts trying–
whether typo, a transposition or both–
On my web site or the internet as a whole?
What page is this? What webbish growth?
What mistaken address? What page dying?
But try again for a page that will scroll.
The L.A. Times is running a series of articles on Wal-Mart. I promise I’m not going to get mouthy … I’ll let this do it for me.
Okay, today seems to be my rant day.
They’re fighting about whether the morning after pill should be made available without a prescription. Opponents say it will make young women rely on the morning after pill as a form of birth control and reduce the number of teens seeing a doctor for birth control.
Now, is it just me, or are those most fervently anti-abortion also fervently anti-pregnancy prevention? Get real: condoms break. And Stuff that Shouldn’t Happen happens anyway. This is a good OPTION after the dirty deed has been done.
Regarding the argument that it would reduce the number of teens going to a doctor for BC, well, that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Any doctor worth his salt wouldn’t send a teen away without a bagload of condoms–which can be bought at any drugstore once they’ve gotten over their initial embarassment. Are they going to try to make condoms available only with a prescription now? Wouldn’t surprise me.
Here’s one thing I simply don’t understand: why people are planning to vote for Nader.
Okay, maybe they like what he stands for, but the fact of the matter is that it just siphons off people who would ordinarily vote for the Democratic candidate. C’mon people! Let’s get Bush out of office. That should be our number one priority. Every time I hear him speak, I just cringe and wonder what insanity got him elected. Oh wait … yeah, that’s right … he WASN’T elected.
Stayed up far too late last night reading two more Sujata Massey books. Mike caught another one of the squirrels scrabbling about in the walls and we drove it up to Camel’s Back Park and let it out. Then ran up to the airport to change the freebie ticket into Steve’s name. Now I need to finish the assignment for my writing group, mail Steve’s ticket and then buy Christmas presents. Every year, say NO MORE PRESENTS, but alas, it never seems to work out.
Saddam Hussein has been caught, which brings up the issue of how to treat war criminals, and I’ve just finished reading Sujata Massey’s “The Samurai’s Daughter,” which centers around reparations for wartime atrocities. Funny how things always come together like that. It was a pretty good book, and I really liked the main character because she’s a bit of a brat. Should come as no surprise that I related. Especially the part about being a vegetarian for long after she really wanted to. Next on the list is “Nickel and Dimed.”
Looks like Steve will probably get up here for Christmas. Makes me happy. I was getting very lonely thinking about the holidays without him.
Been on a movie kick this week. Saw “I Captured the Castle” last night. (I would post the link, but it’s not working.) Never having read the book, I enjoyed the movie, but it was eminently forgettable even though it was populated with bizarre characters. Tara Fitzgerald was amazing as Topaz, the career muse who disrobed in the wild for “release.”
If you haven’t already seen Sylvia, don’t bother. Half an hour into it, I was fervently praying that she would go ahead and gas herself.
To be fair, I went to the movie fully expecting to hate it. The last movie I saw Gwyneth Paltrow in was Possession, my absolutely favorite A.S. Byatt novel. She was lousy in that too–but at least some of the onus was taken off her by an awful script that took terrible liberties with the story. But I had to go to Sylvia anyway. And then, having paid for the ticket, felt compelled to stay until the bitter end. And bitter it was.
Singlehandedly, Paltrow managed to turn Sylvia Plath into a whining, self-indulgent woman I just wanted to smack. She cries, stares mournfully into space, rocks back and forth at her desk, and doesn’t brush her hair. But at no point does she manage to portray mental illness or depression in a way that gained the audience’s sympathy. I came away thinking, “Wow. And all that for the breakup of a marriage? Get into therapy and get over it!”
One of my main objections to Paltrow is that she always seems to be playing the same character: herself. She also shows stubborn unwillingness to be anything other than pretty on the screen. With any close-up, the glint in her eye seems to say, “And don’t I look nice playing this role?” Indeed the most powerful scenes in the movie were those in which she allowed herself to be ugly. Unfortunately, these were few and far between–and believe me, I was counting the seconds.
“Winter Laps” returned with a form letter rejection. Now to send it out again. Got a groovy little freeware app, Writer’s Database, that tracks submissions. It’s a little clunky, but works fine for my purposes.
Much as we would like to think our tastes change on the boyfriend continuum, the fact of the matter is that they don’t. I went over to Chris’ again last night (night 2/2), and after Dana and I walked dogs, went into the kitchen to make tea. Opened the silverware drawer for a spoon… and realized it looked EXACTLY like Steve’s. The silverware was perfectly sorted into compartments. There were outsized implements to the right. And there, tucked into the very front, were the fortune cookie extras, in exactly the same place Steve puts them.
Maybe everyone keeps their chinese takeout extras in their silverware drawer. Personally, the fortune cookies never last for very long with me around; I munch one after the next, and then choose the fortune I like the best.
Chris and I ordered three dishes and two appetizers in a restaurant in San Francisco’s Chinatown. This was very early in the relationship, and we felt like celebrating, translating our happiness into a largesse we could put in our mouths, swallow. Our waiter said nothing at our extravagance, but his lips thinned in a disapproval we didn’t understand until our table was groaning with steaming platters larger than anything we’d ever seen. Even the extended Chinese family next to us looked over from their round table, the grandmother pointing, the mother looking up from serving the chattering men, and the two pretty daughters sipping Coke through dark, dark lipstick.
We hardly made a dent in the platters, but we laughed. And later that night, tucked into our hotel on the hill, we would wish we had taken the leftovers, because we were hungry again. We ate and ate, and at the end of the meal, the waiter whisked the dishes away and presented two fortune cookies and the bill. I reached for them both.
“No,” Chris said. “Let me. I want the air miles.” He slid a card out of his wallet, and I let him because I was 23, had no money and was moving to India on my savings. But I took a fortune cookie in each hand and held them behind my back.
“Choose.”
He chose the right and cracked his fortune open, the future yawning wide. So I took the left, and did the same. We had the same fortunes. “You will marry the person you are with, and lead a happy life.” We put them in our wallets; it was a sign.
I moved to India two months later, moved back six months after that into an apartment where he let me rearrange all the furniture. We got a dog from the pound and split all expenses right down the middle. Congratulated ourelved on our fortunes until they crackled with self-righteousness and we landed on a therapist’s couch.
Finally, I carted my possessions carload by carload into a huge, cold apartment, the fortune tucked safely into my wallet until I threw it on a canvas of other lost objects: frayed string and bent nails, my old mailing address and expired Marigold seeds, the key to our apartment.
Steve had the Seattle interview yesterday. Called me from the airport, utterly puzzled by what he said was the weirdest interview ever. He flew in and drove to the site. Two guys, no time, pinging questions at him for about fifteen minutes. Then they left, and he spent more time filling out all the mandatory paperwork–yes, you can drug test me, yes you can check to see if I have a criminal record–than he did with them. But they talked salaries, moving expenses etc. His take was neither positive nor negative. We’ll see. I’ve allowed myself to start thinking about Seattle realistically, but might have to reel myself in a little.
Trundled over to Chris’ house last night to dogsit Jenny, and staying there was a better option simply because Sadie has her food out here and nibbles all day. With the pancreatitis, Jenny has to be on a very low fat diet and gets awfully sick if she eats regular food. In any case, it was strange. His new house is SO beautiful, but it was still weird staying at my ex-boyfriend’s. Told Steve the plan yesterday, and he, naturally, responded with, “I’m going to kick his ass.”
