Message to Fuzzy, left on his voicemail:

Hey, Fuzz, it's me.
Now, I need to tell you something, and you need to promise not to yell.

You know how the Alpha guy reminded us to refill the pool?
Well, I did…except…

I kind of over-filled it.
I kind of over-filled it a lot.

Specifically, I overfilled it enough that the deep end is sort of, well, overflowing.

And the raft managed to beach itself:

Love you!

Bye!

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TJ of Zazzafooky asked me some questions, which I'm answering here.

1. When you were a kid, did you have an imaginary friend? If so, describe.
   When I was two or three I had an imaginary friend named Taffy, and I know I blamed her for stuff I'd done, but I don't remember much more. When I was three, my grandparents gave me a poodle puppy, and we named her Taffy, and the imaginary Taffy disappeared, but it's a funny thing, the dog had all the same mischievous traits that the imaginary human had possessed.
2. What is the worst sinful thing you've ever done that you were never caught for.
   All the really awful things, like hiring hit-men when I was nine, or eating all the communion wafers when I was three, were discovered. The most sinful after that? I can't really answer this knowing that my mother and husband read my blog ;) Let's just say, I knew he was married, and I slept with him anyway, but I was very young, and very stupid at the time.
3. What is the greatest contribution you have made to society?
   Not breeding? (I kid.) I don't know. I've put my body on the line to help protect reproductive choice; I think that's important. I vote. I participate in things like the blogathon, which are attempts to do good work. I don't think it's really possible to know the impact of one person while they're still alive and relatively young.
4. Describe the worst boyfriend/mate you've ever had and what made you part.
   He was a jazz musician, with all the sterotypical fickleness that such a career implies. He made amazing music, but he also made some scary choices. The fact that he slept with men as well as women wasn't the deal breaker. The fact that he didn't tell me, was. And then, years later, he was busted for pedophelia, which has got to be an a-list item of fucked-up behavior. And yet, even the worst relationships still bring something good to your life in terms of lessons or new discoveries. I took away from it a deep and abiding love of jazz and blues, ballads and standards, and that still informs my musical choices today, fifteen years later.
5. What would people most NOT like about you? What would they most LIKE?
   NOT LIKE: I'm fundamentally pretty boring. I'm shy. I can be prickly. And I have a definite bossy streak. I clam up in large groups.
   
   LIKE: It truly is a wonderment that anyone likes me at all. I've no idea why. I can be generous, I guess. And sometimes I'm funny, but the shyness overwhelms that. You tell me?

David Sosnowski
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I always enjoy a good vampire story, so when I saw Vamped staring at me from the library shelf, I had to take it home.

In this alternate future, the only humans left are farm-raised for uber-rich vampires (all the others have been vamped already), and a single box of Count Chocula goes for several hundred dollars on ebay. Then Marty, an eighty year old vampire, and the person who was responsible for the vamping of the world, finds a five year old mortal child on the run from one of the farms, and instead of killing her, or vamping her into a Screamer (as other child-vamps are called), he decides to raise her as his daughter.

Plot twists and romance are woven through the story, but the parts that I enjoyed most were the descriptions of societal changes – grocery stores selling mainly bleach and laundry detergent, and apartments built without toilets, for example.

Permalink at Zenitopia.com

Queen Noor
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I borowed this from a friend about a month ago because she seemed to really enjoy it, and I wasn't disappointed in the least, though I did take forever to really begin reading it, which is rare for me.

In most respects, this is a fairly straightforward tale of the way an American girl named Lisa ends up being Queen Noor of Jordan, and that part of the book was interesting enough. But the first-hand explanations of the political, cultural, and social climate in that part of the world, from the early seventies to today, was really what gripped me.

The events are all well-known to most of us.
The perspective is new, and interesting.

Permalink at Zenitopia.com

Michele asks, “Why do you blog?”

In all honesty, there are some days when I look at the WRITE screen in WordPress and think, “You should be working on stuff to submit somewhere, not playing at journalism,” but the thing is, despite my love of the written word, and despite all the best intentions and a small fortune invested in spiffy looking blank books over the years, I'm really bad at keeping a personal diary. I blog, at least in part, because having an audience, no matter how small, makes me accountable to some external force.

Then, too, there's my Productivity Rule: I must do ONE PRODUCTIVE THING every day. Writing in a paper journal doesn't count, but a blog entry does. I'm not sure why. I guess it's the accountability issue again.

So part of why I blog is that I'm not disciplined enough to keep a normal diary.

But the other part is that these unedited glimpses into my daily life are a form of connection to other people. I've had so many interesting conversations, as a result of writing here, or following a thread elsewhere, and it's helping me to be less shy.

And I really am basically shy.

Truly.

And then there's the “writing practice” reason. Even if I'm not working on something specific, throwing some words on this virtual page helps me improve my writing skills, helps spark ideas for things that I CAN submit to actual literary journals, helps me find new directions, and new ways of saying things.

Mostly, though, I do it because it's fun.

Permalink at MissMeliss.com

I'm in a bit of a pissy and ranty mood today, so it's been a challenge to come up with items for the Happiness Challenge, and yet, I've managed to find two.

First, I'm happy because I have friends who not only listen, but actually try to help, when I'm in pissy and ranty moods.

Second, I'm happy because I posted a piece of flash-fiction on a critique board. Openly inviting critique is somehow different than posting to my own blog, though, I'm open to critique on anything at MoonChilde.com, as long as said critique is constructive.

Permalink at MissMeliss.com