Observations from the Window 4.14

Something about the coming of spring, the official sunny warm walk outside without a jacket coming of spring, that puts me in a mood. I don't know what the right word is to describe it. Sexy, sensual, passionate, alive. Not that I don't feel this way other times, its just that the feeling is so magnified this time of year. An all consuming urge to explore and enjoy life, to go out and create.

It makes me want to fill the tub with my fav Bath and Body Works Black Amethyst bubble bath scented with bergamot and sandalwood. Do the whole routine with bubble bath, body wash, and spray. Take a long warm bath with the door open so the sun falls through the window into the bath. The slightest bit of steam rises from the water so the scent fills the room as I just lean back with a towel behind my head and soak with jazz quietly playing in the background.

It make me want to sit on the bed in my silk robe and do my nails with China Glaze midnight seduction, another fav. I won’t even bother straightening my hair, which seems so cold weather, just pull in back in a wild mess of black curls. Than just a last spritz of body spray before I pull on some grungy clothes and a pair of flip-flops. I'm ready to go out and take some pics.

Not that I did all that, no never.

W. Somerset Maugham wrote "It’s a very funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it."

So much truer in the spring.

Observations on Politics 4.13, TBFM

I may have mentioned before that I have a temper but I don't dwell on it because lately I’ve been doing a good job of keeping it under control. Well last night I was looking at headlines when I came across one that just made me want to scream or honestly just smack her. "Michele Bachman calls for criminalization of same-sex marriage during speech in Iowa." (l)

During a speech to the right-wing and anti-gay group The Family Leader Bachmann called Planned Parenthood the "LensCrafters of big abortion" and than said this, "In 5,000 years of recorded human history, neither in the east or in the west, has any society ever defined marriage as anything other than between men and women."

What a totally ignorant bitch. Numerous societies have a broader definition of marriage or family than that and a broader understanding of human sexuality than purely heterosexual. To me faith-based is in such direct opposition to fact-based that it starts to approach pathology. "If I believe it strongly enough, it's true!"  Iraq had WMD's, Obama is a foreign born Muslim socialist and the founding fathers wanted the American government to be based on a narrow, radical and extreme interpretation of the Bible. Believe it? It's true.

Igor Volsky of Think Progress was there and asked the Minnesota congresswoman if she agreed with the stance of group head Bob Vander Plaats that homosexuality is a risky lifestyle akin to smoking. Bachman's answer was "Um. I don’t have an answer on that. I don’t have an answer. Why don’t I have another question." Because you are so damn pathetic you don't deserve another question.

Bachman often quotes this verse from the Bible, "You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination" (Leviticus 18:22). Personally I think the first part of it is might be true, it's much better with a woman, but I have no first hand experience with a man to base that on so please no e-mails. The larger abomination here is that Bachman was elected to Congress at all and that she is taken seriously as a contender for the Republican nomination for President of the United States.

From this moment on I will simply refer to Bachman as 'TBFM' or  That bitch from Minnesota.

Observations from the Coffee Shop 4.10

This should have been posted as 'Observations from my Bed' but I was busy and never finished it. It would have been much more fitting a title though.

Sometimes I have dreams when I sleep. I know that is a strange thing to say but normally I don’t have them. There was a time that I did more often but that was long ago. I don’t know if it's the fact that I don’t sleep nearly enough, I drink too much, or if it is something related to my past as a pharmacist. I have never asked anybody why.

When I do dream it is almost always one of two ways. Some are very hot and sexy but I should add that I'm always alone in those dreams. I have been told that these dreams may come from a struggle to find a balance between the genders in my personality. The mystery lover of the night trying to show me the right balance of firm and gentle, bold and caring, yin and yang. It sounds a little deep but it could be true, who am I to say.

The other type I can only describe as an abstract type of dream. Physically I'm not in them but yet I am, or maybe you could say my soul is in them. I tend to style my life and art in shades of black and white yet these dreams are always colorful and graphic. I think of them as my inspirational dreams because they sometimes give me an idea for a painting or a shot I could take even if it has nothing to do with the dream itself.

The rarest form of dream I have is a combination of those two. You could say it's the most enjoyable of the three and that is where this post came from because I had one of those dreams last night. When I woke up I had what I think was an awesome idea which I'll post as an update later tonight. Rare as they are I have always thought that my dreams try to tell me something, it's just that I don’t always know what it is and I don't always listen if I do know.


"falling Down"

4/11 update - I stumbled on this quote by John Steinbeck that seemed to belong with this post. "People who are most afraid of their dreams convince themselves they don't dream at all." No comment.

Observations on Politics and the Coming Shutdown

Some random thoughts on the government shutdown from my increasingly disillusioned mind as we approach 'zero hour' tonight at midnight ….

The fact that the Republicans and their teabagger members will shut down the federal government over the funding of Planned Parenthood strikes me as insanity or political theatre at its absolute worst. They keep saying it doesn't have to be debated today yet they don't offer to take the rider out of the budget bill.

I still miss Keith Olbermann but I'm finding that Lawrence O'Donnell is a worthy replacement. In some ways I like him more than Keith, he seems to be more in your face than Keith and less obsessed with Fox News. Still Olbermann's show on Current TV is slated to start in late May or June and I'll be watching from day one.

It has just amazes me to see so many young, healthy, rich white men debate women's health. All they seem to be proving is how little they know about it and how much less they care. They should know that Planned Parenthood can't spend any federal money it receives on abortion but it doesn’t seem to matter at all. So what does it spend the money on or what is it they want to cut? Teen pregnancy services, diabetes testing, breast cancer screening, and pap smears to name a few. I guess they think the oil companies deserve our money more.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor reminds me of the spoiled little rich kid on the playground. The bratty kid who was so full of himself because his parents would do or get anything for him and always had that I’m better than you smile on his face. The little shit that would run home and tell daddy when the weird girl yelled at him because nobody else would. Anyway, Cantor reminds me of that little shit, I mean kid.

Finally a question, who do you think would make a better President, Donald or Daffy Duck?

18:00 update - Going to share a bad joke I just received in an email. I'm not sure if I am saying it's bad because it isn't funny or because it's all too true. "What does the Republican party have in common with the Taliban? Both want to use terrorism to take away women's rights and return us to the world as it was like 1000 years ago. Difference? Republicans don't demand a burka.

Observations from the Window 4.8

A beautiful morning in the Village, sunny and not quite as cold as it has been, but I’m still waiting on the arrival of spring. The trees below are covered with buds, my vendor is back to selling all his tourist paraphernalia, even the pigeons are primped and ready but the weekend weather forecast dropped that magic 70° mark. Still it’s a gorgeous sunny morning as I watch the people rush up and down the street. Gorgeous enough to declare it a work from home day, which means I will accomplish nought but so be it.

I feel like going for a walk but yet I don’t want to move. I feel like eating but I’m afraid to look in the fridge to see what might or might not be in it. Work from home normally means answering email, washing the black stuff, doing some cleaning, and maybe running up to market for food but for now I just feel like sitting here and watching the people pass by.

I was just thinking about writing, how much I seem to be addicted to it. I remember when I finished writing my 700 page ‘paper’ to finish my degree; I swore I would never write that much ever again. But here I am typing away about nothing in particular and doing it without even thinking about it. I just sit with my netbook on my lap and type away just to see what I come up with. It really doesn’t seem like it’s going to be anything profound today.

I do know one thing about all this typing, it’s just hell on my nails. There was a time not so long ago when I was just so proud of them. Long, black, and glimmering; the word immaculate comes to mind. Even sports didn’t seem to hurt them because that’s what gloves are for and I had quite a collection of hockey gloves. All black and all leather. But now my nails look like crap and I think I need to start spending more time on them or maybe just start chewing.

I warned you this wasn’t going to be anything profound. Maybe I should declare it a work from bed day instead.

3 Doors Down - When You're Young

Observations from the Coffee Shop 4.5

Just a copy of the transcript of Chris Matthews' final segment on "Hard Ball" last night. I don't usually just post other peoples words but I thought this was very good on the day President Obama announced his re-election bid. I wish there was somebody to push him just a little but I don't see who it could be in the Republican Party. I think it's a political party that has truly sold its soul to the rich, the corporations, and the far right religious zealots. I don't see how it can ever turn back now.

"Let Me Finish tonight with what I see happening to one of this country‘s historic political parties. The Republican Party has given us great moderate leaders in the past: Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower. It‘s given us flawed leaders who are nonetheless great Americans, I think of Ulysses S. Grant, for example, who won the Civil War and was a true believer in reconstruction after the war.

I don‘t know where the tradition I‘ve just described broke off and this new thing took over. I think it was passage of the Civil Rights bill back in ‘64, when the enemies of civil rights flipped from the party of Jefferson to the party of Strom Thurmond. Or maybe it was the Supreme Court ruling banning prayer in public school. But what we have today is a different, deeply different, Republican Party than the one that fought slavery and championed conservation in the old days.

I listen to Palin and Gingrich and Bachmann and Huckabee and what they believe. I listen to Romney and Pawlenty and now Trump trying to talk their language and I think we‘re talking something very different from the mainstream Republicanism, the kind that has long won in the independent, moderate suburbs, won with the people I grew up with, with my family, actually. Palin talks like thinking isn‘t necessary; it may not even be good for people. Gingrich uses his mind to say truly hateful things. Huckabee is a theocrat, someone who statements about the Mideast are downright incendiary. Mitt Romney knows better. So does Pawlenty. I‘d hate to see Haley Barbour start dueling in these woods. He might be smart enough to beat those folks at their own game.

But beware, Haley, or anyone else who‘s thinking of joining the jamboree. The evidence out there is that the Republican Party today, you can‘t say you believe in science, you can‘t say you believe in evolution or in climate change or in gay rights, or even in separation of church and state. If you do, you lose the zealots, and the zealots will be waiting for you in Iowa to make sure you eat your words.

John McCain tried to beat them, the zealots, once. The family values types went after his family. George Bush‘s father tried to take them on. Ronald Reagan managed to charm them, but he was a rarity. The danger today is that the only way to win the Republican Party presidential nomination is to get past the gatekeepers of the right, and they aren‘t looking to let anybody past who isn‘t dead right like them.

Maybe this is God‘s will, that Obama not have a reasonable opponent out there. How‘s that for an incendiary statement?"

Observations

Observations from the Road 4.4

Saturday was the first day of trout season in southeastern Pennsylvania. It seemed early but that is because starting this year it opens two weeks earlier in the southeastern part of the state than it does in the rest, something to do with warmer temperatures. As I cast my first line I thought that was a lot of bs because the air temp was a balmy 42° when I arrived at the stream. It didn’t seem to bother my dad at all because he was standing in the middle of the water which might explain why he caught dinner and I didn't.

It was just another one of those fun family things with my dad that once prompted a not so open minded friend of his to ask if my dad had ever had any daughters. He learned a long time ago not to let comments like that bother him and instead seems roll with it. I don’t know why but my dad just doesn't have that smart ass gene that his three children seem to have inherited.

As I wasn't about to touch my camera with bait stained fingers I'll try and describe the scene. In ways the four of us are so alike, and very close, but at moments like this the differences in personalities are so damn apparent. You have my dad who is knee deep in the stream and so totally serious about his fly fishing. He never has let on but I swear he must have taken that fly fishing class at Penn State. My sis seems to be the best at multi-tasking, that girl can cast with one hand, text with the other, and I let her know I’m suitably impressed. I think I'd have my line wrapped around my neck and my phone in the water. Now that I think about it my brother isn’t too bad at multi-tasking either. He seems able to listen to music with one ear and listen to the rest of us with the other. At the same time he did refuse to get his new Timberland boots wet and so fished from the bank. Not quite as serious about it as my dad but if any of us could ever be described as stoic it's him.

And than there is me. No I don't fish in a leather jacket, actually the only black I had on was an old Flyers warm-up pullover and the Under Armour hoody under it. I didn’t fish much, always the observer I just sat on a rock taking it all in and enjoying the moment. Maybe I'm wrong about Sean, maybe I'm the stoic one. I didn’t catch anything, my excuse being that I didn't try, but I did make a dinner of Cajun trout. Sear trout covered with Emeril's Cajun seasoning in an iron skillet than throw in the oven with green peppers, jalapeños, onions, diced tomatoes, and bacon. Yes that is pretty much how I cook so I don't expect miracles but it wasn't bad, wasn't bad at all.

I have an awesome recipe for salmon too. Just sayin.

The Kills - Satellite 

Observations from the Window 4.1

It seems I’ve been downer blogging lately so in attempt to purge it from my mind I'm going to tell you some things I like. Things that make me feel good. Just things that go a long way towards making my life worth living.

Pancakes covered in syrup and fresh strawberries, steak, big greasy cheese and jalapeño covered hamburgers. Real Philly cheesesteaks, and not the damn chicken ones. My own chili, both the red and the white versions. Ice cold Corona with lime, tequila on ice, and hot Sidamo coffee. French fries covered with Old Bay seasoning or covered with chili and cheese. Seafood burritos or breakfast pizza on the boardwalk. Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia ice cream.

I adore my family and friends, all my friends, in both my real life and my 'second' life. All the people I have met online, so many and all of them such awesome peeps. When either the kid or the sis call me just to say hi and watching a Phillies games with my dad. An intelligent conversation and even more than that I like an intelligent argument. Taking very hot steamy bubble baths with candles lit, wine, and jazz playing. Yes I said jazz; you have a problem with that? Anderson Cooper.

I love the feeling I get when i finish a painting or go through a hundred shots to find that one photo that makes me smile. The look on somebody's face when they see something I did and I know they like it. The feel of my Nikon in my hand and the smell of a new canvas. Losing hours in a museum or gallery just sitting and looking at a painting and taking in every little bit of it. Van Gogh. Moma. The Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Sports, both playing and watching. The Phillies, Flyers, Eagles, and always Penn State. Running or just walking on the beach, ice skating. Stone Harbor, Fred's, and spending time doing nothing at the beach house. Waking up on the deck under the stars and hearing the waves crash on the beach. Beaver Stadium on a cool fall night, white out nights, and driving much faster than I should. Waxing Foxy.

Waxing Foxy ....

Sometimes life is good.

Finger Eleven - Whatever Doesn't Kill Me

The Story of Hena

In this sometimes sad evil world we live in I honestly find it hard to be shocked by anything I see on the news. Call me cold if you must but I sometimes just expect the worst out of my fellow human beings. But having said this I also have to say that the story of 14 year old Hena Akhter brought tears to my eyes. It's quite possibly one of the saddest stories I have ever heard and one I feel the need to pass on.

Hena was a Bangladeshi girl who was attacked by an older man when she went to an outdoor toilet. She was than bound, gagged, and raped by that man who turned out to be her 42 year old cousin, Mahbub Khan. The wife of the Khan saw it happen but instead of helping Hena she dragged her to their hut where she beat her. The imam of the local mosque found Hena guilty of adultery and ordered she be punished and a ramshackle local court sentenced her to 100 lashes in a public whipping. Hena continued to plead her innocence as she was led to the village square for the sentence to be carried out. A CNN blog post said that the parents “had no choice but to mind the imam’s order. They watched as the whip broke the skin of their youngest child and she fell unconscious to the ground.” She dropped after 70 lashes and died in a hospital a week later.

Immediately following her death doctors recorded it as a suicide because women and girls who are raped are supposed to commit suicide to spare the family, I would say the men of the family, embarrassment. Currently these doctors and others, including Khan, are under arrest and investigation because Bangladesh outlawed Sharia and fatwas over ten years ago. The United Nations estimates that almost half of Bangladeshi women suffer from domestic violence and many also commonly endure rape, beatings, and death because of the country’s male dominated system.

I can think of no definition of the word crime that Hena could have been found guilty of. You may have figured out by now that I am in no way a religious girl, quite the opposite. At the same time I won’t fault somebody their religion as long as they don’t try to force it on me but after this I think the mere sight of the word Sharia will make me sick. Sharia justified the absolutely inhumane whipping to death of a young girl who committed no crime at all. It seems to me her only crime was being born a female in a male dominated society.

Hena wasn’t even old enough to get married.

Observations

Alye Pollack, a 13-year-old girl in Connecticut, posted an absolutely haunting video where she, without ever speaking a word, describes the bullying she has endured every day since 6th grade. Titled "Words are worse than Sticks and Stones," the video has had more than 150,000 hits since it was posted on March 14.

"For inquiries, please send an email to wordsdohurt@gmail.com
and not directly to Alye. Thank you, her family."

Observations from the Library 3.30

I dont know why I am doing this but here are a few things that just totally irritate me. Maybe it's like a spring cleaning for my head ....

I hate when somebody is painting with good brushes than just drops them in a can of solvent, doesn't clean them, just drops them in the can. Kolinsky sable hair filberts are not just brushes and they deserve better than sharing a can with the brush that you used to spread latex on the wall.

It drives me crazy when people smoke while they drive than just toss the cigarette out the window. Nothing like cruising down the interstate on a dark night only to have a cigarette butt hit your windshield and explode in a shower of sparks. And while I'm on the subject of smoking I absolutely can't stand second hand smoke. I know I have smoked for years but it's true. Smoke filled bars or clubs just give me a headache, I rarely if ever smoke inside, and don't even get me started on smoking in the car with the windows up.

I think I remember now why I started this, supposedly well educated people who refuse to believe President Obama was born in the Hawaii or is a citizen of the US. Yesterday I got into a discussion with somebody who turned out to have way more conservative views than I have. So I asked him where he thought President Obama was born. Kenya was the answer I got and it was as if a trip wire in my head had been yanked. I just don't know how to deal with people like that and I ended the discussion right there.

I have a theory on this whole 'birther' thing. Personally I think that it is just pure racism and ignorance wrapped in the American flag to make it more presentable. Seriously, if you are so damn sure Obama isn’t a citizen just impeach him, take it to court, do something other than bitch and whine about it. If they can try to impeach Clinton for not having sexual relations with that girl surely you can impeach Obama for lying about his birth place. But that is only if you are sure about it; otherwise please just shut the hell up.

And than there are those modern day robber barons at GE, Exxon, and and ....

Iggy Pop feat. Sum 41 - Little Know It All

Observations from the Gallery 3.28

This will probably be a rather short post because I'm about to try something new. I downloaded the Google Blogger app for my Droid today. I wanted to try it out so I think this will be my first ever posting by phone. I have no idea how it is going to look when published and the app doesn't have a spell checker so I may be doomed from the start but I still must try.

Another thing missing is the ability to edit previously published posts. That is nothing totally Earth shattering but it means I can't keep a running post going by phone, unless I can save and post over and over, I must ponder that one. But for now yes, just another app on my phone.

Soon I'm going to need one of those newer droids that can run more than one app at a time. Now I have blog apps, sports apps, mail apps, twitter, facebook, music; what the hell did we do before we had apps on our phones?

Well it's time to hit the publish button and see what happens. Hopefully the world doesn't come to an end.

(I did learn one thing, don't try and use code, it doesn't work. On top of that don't try and fix it if you do try and use code, it just makes a mess of it)

Observations from the Edge 3.27

I was finishing a day of shopping with a friend when I got one of those calls I sometimes get. She called just to hear me answer, to see if I was alright, basically to see if I was alive. There was a time when the calls bothered me, I thought people didn't trust me, but I learned over time it wasn't a matter of trust but that the caller cared and really just wanted to make sure I was well.

Sadly there was another reason for the call. She had just lost an acquaintance who she told me was the smartest person she had ever met in her life yet she had never seen a day when he wasn't wasted on something. He was a star lacrosse and soccer player in high school and in a gifted student program all his life. He was attending a major university where he had been awarded an honors scholarship to study psychology.

Now he is dead, he overdosed on a mixture of heroin and fentanyl* which is otherwise known as magic. I recently read somewhere that a one dose bag of heroin is cheaper than a six pack of beer, it really is a messed up world we live in. Such a terrible sad fucking waste.

I really don't mind the calls at all.

*If you don't know fentanyl is a synthetic opiate about eighty times as powerful as morphine and the use of it and heroin together is a hundred times more likely to lead to overdose and death than the use of either alone.