shiskoza

Tumped over.

I am average.

I don't mean that as a self-deprecating comment, I am pleased as pie to be average, a woman who is the average height (five feet four inches) and average weight (well, plus thirty pounds, maybe) and average income, average driving habits, average vices, perhaps a more-than-average backside but whatever, and yet there is one average I never counted on. (Being divorced, of course.)

These days I think a lot about loving. You'd suppose that based upon my recent history I might think a lot about self-advancement or fun places to vacation or Getting Back At Him or should I lose weight? But mostly I think about loving.

I forget that for many women quiet nights alone are a luxury, when your spouse is away on business and the kids mysteriously, magically end up at camp or a sleepover, and you have a whole evening of unbroken silence and it is a glorious thing. I forget this because every night is unbroken silence unless I actively make it full with plans and of course, that isn't always plausible.

I'm not complaining.

Every evening just before I fall asleep I list to myself and whatever heavenly ear might be listening the very things I am grateful for: my family, friends, good health, three and a half happy cats, a great job, presence of mind not to stalk my ex, my successes however small. Then I ask God to bring love into my life, and I don't even know what I want that love to look like or be, just that I need some love. Something small and kind and true. Luckily my God can decipher wine-drunk pleas.

I think we often confuse the need for love with the idea that we don't appreciate the things we've got. I do appreciate them. I am thankful. I am just so very alone that sometimes I overflow with it, inversely proportional to those times you desperately need your alone time, just need some damn peace and quiet. If it's not in balance, you know. Too much of one thing and not enough of another.

Of course there's no use in bemoaning a thing like loneliness because you know that life is a law of averages and we hope to reach stasis at some point, a decent mix of quiet and together whatever that may be. Maybe the only way to appreciate a thing is to go without it for a while. I complain anyway, even if just to myself because I have told myself often enough that "complaining burns calories," so I wonder why the hell I'm not twelve pounds soaking wet.

Small things really, that's what you miss. The cruel trick of being human is that you sometimes get maudlin and reminisce about things that weren't that great at the time. But Lord, the feeling of getting in bed beside someone warm and smelling of sleep, the tiniest happiness of walking through a door after a long day and knowing someone is there waiting for you. The idea that after a very long, hard week you couldn't just get in your 1995 Jeep and fill it up with gas and drive, drive all night to a Waffle House and smoke cigarettes like you never quit and eat bad steak for breakfast and drive on down to El Paso or Denver or wherever the hell you end up, no, you can't do it because someone (anyone) would miss you that night. That is something you can't count on. You could be in Rosarita by dawn and no one would be the wiser.

Sounds like paradise to some. Makes you wonder what average lonely is. Makes you wonder when (if) it ends.

A picture is worth 47.4 words!

Are ya'll surprised I could fit my whole butt PLUS my handbag in that rental car?

I love my Aunt Pam, she is so freaking cool.

So, I got another email today from yet another Concerned Citizen Of the Innernets that Drew may have been:

A) Kidnapped by me and forced to live in a locked room with no computer access and I refuse to release him from Encino-adjacent and will I please give him back to the crochetworld?

B) Injured in a random yet highly dangerous Red Heart incident and he is tangled and trapped in his studio will I PLEASE CALL THE HOUSTON POLICE ALREADY?

C) Overcome with excitement that the Suri Cruise photos were released and he has abandoned his blog in favor of persuading me to hatch a Suri-scientologist child of our very own.

I am here to assure ya'll that none of these are true and he is fine but hasn't had internet access and I would email each of ya'll individually except remember that time some spammer sent out eleventeen million spams but faked it as coming from my email address? Apparently all sorts of places now block my email for that reason. They believe I am a spammer. Good grief! Technology.

Like Motel 6, only fuzzier

Why people want to traipse across this great nation and stay with me is really just a mystery. Because try as I might (which, to be honest, might not be enough) I truly am a poor excuse of a housekeeper and someone someday is going to have to haul in the Jaws Of Life to unclench me from a furball in the darker recesses of my house. But whatever. I have plenty of booze, so I guess folks will put up with four cats and some other oddities because the drinks are flowing and the hostess thinks she's Blanche Dubois. Which can be damn funny if you drink enough.

Although it did sort of reach a new low in the "Welcome, guests and weary travelers" department when I told Drew, who was possibly tired and hot and covered in travel goo, that he couldn't take a shower until I washed a load of towels. Nice! Followed by, "Oh, darlin, don't go in that room... it's scary in there."

Then of course I plied him with alcohol and put on a load of wash and all was right in the world. Welcome to Chez Colorful!

While Drew was here, we went to the West Hollywood Saturday mornin' Stitch-n-Bitch. It was so much fun! We had coffee and chitchatted and I spent most of the time making a center pull ball out of a big yarn thingamajiggy and I oohed and aaahed 'em with my powers of BALL MAKING. Hey, I never claimed to be a great knitter, but I am a great ball maker. It's an underappreciated talent, ya'll.

On the left, there's Ellen and Ana and Christine posing for the camera lady, and on the right there's Cory and Kendra enduring my stalkage.

I have to tell ya'll, I may be shy and dorky and not good with saying normal things, but I do really enjoy seeing folks at s-n-b. Please be patient with those of us who are bad at socializing, like perhaps me. OH MY GOD, also, Annika, I am so sorry I am a dumbass.

Me: Oh, I've never seen your little baby!

Annika: Yes, well, I usually leave him at home with Will.

Me: Oh, right. Yes. Well, of course. Because babies aren't formed yet. So I guess they can't stay home by themselves.

Annika:

Me: He's a cute little booger, though. Isn't it funny how all babies look stoned?

Annika:

Me: (silently to myself) Holy shit I need to stop talking outloud. Right now.
Me: (out loud) I need to stop talking outloud. Whoops.

Then I remembered I had video taking capabilities on my camera and promptly began to stalk people with the camera in a whole new way, which once again reminds me that I should just STOP TALKING in general, what with the generally squeaky and redneck nature of my voice and also, I do say some staggeringly dumb things. Oh well.

Video #1:
Wherein cracker crazy camera lady terrorizes nice people who knit and crochet.

Video #2:
Wherein Ellen is a good sport and talks to me about crochet, except I stood too far back and ya'll can barely hear her for part of it but that's my fault because I am not so good with techmology. [As of noon, this one says "still uploading" and I do not know why. Hopefully it will magically heal itself and start working soon.]

Video #3:
Wherein I SWEAR TO GOD I said the word "LEI" not "LAY." I mean really people. I even manage to embarrass myself when I am talking to myself. THAT IS TALENT.

So he left yesterday and of course I cried all the way home from the airport, I just hate good-byes. I miss Drew when I don't see him and somehow even more when I do see him, because it reminds me he'll be leaving again soon.

This weekend, however, I did try to convince everyone about sixty-two times to either A: Make him move here or B: Begin a mass migration to some new city where we take over an entire neighborhood and/or city block and start a compound of knitters, crocheters and crazy people and we could have a yarn co-op and rotate cat-sitting for each other and generally drink and carrouse and carry on in the kinship of friends. In a city we take over by sheer force of will. Who's on board?

And speaking of carry on, I think one day we'll all be boarding airplanes in our underwear and paper surgical gowns and they'll have to give you a valium and/or bourbon IV just to help you endure the flight, but Drew was a good sport and didn't bitch and complain about the whole OH MY GOD TOOTHPASTE COULD EXPLODE nature of airplane travel. Unlike me, who complained freely about it all weekend even though I have no travel plans at all for the next 800 years.

But I do have clean towels now, and ya'll that is a glorious thing.

TV is your friend

Yesterday I got a question from a reader, "Who is this Kitty Carlisle you speak of?"

I am so glad you asked! Long before Lorelai Gilmore showed up, I would face all crises both big and small by asking myself, "What Would Kitty Carlisle Do?" There's perhaps nothing more indicative of mental instability than taking all your social behavior clues from a group of cheery, chain-smoking 1950s game show celebrities.

But anyway. I REALLY wanted to be Kitty Carlisle.

I discovered Kitty on the Game Show Network when I was still married and living in an apartment with Mr. X in Studio City, and I was desperately unhappy with my job and my life and it was 1999, right before folks started telling us the world was gonna end (so go buy toilet paper! stock up on canned goods! the power grid will fail!) (I stocked up on wine and cheetos) and I would stay up late at night watching old game show re-runs on the TV.

My favorites were the really old episodes of "To Tell The Truth" and "What's My Line?" where Kitty Carlisle swooshed around in snazzy cocktail dresses and Soupy Sales made off-the-cuff remarks about his fabulous New York nightlife escapades. They appeared to have fantastic lives, with nothing but cocktail hour, seeing plays on Broadway, and guest-hosting on game shows. I imagined they probably had vodka tonics and ham-and-cheese pinwheels in their dressing rooms. They wore a lot of flammable materials. They spoke eloquently, had high-falutin' accents and sometimes Kitty even wore elbow-length gloves or a tiara.

Interjection Of Necessary Factual Information:
A few weeks ago, I made a Kitty Carlisle reference when I was out on a first date. The guy I was with proudly told me that he does not own a television and (insert snotty tone of voice here) had not watched TV in over a year. Looked at me with one eyebrow arched.

Good grief. I mean it's fine if you don't watch TV, in fact I'd probably have a much smaller ass if I myself got out more, but I have about a real short fuse for people puffing up on Holier Than Thou, especially on a first date.

I guess I was supposed to recognize his utter superiority over those of us too weak and shallow to abstain from the TV, but all I just drawled out my best hillbilly accent to inform him, "You know they have them thar TV sets real cheap at The WalMart!"

Needless to say, he was not amused.
Needless to add, it was our first and last date.
End Factual Interlude

So anyway. I like TV. I like watching Brenda Lee on "The Closer" drawl out something to a bunch of citified Los Angeles cops (makes me feel like Yes, ya'll, The Southern Woman Can Kick Your Butt!) And when a shirtless Sayid went to fetch water for Shannon (pre-death) on LOST, I thought I myself had died and gone to heaven. I even watch the news sometimes, Anderson Cooper.

Even when TV is bad, it's still so very, very good.

My entire family is kind of off-kilter with the TV love. I called my mom and dad once, just to check in.

"Hi, what are you guys up to?" I asked.

"Oh, your dad and I are just sitting here in the kitchen, shelling black-eyed peas," said my mom.

"Ooooh, fun," I said. "You two crazy kids."

"Well, your father bought a bushel of black-eyed peas. Do you know how many pounds that is? That's 28 pounds of black-eyed peas."

"Oh. My. Gawd. What would anyone on the face of this earth need with 28 pounds of black-eyed peas?"

"He's going to vacuum-seal them and freeze them."

Ah. The light had dawned upon me. My dad doesn't need 28 pounds of black-eyed peas. My dad wants to use his new toy, the Super Dooper Vacuum Sealer Thingamajig!

My dad is the coolest guy on the face of the earth. But he has this, um, little problem. He loves infomercials. And I inherited that trait from him, it's right there on my DNA strand next to the newspaper-loving gene and the smartass gene. I love to stay up late at night and watch infomercials, marvel in their chipper craftiness, bask in the light of only four easy payments! And the free gifts! It's enough to make one salivate on the way to the telephone -- hurry! Operators are standing by!

I have seen the vacuum-pack thingamajig infomercial once or twice. It's that device that not only stores food in airtight freshness, it also sucks the air out of bulky linens and comforters for convenient wintertime storage. It's a miracle of modern science, in perfect plasticine containers.

According to my mom, Dad went a little wild with the vacuum sealing when his new toy, er, much-needed household implement, arrived.

"He 'tested' the vacuum sealer on the TV Guide, he shrink-wrapped an umbrella, two sets of bath towels, our entire collection of steak knives and an egg."

"So," I said, "Did you get the free super-whirl hand mixer with purchase?"

"Yes, I think so," she said, "but your dad vacuum sealed it and now we can't use it."

Just think, with a gadget like that, you could make literally hundreds of canapes and finger-foods and ham-and-cheese pinwheels and seal 'em up ready and waiting for their next Kitty Carlisle dress-up party.

Flammable fabrics and elbow-length gloves optional, of course.

I'll stop

I don’t care about what book Oprah is picking. If I like it I’ll read it eventually and not because she told me to. :roll:

My mom is driving me nuts. She’s in the middle of moving…2 blocks away from the place she’s in right now. But she wants me to help her take boxes to her new place so the MOVERS don’t have to move so much. WTF?

It’s still too hot and I don’t have air conditioning in my car.

Oh I could go on…but I think I’ll stop. lol

LOL

I’m married to a 26-year-old guy who’s ALWAYS HORNY and we have no kids, so…not often, and rarely for anything other than stress relief or sleep problems (which takes the fun out of it anyway). No, I’m not complaining. Not bragging either. I know it won’t be like this forever. LOL

We’re back!

Hi! We’re back, and we’re married! Everything went perfectly and we had a blast on our honeymoon. Now we’re back to reality and digging ourselves out of all the things that piled up in our absence.

More pictures to come later, but for now, I’m revealing the winner of the Email Guessing Contest. In a shocking turn of events, I got hardly any email during the 8 working days I was gone: less than 10 per day. This is incredible, especially since I typically receive 50+ in ONE DAY. So, the final tally was 77.

Technically, Jason won, but since he’s ineligible, the next closest guess was from Sara. Congrats, Sara! Email me your contact info and I will send you a set of 5 handmade, fall-themed thank you cards.

And, just a reminder: we’ll announce the winner of the second So you think you know us? contest tomorrow. So keep those (hilarious) guesses coming!

Wedding , So you think you know us?

Reading books

I have an ebookwise (ebookwise.com and about $160) reader and I love it. Right size, lights up, holds charge. The thing I don’t love about it is that too many of the NY bestsellers and new books don’t offer the secure format that works on mine (secure .imp). I can get all my small publishing house books on it (but not adobe format), and a large number of NY titles…but not all.

However, they are working on a standard format for ebooks so all ereaders can access them. That will make me happy.

The reason I didn’t get a kindle, aside from price, was beacause it doesn’t have a backlight and I specifically wanted to read in bed. I have occasional insomnia and my husband does not.

For this I almost went to Bloomingdales Jail.

In this time of post-war, nothing screams, "I am a big fat terrorist!" like furtively photographing the goods ... even if those goods are Betsey Johnson hats and scarves. People in black smocks will maybe come and question you, and you will have to look at them with a totally straight face and say you're taking pictures for your imaginary sister, who is in the hospital with a rare viral disorder, possibly the Yarn Flu, and nothing will make her well except a hand-knitted accessory from Bloomies. And if you sniffle a little, and look sweet and innocent, and ask where the Estee Lauder counter is, you will have fought the law BUT THE LAW WILL NOT WIN.

Now, one day when I am very, very rich (Notice! I am currently accepting applications for sugar daddies!) I imagine I will just loll around naked in a big pile of money while wearing this knitted hat.

And one would have to be of the lolling-rich persuasion, because did you notice the price tag on that little hat?

Bloomies had some cute scarves, too, by Aqua. Stripes and pom poms! I love love love scarves that end in pom poms, I think they're so cute and cheerful. I'm making a cable-knit scarf right now from the "Just Scarves" book and I'm going to trim it with tons of dorky pom poms. Of course with the cables and all, the scarf will likely be completed by September of 2021, so there's that. In the meantime, cuteness:

The next illegal pic is for Jennifer. She and I were talking recently about that little ridge of color you get on the backside of a stripe, and how we didn't remember scarves from J Crew and the Gap having "the ridge" on the back. So when I saw these fancy schmancy Bloomies scarves in stripey colors, I had to check the back:

Looks like they did not escape the ridge either.

Cute cute!

Yes, I maybe had a few cocktails when Jen was over here tonight and now I am posting pictures like a four year old on a movable type high, shutup.

Cute knitting bag alert! Saw it at Target today when I was Al-Quaida'ing the knitting kits. The interior bag comes out, so it's just a clear vinyl baguette, and long enough even for 14" needles. It's Isaac Mizrahi (am I spelling that right? too lazy to check online, hiccup!) and it was about $20.