Month: September 2009

A love story

A journey through the soul, told in the chosen format of crappy iPhone photos.

Oh coffee. How I love you so. (Yes, I know the cup is empty. It didn’t last long. I slurped that thing through that pretty blue straw and uttered an “aaaaah” when finished.)

Yes, I love you oh so much. Sadly, you don’t love me in return. You leave my stomach acidy, my esophagus crying out for relief and my adrenals asking for a nice day off.

It is a star-crossed love affair. And a fairly one sided love.

Ice cream, oh ice cream! Rich, creamy, frosty, tasty ice cream. How I adore you as you caress my mouth with your sugary creamy goodness.

But as much as I love you, you don’t love me back the same way. You leave me phlegmy. Also, all that sugar doesn’t help my already acidy tummy.

And you always seem to take up residence on my already poochy belly and round hips.

Damn you ice cream, for being so tantalizing and so not good for me!

Cheese! My sweet longtime lover, cheese! You and I go back to the early years. Remember all the grilled cheese sandwiches we shared? Sprinkling you over enchiladas and broiling until bubbly? Remember when I’d just hack off a slice and eat you as you are, because you and I are so simpatico like that?

Truly, you aren’t terrible for me when enjoyed in moderation, but how can I possibly enjoy your delicious goodness in moderation! No, I indulge too much in my love and you join ice cream on my hips.

It’s cruel, cheese, just too cruel. I mean, after all we’ve shared!!

Ah full fat ranch. You tempting, tempting fella. You flirt with me. Wink your little bottled dressing eye and beg me to partake.

Much like cheese, a little occasionally, fine. But who can have a *little* and why occasionally?

But you mock me. You taste so yum and then you turn on me and do mean things!

It’s not right! I love you so much, why can’t you show me a little kindness?

What’s this? Oh, hey lettuce. What are you doing here? Hmm, yeah, uh, nice to see you too.

I have what can certainly be described as kind regards for you. I’m sure you’re a very nice comestible.

You just don’t…turn me on.

But you seem to *adore* me. Oh sure, you treat me so nice, giving me nutrients and not settling on my hips. Providing energy and fiber and you are such a hair parted down the middle, church on Sunday, help little old ladies across the street nice sweet gentle food.

It’s just…I don’t *want* nice!

I want wild! And passionate! And fascinating and rich complex textures!

I want to run with the bad kids and cut class and down twinkies and potato chips and stick my tongue out at “health” experts!

I want….I want…..

Hey, hey good lookin’…..what’s your name? Wanna run around with me and coffee?

Oh, wait, who is that over there? Well hellooooo handsome!

Wanna take a walk on the beach, hand in hand, and watch the sun set? Wouldn’t that be a nice way to spend some time together?

I know I’m flirting…I can’t help it!

Oh wait, what’s this?

Oh crap. That’s not playing fair…

Hellloooooo lover!

If you hear a tiny *pop*

…it is the sound of my mind being blown.

*pop*

Yesterday, I talked about this whole period-space-space thing.

So today, I’m going to take on a few grammar rules. I am breaking Sister Mary Margaret’s ruler right over my Strunk and White. Oh yes I am!

(That sounds kind of….naughty! heh heh)

Ok, confession time: I didn’t go to Catholic school. APS was a-ok.

Apparently middle school is much on my mind this week. Likely reflective of my mental age right now…but I digress.

Today we speak of Mr. Parker. Oh yes, another educator that saw my brother and sister pass through the doors of his classroom before I came along, all impressionable and scared.

Mr. Parker was, to put it mildly, a grammar Nazi.

(Yes, that’s putting it mildly! And no I am *not* prone to hyperbole! Quit taunting me!)

Mr. Parker was all about forcing us to diagram sentences at the chalkboard.

(For the younger readers, yes, we used actual chalk in those days. And we had to walk uphill both ways to get to school.)

Mr. Parker would rattle off a sentence, and then we had to diagram the damn thing.

If you got stuck, he’d make sarcastic comments. Occasionally singing a little ditty meant to embarrass you. And then he’d tell you how you blew it. Because we always blew it when it came to diagramming sentences.

Fun.

So Mr. Parker’s waltzing, melodic teasing is in the back of my mind as I read this article:

Three grammar rules that are okay to break.

Doh! That’s wickedly delicious, like getting caught smoking out behind the portable buildings!

(Not that I did, I was am a painfully rules compliant girl)

Here we go:

1. Feel free to boldly split infinitives.

They quote the famous Gene Rodenberry line, “To boldy go where no man has gone before” as evidence that this is ok.

Hmm. Not sure “Star Trek” is the high water mark for grammatical correctness. Then again, maybe I could get into this.

Problem is, it’s also been drilled into me that adverbs should be kept to a minimum, under which “boldly” would qualify.

So…to capriciously break the rules, seems…well, I just did it, that’s not so bad.

Oh yeah, I’m turning to the dark side!

(Mixing metaphors too! Oh, I’m naughty!)

2. Ending a sentence with a preposition is nothing to worry about.

Ok, I admit it, I already do this. And I hear Mr. Parker in my head when I do, but damnit, I do it anyway.

But I’m not going to stop!

At least until I get in trouble and then I’ll be very compliant and mild.

3. Is it even okay to use sentence fragments? Yes.

Yeah, ok, fine. I do this. A lot. With frequency. And I’m not going to quit!

If loving sentence fragments is wrong, I don’t want to be right!

I often get that green squiggly underline in Word that says “sentence fragment, consider revising.” To which I reply, boldly: “NO!”

Then click ignore. It feels so good to click ignore.

You wanna know what else?

I also dangle my participles. I do and I’m not sorry.

Oh I’m grammatically running amok now!

Whoooooooo!

Old habits like these are so hard to break*

It was seventh grade. She was Mrs. Olivas. Typing teacher. A rail thin Hispanic woman with long black hair, parted down the middle, a sour face and an even sourer disposition.

(sourer doesn’t sound right, but Word grammar checker told me that “more sour” was incorrect…so let’s roll with it)

Mrs. Olivas taught my brother, well ahead of me in school. She taught my sister.

And then she taught me.

There we all sat, trembling, at the keyboards of electric typewriters distributed about the classroom. Eyes forward. No looking at your fingers!

Mrs. Olivas would wander the room, shouting letters like a drill sergeant. We would type what she shouted. In unison our keys would strike the paper.

My sister had warned me, with her accent, her “v” sounded like “b” and vice versa. And she graded harshly when you got it wrong.

Mrs. Olivas taught us that after every period ending a sentence, you hit that space bar twice.

End a sentence, space twice, start the next sentence.

One space looked too crowded. Too hard to tell where one sentence ended and the next began.

Two spaces.

No questions. Don’t ask. Two spaces.

I follow this great lady, Debbie Ridpath Ohi, on Twitter (her screen name is inkyelbows). She is a writer and creates spot on comics about and for writers.

So imagine the shock and awe in my world when I read the following re-Tweet:

@inkyelbows From literary agent @Ginger_Clark “Authors: stop double spacing after every paragraph. It’s unnecessary.”

What?!? Sputter sputter. What!?!?

I say…..WHAT?!?!

Ok, to be fair, Twitter itself had me changing my typing habit. Why type two spaces when that takes two of the precious 140 characters? So I figured in the Twitter-verse, it was ok.

But in my regular writing? Stories, emails, blog posts. Can I stop?

Period-space-space is in my muscle memory! It lives in my cells!

Seventh grade was almost thirty years ago! If I don’t period-space-space won’t Mrs. Olivas come haunt me in my sleep like the La Llorona of the Smith Corona?

“Peerrrioood-spaaaaace-spaaaaace,” she will howl outside my window!

I found this bit of explanation online: ” It is generally accepted that the practice of putting two spaces at the end of a sentence is a carryover from the days of typewriters with monospaced typefaces.”

So to do a period-space-space is something of a throwback. It marks me as “old school.” Someone who learned to type on an actual typewriter.

Ok, fine. I’m trying. Every day I’m trying to retrain my obstinate thumb to only tap that space bar once. Just once.

It’s tough! I still have to do a find and replace when I finish any document, including this blog post.

I’m too old to learn new tricks!!!!

Waaaah!

Oh, and:

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

*apologies to Hank Williams Jr for bastardizing his lyric.

Coming tomorrow: “Three Grammar rules that are okay to break.” My world is off its axis!

Whoa Nellie!

Back in March 2007, I started this little ol’ blog, with much tentativeness and apprehension.

It was The Good Man’s idea for me to become a blogger, and he’s been my biggest supporter all along.

So he made me a deal.

Threw down a gauntlet.

Set a goal for me.

If I could top 100 unique visitors in a single day, he’d buy me dinner.

A *nice* dinner.

Yesterday, I finally achieved that feat.

WHOOO HOOO!!! Dinner! Yeeessss!

Recycled Conversations

So the conversation goes like this:

“Hey, do we have any WD-40?”

“Yeah, I think so, why?”

“Where would it be? I want to fix the squeak in that [curse word] bathroom door.”

“Oh. Yeah, it’s probably in that same cabinet where we keep the toolbox.”

“Ah, ok.” sounds of digging around “Found it!”

sounds of more cursing, spraying, door swinging back and forth

Yeah, see, this conversation in a similar form took place on more than occasion between my mom and dad.

The ol’ man was hell on squeaks, rattles, and turning off lights when you left a room.

And he was all about the WD-40.

The conversation above? Took place in my home this past weekend.

Only, it was me cursing at the bathroom door, maniacal look on my face as I eliminated the squeak.

So why again is it as you age, you become your parents?

And why again am I becoming my father?

When I start wearing Sears brand jeans and listening to Big Band music, you all have my permission to take me down, Mutual of Omaha-style.

Damn bathroom door is pretty quiet now, though.