Category: where I come from

Countin’ ’em

*sigh* Monday. It’s Monday again. Why God why?!?!?

I guess cuz it has to be.

Granted, I had today off. Not because of the holiday. My company doesn’t give us that one off. Nah. I took a few days vacation.

I was honored, over the weekend, to have a visit from my best friend. She lives in Las Cruces and made quite a long trip to get here. Should have gone easy, but due to inclement weather somewhere or other, she languished in the unfathomably ugly Phoenix airport, cutting short our visit time by several hours.

We hadn’t had the chance to be together in person for quite a while. October, I think, was the last gathering in New Mexico. She hadn’t been this way for years.

The occasion of her visit was to begin her duties as my Matron of Honor (what a terrible thing to call a nice married lady…”matron”, feh!).

Those duties included 1) calming my ass down, 2) helping me look at wedding magazines without crying in anxiety and 3) going with me to choose a wedding dress.

It is that last one, the wedding dress one, where she earned her combat pay.

Despite having been in several weddings, I’ve never had the, uh, agony, pleasure, of going with a friend through the whole dress buying process.

Through the recommendation of a work friend, I found a place in San Francisco (right off Union Square) that you can choose from their “menu” and they make you a custom fit dress. The friend that made the recommend doesn’t have a model perfect bod, and I saw her wedding photos. She looked *stunning*. I figured these were the people to work some magic.

Let’s review. 1) wedding dress shopping, 2) in San Francisco, 3) off Union Square, 4) getting measured.

I. Was. Terrified.

The good news is, as of this year, my friend has been my best friend for, count ’em, twenty years. Yup, met back in 1988. Oh the lives we’ve lived since then.

So I felt comfortable in the presence of The Good Man and The Best Friend to say, “I’m scared.”

And bless them both, they talked me down, fed me breakfast, told me I’d be great and brought me to the fifth story, blonde-wood floored dress shop feeling strong and confident and loved.

As an aside, let me tell you this bit of Too Much Information. At the shop, they hand you a strapless bra, some really awful gold lamé shoes, tell you to strip down and we’ll be right back with dresses for you to try on.

I wore a pair of steel belted control top hose to try to better my chances. So there I stood, shivering in a billowy curtained dressing room wearing black hose, a strapless bra and gold shoes. The urge to wheeze, “anyone want a cocktail” like a Reno waitress was too much to bear.

I stood there, horribly nervous and horribly uncomfortable and I looked over at my friend. She gave me an “it’s going to be ok look” and all I could do was bust out laughing.

The laughing stopped when they slipped the first dress over my head. Who knew I had a waist? Who knew I could actually pull off a strapless?

My friend was brutally honest with me on each dress we tried on and after an hour and a half, I think we’ve settled on a good one.

After that, the rest of the weekend was easy. We did sightseeing and had good eats. I got the rare chance to spend several days with my two most favorite people in the world. And was so gratified to see how well they got along with each other, as well.

I choked back a lot of tears this morning dropping her off at the airport. She has to get home to my two gorgeous goddaughters and her husband as well. I’ll see her again soon, but tonight my heart aches.

I miss my best friend, each day, very much.

Together she and I have learned a lot of lessons.

The most recent, from the dress shop employee.

The key to femininity is:

Spanx and a sash.

And she’s not lying, that sh*t can work wonders!

Most people in this world, if asked to make a party list, can fill a page with a list of friends. I cannot. I have very few friends, but the friends I do have mean everything to me. They are more than friends, they are family.

For that, I am grateful.

Add to that, my friend carted a bag of Hatch grown green chile out here and whipped up a batch of rellenos Sunday night that would make you cry (and I think The Good Man and I did weep, just a little, in gratitude). THAT is love.

Photo below to make you drool.

Moist!

Ah yes, it’s that special time of year. Right on time. We have arrived at the rainy season when soaking rains last for days and days and make it non-stop damp. Makes slugs and snails slither across sidewalks (: shiver :).

Inspires my auntie (formerly of Oregon) to claim that mold is growing in one’s own nooks and crannies. (ew)

I remember when I’d first moved to the Bay Area back in ’97. I was VERY naive. Incredibly so. I spent the first year living here picking hayseeds out of my hair.

I used to cry at night wondering where all that rain would go. In New Mexico, that much rain would cause massive and cataclysmic flooding.

I had this incredibly caustic friend I worked with at Lockheed. She was a lifelong Bay Area resident and she took me under her wing early on. I remember asking her where all the water would go. She looked at me incredulously, and said “uh…there’s this thing called the Bay?”

“Ohhhhh,” this desert rat said. Beginning to realize that Dorothy was not in Albuquerque any more…

But the best story came one afternoon at work. After weeks and weeks of rain, we were outside so my friend could take her afternoon cigarette break. I don’t smoke but would go outside with her. We were talking and I looked down and saw the most profoundly blue iridescent fuzzy thing on the ground. It was beautiful. I’d never seen such a color. I wanted to take a photograph!

Was it a bug? A flower? What incredibly new and wonderful thing was this that I had discovered?

So I asked my caustic friend!

She took a long drag from her Marlboro Light and kicked at it.

Then she fixed me with a steely glare and responded, “It’s mold on bird shit.”

Ah.

So I’ve toughened up a bit over the years. Age and intention can do that to you.

But just to prove I haven’t lost the wonder of it all…

Yesterday I was on my way to the stop where the work shuttle bus picks me up to take me to the CalTrain station.

And I saw something that caught my eye. And since my phone has a camera, I stopped, squatted down, and took a photo.

Here’s your Bay Area “art shot” for the day. Better then mold on poop, right?

Bill! Don’t make me like you!

The Cute Boy™ is very into politics. He can speak about them intelligently. Profoundly. And he knows what he is talking about.

After being harangued by dear old dad in my formative years regarding politics (papa leaned so hard to the right it’s a wonder he didn’t flop over. Daughter tends to be more than a skosh toward moderate). And when I say harangued, I mean dash from the room at a dead run to avoid the inevitable lectures.

That being said, I’m trying. But I find I can’t tolerate listening to any of the current candidates speak. None. Right. Left. In the middle. Out in left field. I just can’t. It is just so false. I get the same tense-in-my-chest feeling that I get when a sales-weasel puts the full court press on me at work. I find it distasteful. Disingenuous. And just not ok.

I have been following the trail of Oh Fair New Mexico’s own Governor with mild interest, mainly because I’m curious to see how this all goes.

When I first heard he was running, I made barfing sounds and stamped my little feet.

See, when I was living in my home state, I didn’t like ol’ Bill all that much. It’s ok. I own it. (Don’t tell Jim Baca, ok? I like Jim a lot and don’t want to get on his fighting side.)

It started with that g’damn cheesy billboard on I-25 between Albuquerque and Santa Fe. If you lived there long enough, you remember it too. “Bill Richardson welcomes you to Northern New Mexico”. Bill leaned across his desk, fixing you, the driver with that jowly stare.

AAAAAAGH!

Then I came to dislike him more because both my folks worked for Sandia Labs and for a while were located at the WIPP Site in Carlsbad.

If you are unfamiliar…in a quick nutshell…the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant or WIPP is an experiment in the disposal of low-level nuclear waste. The WIPP site is located way down in some ancient salt beds. The theory (this is me, a layperson and not a scientist, so give me wide berth) is that a properly sealed container could be placed into a hole made in the salt. And over time, due to some fluids in the salt, it will migrate. Meaning the salt will close in around the container, encapsulating it, thus keeping it safe and sound and away from contaminating anything else.

Obviously, this plan has met with a lot of opposition over the years. The moving brine water means that folks are concerned with contaminating water supplies. And other such (legitimate) concerns.

So my folks worked there back in the early 1990’s and the site was dug out, ready to go, but faced massive political opposition to opening. Or even *trying* out the storage of some low level nuclear waste (like gloves, jumpsuits, etc from workers in nuclear plants).

One of the biggest voices of opposition was our own Bill Richardson, congressman from the northern part of New Mexico. Vehemently.

Except when he became the Secretary of Energy under Bill Clinton.

Yeah. El Flippo Floppo.

I guess after hearing my dad rave on about the evils of Richardson, much of it took hold in my head. Again, for the folks following along at home…dear old dad was a staunch Republican. In hindsight, that *may* have colored his view…just a skosh. But to be fair to my pops, those were frustrating years at WIPP because they were fairly *begging* to be given the chance to at least TRY their theories and see if they worked. And Richardson issued a firm “nyerhe, no, nada, nope”. Didn’t make my folks big Richardson fans.

And well, after all of this time….I’m not a fan of Bill either. Just not. Or was not, I should say.

As this campaign progresses, my mind might be changing.

I’ve listened to some speechifying over the past week. I thought I was an Obama girl, but I really listened to a speech he gave in Iowa and was sort of turned off when it was done. For a variety of reasons. I think Jim actually put it best in yesterday’s post about worrying that he’s all hat and no cattle.

As a woman, I’d like to like Clinton. I just…can’t.

Edwards is sort of blah to me. And I think he’s putting on that accent a bit. I know it’s natural, but he seems to Hee Haw it up a bit, in my opinion. But so far I’m ok with him. Not sure I’m Team Edwards yet…I’m team no one yet, really.

And forget all the Republican candidates. I listened to their first debate and was like, uh, no.

So. Sunday night I watched the Democratic candidates debate with each other. Well, I watched the end. Listened to much of it while working in the other room then came and sat down and watched. It was the last question that intrigued me.

Moderator Charlie Gibson asked the question, “Of all the debates that have been held so far what have you said that you wish you could take back?”

Clinton went first. And didn’t answer the question. Blathered on about how the real thing to concentrate on was the difference between the Democrat and Republican debates. I kept yelling at the TV “ANSWER THE QUESTION!!!”

Richardson went next. He told a funny, charming story about one of the early debates where he was asked who was his favorite Supreme Court Justice. It was endearing, self-deprecating, and got a laugh from the audience and candidates (and me).

Edwards said his was when he made fun of Hillary’s jacket early on. Ok, at least he answered the question.

Obama said he agreed with Clinton and blathered about the differences between the two parties. He also didn’t answer the damn question.

So at the end I was like “oh my god…Richardson *may* have just made me like him.”

Wow.

I don’t know what to do with that.

It may be for the best that dear old dad has (sadly) passed on from this mortal coil. Because I think if I voted for Richardson it would send him into convulsions…

I have until February 5 to figure out exactly which name I’ll put the mark next to on the ballot. I may have to do like I did in that whacked out election for California Governor…pick the most outlandish candidate and give them my nod. Not very mature, but it made me feel better when I left the polling place.

Ok. All this talk of politics is making me twitchy. Wonder what Britney is up to today?

Alert! Frosty down! Repeat, Frosty *down*

Yes, folks, the mother-of-all-storms, or rather, the middle of three mother-of-all-storms has passed over the Bay Area today. Oh what havoc it has wrought!

Accidents! Solo spin-outs! Semis toppled on the Richmond San Rafael Bridge. Flights delayed! Manhole covers overflowing! Karen and The Cute Boy™ trapped in the bowels of Burlingame as parts of El Camino were flooded! Power out at the Casita Bonita!

And most telling of all, over at the Mediterranean restaurant two blocks over, the six foot plastic Frosty the Snowman, lovingly displayed out front, was torn asunder, carelessly tossed and laying face up on the front porch, top hat rudely ripped from his head, carrot nose cranked to one side, and little twiggy arms reaching toward heaven as though to proclaim “Oh the humanity!”

And at this sight, after a harrowing drive in furiously pounding rain and violent winds, amid the sound of sirens, The Cute Boy™ proclaimed “Frosty down! We have a Frosty down!”

It’s been a hell of a day.

We had to take the Cute Boy’s automobile in to be serviced. For making me get up early. In the inclement weather. And drive with the Bay Area loo-loos, I made him buy me breakfast.

Meanwhile, The Feline did this:

Extended coverage of Storm Watch is all over the local news. The news went an extra half hour in breathless anticipation. For the local meteorologists, THIS is the World Series.

Click here for photos of the utter devastation (except for Frosty. I shoulda taken photo but didn’t….)

Where I come from, they’d call this a certified frog strangling rain….(or the less couth would call this a turd floater, but I’m not so coarse as to say such a thing…*wink*)

This is supposed to blow over by Sunday. It’s gonna be a wild weekend……

Image via SFGate.com