First Baptist Church of Jacksonville

I am both fascinated and appalled by this mega church's soap opera. Read it for yourself:

Jacksonville.com article about a blogger/church member

The blog itself

Addictions of late, in no particular order

1. Ginger

Can't get enough of it. In classic therapy-couch fashion, I blame my mother. This past Christmas, she gave me a little box of candied ginger in my stocking. I stashed it in my tea cabinet where it was obscured for two months by Earl Gray, Jasmine Green and other conspirators of the ginger-hating variety. When I started getting ready to move recently, I rediscovered it and took it to work where afternoon sweet teeth have been known to appear. The whole box was gone in short order and since then, I've gobbled up a bag of gingersnaps, three boxes of ginger tea, a handful of ginger candies from Native Sun Market and the obligatory ginger salad dressing when we go out for Japanese. I want to grow it - oh baby.

2. Picture is Unrelated

I'm noticing a pattern that's beginning to emerge here. Again in the afternoon, I need a break from what I do for a living, so I check out a few of my favorite funny, mindless sites. The distraction du jour is Picture is Unrelated. Don't look for logic or meaning or anything at all for that matter. Just look. And pee your pants.

3. Hot Chili Chocolate

One of the very few speedbumps on my half-assed path to being a someday vegan (vague enough for you?) is chocolate. What's even worse is that some chocolate companies are now making a dark variety with hot chili pepper in it. I've tried several varieties, but my favorite is Lindt, since it has the most spark. Personally, I would be happy if there were a more mouthy, smouldering make-it-hurt-a-little version. But for now, this wimpy tepid version will do.

4. Dirt

Not dirt, per se. Things living in dirt. And the piece de resistance of dirt, compost. Don't even get me started about it - it's weird and I don't care. All I know is that the secret voodoo bacteria dance that turns my kitchen scraps into sweet black soil makes my heart practically vibrate with joy.

5. Bonne Bell Strawberry Lipsmackers

I have them stashed everywhere. I need them. I vaguely but happily remember eating cherry chapstick on the playground as a kid, so this fruity lip thing is nothing new for me. In retrospect, I hope it was at least mine. I remember it with the same fondness as my brown sweater with the gold loop zipper on the front that wore in 1970something. In all honesty, I have to admit that I try to be a good bee-loving conscientious user of cosmetics and use Burt's Bees lip balm and others like it, but nothing's as dewy and delicious and the old Bonne Bell. Yeah. I said it.

6. Avocados

If anything makes me fat, this will be it. A half an avocado smashed and on hot toast in the morning is a queen's breakfast. And nothing revs up a tofurky sandwich like the creamy green oh-yes-touch-me-there morally-bankrupting deliciousity of avocado. I've learned to buy them bright and hard and leave them on the kitchen windowsill until their plump flesh begs to be divested from the shiny black outfit. I need one right now. Damn, it's hot in here.

Hate vs. Consternation in a Celebrity Deathmatch

Yeah, it's been a while. This blog thing goes in fits and starts. I hate to have something hanging over my head like so many things tend to do. I imagine standing under the shadow of a tenuously balanced pile of boulders, each chiseled with inscriptions like "start Christmas shopping in June", "finish that skirt before my ass gets any bigger" and "start blogging again". You get the picture. At this moment, I haven't even read my last blog post to know what's happened in my life since the last time I wrote.

So I was in IM with Flora earlier today. She was very pleased with herself for thinking that she had invented a new word with which to grace the English language. I hated to deflate her enthusiasm and creative energy, but I told her that I had heard that word for a long time, and sent her the urban dictionary link to prove it. While there at the UD site, that yarn-ball of bad grammar, txt and intoxicated speech, I noticed that Flora's word had been made into a conversation heart. Aw. I was simultaneously enthralled and inspired to rush home and create something else along that line - maybe a little painting or a sketch. Here is the little photo that stole my <3 :

So then she and I were talking about other great phrases that could go on these things, which I decided should be called "Consternation Hearts". She thought "Hate Hearts" would be more catchy but I love the nerdy wordplay of consternation/conversation. Anyway. Here are a few additional ditties we came up with to go on the hearts: STFU, Suck It, Tested Positive, Kiss My Ass, h8ter, Drop Dead, and others that I can't write here in case my mother still reads this garbage. Not that it would be much worse than the confectionary profanity that started this whole thing. So that's what I did today from 11:15 to 11:30. Unless someone from work is reading, then I just dreamed all this.

speedbumps....bad

I am looking forward to this Christmas season for a few reasons and dreading it for others. I suppose everyone could make such an astoundingly boring statement. I have become a tad Grinchy over the years--overcome by the shameless shallowness of the whole affair. I think a perfect year end would stop at Thanksgiving and pick up somewhere around Valentine's Day. I predict that someday technology will afford people like me the ability to be temporarily cryo-parked for several months at a time in a dreamless holiday-free state of chilly bliss. But whatever. Maybe in another post I'll list the things that piss me off/irritate me/depress me about Christmas. But not today. Justin is in love with Christmas and for his sake, I am trying to be a jolly ol' elf about it.

In other news, I got a skateboard for my birthday. Oh yes. It's huge - a monster, a massive monolith of mythic proportions. I am teaching myself to ride it and so far I am only riding at night so as to not draw attention to myself. This will give you an accurate mental picture: Imagine someone standing up but convulsing, or hula-hooping. Imagine that person's face frozen in an expression of intense concentration while waving their arms like a windmill in a hurricane. That's me sk8ting. Oh yeah - good stuff. So far I haven't hit the ground, but I have developed a new language that's a phrenetic combination of profanity and panting. "Oh Faaaaaaaahhhhh!" I wanted this skateboard because everytime I see some little kid doing it, it looks like so much fun. To hell with that little dignified voice in my head that says a woman of my age and decorum has no business adjusting her trucks. If it's fun, then I have to at least try it. So far I can tell you this: speed bumps are bad.

Dirty Laundry and the Penny Boy

So I learned a few interesting things this weekend. Justin’s kids were over and they are apparently quite a fount of information. The first thing I learned was from Abigail, who’s learned quite a bit in her six short years upon this earth. As we were driving along in the car, she was weaving a continual chain of chatter, and once in a while I would grab hold and give a little tug. One thing she said caught my ear:
“Sometimes grownups lay in bed naked together”.
That was too good to let pass so I asked, “Really? What’s up with that?”
She, seeming unconcerned about it added, “I don’t know, but I think it’s because all their clothes are in the wash.”
I accepted her reasoning and let it drop not wanting her to think too much about it but decided right there to stop doing my laundry for a while and see if I end up in bed naked.


Presidential hopefuls would do well to take into consideration what Ethan had to say. He’s five, and he knows stuff. Take politics for example. He was talking about a trip he took to Washington DC and mentioning the various memorials. What he said went something like this:
“They have a giant penny-boy there, but they have guards and policemen so you can’t draw or paint on it. It’s HUGE.” (Visualize big brown eyes and arms stretched out wide)
I had to ask, “What’s a penny-boy?”
He seemed genuinely surprised that I didn’t know. As if adults aren’t so smart after all. “You know!” he answered incredulously, “Penny-boy!! His picture is on a penny! That’s why he’s the president!”
Ethan does this thing that never fails to crack me up. He sticks one finger in the air, raises his eyebrows and closes his eyes as he says “Actually…” And that’s what he did when I asked him why people’s pictures are on coins.
“Actually, you can only be the president if your picture is on the money. That’s why Penny-boy is president, because he has a lot of pennies with his picture.”
His rationale is adorable, but if you think about it, it usually works out that way – the one with the most pennies gets to be president.

aaah....Justin

Can I just tell you (whoever you might ubiquitously be) how wonderful my fella is? He got home from work a little before midnight after working a 12 hour shift in the E.R. Earlier in the day, I had some trouble with some files on the computer. If you know me, then you know how sadly common an occurrence this is. So he comes home, schleps up the stairs to the apartment, showers, and sits down at the computer to try to figure it out. He finally comes to bed and a few hours later, he wakes up to comfort me after a nasty nightmare that had left me sweating and seriously creeped-out. A few hours after that, I get up and hop in the shower. When I get dressed and emerge, half ready to face the day, I find that he has gotten up and cooked me a hot breakfast. His plan is to go back to bed after I leave for work so he can get a few more hours of sleep. I know I don't deserve to be with someone like him. Being on opposite schedules sucks, as you might well imagine, but he is making it easier than I thought it would be. Here are a few of the crazy things we do to cope:

• 
  Dry-erase markers on the bathroom mirror. "Can you have lunch with me and mom on Friday? Check one: yes/no/maybe". Gotta love the throw-back to the third grade.


• 
  Lunchbox notes. Reminders to take vitamins. Encouragement of various persuasions.


• 
  Coming home to a clean apartment. I can't tell you how many times I've come home to find that before he left for work, he's vacuumed or put away the dishes or some such.


• 
  God bless the public library! To distract myself from the fact that I'm home alone a lot, I'm reading like crazy. On the nightstand today: Naked in Baghdad: The Iraq war as seen by NPR's correspondent by Anne Garrels.


• 
  Candles. As silly as it sounds, when I am up and getting ready for work and he has just gone to bed, I use only candlelight to dress, do my hair, etc. No comment on the questionable results. He has done the same when I've already gone to bed and he's just getting home.

Those are just a few of the things we've figured out. We have less time together, but in many ways, it's still sweet.

uh....yeah

I can't believe it's been a month since I've blogged about anything.*

There's nothing particularly noteworthy going on just now. Since Flora moved to NY, I've saved a bunch of money on going out and such, but the flipside of that is that I'm not having nearly so many adventures. Justin and I went out the other night and on the way home I said, "We could go out for pancakes, but it's not even 1am yet..." Just not the same. Don't get me wrong, Justin rocks my world (apologies for the cliche) but you just can't beat Flora for pure trouble-making impishness.

Now this!

In other downer news, I fedexed paperwork to an attorney in Maine today to wrap up the closing on the sale of our camp. Ron and I owned it and even before the divorce, we had decided to sell it since we were hardly ever going there anymore. One of these days when I am less depressed about it than I am today, I will write about the camp. It was truly Nirvana, and the halcyon days spent there have been some of the best in my life. But now the little three acres on the bank of the Penobscot River belongs to someone else. No more chopping wood to go in the stove at 2am, no more lantern-lit trips to the privy, no more sunbathing and kayaking in the swirling smooth current of the river. But I said I wasn't going to talk about it! Hearing about someone else's favorite vacation spot is about like being forced to see silent 8mm reels of a pipefitter's convention in Cleveland. So I digress about the camp.

I recently joined this thing called Book Crossing. The idea is good, but there seems to be a shortage of books I care to read in the greater Jacksonburg area. Still, the idea intrigues me so I'll hang with it for a bit and see if anything good pops up.



*visualize self-flagellating comment here with corresponding excuse/reason for same