lessons learned the hard way

 

Never, ever, fall asleep with bleach in your hair.

Your I Will See You In Hats Adams Girl

 

in memoriam

 

Gee Nicholl’s —

Memorial is today. I remember when Greg first told me the story about Don and Gee Nicholl. They lived in England. It gets cold in England. Don was a struggling writer. They would talk sometimes about how much easier it would be if there was just some help for struggling writers. Then, Don Nicholl got very prosperous. He worked on All in the Family. He worked on other shows. They did real well. And then she lost him.

But she remembered those conversations. And others, about how it would be good to do something that made it easier on young writers than they had had it. And she set up the Nicholl Fellowship. First at Stanford. Later at the Academy. And she named it after him.

I did not know Gee Nicholl well. She was a nice lady who came to the awards ceremonies. She was polite and gracious. She dressed well. She was not always in good health.

And she singlehandedly created the fellowship that, in 1994, changed my life. And not just my life. The Nicholl Fellowship has touched more writers and not just the winners. Also the finalists. Also the runners up. So many many struggling writers whose lives have been forever changed because Gee Nicholl remembered what it was like to be worried about the heat being turned off in a cold English flat.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from chinta

the accident

 

Once upon a time —

[I have to say once upon a time because once I posted about an accident present tense and everyone freaked so now I have to make time scales really really clear.]

Once upon a time I was in this astounding accident. I was in a Saab headed down the 405. I was the passenger. A past love was driving. Traffic was slowing up in front of us and he stepped on the gas. I, sort of wondering why he was jamming the gas pedal to the floor and trying to kill us by slamming us into dead stop traffic in front of us, turned around.

[I generally give loves the benefit of the doubt.]

And, right behind us, there was this Mac truck not stopping.

We swerved into another lane.

The guy in front of us did not.

 

---

Cars were flying all the hell over. I mean “flying” too. The car that had been ahead of us took the impact so hard it was like a pool ball and hit three other cars and then everything just got surreal. The truck was veering and hit a cement side rail and kept going and the side rail was turning into cement dust instead of a cement side rail the dust all billowing as it just kept going like chalk in a blender not cement and cars were spinning and one went airborn upside down and hit oncoming traffic on the other side of that disintegrating side rail and then three of those cars went airborn and came flying back at us.

 

---

When everything stopped moving we were not hit. We were just sitting in a Saab in the middle of the wrecks of at least forty cars.

We got out and there were these people with a little kid and the kid was on the ground crying. He looked around six. Maybe eight if he was a big six. Or eight and a small eight. Who knows?

Something was broken, it looked like his arm.

There was a huge puddle of gasoline next to him and growing.

 

---

I said, Listen, you have to move the kid. And the adults in the group kept walking around in circles around each other ignoring me and I said, Listen, you have to move the kid. And one of them said, He is hurt, we cannot move him. And I said, He will be more hurt if that gasoline hits him and goes, pick up that ladder [there was a ladder on the ground that had been blown off a mobile home] and put him on it and move him.

So they walked in circles a little more and then they put him on the ladder and moved him.

Six inches.

And I walked away.

 

abby is that you?

 

I met —

My aunt for dinner the other night. We went to this restaurant Dar Maghreb that is Moroccan and very fancy with a fountain and they pour rose water over your hands before you eat. The rose water ritual is tricky the person pouring rose water does not stop until you take your hands away so a lot of rose water got poured before I snapped maybe he needed a signal from me that was enough. [Wow were my hands clean.]

You eat with your hands and that is tricky for my aunt because she is left handed and tradition says you eat with your right. But we made it through and it was fun.

And there were belly dancers.

The head belly dancer is Mesmera and a friend of my aunt’s [my aunt is a real mover and shaker with belly dancers] and came up and talked to us. And this head belly dancer Mesmera is the spitting image of Abby from NCIS. Except with red curly hair and a belly dancing costume and no goth stuff. She even sounded like Abby from NCIS. So the whole time she was talking to us I was just staring thinking, It is Abby from NCIS!

[Probably she thinks I am the "special" neice since I just sort of stared and did not talk much.]

 

---

[Abby is played by Pauley Perrette btw.]

 

year of the ox

 

It is —

Year of the Ox. Really I do not know a thing about Year of the Ox I just think that is a really cool ox photo by Richard Gin. Yay!

 

---

Okay that was a lie. I do know something about Year of the Ox. The ox is about building slowly for long term. I figure this is positive since as a nation the Stripes is pretty much in the toilet and everyone needs to really consider, be pragmatic, thoughtful, and then rebuild conscientiously with forethought for the long term, not just quick term trash everything for short term gains.

Also, cool photo. Yay!

 

where that cool ox photo comes from :
that is from richard gin

[go see richard gin's site many of my especially
cool animal photos come from him]

uh oh

 

Uh oh.

Twenty one days till Valentine’s Day and NO BOYFRIEND.

This is no way to get flowers and candy.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from alacrity danger

me and my band

 

I am —

Standing outside a bar having a smoke. A man who is a total stranger to me walks up to me and tells me I should not smoke. [I do not know why total strangers think it is okay to tell me what to do.] I say, Oh it is a job requirement I am in a band called Black Lung. He perks up. He says, Really? You are in a band? Where do you play?

 

---

[People are SO dumb.]

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from bastatas

garbo manga!

 

This is —

Pretty cool. Worth 1000 held a comp where artists took vintage movie star prints and turned them into manga images. My fave is Garbo. [Garbo is often my fave so this is not surprising but I really like how she turned out so it is not just Garbo bias talking there --- says the woman with the Garbo bias.]

:::check it out:::

 

where i picked up that manga goodness :
i picked up that manga goodness at grace’s

cookies vs. jayne cobb

 

So I have been —

Stressed. And Kym wrote me and natch I told her right off send Jayne Cobb that would fix everything but she is strict in her love o’ Jayne and said no [stingy!] and then today I opened the mail and there were —

Cookies! Yay!

They are delish and wonderful and homemade by Kym and almost as good as Jayne Cobb. Almost. Maybe if I put little hats on them….

 

netflix is empty

 

Uh oh. The Netflix queu is empty.

This would not be a problem if I could think of any film I have not seen that I actually want to see but I cannot think of a single one. So then I was watching films I really do not want to watch but probably should. And now I am out of those too. And pretty much every television series I care to see and do not own.

There has got to be something. Suggestions?

 

---

This is what I do when I cannot sleep. Watch movies. Which means when I am doing red flag insomnia episodes I watch a whole lot of movies. Bad movies are actually a godsend for insomnia. Sometimes they can blank you right out where a good movie will sometimes have you working to not fall asleep so you can watch it.

Usually if I do not sleep I will crash out a couple hours during the next day and that sort of keeps me sane. But yesterday I got the bright idea to just stay up all night and all the next day and I thought that would do it and I would crash the next night. Um. No. And I have a lunch to go to today. This should be interesting.

 

i think i saw this guy on match dot com

 

 

where i nabbed that sassy bear guy :
i nabbed the bear guy at rain’s

finally!

 

Today is the day.

Yay! Yay! Yay!

I have been waiting for over eight years to see George Bush booted out on his can. Really he should be frog marched out but I will take booted out if that is what is on the menu.

 

---

[Wow. Think those skeevy boys will really go without a fight? I keep worrying a crazed secret army will descend on Washington or something.]

[Also go read Obama's inaugural address Rain posted it and it is pretty awesome.]

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from i averbuch

battlestar xanax

 

So um —

Has everyone seen the new episode of Battlestar Galactica?

I guess that was the nervous breakdown episode.

Hmm.

 

mainlining petroleum

 

I am watching TV.

Another drug ad comes on.

It seems like more than half the ads on television are drug ads.

[Say aren’t we in the middle of a war on drugs?]

Most of the drug ads tell you there are a thousand ways they can kill you but do not worry about that they are nifty. Also mostly they tell you that they do not protect against anything you are actually getting the pills or injections to protect against but just in case give it a try and also say they have hella side effects like cramps, baldness, bruising, personality change, insanity, depression, suicidal thoughts, mad sex crazed urges, rage, hallucinations, gross physical abnormality, inexplicable and undiagnosable pain, unforseen hair growth in odd and mysterious places, unforseen hair loss in odd and mysterious places, seizures, dry mouth, bad breath, body odor, loss of erection, over erection, under eating, over eating, jaundice and, um, DEATH.

But hey give them a try.

[It is appalling to me I am so used to all this I can type that all out off the top of my head and not even blink when usually these kinds of reactions are attributed to victims of biological warfare. But. Anyway --- ]

This ad —

This particular ad. It catches my attention more. It says you should not get the injection if you are allergic to one of the ingredients — petroleum.

Okay.

Does anyone who is not a machine not have a problem with being injected with petroleum?

That is non-refined gasoline, right?

 

where the art work comes from :
that is barbie vs dinosaur from jessie

gee nicholl

 

I got sad news today. Gee Nicholl passed away this month.

Gee Nicholl is the reason the Nicholl Fellowships exist.

God Speed Gee Nicholl.