Dotty Parker

kitty porn

I was talking with ChillyLilly and she was saying that the cat was a bit bored as it couldn't look out the windows. Having moved to Florida, the sun is a bit more intense and opening the shades during the day illustrates the greenhouse effect too clearly.

I was telling her about the videos and DVDs that are out there for cats. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology has them. So does Amazon.

So the term kitty porn...there are squirrels running around and having a good time. Sometimes there are fish in an aquarium. I suspect the Cornell Lab of Birdiness would have a complete selection in order to give kitties the idea of killing birds without actually having to kill them.

It is, indeed, akin to pornography.

I could make some inappropriate comments about cat words that collide with slang words of naughtiness, I could talk about how kitty porn and heavy petting could go together, but I won't. Nope.

After all, I'm a delicate flower.

no! no! really!

I've been watching (am watching...am I incredible or what?!) the Democratic Convention. The camera people pan across the audience and most of the time they show people who are being really happy or really sweet or really patriotic.

Then, of course, there are the people who are snort-worthy. One woman was perfectly put together. Lipstick matched her lovely red jacket, perfect makeup, slim and cute. But I swear she had a blond helmet on her head. An asymmetrical helmet, at that. Not attractive. Nope. Not a bit.

There's a woman who has to be overly happy all the time. She was wearing her happy Americana jacket and getting her boogie down like nobody's business. She was so impressive, they showed her twice.

One woman wore a sequin bedecked visor and a v. v. sequin-y vest that said, "I (heart) U.S.A." It wasn't a good look. I think only ballerinas can wear solid sequins. Those ballerinas are wee girlies.

There was the very sweet guy who tried to clap along with the crowd. Poor darling. He shouldn't go to music school. But he could write a children's book.

They're having some kind of dance party right now. Lotsa people are singing their own song right now. They're playing "Celebrate" right now. It's no Kool and the Gang, but what is? I swear I haven't seen so many scary people shaking their ass in my life. Not even at a wedding.

My advice for anyone who has a seizure disorder: don't go there.

And oooolala! Check out Andre Heinz! Very handsome. Very well educated. And not someone I'd want to have dinner with. Perhaps that's why I won't marry someone who is heir to a billion dollar fortune. Of course, it could be that I'm married, too. (Do you think BrilliantEditor is a secret billionaire heir?)

Of course, there's a line of three women, possibly sorority sisters back in the day, and they were doing the rocking back and forth/holding hands thing. Woman one knew the words to the song, woman two knew some of them, women three knew that she was supposed to rock back and forth.

At the end of the day, I must say that the music selections were odd. I don't think they'll be selling the soundtrack. Or maybe they will. Good fundraiser?

James Taylor redone by Carol King
Willie Nelson
Van Halen
U2
Lots of other things that didn't go together like peas or carrots.

But the music...I think that the selections were suitably diverse so that everyone there could say, "No! No! Really! Bring that camera back! I know the words, I really do!" Or "Nope. I don't know that one."

how much is that doggy on the cover

BrilliantEditor is at work and has discovered intrigue! A book was stolen!

That plea was made to the attendees. I thought it was quite charming the way that the writer assumed that it was a mistake. Very kind.

This note then appeared:

Ransom? Or just silliness?

In my never ending quest to be not-helpful, I suggested that BE put it like a lost dog poster:

I think they might want to change the whole cover to mine. People will feel more affectionate toward a book about licensing. And we all need more affection. Even books.

car saga

BrilliantEditor and SirDougg were driving on Saturday to come home. They decided to take the pretty route through the Adirondacks. BE thought that SirDougg, being British, might enjoy a little American out-of-doors. (They have to stay inside in England.)

Well, the darlings got caught in some construction traffic and the engine started to idle much too high. BE knew that turning off the car and turning it back on again usually made the idle come back to normal. Guess what!

Not this time.

The car just wouldn’t start. He had lights come on, but, um, no one was home. A tow truck had to come and get them (they cuddled in the front seat on the way to the garage), but because they were in the middle of nowhere, it took an hour and a half for the cozy, towzy truck to get there.

The truck came from Utica and went back to Utica, but you can’t rent a car on Saturday afternoon around here. I had the little car (two seats) and therefore couldn’t bring them home. TheLion and LeTigress let me borrow their car.

So how did I find out that these two kids were stranded by a lovely lake in the Adirondacks? When there was no cell signal? I got a call from a woman with an accent from Tennessee maybe? She asked, “Is Dotty there?” Yep. “We have an insurance issue to deal with.”

I thought, “What the hell is this?” She said, “A ‘BrilliantEditor’ wanted me to call to tell you that he had car trouble and is stuck at a resort. Apparently they broke down in a construction site. Is he your boyfriend? Or your husband?”

An insurance issue? The car insurance has a AAA-like feature. This would, indeed, qualify as an insurance issue.

“Yes, he’s both boyfriend and husband.” She explained how things would work although I had no idea why they were in a construction site (she meant road work) and why they were at a resort (she meant a little resort town).

Things would work this way: they wait for the tow truck in a town called Inlet (now called Intel), the tow truck loads up the boys and the car; they drive an hour or two back to Utica (now called Cuticle), eat some steak at a scary, silly, Mafia-esque restaurant, and have a very charming person (me) pick them up and bring them home, another hour or two.

What an odd series of events. BE and SirDougg were very cute and sleepy. BE was doing his best to remain sitting upright while SirDougg was reclining as best he could given the restrictions of a car for a person over four feet tall. He seemed to slide in and out of wakefulness, sometimes sleeping, sometimes giggling at my and BE’s nonsense, sometimes giggling at his own, too.

We got home and have had a lovely, lovely time. Spring and Sprocket have entertained. We rented a car so we could all fit in one without stuffing one of us in the trunk. (Always volunteer to drive when this is a possibility. That’s a tip, kids.)

I got a call from the car people. There’s a bad starter. That’s all. We were budgeting a few thousand dollars and then budgeting a new car, but no! Hooray! Oh yes, indeed!

We’re getting our car back. Huzzah!

whoa

I was going to tell the astonishing tale of how I found BrilliantEditor and SirDougg in Utica after BE's car broke down in the Adirondacks and was towed to the Utiification location.

Instead, I will say that I got 275 pieces of spam on my comments here. That's a lot of spam. It's gone now, but if you want to view some porn, I highly recommend starting your own blog and just letting the spam come flowing toward you.

I'm still tired, though, from driving around and borrowing LeTigress and TheLion's car and returning it and waking up TheLion to tell him we'd be returning the car in the morning and oh what I story I have for you but you'll have to wait.

Oh yes.

tom churchill

Tex and Florette told me that the meteorologist Tom Churchill from the radio was a computer. I listened for weeks and weeks, trying to decide. Just a few days ago, though, I heard it. He said, "The high is clickseventy-five degrees." And the seventy-five bit was higher pitched than the rest.

Tex! Florette! You two are geniuses. I salute you and your cleverness and fine skills of observation. My darlings, you must always stay nearby.

Even if I move.

on the road again

BrilliantEditor is off to pick up SirDougg. Off to Ottawa, you see, to find the silly British man (who Sprocket calls "The British Bulldog") and bring him home to our fur- and fun-filled home. I must clean. It makes me sneeze. I am so delicate.

SirDougg owes me big time. At least a box of Kleenex. And maybe a pitying look. And many many many presents.

Or maybe he could just say something British-y in his false Birmingham accent.

Or maybe I could stop writing stuff and continue making it look like people, rather than gremlins, live here.

sniff sniff achoo

hush, hush, shhhhh

Went with BrilliantEditor to a schmancy (Vaguely schmancy, but my life must have fanciness. Fanciness I say!) thing for John Kerry. My friend, I call him PrePrez, was supposed to stop by, but I do believe he got caught in traffic. It's so difficult at rush hour around here. Just yesterday there was a line of ten cars to get onto route 79! Ten! Even the deer had to wait to cross the road.

At any rate, I wore tall shoes. I was nearly as tall as Chewbacca. I already have the wild hair, so why not the height? That's what I thought at first. Besides, they're the only black shoes that I own that aren't lined with some kind of fur or kevlar. To keep snow and bullets and ice bullets away from my tootsies.

I discovered that being the height of a water tower, relatively uninformed (Like, hey! I came with that guy. He's swell.), and talking with tiny old women, while stooping slightly to return to human height and wobbling a bit as I'm not used to such a cumbersome pose, well, I discovered that I'm completely uncomfortable.

Ta dah!

So! I decided that I should sit. I decided that I should not sit by myself looking like the girl at the eighth grade dance in her too-tall shoes. I need an activity and I need to chit chat. Lord knows I can chit chat.

Chatting was not easy, however. People already had their conversations going. People knew me, but I didn't know them. We'd met before, apparently, but my mind had most certainly been on other things like making pancakes or keeping the dogs from biting them or wondering if I had left the iron on and was responsible for that terrible fire. I was wishing that I had paid more attention. Still, I vow that I will now have a thing to say when I don't remember meeting someone. I've not determined the script yet, but rest assured, it will be brilliant.

At last a savior came to join the conversation. Surely he didn't expect me to monopolize his evening, talk constantly and then punch him in the nose, but we all need surprises in our life, don't we? Of course we do. Happily the host began speaking, thus obviating the need for police intervention.

During these kinds of schmanciness there are too many people and too much noise. It's not like being at a bar, either, where I can just ignore people I'm not with. Here there's an obligation to be interesting without using naughty language (I didn't manage that) and without telling outrageous lies (which I did manage). There’s an obligation to meet people, at least a little. The obligation continues when I manage to recognize people and they recognize me and then we realize that recognition has ZERO to do with shared interest so we talk about gas mileage and the price of tea in China and how interesting lampshades can be. Multiply this impression by the Universal Gas Constant (8.3144 j/(oK mole), and you might have an idea that this was, for me, the delicate flower of all delicate flowers, a flood of noise and stuff and info and whoa.

I went outside because I started zoning out. The man from PhysicsComputerTown, who had much potential to be interesting, although I no longer cared, was pawned off on BrilliantEditor. PhysCompTown was happy and BE was in his element, I think, and I went outside to look at the hostas and daisies and astilbes (which bloomed nearly two weeks later than mine).

After a walk around the yard, I talked with the elections man about electronic polling and then tried catching BE's eye to say, "Yoohooooo! Time to go!"

We went to dinner and we ate outside because it was quieter (!!). I thought it might be fun to go to Madeline's to take home dessert, but there was no one behind the counter and five kids and an inattentive mom were there. One kid said to another kid, "I am your fairy godmother and I will give you dessert if you give me two hugs!"

We left before I screamed.

No dessert for me. So sad.

I am, however, home now. In the relative quiet I can hear my fingers typing and my head is becoming lighter as I send my nonsensical complaining to you instead of keeping it all to myself.

a very merry unbirthday

Had a lovely day at the lake with my parents and BrilliantEditor's parents. As had been promised, there was pasta salad with tuna, but there was also some without.

I skipped the tuna version.

The next day BrilliantEditor's mom cooked lovely food for lunch--pork loin and tasty food. Yum. And wee lemon cookie straws. Straws they were called. There was no hole in them. You couldn't drink from them. Neither could you use them for bedding for an animal. Nevertheless, they were long cookies rather than round. Straws, I suppose, is an appropriate name.

summer

It's been hot. Only eighties hot, but hot. And it rains a little every day, so it feels hotter. Sprocket doesn't seem to mind, but Spring comes in the house with this mad look in her eye and her mouth open and her hair all screwy. I bet she could write some astonishingy good poetry when she's like that. There's be all kinds of insanity and violence and food. There's be rapturous verse about the allure of cool basements, the rich, velvety taste of puddles, catching flies with chopping jaws, and the rapid refreshment of the water bowl.

Perhaps I will attempt to capture the dog powered poetry. When she breathes it in her sleep, I will be there to record and then translate her snorts and whines and nose twitches into the powerful, strong verse that most certainly inhabits her cone-shaped skull.

happy birthday, baby

It's my birthday! Yeeeehaw! I just might go to the rodeo. I've always wanted to be a cowgirl. Only in the sense that I get to wear cowboy (girl) boots and a big hat and ride a horse. I don't actually want to work hard. Yuck.

Here's the birthday cake I requested.

I'm going to the lake to be with the two sets of parents. It should be fun. We're having a barbeque. lala. My father wants pasta salad. His version has mayonaise and tuna and onions. Mine doesn't.

When PTAMom asked if I liked it that way, I said, "Nope." She said, "I didn't think so." Dr.Dad cackled in the background, "You don't know what's good!"

He'd say that about possum stew. And maybe it would be good.

Until he added mayonaise and tuna.

supreme, extraordinary knowledge. except for this

We were talking, on Saturday, about women who breastfeed their children for what we, the possessors of extraordinary knowledge, deemed too long. One example was of, I believe, a three year old who was still being breast-fed. The child may have been older. The mom said that it was a way for them to remain close, a private, quiet time.

Whoa, I say. That’s a lot of breast-feeding. Try reading a book. I attempted to think of a good reason for this phenomenon. Or even a bad reason would be fine. I could only come up with this: Maybe this is the only allowed form of birth control. I’d heard that if a woman is still breast-feeding, she can’t become pregnant.

But no! Apparently, I can attribute this information to Florette and LeTigress, it’s just not true. LeTigress, who is in possession of a baby of her own, indicated that her doctor said, “Hey, look out. That whole ‘you can’t get pregnant when you’re breastfeeding’ thing isn’t exactly true. So watch it, sister.”

I am paraphrasing, of course.

This was news to me! I had only learned that old wives tale (if they are old and wives, at least some of them should know that this tale is of the fairy variety) a few years ago. Now the idea that some woman, who is in bondage to a religion or ideology that refuses to allow birth control, could just breast feed her child until she reaches menopause so she’d have only one child…well, that idea is just won’t cut the mustard! My dream of super-secret breast pumps in the closets of Catholic women—women who would siphon a magical elixir that will be used to feed the cat that stalks and kills the stork--will no longer be relevant to birth control.

That’s an impressive, convoluted, and very strange dream, too.

I sat there on our picnic blanket, as we were enjoying our supreme command of knowledge at a picnic, and thought, “Wow. I’m glad someone told me not to have a baby so I don’t have a baby.”

What a strange circumstance that would have been.

people laugh more

I went to Amazon.com today to pick out some hippie, liberal, leftist products.

When I arrived I forgot all about that stuff and read the page before me with amazement and amusement. I suppose that would be "mazmusement". Or maybe not.

Here's thing one:

I am recommended Bill Clinton's book because I bought a book about dogs. Hmm. The possibilities for ironic statements are nearly endless.

And here's thing two:

What does cooking have to do with this book? I'm tempted by it anyway, but still, it has little to do with books about food.

I'm very amused. I think this is in test format, but wow. It's suddenly fun to take a test.

misogynist

At work today there we had an educational event to teach our customers about the brand new sparkling new more money new software that Viking's putting out. (Incidentally, if you're looking for embroidery software, this is actually pretty damn cool.)

What wasn't cool was our presenter's personality.

In the first hour he said things like, "Now, I know all you ladies go shopping all over the place..." or "You ladies have asked for this, although you didn't need it..." or "I could smack teachers who don't talk about pictograms..."

Okay, Bozo, let's take this outside. I am one of those teachers and if he smacked me, after I very sweetly got him a drink of water before he began, I'd shove him so he'd fall on his fat ass and then I'd hiss at him, "That was not cool." I'd say it so he'd know I'd be contacting everyone I could think of to make his work none-too-pleasant for quite sometime.

Am I over-reacting? You bet your boots I am! BUT! Here's one other little note. In the new software you can design pictograms. It would be a fancy way to do a pictogram that I'm supposed to teach.

A woman (should I say lady?) asked, "Can you show us how you'd do a pictogram in this software?"

Ha! He'd never done one! Loser! I'll smack him!

These kinds of things always bother me, but I doubt I'd begin to like this man whatever he did. He's a punk.

I do believe that I'm not intended to work with groups larger than ten. I get angry when they talk while the speaker is speaking. Especially when the speaker is me.

We all know that asking people to stop talking is a losing battle. I keep fighting it. I want to win!

Now hush and pay attention, children. Your computer is whispering to you, "Take a break...take a break...take a break."

meetin'

I went out to my friend BoPeep's house. Her husband is home from Iraq and I met him tonight. He's very funny and they're quite lovely together. They laugh a lot. That makes me happy.

He seems relatively unscathed. He's an electrician, so he doesn't have to shoot people, really. I think that helps. I read an article somewhere, maybe The New Yorker, about how being a soldier who has to shoot people is not dealt with at all in the military. Apparently there's no one to tell a soldier what to think or feel when he's done his job, even though the job is frustrating and gut wrenching and horrifying.

That's not what I wanted to talk about, though. Mostly I wanted to say that we had a lovely time playing games and drinking wine and telling stories and eating dinner. It was a really lovely time.

kareer kwery

So I got rejected from graduate school. Okay. These things happen.

Now, the next question is this: Should I reapply? Well, yeah. I spend another $65 but I get to learn how truly foolish they are.

The other next question is this: Do I really want to do this?

I've been back at the Sewing Gallery for two days. In these two days I have been doing tasks like making a spreadsheet and some embroidery designs. It's not really like I'm at a sales job. I'm just in the middle of the sales floor doing something else.

Of course, when there's an extra body around and someone needs help, the extra body is asked to help. And this extra body likes to help out, actually. It makes me happy. I enjoy it.

Of course, I do have to complain.

People are really weird. They get really wound up about things that cost $35. When they look at something to buy they say, "Whoa. I'm not spending that much for a walking foot. I can do it the old way."

This can cause a problem for me. Sometimes it's okay, but when it's an attack on quality or usefulness I'm irritated because it's something that I like and use. I can't work with people like this because I want to say, "Fine. Don't spend it. Despite being so thrifty, you have officially purchased the right not to complain when you can't make things work."

Hmm, I think this boat paddle is too expensive. I'd rather use a coffee spoon.

*you may not complain when you're up a creek without one*

I think this car costs too much. I'm going to put wheels and a blender motor on this cardboard box.

*you may not complain when you drive farther than your blender cord*

I think this aspirin costs too much. I'm going to bang my head against the wall until I pass out.

*you may not complain when you have a headache when you wake up*

Don't these folks understand? Hey! I'm not the enemy! I'm just doing my job, and it isn't even my job! I'm just being nice!

Back off on the surliness.

And here's a coffee spoon to get you started paddling your way out of here.

So is it that I'm cranky today? Of course that's part of it. But I'm responding to one person. ONE! Is it possible that I don't have the personality for this?

I'm confused about this because I do possess the charm and sincerity to get the things that I need. Today, for example, after someone else was turned away, I got the requested items and a hug. Yep.

But that doesn't translate into therapist. That translates into a gifted gopher. And hey, if I can make up the words "gifted gopher" in a jiffy, as I just did, I could maybe be a writer.

I think, however, that my Floridian friend ChillyLilly has the best one. I don't know what I was saying, but she heard, "blame the socialite in the sky."

Now that's writing.

I went to find a picture of a socialite and I found this instead: Crazy So Cal Lady with Self-Love and Superiority Complex; Unfamiliar with Irony.

ohio

A month or so ago BrilliantEditor and I went to Ohio to see BellyRub and Erotica.

I don't know that I talked that much about it, but I did take some pictures.

This is my brother Bellyrub:

He likes to dress so that he looks really sharp. Few people can match him for coordination of colors and patterns. Be on the lookout for his fashions on the runways of Cleveland next season!

This is a view of onions:

When you buy a hot dog at the baseball game you can put onions on your personal-sized sausage. I don't know if the method of application is to keep people's fingers out of the cookie jar, so to speak, or if it's just to amaze people like me who don't actually watch the game.

This is Ohio:

I actually liked downtown Cleveland. It was in what seemed to be a state of renewal and the people were friendly and I got free Swedish fish and Rolaids (not from the same people) when we went to the Bar-B-Q cook off.

That's cool.

But this is what I saw on the way into and out of Ohio. This amazing restaurant (I'm still not clear about their oil change policy--do they do it or not?) and the fireworks stand and the Motel 6. Then there are the power lines to tie it all together with their electricity laced cables!

Ohio, I salute you. I'm not sure why, but you surely do have a thing going on.

wild-life day in dottywood!

I had a chickadee crash into the window. I rescued it from imminent sniffdom; Sprocket was prepared to investigate. The bird had freaked himself out. He was on his back panting and then flipped over to his front panting, then flipped out again and flapped onto the ground where I scooped him up again on a subscription card from The New Yorker. And he had his mouth open the whole time. Trying to cool off, you see. But he looked kind of elated. Like he was singing, "Ahhhhh! Laaaaa!"

I don't think he was. I knoow I'm not elated when Sprocket sniffs my tail. I can't imagine that a chickadee would appreciate it. Imagine the scale of that! A huge, damp nose investigating your shirt tails! I'd hyperventilate, too.

a screaming comes across the sky
I heard a red-tailed hawk today. It screamed a couple of times, the noise you hear in old westerns when vultures are supposed to be approaching...I looked up and saw this hawk chasing two crows. I don't know if they'd done anything wrong, but one was gargling a little. I'd not heard that sound. I do believe one was chatting. Crows have laughed at my dog, I don't see why they wouldn't chat.

the primrose path
I'm writing about gardening quite a bit, I think. I talk about it more. The Queen has asked me to show her what it looks like and as I'm proud of several parts of it, I'll show them.

math beans

Two days ago I went for coffee with my friend who has just now moved to Florida. I ordered steamed milk and biscotti. I got a wee napkin to put under it when we went to sit down.

It was a cocktail napkin, the smallish, square ones that they give you on the airplane. I was moving my cookie around and discovered, "The length of my biscotti is the hypotenuse of the cocktail napkin!"

Holy cow! What an amazing discovery!

pulp fiction
Every now and then I get the notion that I should be a writer. I look at things I've written in the past and think, "Hey, that's not too bad."

I've decided to reserve judgment on whether I'll write the next great American novel. I'm not thirty yet. I've got time. Unless I get hit by a bus or something. Which isn't likely as I don't leave the house most of the time. Except for when I do...

But at any rate, I found these books that I wish I had written. I wish I'd read them, too. But here are the covers!

dreaming about pulp

A year or so ago SirDougg bought me a very thoughtful and hearfelt gift. It was a book called The Dreamers. I wrote a little bit about it before. An amazing work of propaganda, this book must be shared only in little doses. I shall do so one day, well, several days actually, but until then, this book will be my inspiration and my warning. I will be very aware of how much a book can change and I will also be aware of how little a book can change.

Perhaps I'll write erotica. That never changes.

the 'rents

The parents. That's what 'rents are.

I went to Albany this fourth of July weekend to have a family reunion thing where I met a fabulous new second cousin. Neither one of us could figure out how it is that we're related. We're probably not. Not really, anyway.

Then I went to AngerTrain's house to meet his new girlfriend (PTA mom said, "meet his new friend" but I think that sounds ambiguous and weird). After that I went to the July fourth thing down on the plaza and watched fireworks that were at once spectacular and silly. Some of the music they chose was great, but some of it was rather cheesy.

I stayed out too late that night with the new cousin, TallDrink, and flipped my parents out. Dr.Dad was going to leave the house and drive around looking for me. But where? That was the question. So they stayed awake and flipped out. When I called it was like I was once again a wee lass. "Dotty, where are you? We can come and pick you up? Are you okay?" Very strange to hear.

Dr.Dad said, "If you'd been out that late with BrilliantEditor I wouldn't have worried..." I don't buy that one either.

And finally, the next day, I went back to AngerTrain's house and raided his garden. I got a lot of loot. I am, of course, not certain that it will grow, but if it does, it will be swell. If it doesn't, well, it's still swell as I didn't pay anything for it.

Coming home is always a bit of a relief. I can rest and relax and do what I want. Somehow I just get wound too tight when I'm not home. I'm wound pretty tight as it is. I may just bust a spring!