Category Archives: Splashes

Rainy Days and Mondays…

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…don’t get me down; they inspire me to write. Today, however, I really wanted to just sleep, and I did take a nap instead of having lunch, if you must know.

As for the weekend, and the non-nap parts of the day? Bullet points are my friends.

  • Friday Night: Received new cell phone from UPS and it melted in my hand after making brown electrical smoke. Went to Cingular store to exchange it, then to Jamba Juice and then to Mimi’s for take out (mmm, quiche and salad). Exchanged phone subsequently turned out to be both broken and illegally returned by an employee who put it in a new box. Watched Stargate as Cingular kept us home too long to go to CSz. Missed phenomenal show.
  • Saturday: Went back to Cingular, got NEW new phone. Went to Cracker Barrel for comfort food. Went to Jamba Juice and then to CSz where I played, but it was an off-kilter night. It didn’t COMPLETELY suck, but it wasn’t at all focused or cohesive. After the show, went to dinner with troupemates, and celebrated D’s birthday.
  • Sunday: Slept and puttered and ate tacos and watched movies and wrote.
  • Monday: Worked from 7:30 AM – 11:45 AM. Slept from noon to 1:30. Worked til 4:30. Went to lunch. Went to Workshop even though I wanted to stay home and sleep. Workshop helped me feel better. Came home happy and wired. Ate dinner while watching season finale of Heroes. Had brief but nice chat with friend.

And since I’m having fun with lists, and we played Seven Things as a warm-up at Workshop, here is my list of Seven Things in My Day:

  1. Woke to the happy surprise that it was raining. As chances for rain today were below 40%, had not been expecting actual precipitation.
  2. Was awake and functional before eight AM despite having been up til almost four.
  3. Caught an episode of Star Trek Voyager that I’d never seen before, spontaneously captured by TiVo.
  4. Chose to nap instead of eat lunch, and woke feeling refreshed and clear-headed.
  5. Left for Workshop with enough time to get an iced almond latte on the way, and still make it to the Arena early and before the rain came.
  6. Had my favorite bra break (the plastic “underwire” snapped in two) during dinner – an excuse for new lingerie!
  7. Found out that even though NBC canceled Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip the remaining episodes of the completed first season are airing on Thursdays beginning this week.

      8. And with that, I’m off to bed.

Thursday Thirteen – 0705.17

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Thirteen Things about MissMeliss
Thirteen Things that Begin with “G”

  1. Garlic It’s a staple in my cooking, whether I’m chopping it for pasta sauce or chili, or to mix into scrambled eggs, or roasting it to serve with a crusty baguette and hot soup. It means “home” to me.
  2. Genie This is the American version of the French word, which actually doesn’t share etymology with the more correct “Djinn,” but I have an affinity for trickster characters, especially tricksters who use magic.
  3. Georgetown, CO I lived there when I was seven-ish, and it was an idyllic place to be a small child. A part of me still yearns for small town life. I just want the small town to also have a decent bookstore, cafe, a coastline, and internet access.
  4. Gestures When you come from an Italian family, talking with your hands doesn’t mean “sign language” but broad passionate gestures. I’ve restrained myself a lot, but when I’m truly comfortable with people, they come out.
  5. Ghirardelli Square The stores have changed a lot since my first visit there, in 1980, and watching the molten chocolate pour down isn’t quite as magical as it used to be, but this is still my favorite San Francisco tourist attraction, and I used to love taking the bus down Van Ness on weekends when I was at USF, and hanging in the square, watching the street performers and sipping hot cocoa.
  6. Ghost Stories Like many people, I like to be a little scared, and I like my fiction a little dark. But ghost stories don’t have to be dark – sometimes they can be merely mysterious, and other times romantic.
  7. Gingerbread Classically spicy, always tastey, and did you know it’s fabulous with dark chocolate sauce?
  8. Gipsy Kings, The They’re French, but they sing in soulful, earthy (yes, both at once) Spanish. I love their rough voices and their guitars.
  9. Green It’s a cool, wet color for me, one I associate with beach glass, kelp forests, and dark, soft moss.
  10. Groovous In my effort to decrease my use of the word “cool” I started using “spiffy” and “nifty,” but sometimes they’re not strong enough. “Groovous” which is my spin on “groovy” is unique enough to suit me, and tends to get attention as well. Plus, it’s fun to say. I like words that are fun to say.
  11. Guessing Games I’m good at closure, so it’s natural for me to like such games.
  12. Gypsies Like “Genie” above, it’s the romantic, fictional gypsies I refer to here.
  13. Gyroscopes I remember playing with a toy gyroscope my grandfather gave me, letting the ball spin as I turned the contraption in different directions. It fascinated me, but I don’t have the math finesse to ever be good at physics.

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

Noon

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…is when the alarm went off, after I re-set it. Fuzzy was still home, and when he moved his chair in his office the rolling wheels on the hard floor sounded like distant thunder. The dogs were huddled close to me, willing me to feel better.

I haven’t had coffee all week.
Or tea.

Instead I’ve been sipping cold water, or chilled cranberry juice mixed with lime Perrier. The carbonation makes my tongue tingle, and forces a smile even when I’d much prefer to wallow in crankiness.

I made chili last night, and watched the final episode of Gilmore Girls, and then Fuzzy came home a couple hours later, by which time I’d found a marathon of cheesy Alien Nation movies (tv-verse) running on one of Cinemax’s sub-channels. I confess to watching one and a half of them, but the cable was glitchy and made it too frustrating, despite the game of tallying the number of AN actors who had also done guest appearances in TNG.

And the mocking of the hair styles.
Or lack thereof.

And then to bed, to sleep, to wake at nine being told I should rest, and the resetting of the alarm to the afore-mentioned Noon.

Which is when I woke, and drank a peach and pomegranate yogurt smoothie.

I think I’m hungry.
And I think I want coffee.
But I’m afraid I won’t like the smell of it, as happens when I feel like this.
And it’s always so disappointing.

Also, to the LJ crew: I’ve been testing a new plugin that allows the cross-posting of blog foo to LJ. Not sure if I’ll continue it…Might….Might not.

Sabotage?

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Fridays at ComedySportz are always a little weird. Saturday houses are generally good, but Fridays are iffy. Tonight, just to make things even weirder than usual, we had only five players, playing 2-on-2 with a “designated jokester.” I was on the Red team and E was my captain. BigE reffed. S and BabyJ were the Blue team, and our director was the DJ.

We opened with the worst-ever game of Doo Rap. I don’t think we made it past three people before we had to start over, and then, when it was down to three people, the name we were supposed to rhyme was “Meg.” S started, but for some reason she had the name “Sue” stuck in her head (it was a suggestion not taken), so when she was told we were starting with her, she used the name “Sue.” I was next. I knew the name chosen was “Meg,” but I also knew that I was going to be called out either way. If I corrected the name, I’d be told I didn’t rhyme, and when I DID rhyme “Sue” I was called out for using the wrong name. As our director put it during half-time, “You were pretty much screwed either way.” The audience thought it was funny, though.

We ended up winning that game anyway, and our next game was SlideShow, with two volunteers. It was an okay game. Blue played Arms Expert, and literally soaked the volunteer, who was pretty good at answering questions, but, per director, had hygiene issues. Blue won that round.

Blue then played Changing Styles and Emotions, which was funny, but no one really knew who was who. Ditto our game of blind line. I stupidly began by denying our director, and then I corrected, but the whole scene was just off. The audience liked it, but they liked Changing Styles MORE, so Blue won that round also, and got to play Five Things. During this game, BabyJ was miming giving birth in order to convey to S that her football was a baby, and our DJ emerged from between his legs, AS the baby. It was …original.

We played Dance Party as a catch-up round, and I forgot to unfreeze. Story wasn’t our best, but I won that, so at least I felt like I’d redeemed myself somewhat, and 185 seemed to last forever. Blue won (no surprise), but notes weren’t that harsh, as everyone had had fun.

We came straight home after, watched Smallville on TiVo, and now Fuzzy’s doing last minute work foo, and I’m about to fall asleep.

As to Sabotage? That was a referral to something I said in notes, about me and S trying to sabotage the match…I was kidding. Really.

Friday’s Feast 0705.11

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Appetizer
Tell about a time when you had to be brave.
I don’t think I’ve ever had to be particularly brave. I mean, yeah, I watched the plate-glass windows crumble one by one during the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and yes, I’ve recently had tornado warnings here, but you can’t control that. You’re there. You’re stuck with it. Bravery, to me, implies a choice. Friends have said it took bravery to audition for ComedySportz, that it takes bravery to go on, but…again…bravery isn’t really the accurate term for that. Confidence? Yes. Bravery? No. And do could I possibly compare my safe little life to that of anyone who lives in a truly life-threatening environment?

Soup
Which upcoming movie are you excited about seeing?
I can’t pick just one. The latest Harry Potter offering, of course, as well as Hairspray and the newest installments of Pirates of the Caribbean and The Fantastic Four rank up there, as well, I guess.

Salad
Name an item you try to always have on hand.
Pasta. Even plain it’s a meal if there’s nothing else, and it’s quick and easy to make.
In non-food items? Toilet paper.

Main Course
Imagine the most relaxing room you can think of. Now describe it!
Cool ceramic tile the color of beach sand forms the floor, and the walls are a warm coffee-and-cream color below chair-rail height and a wash of watery greens and blues above. Window sills and doors are painted clean white, with a hint of a gloss. Blinds are the opaque horizontal ones that look like paper, allowing light to filter through, but not allowing outside gawkers. The tub, for this is a bathroom, is an antique claw-foot cast iron model, with lion paw feet, and a rack for holding soap and a book. There is a soft bath pillow attached to the up-swept end.

Sinks are colorful ceramic bowls sunk into a marble counter top. Wooden cabinets are the color of warm cherry- or pear-wood. Faucets and pulls are brushed nickel. A cobalt blue vase of flowers is on the counter between the pair of sinks, and a collection of blue and green beach glass resides in half of a shell on the windowsill behind the tub.

Across the room is the shower, a spa-type shower with bottle-green glass, and room for a bench to hold hair towels outside the spray’s reach. The shower walls are the same warm beige tile of the bathroom floor, with cobalt and teal squares inserted randomly for color.

(The toilet is in a nook of it’s own, with a frosted glass door to allow light, and a built in book-shelf.)

There is a chair between the two sinks so that area can be used as a vanity, and a lit make-up mirror can be plugged in when necessary, otherwise there is an oval mirror above each sink, and there is art on the walls – beach scenes, mainly. The linen closet is full of extremely soft cotton bath sheets, smaller towels ideal for wrapping long hair, wash clothes, and extra stashes of soap, shampoo, conditioner, etc. A cd player also resides here, and speakers are mounted in niches in the walls.

Dessert
On a scale of 1 to 10 (10 being highest), how spiritual or religious are you?
It depends on the day. At times I’m an 8 and at other times I’m a 2 and most of the time it varies between them.

Thursday Thirteen – 0705.10

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Thirteen Things about MissMeliss
Thirteen Things that Begin with “F”

  1. Faeries

    O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
    She is the fairies’ midwife, and she comes
    In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
    On the fore-finger of an alderman,
    Drawn with a team of little atomies
    Athwart men’s noses as they lie asleep;
    Her wagon-spokes made of long spiders’ legs,
    The cover of the wings of grasshoppers,
    The traces of the smallest spider’s web,
    The collars of the moonshine’s watery beams,
    Her whip of cricket’s bone, the lash of film,
    Her wagoner a small grey-coated gnat,
    Not so big as a round little worm
    Prick’d from the lazy finger of a maid;
    Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut
    Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub,
    Time out o’ mind the fairies’ coachmakers.
    And in this state she gallops night by night
    Through lovers’ brains, and then they dream of love;
    O’er courtiers’ knees, that dream on court’sies straight,
    O’er lawyers’ fingers, who straight dream on fees,
    O’er ladies ‘ lips, who straight on kisses dream,
    Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
    Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are:
    Sometime she gallops o’er a courtier’s nose,
    And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
    And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig’s tail
    Tickling a parson’s nose as a’ lies asleep,
    Then dreams, he of another benefice:
    Sometime she driveth o’er a soldier’s neck,
    And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
    Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
    Of healths five-fathom deep; and then anon
    Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes,
    And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two
    And sleeps again. This is that very Mab
    That plats the manes of horses in the night,
    And bakes the elflocks in foul sluttish hairs,
    Which once untangled, much misfortune bodes:
    This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs,
    That presses them and learns them first to bear,
    Making them women of good carriage:
    This is she—
    Romeo and Juliet – Mercutio Describing Queen Mab

  2. Fall My favorite season, with crisp temperatures, crunchy leaves, and the anticipation of winter evenings.
  3. Family Even when they drive you crazy, they still love you unconditionally.
  4. Fedoras Quite possibly the perfect hat, and wearing one can make you a journalist or a spy, or just really, really stylish.
  5. Fennel Chopped up in pasta sauce, it gives an extra kick. It may look like celery, but it has the kick of anise or licorice. Definitely an acquired taste.
  6. Festivals I like country fairs but I love festivals, and it doesn’t matter if they’re celebrating arts and crafts, improvisational theater, or pumpkins. They’re always fun, and often filled with hokey charm.
  7. Fiction Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere. — Carl Sagan
  8. Flames Whether they’re crackling in a fireplace, flickering at the top of a candle, broiling the perfect burger, or coming out of one of those tiny kitchen torches used for caramelizing sugar, flame is magic.
  9. Flowers I love flowers. I have vases in the breakfast nook, living room, and on my office, and I’m constantly refilling them. Fuzzy is even in on it – he brings me bouquets every time he goes to the grocery store.
  10. Fog It softens the edges of the world, and makes mystery out of the mundane. It’s the perfect inspiration for someone with an over-active imagination.
  11. Footwear I like shoes, and boots, yes, but I also like funky tights and seasonal socks. Pretty much ALL footwear, really. Even galoshes.
  12. France I really believe part of my soul originated in Paris in the 20’s. Or at least spent some time there. But I love other parts of France, as well – Languedoc, Carcassone, Nice. MUST get back there soon.
  13. Friends I am lucky to have diverse friends who provoke, inspire, support, edit, listen, and amuse.

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!