Glad you could join us.

The problem with taking an extended blog break is you end up with a week's worth of backlogged brain crap to empty out before you feel like you can move forward. In the spirit of flushing the mental toilet, I give you last week's...
Memory:
I remember being asked to jump in on a game of double dutch with Ma'lee and Dawn, and being terrified. I knew full well (from past experience) that if I didn't step in the circle at exactly the right moment I would not only suffer the indignity of getting smacked in the face with the first rope, but would be clothes-lined and brought to the ground by the inertia of the second. They insisted my problem wasn't timing, but approach. Ma'lee and Dawn slipped between the ropes like eels, slid their little lanky bodies sideways and up and over in one quick, remarkably fluid motion. I, on the other hand, thrust myself into the circle like I'd just been thrown off a dock into a lake; legs akimbo, arms extended, fingers splayed out into jazz hands. I'm convinced the only reason they continued to include me was because my jazz hands kept great time swinging the rope, and I knew all the words to "Lady Marmalade," including the dirty french part about going to bed with Mz. LaBelle.

Epiphany:
I know two things with great certainty. The first: last Saturday was not a good day to try and quit smoking, or to attempt to help myself do so by spending the last pennies I had on 2" dowel rods for some pointless home improvement project that will bring neither myself or my man any joy, certainly less joy than twenty cigarettes would have had I had the money to buy them. The second: Michael Jackson is a freak.

Related Plea:
Listen mister, I don't know where you buy cigarettes, but I have never received an "extra" one in the pack. Stop asking me for it. I promise if that 21st cigarette ever materializes, it has your name all over it, okay?

Discovery:
Seems my dog is a Puritanical Baptist, or some similar sect thereof. And even though I'm more of a buddhist/naturalist, quasi-spiritualist Jew type myself, we really get along quite well. I chalk that up to preaching religious tolerance and an appreciation of ALL belief systems throughout her life, even if it sort-of bit me on the ass when she decided to become some freaky Christian freak. But we've learned a balance. I tolerate the wild machinations she goes through to disrupt all the drinking, dancing and pre-marital sex that goes on around here, and she puts up with me listening to punk rock, occasionally quoting new-age Dr. Wayne Dyer bullshit, and making dreidels out of clay.

And finally, A Warning:
When, while playing Scrabble, your boyfriend forms two words by placing a "Z" on a triple letter score, therefore getting the triple both times and like a ka-jillion points in the process? Quit the game. Forfeit, whatever. Unless of course you ENJOY staying up all night trying to concoct baseless arguments as to exactly why he's a mean-spirited asshole in an effort to cover up your selfish sour grapes. Just call it a draw. Go make love, bake cookies, re-arrange the closet, anything. Trust me.