Meet Blueberry

The seemingly never ending saga of Anna Needs to Buy a Car has, against all odds, has ended.  Buying a car has been terrifying to me, it's a lot of money (something that my miserly little soul doesn't like spending), it requires financing (something I've never had to get before) which in turn means monthly payments (something I've never had.) Big, scary, looming adult-y decisions to be made and I seriously miss being twelve.  So after months of cowardly inaction I bit the bullet and did something that scared me, I bought BB:

She's cute, she's speedy, she comfortable and she's completely impractical.  She only has two doors and if I want to get more than two bags of groceries at any given time, I have to fold the back seats down to fit them in.  Yep, entirely impractical but it's okay because my life doesn't need practicality right now - it needs fun and she is most certainly is fun. Even more fun than her speedy cuteness is the absurd and faaaan-tastic Mini Nod.  As someone who has always driven entirely inconspicuous cars I didn't know this until recently but there seems to be a strange and entirely absurd camaraderie among people who drive certain cars. 

Jeep drivers have a wave, a small and oh so cool "hey there" kind of wave out the driver side window.  I giggled a little when Wes explained this requirement to driving his Jeep until I remembered Todd Brewer telling me about Jeep Love when I was in high school. Todd was (and probably still is) an interesting cookie and I just assumed that this waving thing was code for Todd Brewer likes to wave at strangers. While that might be true, Jeep Love or the Jeep Wave, whatever you want to call it, much to my Mom's amusement, it exists. 

I think it's been well established that coolness is just not among my attributes and to find out that the Mini Coopers have their own version of The Wave, well that's just typical. :)  It's not a wave, not even so much a nod as a "what up" chin lift as you pass in traffic. One would think that this would be an easy acknowledgement to master but I've NEVER been able to make a chin lift look anything but ridiculous.  My uncool nature means that I instinctively nod down instead of up and lets just say...that's not the Mini nod.  This is going to take some practice.

QotD: Stolen from my Christina

I am going to make everything around me beautiful. That will be my life.

~Elsie de Wolfe

QotD: Destruction Edition

"The destruction is always there if you are looking to destruct.  I am lucky to have lots of friends."

Manny Pacquiao

Mother's Day, Version 2.0

I know it's a little past the day 'o celebration but I never intended Version 1.0 to be the last word in mothers day musings. Why is my Mom better than your mom you ask?  And why is my Mom a proper noun and yours is just a piddly, little lower-case noun? Don't take offense to the proper noun part, it's because she's mine and this is my blog so she gets proper noun status.  You can, however go right ahead and take offense to the "better than yours" because I'm not backing down from it.

I could fill a book with all of the memories I have of my mom but for the sake of your sanity and the bandwidth available to me on this blog I'll restrain myself to one that has inexplicably stuck over the years:

One Saturday morning when I was in high school I stumbled out of bed  and into the kitchen where my mom was unloading groceries. She looked at me and said: I got raspberries at the store that are great, do you want some ice cream with raspberries for breakfast?    This?! From the woman who fed me carob and kefir growing up?  Yes, yes I did most certainly want raspberries with french vanilla ice cream for breakfast.

It's an odd memory to have stick with me for all these years; at first it stuck because it seemed so out of character for my Mom of all people to be offering me ice cream for breakfast.  In retrospect though I think it sticks because it's so in character, I just didn't know it at the time.

I realize how insanely lucky I was growing up to never question my Mom's mom-ness.  I never doubted that there would be breakfast (not to mention lunch and dinner), that I'd get picked up from school or that I'd get woken up every morning and there would be clean clothes to put on.  I took entirely for granted all of these things that were a given in my life because of the time and energy she dedicated to making it so. While I am endlessly grateful for the Mom that she was while I was growing up, there are so many things that I've started to appreciate in my Mom who, as I've gotten older, become as much friend as she is Mom.  Her loyalty to the people that she loves and the kindness that she values so highly.  Her love of beauty and music, and the fearlessness with which she attacks new projects and hobbies.  She has a penchant for ceramic bowls, art festivals and sitting in the sun. She can Snoopy like a pro, appreciates the odd glass of wine on a Saturday afternoon, gives some of the best hugs around and when I'm with her, I'm home. 

How insanely I love my mom and how very much I admire her can be (insufficiently) summed up by a conversation that Wes and I had the other night while watching TV.  Wes had commented that he hoped to be as good a dad someday as the character we'd been watching.  I thought about it for a minute and realized that I am familiar with that sentiment, it's just that I hope someday to be as good a mom as my mom is.

Love you Mama, Happy (Belated) Mothers Day.

Mothers Day: Version 1.0

My Mom's better than your mom.  BOOOOYAHH!!!

QotD: DiNozzo Edition

"You can't out run me!  I'm wearing tube socks!"

- Tony DiNozzo NCIS

I love you NPR

"The minute someone says 'there's no question that...' that's the red flag.  I think there are lots of questions, you're just not asking them,"

H to the Izzo

Anna: what does H to the Izzo mean?

John: Hove.

Anna: Huh?

John: It's spells his name...

Anna: uh...how is that?

John: (*siiiiiigggghhhhhh) H-O-V-E.  H is an "h", izzo is the "o"...

.....

John waits patiently while I ponder this

.....

Anna: oooohhhhhhh

John: God you're white.  Did you go to private school or something?

Doing it like the adults do

I've been on a bit music kick lately and when it comes to music, I'm a giant goober who likes to find personal meaning in the lyrics.  As embarassing as that fact is to admit to, I am proud to say that the songs that I've been finding meaning in are of a much more impressive caliber than those that I found meaning in when I was 18, no Britney this time.  So rather than simply post some songs with a smiley face and a SOTD tag, I thought (since I've now outted myelf)  I might as well share my gooberishness and try to explain why I love these songs to much.

I've been feeling rather adult-y lately, a feeling that's good yet unwelcome all at the same time.   Yep, this life is mine and in the immortal and wise words of Hyperbole and a Half  "I'm really not comfortable with the fact that I'm responsible for all the decisions." 

All the decisions (and there's literally dozens needing to be made each and every day,) the good and the bad, they come back to me and then I have to live with the results.   It's all beer and skittles when decisions turn out well but what about when those decisions take a sharp left hand turn to Bad-Choice-ville?  Bring on the self flagellation and Popsicles to say the least.  There is distinct comfort however in knowing that in my relative solitude, the amount of damage that I can wreak is limited to a small, very intimate, radius of...well...me (and sometimes wondieful boyfriend.) I guess you could say it's been a very introspective year.

Then, this past Sunday I was watching the Superhero Marathon on USA and a line in Spiderman, of all movies, resonated.  "With great power comes great responsibility."  Well...really it's more meaningful for me in the reverse: with great responsibility comes great power.  My life is mine and that means that if someone crosses a line and I want to kick them out of it?  I can.  If someone gives me advice that I don't want, don't like or don't agree with?  I get to ignore it!  Or, in the far more eloquent (and succinct) words of Sarah Bareilles:

You've got opinions, man

We're all entitled to 'em

But I never asked

So let me thank you for time

And try to not waste any more of mine

Get out of here fast

I hate to break it to you babe
But I'm not drowning

There's no one here to save

Who cares if you disagree

You are not me



On Osama

I have to admit that when I turned on the TV the other night and saw that Osama bin Laden had been killed, I felt relief.  Bin Laden was not a good man, he killed people indiscriminate of race, creed, age and gender.  He sought power and legacy through terror and I believe that the world is a better place with him no longer in it.  If my belief towards this end wavered, it was immediately cemented when I read the report that he used his wife as a human shield when the shooting started. Yes, I was relieved.

Along with the relief I also find cynicism.  Cynicism as I watch American's celebrating this "victory" over terrorism in the streets. Is this victory?  It feels remarkably like watching President Bush declare victory almost exactly eight years ago on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln; it feels false.


I know that violence is a reality in the world that we live in and that thousands of people volunteer to carry out the violent tasks that safeguard the life that I live and the world that I live it in.  For this I am grateful. Violence may sometimes be unavoidable, but to gloat over the death of an old man?  To dance triumphantly over the bloodied body of an old man, regardless of how evil, strikes me as disturbing and barbarous. 

No doubt, I'd feel differently had I been in New York in September of 2001.  If I had I lost a sister, father, cousin or friend in those attacks I would want justice and beyond that, I would probably want revenge.  I would probably hope that with justice and revenge would come closure, an end to the sadness and loss.  If my life has taught me anything it would be that nothing but time can heal such sadness, that justice and revenge are just that and nothing more.  I can't comment on how people grieve, how they cope with senseless and life shattering violence but I will say that I feel uneasy when I see this celebration of bloodshed, no matter how evil the blood shed.

We're young enough to say...this could really be a good life

Song of the Month:

Sometimes there's airplanes that I can't jump out of

Sometimes there's bullshit that don't work now 

We are God of stories, but please tell me

What's there to complain about? 

When you're happy like a fool, let it take over you

When everything is out you gotta take it in

....

We're young enough to say

Oh, this has gotta be the good life

This has gotta be the good life 

This could really be a good life, good life.