I’m Moving!

This is the last post I’ll put on this blog, and the beginning of my career as a grown up blogger (hopefully).

From now on, you can find me here: Human Textuality

It might cost a little more, and require some edu-ma-cation about blogs and plugins and domains and stuff, but I think it’s a good thing. I’m also trying to clean up the look, just a little, while keeping it in a style that feels expressively me. Please bear with me as I make little changes and learn how to make the blog better for all of us:)

Any feedback you have would be much appreciated. The goal is to post three times a week beginning next week. It will also be my first week as an unemployed writer… ahem, freelancer.

Thanks for reading, and I hope to see and hear you in .com land!

🙂

It’s the End of the World

The pudgy Hispanic boy two driveways over momentarily distracted the robin from his search. After a second’s pause, he returned his beak to the matted leaves in the gutter. There had to be a worm in there. Anything less was a waste of time. Spring was, after all, very short.

The boy, facing the street, looked backward over his shoulder, and hefted his basketball up and over his head. The ball disappeared behind him, perhaps into the net. Perhaps not.

Leaves jumped to the left and to the right as the bird picked at small sticks and wrinkled candy wrappers.

From the car, she watched all of this, while a man in LA told her the day’s economic news through the radio. It wasn’t terribly encouraging news, but the man had a nice voice.

My New Love Affair: Quinoa

It all happened so fast…

I’d been perfectly happy with my brown rice and occasional couscous for a long time. Even after I stopped eating meat, those old standbys always did the trick when I needed a traditional meal base, or something a little more exotic with herbs and pine nuts.

But last night, everything changed.

Worry, Be Happy

Lately, I keep hearing about a phenomenon that I think we can all understand:

‘Suppressing bad feelings is not good for your health.’

Duh.

But, the conversation goes further than this. It not only says that long-term neglect of depression, grief or even just the blues is bad, but that momentary facades – like a forced smile – can make a bad-mood-day worse. In turn, the whole mind-body unit takes a hit.

The Great Blue Hole

I am so captivated by this thing.

What Is It?

Reminding viewers of an enormous pupil, this fascinating piece of naturalness is known as The Great Blue Hole (hereafter GBH), and is a part of Belize’s Lighthouse Reef on the coast of the Caribbean Sea.

The Lighthouse Reef is an atoll. Atolls are distinct from other reef types, such as barrier and fringing. Most common in the Indian and Pacific oceans, atoll reefs enclose a space in the shape (ish) of a circle or horseshoe.

February 16, 1996 (which was a Friday)

I don’t markedly observe death dates. I don’t feel ‘down’ or visit the cemetery; I don’t mention the fact to those who don’t already know. I think about the significance of the date, sure, but I like to keep my annual rituals happy – there’s already enough to be blue about in the world.

The only thing I do is draw little black curtains around the day on my calendars. It’s enough for me, and adds just the right touch of drama. Fitting.

But today is different. It is the 15th anniversary of my father’s death.

The Night I Met Lurch

My husband works second shift in a cargo office at our local airport. My 9-5 is just minutes down the road, and I occasionally visit him afterward for a dinner date.

What is airline cargo, you ask? Parts? Tools? Merchandise? Yes. Pets too? Most certainly. Many pure-bred puppies and kittens spend frustrated hours caged-up in his office, nicely complementing the stank of stale cigar already hanging in the air.

But you may not guess what the most common type of cargo is – the shipments that take up most of my husband’s time, and are so large that they must be driven in a cart from air craft to cargo office to customer vehicle.

New Look!

A while back, WordPress discontinued my theme (Pressrow), and replaced it with a similar one (Pilcrow).

I just today realized that I could radically alter the appearance of my blog with this new theme, and spent the afternoon and evening playing with backgrounds and colors and sidebars and widgets. It was super fun.

I’m still trying to get things figured out, but I’ve got some new features and links, so feel free to poke around!

Thanks for visiting:)

To My Ancestors: A Little Modern Grinching

My Dear Dead Relatives,

Why, oh why did you ever choose to settle in Michigan? Why did you select this region of unreliable summers, and predictably drawn-out winters?

Numbered in the 300 Millions

Have you even been convinced that you’re going to be a statistic?

One little bump on the head, and you’re most certainly experiencing intracranial bleeding.

A tired day and you have a rare form of cancer.