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There have been a ton of late season critters eating the more tender plants, but I waited to see what they’d become and let them to their damage. I wonder if, once they’ve become butterflies, they like to return to the place where they fed and cocooned?

You can see one of the the many orange and black butterflies, and to the bottom left, a very similar looking caterpillar, looking about as big as they get before the change.

A week ago today a friend was killed in a freak accident, and I’ve thought of little else since then. Chip was young, on vacation with his family and having a grand time. It was just…incomprehensible.

As it happens, I’ve been thinking a lot about Chip and his wife Cindy, because there’s nothing like planning for a wedding to make you go over your mental list of friends and family.

I had been remembering their support, way, way back in the day, and in particular something that literally changed the course of my life.

I’d been separated from my husband for some time, but we were living in different bedrooms in the same house for financial reasons. I was young, broke, and muddling through, but finally moving into my own place when a man appeared on the horizon. I didn’t think I was anywhere near ready to deal with any kind of relationship, plus the guy was not without his own complications- it would have been an entirely unorthodox match.

We were sitting in their backyard, laughing, and when I told her I didn’t think I could handle anything else on my plate right now- never mind a man! – she sat forward with great intensity. “Don’t do that,” she said. “Don’t you joke about happiness. There’s not nearly enough of it in the world, and you don’t know if it’s ever going to come around again. If you think you’ve got a shot, you’d better take it.”

Chip had come up behind and put his hand out to squeeze her shoulder, nodding. “We would know.”

So now, having followed that advice, I find myself planning a wedding to that same unorthodox man. Life has taken us in different directions, but I’ll always love Cin & Chip and this accident has just reinforced their words.



They found happiness and clung to it for all it was worth. They made a good life together and adored each other like few I’ve ever known. As horribly unfair as the accident was, they had something precious, and they were smart enough to know it.



May we all be wise enough to go forth and do likewise.

I have turned into someone I don’t recognize. Allow me to quote mock the old me, a mere 45 days ago:

If I don’t do something about planning this wedding, Charlie will kill me if my sister doesn’t get me first. Though the venue and date are now set at least…which happened just yesterday. I know, I know, I’m a bad bride, but this should not come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, really. It’s hard for me to worry about those kinds of things. It’ll happen, it’ll be fine, it’ll be a party, and that’s that.

Honestly, the idea was that simple- although I should’ve seen the signs. Originally it was going to be dinner with the family at Commander’s, but it had grown to renting out a local haunt for an evening. It’s a strange little place with a good vibe and a lovely courtyard. The food’s decent, they weren’t going to charge us a venue fee, and the price was fantastic. It was going to be simple.


Done and done…except that I’ve discovered that having a wedding is like having a tube of toothpaste pierced by a thousand needles. Once you announce you’re getting married it starts oozing out of the pinpricks- the money hole, the friendship hole, the money hole, the tradition hole, the money hole, etc… and we all know you can’t put toothpaste back in the tube, so the pile of goop just grows and grows.


Now I realize that I must’ve accidentally purchased the extra-large economy size of Wedding brand ® dentifrice, which lurks on store shelves, hunting unsuspecting women to capture and transport back to its corporate headquarters on Brideworld.


Previously, the two ladies who jumped in to help me navigate the savage unknown of this alien plant were dragging info out of me. These are actual (I swear) examples:

Q: What are your colors going to be?
A: Colors?

Q: Okay, well we can take the colors from the flowers, then. What are your flowers going to be?
A: cheap?

Q: What do you want me to wear?
A (pause for thought): Well, not shorts. (in fairness, this was back when it was in the park.)

Clearly, I am not equipped to do this, and even a little proud of that fact, truth be told. This was never something I dreamt of as a little girl- the dress, the princess thing, the public validation of something private etc.


Still, we were doing this, and there were protocols to be followed, so I was getting the Save The Date cards (seriously. me. doing save the date cards. sigh.) together to start mailing when my sister reminded me that the venue hadn’t sent the final confirmation, which would be an excellent thing to have before we start telling people to buy plane tix, etc, so Charlie and I stopped over at the restaurant for a drink and to pick it up. The owner told us that “he’s just juggling so many balls right now it slipped his mind” and “could you sent me another email to remind me?” and my very favorite: “I’ve also been working days as a carpenter to get some money coming in.”


Pride, meet the stairs.


That was a little over a week ago. Since then I have:

• Panicked. Repeatedly.
• Called/visited/googled 3 dozen alternative sites
• Hyperventilated at the prices.
• Attended a bridal expo
• Signed up for 3 different wedding websites
• Begged friends for help, and through them…
• …found only place in town that costs less than one kidney per attendee
• Discovered they had exactly 2 dates available for the entire spring, one of which is while we’ll be gone on our honeymoon.
• Snatched that one remaining date like the life raft that it was, and counted ourselves lucky to only be paying 2.5x the original cost to get it…even though it’s Mardi Gras week, and a whole month earlier than we’d planned.
• Realized that the venue upgrade turned it from an easygoing lower case ‘w’ to upper case ‘W’edding and I was going to have to really get serious.
• Bought an economy size bottle of Jack Daniels and a case of Coke (REAL Coke, dammit, not diet, even though I am, like every bride everywhere, working out like a fiend).

And this is where I find myself now. Deadly serious about things like flowers, colors, knicknacks and dresses with actual, shocking interest that borders on obsession. Shooting out rapid fire emails: “Will this go with that?” “Do we need these other things?” “What about those useless gee-gaws? Will people expect them?” (Bonus bridal hint: etsy.com is your friend here. Stuff that doesn’t look like it was plucked from a store shelf. Handmade, gorgeous stuff for cheap.)


Periodically I try to grab the remnants of the me that was. I stand on the surface of this new planet and look fondly back at earth, reminding myself that really, it’s just a party for friends. The venue is beautiful all by itself- any decoration is just lagniappe. The menu is wonderful, the bar is open. If I only get as far as hiring a band and an officiant, we’ll muddle through. Everything else will take care of itself. Our friends are not the sort of people who will snigger if we don’t have the $300 silver etched cake servers.


Cake? OMG. Cake! Who are we going to get to do the cake? What colors? What flavor? How many layers? Who’s going to cut it? Did you know that some bakeries charge as much as a dollar a SLICE to CUT the cake for you? Why? Isn’t that stupid? It’s a cake! Or is it really stupid after all? Maybe there’s some mystical property of wedding cake that makes it impossible to cut unless you’ve earned some kind of certification??


And so…zzzoooooop! Just like that Brideworld has sucked me back in.

Bianca decided to get frisky, inspired by the refilling of the bird feeders after they sat empty for about a year and a half. I’d stopped taking care of them because, and this might sound like a Capt. Obvious moment, but…they just ate it. It’s not their eating that’s a problem, but the piggishness of it- dozens of little boring dirt-colored birds, gorging themselves, emptying the feeder every single day and periodically being picked off by one of the cats when they got too fat to be fast.

A few things have changed- now we have some jays and cardinals around, which makes for a more interesting viewing experience for my seed-purchasing dollar, but also, and maybe more importantly, the cats are older and more sedentary, so I don’t feel guilty, as if I’m stuffing them like mini-turkeys.

But Bianca decided she wanted to relive her kittenhood and started searching for a vantage point. He’s a bit of a porker herself these days, and the birds saw her coming a mile off. She happened upon the brilliant idea of climbing the trellis, I suppose with the plan that she’d drop on them from above.

This greatly alarmed the dogs:

(please forgive the messy yard- I was moving things around and creating obstacles to impede her lumbering charges at the feeder)

Initially she was proud of herself, and basked in her queen-of-the-hillness:

But shortly thereafter, she got worried, too, and hoped for a helping hand:

Eventually Bianca made her way down, and peace was restored to the kingdom:

I finally got around to moving the boy’s perch into the kitchen- it hadn’t been any kind of priority because they haven’t shown any interest in it whatsoever, but I spent a bunch of money on this thing and I’m determined to get them interested.

Well, Pratch got interested, alright- but not in the big contraption:

He just likes getting up high, and standing on top of the hanger was pretty cool…until he started worrying about how he was going to get down:

He did finally manage it. And, although these were taken about a month and a half ago and he’s had plenty of time to explore the exciting options the perch offers him (everything moves! jingles! twirlly fun!) he still prefers the stupid hanger.

He seems just like a kid who prefers the box to the toy inside. Sigh.

Hey y’all…

So yeah, been a bad girl and haven’t been posting. Again. I know I promised to be better but I at least wanted to pop in, make sure you knew I was still here and still dedicated… and that I was going to have to step out for a few more weeks. It’s for good stuff all around, but other than a few very brief posts I have auto scheduled, I’m going to be MIA for a few weeks while I’m away both physically and mentally.

Things I’ve learned during my transition period so far:

1. I have a metric crapton of pictures. I’ve kindly been invited to do a show of some of my cemetery photographs in a local cafe, which is totally flattering and wonderful, even though it’s made me face the depth of my photographic illness. I’ve discovered that I have several (like 5) thousand cemetery photos taken over the last decade, most of which haven’t been looked at in a long time, many still on film only, and oh, btw, I have no idea how one goes about putting this sort of thing together, so it’s been a really interesting process, but I think we’re getting there, finally.
2. Weird cherry picking process makes me bang my head repeatedly, which isn’t good for concentration I’m actually having to do this bizarre dance with what pics to use and what not to use, because I’m working on (shhhh, top secret! Double pinky swear not to say anything, okay?) a book that involves some of these same photos + some quasi-genealogy, complicating things. But, hey, since when do I do simple?
3. Writing writing not going so well, and drastic measures are called for. Just to be confusing, there’s also the “real” book I’m (theoretically) working on. (Not that you could tell.) I’m starting to reach the panic stage, where I can foresee myself dramatically flinging the bastard into the fireplace flames, drunkenly crying “L’chaim!”

   This sounds far fetched, perhaps and in the particulars I suppose it is- it’s New Orleans in the summer, fer godsakes. There’s no WAY I’m lighting a fire! But in practice, it’s something I’ve done it before. In fact, I have the better part of a pretty good vampiresque parody done that I tossed aside because a) I lost touch with it, and b) panic set in, although, honestly, also playing a part was c)how freaking tired can you get of vampires? They’re everywhere! They weren’t when I started, but by the time I got serious, they were deep into oversaturation territory.

4. Depression/obsession blows like the oil rig that causes it. It is so so SO easy to start reading the horrifying news stories and have a months-long freakout at the bottom of deep dark pit of despair. I’ve been trying to wean myself from the obsession, and it’s not been easy. When we were in NY for 9/11 I watched coverage for months, curled up and miserable on the couch. After Katrina I drove and drove and drove around until I ended up on a shrink’s couch. I cannot afford to do it again, so I’ve got to call for a mental moratorium, even though it sort of seems like cowardice.
5. If I don’t do something about planning this wedding, Charlie will kill me if my sister doesn’t get me first. Ummmm…. pretty self explanatory, really. Though the venue and date are now set at least…which happened just yesterday. I know, I know, I’m a bad bride, but this should not come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, really. It’s hard for me to worry about those kinds of things. It’ll happen, it’ll be fine, it’ll be a party, and that’s that.





So a drastic change of scenery, both internal and external is the ticket. That’s where the stepping out comes in while I take a geographical and mental sabbatical. I’ll be back soonish and will start posting more bits of fiction and suchlike for those who care, and to hold myself accountable if nothing else.

And that’s that. I’ll leave you with one of the photos that I’m on the fence about including before saying hasta luego. I like the perspective and the white against the blue, but not sure if it’s a keeper or not- thoughts or comments welcome as always:


• 

Well, that’s the birds’ interpretation, anyway.

The yearly vet visit is a little different for the birds than the dogs. Puppies get leashed, widdle a little on the doc’s floor and get over it. They know there’s a treat at the end and the bonus of a car ride, so they go along with the program without much fuss.

Birds? Oh boy. Typically Jack’s the troublemaker, but he went without much of a production. Pratchett led me on a not-so-merry, squawking, growling, 20 minute long miserable chase around the kitchen. You would have thought I was trying to kill him.

Never heard a CAG growl? Oh, how you’ve been missing out…






I think Linda Blair took acting lessons from these birds, and Pratch did it for several hours straight.

Check out these fluffled up feathers and glare:

So he had to be toweled twice in one day, once just to get him in the crate, once for his exam, and it was not pretty. I thought the wing clip was going to give him a heart attack, and let’s not even talk about the nail clipping…

Note that Jack is way over in his crate, trying to see what the hell could be so different over in Pratchett’s world to cause all that noise…

The whole time all I could think about what the prediction of a “very active” hurricane season and what a barrel of laughs it’ll be if we actually have to evacuate with our own growling, freaked out and above all LOUD parrot soundtrack.

I did a writeup over at Noteworthy, but wanted to highlight one particular photo from today’s parade that just killed me:

Somehow the blue tarp train just perfectly summed it up (and he was workin’ it, btw). Just as we’re past the last disaster, here we are again.

And yet, still together as a city, and still making the best of it. Still dancing, costuming, second lining. There are worse ways to cope, even as I’m sure it’ll be misinterpreted by some outside the city.

But so what? Screw that. If we give up our ability to laugh in the face of corruption, decay and governmental apathy, we’d all just have to go jump in the oil with the pelicans and have it done with. And honey, we ain’t nowhere near that yet- Satchmo Summerfest’s around the corner, and there’s always one more great event coming up after the last great thing to convince you that, screwed up or not, there ain’t no place like home, baby.

So, yeah. There’s a dog at the house. I have been stressing the word ‘temporarily’ until it’s become a reflex. Someone gushes over him and like a Tourettes patient I yell “He’s. Not. Staying!”

But it’s been a couple of weeks now since Jen and I found him by the side of the road in the Hoffman Triangle, a particularly rough part of Central City. He looked like a large cat, so dirty and tangled that Jen started calling him Marley for his matted dreads. He came running over, though, which is not typical street behavior.

The boy can recognize a couple of saps, what can I say? Jen let the little filthball happily roll all over her while I drove to the vet. They’re a non-profit rescue group and I was hoping they’d be able to keep the bugger. No such luck, and although there were several people who oohed and ahhed over the cleaned up puppy nobody was able to adopt him. So he’s stashed here. And the clock’s ticking. And people are getting attached.

He’s not going to look anything like that in a few months- the vet said he’s a Schnauzer/poodle, about 18 months old and 9lbs. Thick, inches long fur was shaved from him- there was so much of it that we had no idea he was a boy despite his…uh… well endowed and amorous nature (a situation what’s also been ‘fixed’).

Look, I don’t deny he’s cute. But there are already three dogs in my house and I’m in trouble here- outnumbered 2 to 1. Alison wants to keep him because, theoretically, she’ll be taking Bruiser at some point when she gets an apartment and says he’ll be lonely without company. Charlie wants to keep him because he’s a cute little bastard and the same size as Bruiser. When I tell him that Crazyland lives in the gap between having 3 dogs and having 4, he’s pointed out that that’s really only 2 dogs per household. Which is nice, except he lives, eats and poops at my house, not his.

I suspect this is a fight I’m going to lose. But if you know of anybody looking for a cute, affectionate puppy, drop me a line. Please. I’m begging you.

I didn’t want to dwell very much on the situation in the Gulf earlier. Now I find that our friend Craig has done it for me and captured the feeling perfectly:

Stella Got Her Groove Back — just in time to discover she had colon cancer.

I hadn’t realized how much this damn oil situation in the Gulf had been affecting me. Not directly, mind you. But in a more general and more consuming fashion. We thought we had finally killed the loup-garou, but now he’s back — more menacing and more pervasive than ever — and for potentially a much longer while.

Check him out at BeerFoodDude, and in person with the lovely Kim cooking their asses off at the Avenue Pub.