and the winner is...MARTHADONNA!

you too can be marthadonna with a few minor essentials.

i know...you've all been on pins and needles, dying to know...

i went to my friend g's Super Powah Birthday Party as Marthadonna, a suggestion from my dear pal j. (she just had a baby, so it must be all those hormones givin' her them clever idears). for those of you that don't know what the hell i'm talking about, click here. i found it to be the perfect moniker - combining my affinity for all things crafty and domestic with my sangin'. of course, i'm not quite as productive or felonious as Martha, but then i'd like to think my voice is a little better than Madonna's (or is she Esther?), so i figure they balanced each other out, making Marthadonna a fair representation of my built-in "supah powahs."

anyhoodle...thanks to all for your suggestions. j, send me your fave cookie recipe, and as promised, i'll send ya a batch, or whatever's left over to bake after i devour most of the raw dough...( ;

----

and, in the category of Wha-the-Fa? watching a rerun of david letterman with kate hudson tonight. apparently, she was an excellent soccer player as a teenager, but she decided to quit. why? her legs were getting too muscular.

yes, kate. sports tend do that. girls like you certainly made that whole battle for title ix worth it.

holy mother of marinara

this is funny...

Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

i would totally join this church, but my carb-sensitivity and inability to digest tomato sauce without my colon exploding keeps me sidelined and faithless.

---

what did you call spaghetti as a kid?
i called it pa-sghetti.

desperate times, desperate measures

okay...who has an LCD projector (1500+ lumens) i can borrow? (kinda like one of these.)

okay...who wants to lend me $1,000 so i can buy one?

what the hell....who wants to give me $1,000 so i can buy one?

you'll get your name all pretty and big in the program and on the posters as a La-Di-Da Associate Producer, as a matter of fact, i'll get your name henna-tattooed on my ass (i'd do the real tattoo, but i have a problem with commitment), i'll bake you a batch of cookies every month, and...and...you'll sleep better because you'll know you helped make someone's one-person show absolutely-fucking-fantabulous because you bought her an LCD projector that will, er, project thought-provoking, powerful images on the back wall throughout the show making it not just some dumb whiny woman standing up on stage kvetching about the size of her ass, but something artsy, lofty, and multi-dimensional...something that might be written up in Time Out New York, something that Susan Sarandon would come to see and then talk about passionately over a vegan carob muffin and green tea chai...

don't you want to be a part of that?

i know the odds of anyone actually doing this is slimmer than a Renee Zellweger, but i had to give it a shot - ask and you shall receive and all that hoo-ha. honestly, if any of you know of anyone with one that might be willing to lend it, give it, whatever...please let me know. this is really an important part of the show, and i am not, unfortunately, independently wealthy.

thank GOD this show is a labor of love, because if it weren't, i'd have ditched this sonofabitch months ago...

a fable

The Loving Father is driving down the highway. N, his 6-year old daughter, sits quietly in the passenger seat. They are alone. He talks animatedly on his cell phone recounting to the person on the other end of the line (let’s call her Sister in a Far Away Land) with great enthusiasm, the triumphs of his 9-year old son, P, as Football Player:

“He’s a fourth grader on a team of 5th and 6th graders, and he absolutely holds his own! He’s doing great! And yesterday he had a soccer game. N had a soccer game too. I’m on my way to pick up P for football practice and then another game, then…”

“So, N is playing soccer too? That’s great. How’s she doing?” Sister in Far Away Land interjects, remembering what her education teacher said in college:

Indirect praise: Let children overhear you say positive things about him/her to other adults. It boosts his/her self-confidence.

“Oh, yeah. She’s playing too. She’s the goalie.” The Loving Father chuckles. “Halfway through the game, her nickname became The Sieve.”

Ugh.

Sister in a Far Away Land’s heart sinks. She cannot see N’s face. She’s fairly certain N does not even know what the word means.

Sieve.

"But someday she will, dammit," Sister in a Far Away Land thinks. "And this, bothers me."

But Sister in a Far Away Land tries not judge because she knows that she will someday, like her brother, simultaneously love and fuck up her children in her very own special way, indirectly or not.

simplicity...ain't so easy

bad hair days would be a thing of the past...

today, after my first clogging class with marybeth (fun!), i dined on a mesclun, goat cheese, pecan, and dried cranberry salad in union square park underneath a canopy of trees and damp (though not damningly damp) earth beneath my bum while being serenaded by a group of Amish singers in from Pennsylvania for the day. simple, sweet hymns with simple, sweet harmonies. it was a lovely afternoon. autumn was flirting with me like the Casanova that he is; i'm such a sucker for a boy who looks good in earth tones and smells like burning leaves...

the Amish ladies wore the requisite cotton calico dresses in muted pastels and those little white bonnets tied beneath their chins. they were all shapes and sizes. stout and jolly. thin and towering. petite and prim. i wondered if one of them had actually baked the whole wheat ginger cookie i had just procured from the farmer's market and was nibbling on happily.

and of course, dear reader, what was the thoroughly mundane thought i caught whizzing thru my thoroughly mundane brain as i watched these goddesses of simple contentedness sing their hymns of love beneath a divine filigree of trees?

i wonder if they ever think they're fat?

and i see the colored sprinkles.

The optimist sees the donut,
the pessimist sees the hole,
the realist sees the calories.

snacking on poetry

i go thru fits. reading fits that is. other fits too, but i won't discuss those today. sometimes it's all about autobiographies - colin powell, lillian hellman, hildegarde. one summer, it was all of alice hoffman's mystical novels. one spring it was jane austen's lovelies. one autumn in college was spent nose buried in daphne du maurier's glamorous British manor mysteries. one winter...into spring...into summer, it was tolstoy's anna karenina. (by the time i got to the end of that tome, i found myself waiting, hoping, begging for that whiny wench to just end it already. sheesh. co-dependency is such a bore.)

lately, it's been all about poetry. i guess it's because i am so busy as of late, i can't sit down and dedicate any length of time to actually finishing the two books i started quite a while ago - George Eliot's Middlemarch or Lyndall Gordon's Vindication, a biography of the 18th century revolutionary feminist and author, Mary Wollstonecraft. (goodness, i sound like a smarty-bobolardey. i am not. i read way too many teeny-bopper magazines and self-help books on the sly to be a true intellectual. i also do not drink my coffee black or smoke cigarettes. 2 more strikes against me.)

anyway...lately...all about poetry. just a few read on the subway platform, between toner-changes at work, just before i slip away into a vodka-induced slumber, while sipping my morning coffee. oh, i love 'em. it's like the brilliance and profundity of great tomes of literature condensed into a discriminate offering of words. love it.

so. here's my fave from today's readings...blog-appropriate, of course.

fat is not a fairy tale by jane yolen

I am thinking of a fairy tale
Cinder Elephant
Sleeping Tubby,
Snow Weight,
where the princess is not
anorexic, wasp-waisted;
flinging herself down the stairs.

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Hansel and Great,
Repoundsel,
Bounty and the Beast,
where the beauty
has a pillowed breast,
and fingers plump as sausage.

I am thinking of a fairy tale
that is not yet written,
for a teller not yet born,
for a listener not yet conceived,
for a world not yet won,
where everything round is good:
the sun, wheels, cookies, and the princess.

trust and needlepoint

on a day like today, i just needed a little
handiwork to keep me busy, lest my mind
completely explode. thinking of hanging
the finished product above my cubicle.

remind me again why i'm writing and producing a show that is so personal and raw it feels like i'm slicing up my heart and feeding it to an audience of strangers on toast points with a side of frites? what if they don't get it?

i'm sorry? you'd like ketchup with your steak tartare?

can't think about that now. i'll be like Scarlett, pinch my cheeks to a rosy pink, and think about that tomorrow. or never.

this whole show process is one big ol' lesson in trust. trusting myself. trusting my gut. trusting (or not) others. trusting my body when it says it's hungry, or needs exercise, or needs to be touched. i am not, historically, good at trust. i have been disappointed by many people in my life (oh, who hasn't, ya big baby?), so i have learned to be mighty independent. but mighty independent can be mighty lonely, and when producing a show, mighty impossible. so...i am trying. i just have to keep taking baby steps and big steps and baby steps and big steps until i can leap and either:

1. crash, burn, skin my knees, cry, feel sorry for myself for a few minutes, get up, brush myself off, put on some lip gloss, and try again.

or

2. land in a big pile of pillows that some nice person put there for me

or

3. sprout wings and fly.

am i sappy or what???!!!

i am officially losing It. oh well. never really wanted It anyway. It does not go well on toast points.

----

"Oh, darling, let your body in, let it tie you in comfort." - Anne Sexton

i'm trying, annie. i swear, i am.

shuffle for the cure

before the great boozing for nola of sunday night, i'll be running...jogging...trotting...oh, okay...shuffling across the finish line of the Komen New York City Race for the Cure on sunday morning. 4 miles. i should finish in approximately...4 hours. no, not really. i'm a little faster than that.

i find i can run 4 miles on the gym treadmill fairly easily, but it's astonishing how the level of difficulty increases when there are things like hills in the way. drats.

mom was a big runner. she ran marathons. she was built for it - long, lithe legs and a short torso. i have the opposite. short, strong, trunk-ish legs, and an inordinately looooooong torso. (normal-sized t-shirts become navel-exposing t-shirts on me. i spend so much of my day tug-tugging my shirt down-down. annoying.) i am built for short bursts of explosive speed. i beat all the boys in grade school. i was one of the few white girls on the track team that ran the 220. i tend to live my life this way too. short. bursts. of. explosive. speed. not always the best way to approach life, is it?

i do not run long distances easily. i huff. i puff. i almost fall down, but...i keep trying. by running, i'm learning patience, i guess. something else mom had in spades that wasn't transferred while i marinated in The Womb Room. i suppose i (try to) run in order to have some sort of kinship with my mother too. i like to believe if she were still alive, we might go on long runs together in the hills of northern Michigan followed by big breakfasts of whole grain pancakes and too much coffee.

cue the f-ing violins.

blah blah blah...i'm waxing nostalgic, made giddy and pensive by the sunlight streaming thru the tree in my backyard, the murmurs, whispers and giggles of a couple on a nearby porch, and the gentle gonging of the church bell heralding the hour...how can you not be a trifle maudlin in such circumstances?

anyway...like you're not charity-tapped enough...if you feel like donating to my little Shuffle for the Cure, click here. i may not finish in record time, but i'll finish.

and don't forget, ladies...get your mammies grammed.

( :

benefit for the bayou

my fabulously industrious, gorgeous, take-the-bull-by-the-horns kindred spirit and urban family sistah, rachel lee harris, is putting together a party to benefit katrina victims. it promises to be one helluva evening. i mean, really. what's not to like? eatin', drinkin', and gamblin' all for a good cause...

so, come one, come all and laissez les bontemps roulez!

Help Keep the Good Times Rollin' at a

Hurricane Relief Party!

All proceeds benefit the
Louisiana Disaster Recovery Foundation*

Sunday, September 25th from 5:00 to 9:00 pm

NO IDEA BAR
30 East 20th Street (btw Park & B’way)

$60 at the door gets y’all...

Open Bar! 5-8 pm (Hurricanes included)

Creole Buffet

Chances to win spicy prizes, cher, like:
A Night on Broadway
A Tasteful Evening of Yuppy Romance
I Hate Work, I Love Loafing Rejuvenating Massage
FREE Bar Tab at No Idea
plus lots, lots more!

Charity card games begin at 5:30 so
be there by 5:15 to sign up!

Bring clothing and bottled water and get free raffle tickets!

RSVP and Questions to N’awlins native Rachel Lee Harris at hurricaneparty@hotmail.com

* For more information go to www.louisianahelp.org

Thanks dawlins!

yeah, yeah, but i'll bet they weren't jimmy choos.

As Gandhi stepped aboard a train one day, one of his shoes slipped off and landed onto the track, under the train. He was unable to retrieve it as it was departure time and the train was already starting to move. To the amazement of his companions, Gandhi calmly took off his remaining shoe and threw it back along the track to land close to the other one. When asked by one of his fellow passengers why he did so, Gandhi said, "It's very simple. I didn't want to waste a good pair of shoes." "But sir," one said, "you just threw your remaining shoe away?" "Yes," replied Gandhi, "this way, the person who finds the shoe on the track will have a pair he can use."

a bad, though funny, joke.

what's president bush's position on roe v. wade?

president bush doesn't care how people get out of new orleans.

(courtesy of r.p. stole this right off his computer screen.)

to those of you who might be offended, i say, "laugh or die."

unconditional living

this would certainly keep me present.

ever have one of those weekends that you just feel like never happened?

like you just went from friday to monday, and everything in between just...pfffft! disappeared? such was this weekend. it was friday evening, and suddenly, it's sunday evening, and i am left wondering what the fuck did i do for 48 hours? do i have anything to show for it?

yes, margrocks. a bigger visa bill.

being present takes such work, doesn't it? i am so not good at it. i'm thinking i should maybe adopt the technique that addicts often do...whenever they start craving a drink, a hit, or in my case, a Mr. Frosty cone with colored sprinkles...they snap a little rubber band on their wrist. this brings them back to the present moment, forces them, i guess, in some small way to inhabit their body. gets them out of their whirling dervish of a noggin.

snap.

look at the sunset, please.

snap.

enjoy that first sip of a cappucino, por favor.

snap.

experience the little (oh, okay...big) pang you feel when everyone you call on a lonely sunday evening - grandmother, father, brother, entire urban family - doesn't answer. sniff. sniff.

because, of course, being in the present moment means being present for the "bad" moments too. ya can't taste what is sweet without knowing what is bitter and all that razzmatazz...

kinda like unconditonal love isn't it?

ya gotta love all of that cute fella that makes your heart pitter patter one moment, and in the next breath makes you want to kill-kill-kill, or that little exorcistic tyke that screams and hollers and spits up gallons of phlegm/milk...ya gotta love her then too.

so...here i go. on this lonely little evening. i start now. unconditional living. join me. please. feel like bliss. feel like shit. just feel it. be here. when i die, i want this on my tombstone:

m.j.t.l.
she lived..."fierce with reality."
- florida maxwell

and if it's in print, it must be true.

snap.

clogging, but not my arteries.

i think it might make my thighs look thinner.

oh. my. god.

i am so excited. i have discovered my next project. yes, yes, yes...those of you that know me, "like she needs another friggin' project!" but seriously, i've been looking for ways to exercise that are joy-inspiring, not misery inducing. i can't really do the dance classes i want to at b'way dance center and the yoga classes at my local place because they just don't gel w/ my sked. so...i have found the equivalent of exercise nirvana for me...

click here.

is that the coolest or what? i realize it might be deemed "uncool" or too "rural" by some people, but thankfully, those people aren't reading my blog. rrrright? i'm just hoping they'll let me wear one of those big, poufy, crinoline red gingham dresses. crinolines are just begging for a comeback, aren't they?

i love love love movement - that is truly the one thing i really dislike about my current job - the lack of movement. my ever-increasing bum sits in an ever-increasingly uncomfortable chair for 7 hours a day, but exercise at the gym so frequently feels like, well...punishment. doesn't it? i find myself on the treadmill, not thinking of how fucking blessed i am that i have a strong, resilient body that can mooooooove, but how many calories i have just burned off by running at 6.5 mph for 45 minutes. this unconscious movement, i find, leads to injuries and a litany of lesser miseries (a chafed inner thigh from those damn running shorts) b/c i'm not listening to my blessed little body that i have ignores for so long.

if anything is sacred, the human body is sacred. - walt whitman

word to yo' mother, walty.

the irony is, about 3 years ago, when i was interviewing with my landlords for the awesome apartment that i am currently living in, they asked if i had any particularly noisy hobbies "like playing the guitar, or anything." if i moved in, they'd be living below me.

"not really," i said. "just clogging."

k., my landlord, claims to this day that that little bon mot was what won them over and secured me as their new tenant, beating out the columbia grad student that was vying for the spot as well.

ha.

don't worry, k. i won't be practicing at home. promise. but if you notice significant amounts of tulle missing from your fabric supply in the basement, i plead the fifth.
















it will be so much easier to buy Christmas gifts.
this t-shirt, for one, will be a big hit with me.

fashionably helpful

and so continues my obsession with katrina...it's victims...and helping in my wee-little ways...

at this website, you can get the special "regrowth" t-shirt (see the design above) for $10 plus $2.50 shipping and handling.

ALL PROCEEDS go to the Red Cross. none of this lame 5% (of the profit) bullshit that all of the pretty pink breast cancer awareness paraphanelia touts. they've already raised over 50k. i'll be modeling mine, in a powdery baby blue, very shortly. they have manly boy ones too, if you're lucky enough to know any manly boys...

www.threadless.com

in the puhleeeeeez department...

according to the ads, it will "help me soldier on"

oh.

my.

god.

www.hooabar.com

now you know, as ridiculous as this seems to me, i absolutely have to try it. in days, i might develop biceps rivaling demi moore's in g.i. jane...or maybe not. maybe just an overwhelming desire to watch al pacino films.

help katrina victims...

okay. ask and ye shall receive and all that...this just in this morning from my dear friend laurie, whose family has been greatly affected by katrina. i know i've been bothered by the fact that i can't do anything other than send money. well, here you are...a cry for all things household as well as clothing. so, if you're feeling the need for a little retail therapy as well as the warm fuzzies that come with giving stuff away to those who truly need it...here you are:

I didn't know how else to do this. Lots of people have been asking how they could help my family, and well, this is the only way. I hate mass emails, but I thank you in advance for reading.

My entire family is from South Louisiana, with about 60% living in New Orleans. There are at least 16 homes in family destroyed. Homes that survived all before this, ranging from my Grandmother, Great Aunts, cousins, Aunts, Uncles, and possibly sister (if they can get in on Monday withstanding the violence). They are all safe. A couple of hours ago the last cousin was accounted for. They have food and shelter, and are staying with other family members. As you can tell, I come from a large family.... and thank god for family - and friends.

Some of you have asked what you can do. That you don't just want to give money. I say this weekend is a good time to clean your closets, cabinets, drawers, and more. They will need towels, bed linens, kitchen utensils, phones, clocks, books, cleaning supplies, bathroom supplies, school supplies, toys, clothes and much more. Below is a list of sizes for those that I've reached. If it doesn't fit, I promise you that it will be put to good use. Truckloads have been going daily from my home town of Donaldsonville to Baton Rouge to aid refugees. My parents' address is also below if you want to ship anything.

Please, there is no need to email me back and apologize. You've done nothing wrong. But you can do something right. I know I didn't include everyone I know in this email so please feel free to pass to your friends and family.

Thanx.

Laurie Brown

Relief Supplies

c/o Kathryn & Tim Brown

142 Sportsmans Drive

Belle Rose, LA 70341

Ricky Macaluso (41): XL, short length shirt, 38 waist

Melinda Macaluso (38): size 16/18

Mia Macaluso (5): 5T

Josh Macaluso (3): 2T

Monica Macaluso (38): size 22

Gertrude Macaluso (86): size 14/16

John Macaluso (85): 38 waist

Francis Volk (82): size 16/18

Reid Macaluso (48): 46 waist

Eileen Morgan (38): size 14/16

(as you can tell, my family likes to eat:)

grrrrrrrrrrr...

ever have one of those days when you're just angry at everything? everyone?

pissed. pissed. pissed. (i used to get in trouble for saying that word as a teenager. pissed. young ladies don't say that. so i'm going to say it a lot.)

pissed b/c i can't do a goddam thing about the hurricane victims other than send money, which i know helps, but i want to go down there and actively help. scoop out food, pass out water, pray with them...anything that will make me feel less...useless.

pissed b/c i ate half a hershey's chocolate bar (again) last nite, as i was watching hurricane coverage on NBC.

pissed b/c yesterday, i had a cyst (caused, ironically enough, by an ingrown hair brought on by my favorite activity: shaving) the size of a dime ripped out of my skin without any anesthesia. it was the grossest thing i have ever seen and hurt worse than anything i have ever experienced, pretty much sealing the deal: no birthing of babies for me and no more shaving the netherregions. boy shorts all the way on the beach. (yes, yes i went there. deal.)

pissed b/c my apartment is a like one big dusty cat ball...how does this fucking hair get absolutely everywhere?!!??? i pick up my freshly-poured glass of water: cat hair in it. i pull down my black wedge heels from the closet that have been sealed in a plastic shoe box for months: cat hair all over them. couch, bathroom floor, computer chair, cuisinart...all have developed an unseemly calico pelt. why bother removing it? it will be back tomorrow.

pissed b/c i feel like i have so much to do and such little time.

pissed b/c how do you get it through to someone, someone that you care about deeply (as a friend), that i am not interested in you...in that way. so lay off . without hurting someone's feelings or ruining a friendship?

then, even more pissed b/c can't even talk to the person i am interested in? isn't this supposed to stop at age 12? and why can't i talk to him? b/c of this stupid thing called FEAR. capital F. capital E. capital A. capital R. of rejection. or maybe what i'm really scared of is...holy shit! the possibility that he might like me too. or, at the very least, not find me repulsive.

pissed b/c when i look in the mirror all i see is a big, pudgy moonface looking back at me, and all my brain thinks is...hey fat girl, that's why he wouldn't like you. your cheeks are bigger than his backpack.

pissed b/c i am 30 years old, and i still have so much work to do.

pissed b/c i feel so very out of control. almost like my life is being lived for me instead of me living my life.

arrrrrgh!

thank you for listening. i feel better now.

now i'm going to go run on the treadmill for miles lest my head explode and totally ruin my freshly-washed, cat hair-free sheets.

forget apples. comfort me with m & m's.

hey, whatever helps you cope.

so at least i'm not the only one; everyone seems to be craving chocolate.

seriously. it's like a candy-coated zeitgeist.

everyone at my office had a package of m & m's on their desk today - peanut, plain, crispy. unable to do anything about the katrina victims, but watch it get worse (did you know they had thunderstorms today?)...we all attempted to comfort ourselves with cheerful little Technicolor candies that we dribbled onto our desks and into the hands of passing co-workers like some sort of rainbow rosary. our way, i suppose, of commiserating. even the maraca shake-shake-shake of the sugary baubles in their bag brought some sort of happy to our gloomy day, and perhaps the crunch-crunch-crunch of the candy shell alleviated some of the anxiety swirling about our brain begging us to do something.

i dunno.

maybe they remind us of a simpler, happier time? when mom, who usually wouldn't allow junk food to cross the threshold of your granola and yogurt home, brought home a big 1/2 pound bag of m & m's, unveiled them with the flourish of Houdini, poured them into a glass bowl, you'd plunge our "wash-your-hands-first!" digits into the jewel-colored pebbles...couldn't wait to see if the slogan were true..."melts in your mouth not in your hand"...squeeze squeeze squeeze your fistful of M's...and open to reveal...a veritable Rorshach test of food coloring and chocolate...lick...who cares if the slogan weren't true...

still...tastes...good.

perhaps it's just comforting to know that something so simple and something so good can remain after all of the death, devastation, and confusion of the past few days. even if it's just a favorite childhood candy that reminds us of rainbows.

they do follow rain, right?

god, i hope so.
____

fyi: r. tried to post this a few days ago in response to my previous post, but blogger blipped. here's what she wrote:

i tried to post and something got messed up----so here it is:

thanks for the link to help, i was frozen in all the media coverage, and i found this and thought it might also be a good source of info http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/news/archives/2005/08/31/katrina_blogs.html