Nancy in Miami sent me this jewel. There are two things to learn from this life. One being patience. The other is wisdom.
And to have the sense to use them at the appropriate time in you life. So that's really three things, I guess.
*The photographer is unknown to me. I will be happy to update if I find it.*
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Why is everybody making such a big deal out of Shania Twain's trip and fall entrance to the CMAs Wednesday? Is it because she is so lovely? Talented? Because she made such a big deal out of it?
*This image is an AP photo from The Hollywood Insider*
The "most embarrassing moment of your life"? Really? Like finding out your husband is cheating on you with your best friend rated below that? Hmmmm.
I am a clutz. Always have been. You know the DaVinci drawing of the Vitruvian Man? We were studying it in art school, learning proportions. The instructor asked us to stand up and put our arms down to our sides. Our center of balance he explained, should run directly through our wrists. Hmmmm. While the other students realized that their ran through their lower abdomens, mine? Went through my thighs. I have extremely long limbs and a short torso. My center of balance was non-exisistant. So that explains it.
In high school, my art club, decided to go to the University of Richmond to see a comedienne/mime perform. At some point, she asked for a child to come to stage and all of us pointed to our art teacher who is a very small woman. Instead, she called six foot tall, sixteen year old me. As I approached, she made some remark about arresting me for smuggling watermelons. Hmmmm. I asked her if she was ticketed for smuggling walnuts. Everybody laughed. She handed me a microphone and gave me a cue to follow at the end of a story she enacted. It was a tale of a frog and a princess and at the proper point, I croaked into the mic. One of the Furry Godmother's hidden talents is that she can replicate the exact sound of a croaking bullfrog. The Mime's jaw dropped. The crowd roared. I curtsied.
The stage lights were blinding as I approached the edge. Did I mention I was wearing brand spanking new Frye boots that I had never worn before? Step one, I managed. Step two, I fell promptly on my derierre. The gasping of the crowd (of cute college boys, dammit) nearly sucked me back up onto my feet. The comedienne ran to assist me. "Are you all right?" she exclaimed.
"Oh, yeah," I sighed, "I'll do anything for a laugh." And the crowd, thinking by now that I was part of the act, bellowed with laughter. And gave me a standing ovation as I gave them the queen's wave back to my seat.
Shania, even that wasn't my most embarrassing moment. Hmmmm.
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Things are finally getting into a groove around here now that Hud is gainfully employed! He is the Director of Operations/ Administrative Dept at SRVS. He is so very happy. It is all rainbow glitter and unicorns around the Hudarosa.
Please go to Blogher.com and check out my review of Terry McMillan's sequel to Waiting to Exhale. The heroines are at it again, trying to gracefully navigate their lives. http://www.blogher.com/getting-happy-terry-mcmillan
Much like we are doing here.
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David Sedaris came to Memphis yesterday to tout his latest, Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk, A Modest Bestiary. It's a collection of fables, populated by talking animals. But you would know that already if you knew what a bestiary was.
Mr. Sedaris did a reading from the book and commented on the work. He is a marvelous reader, inflection and tone being the key to humor. My favorite part was the readings he did from his diary. Most were jokes people told him. Delicious tidbits like how his partner, Hugh, loves to meet new people. They've recently bought a new home in England and Hugh has made great sport of meeting every person in the entire British countryside. David said he, however, had been known to close the door if he saw one of his neighbors coming and hide until they left. How ironic is it that someone who hides from the people next door wants to spend hours chitchatting with complete strangers?
Hud and I waited five and a half hours for our turn at bat. He did not disappoint. Giving him a copy for our friend's son, JP, he inscribed, "I am steaming that I didn't get to meet you." He then retrieved a large bag and fizzled around. Pulling out a comb from the Ritz Carlton in New York, he penned, "For JP, in case of emergencies. David Sedaris"
I was enchanted. I told him, "I had a grandmother you would have adored. She was horrible." We were leaving and Hud asked if I were going to tell him a grandmother Becky story. I replied that other people were waiting. David pulled out a Zip Loc bag containing peanuts in the shell, pale yellow yarn and a handwritten note reading, "SQUIRREL". Extracting a peanut, he reared back in his chair and drawled, "I have a minute..."
I took a deep breath.
When Hud and I had first started dating, my grandfather EW had to be hospitalized. Hud drove me down. It was late when we arrived and my parents insisted that Hud stay the night. They gave up their room at my grandparents home to him, staying at my mother's family home across town. I slept in the den.
In the morning, I awakened and made coffee. My parents showed up. My mother started making breakfast. Becky awoke, proceeded to the bathroom and started a shower. The house was built like a t-bone. The kitchen and living room were the center of the home. My grandparent's room, bath and guest room were perpendicular to them. The bath was in between the master and guest rooms. Hud got up and came into the kitchen. We heard the shower turn off. My mother asked Hud if it were alright for her to get something out of the bedroom she had left behind. She opened the door. I remembered that I had to ask her something, so I followed her. As my foot hit the hallway, the bathroom door flung open. There stood my wet, wrinkly grandmother, in her best showgirl pose, arm high in the air singing, "IIIIII"MMMMM NAAAAA-KED!"
Stunned, I squealed, "YES YOU ARE! AND YOU"RE BALD, TOO!" I jumped into the bedroom, slamming the door behind me. "What in the hell was that?" asked my mother. "Something I am going to be in therapy a long time for..." I sighed.
The show wasn't meant for me. Her intention was to give Hud an eyeful of her, um, exquisite beauty.
Now, you have to understand, that in her day, Rebecca was a handsome woman. It was something she never quite got over. Not even when her hair fell out did she doubt her sex appeal. No man could come near her that she did not completely believe wanted to jump her bones.
To get the full picture, my grandmother was in her late seventies at the time, bald, sagging and droopy as gravity is wont to do to you in time. She wore a wig to cover the baldness. The only tweak I would have suggested, had I any empathy for her, would have been to tell her to lighten up on the hairline of her wig. She pulled it down to her eyebrows like a baseball cap, exposing four inches of bald skull in the back.
And her lipstick. Oh, her lipstick. Remember in the forties when it was fashionable to draw in your lip line to resemble a heart shaped mouth? She did that. Only the peaks of the heart reached clear up to her nostrils.
"Oh, she sounds delightful," he laughed.
If you get the chance, the charming David Sedaris is extremely generous with his time. The wait is long, but worth every minute.
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Have you painted your cat, yet?
Kidding. These images are spinning around in email land with tales of the paint jobs costing in excess of fifteen thousand dollars. I'm pretty sure that it would be more than that for the artist's medical bills after trying to render this lovely costume. Pretty.
But whomever did the Bathing Beauty above certainly would have fared better than the one who did this.
I will never look at Charlie Chaplin in the same way ever again. Nope.
These are pretty obviously photo-shopped when you enlarge them. The time it must have taken to do them boggles the mind. The people who did them must not have jobs, homes or loved ones.
Or cats.
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In the spring of 1973, I was a ten year old girl living in Virginia who, like every other ten year old girl, loved horses. I drew them for endless hours, alone on the floor of my bedroom while my round orange Panasonic radio blasted out Bobby Sherman tunes. My hair was so long, that I sat on it to hold it off of the papers. The only thing I could imagine would have been better would have to been riding itself.
So when this great beast came along that spring, I could not help but fall utterly and completely to his charms:
*The real one*
His name was Secretariat. Big Red was what the Tweedy stable called him. I drew this very image a thousand times. I knew by heart exactly the length and shape of his blaze. The color of his fiery coat. All the muscles in his handsome face. I used him to teach myself anatomy. I learned proportion by measuring his legs and comparing them to the length of his neck and chest. There was a swirling uneasiness outside my closed bedroom door, but inside, there was Secretariat. And he was lifted up by possibilities and hope.
Last night, Hud and I were given tickets by Blogher to preview the new Disney movie, "Secretariat - The Impossible True Story". I went with great trepidation, afraid that it would not live up to my sacred memories the excitement of the time or of my love for that horse. He let me dream, kept me company during a rough time, helped me hone my drawing skills.
It did not disappoint.
I knew the outcome. I remember sitting front of the television in 1973, gasping as Secretariat bounded out of the gate at the Belmont. And weeping as he rounded the fences and headed for the line. But the movie had me doing it all over again.
It was nostalgic. It was hopeful. It restored a sense of wonder that a ten year old girl had lost over time.
*The real Secretariat*
Even more inspirational is that he was owned by a woman, Penny Tweedy. It was unheard of in those times for a woman to run a horse in the Triple Crown. She countered the ignorance with dignity, humor and grace.
I remember the both of them, Disney. Thanks for reminding me.
*Zali gives this film four and a half poops (with litter crunchies!) Very inspirational.*
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I once shared space with a giant chocolate point Siamese named Mr. Huang. He was handsome beyond compare. His candy blue eyes were as big as headlights. He was tall and strong and gentle.
But Mr. Huang was like Dorothy's Scarecrow. He didn't have a brain.
He could occasionally muster up a clever game to play on Howard the dalmatian. But the two of them had to rub their fistful of synapses together really fast to make a spark. So how hard could that have been, really?
Mr. Huang thought he was hidden if he put his head under the dust ruffle of the bed. One pound of head under and the other seventeen pounds exposed. Yeah. I didn't even know you were there.
He also enjoyed a really good nap in a cardboard box. One day I came home and found him shoehorned in to a shoebox. He popped out of it like freshly risen bread dough.
And now I find out he wasn't original in even that thought.
Two points for style.
That CAN'T be comfortable.
His back is going to hurt in the morning. Or you know, late afternoon.
I don't even know how that's possible.
This was much more Mr. Huang's speed.
Or this. A perfect fit.
Okay, who broke Fluffy? Again?
Caution: Objects may be appear larger in box.
* Thanks to Nancy in Miami for sending me down memory lane.*
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Simone dragged me out on a run this morning. For a wee lassie, that dog is fast. Really. Like high octane lightning. We only go about a half a mile, but we finish it thirty seconds before we start. That fast.
It's the best five minutes of her day. And that's with waiting on cars so we can cross the street. She looks so delicate, but dog up there is a beast.
Zali is much more civilized. He strolls. He pulls out his pee shooter at every bush. Checks his pee mail. Greets other dogs. I have to admonish him to move forward. His walk takes about twenty-five minutes. We do about a mile and a quarter. We have long conversations about the upkeep of yards, the menu for lunch, butterflies on an Cotoneaster bush and his bum knee.
After Zali's excursion, it's my turn. I take him home and head out on a run. I go the same mile and a quarter that Zali and I doodle about for nearly a half an hour. I return home in about twelve minutes, depending on the traffic.
Simone's wind sprint training has upped my game. I am running about an eight minute mile.
Hud timed me the other day. He said, "Funny coming from the woman who said she wouldn't run." I replied, "I said I wouldn't. Not that I couldn't."
I'm running from my butt off. Literally.
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Today's post will be bought to you by my yellow shoes.
Simone and Aida are over there arguing about who gets them to wear on Saturday. As if. But I just realized that you can't see the best part of them.
The heel. It's Zali's favorite bit. Simone was doing a happy dance. She loves these shoes as much as I do.
I took them out to the Paw Prints Gala last Friday night with my friend Tracy. I do not know why I didn't get any pictures of the two of us. We looked fabulous. Her shoes and my shoes had a lovely time bidding on artwork and dining on food from some of the city's best restaurants. The shrimp and grits were divine.
One disappointment was that Tracy lost a bid on a handmade electric guitar. Sort of. She actually WON said guitar. The artist presented it to her, with a hug and a kiss, explaining how it was made. She told him that it was for her cousin, Hal, who plays with Black Oak Arkansas and was going to take it on the South American tour with him.
And then, Ron Childers, the announcer called for the guitar back. Someone else wanted to bid on it.
Can they do that?
They did.
We both were stunned. Bidding resumed. Tracy gave a few more half-hearted bids and then, angry, let it go. I can't say that I blame her. I thought there were rules about that.
The real shame of it is, that instead of going on tour out of the country and appearing in a music video, the guitar is going to be framed and hang on a wall. Untouched. Unplayed. Just an object.
What a shame.
We didn't let it spoil our evening. Tracy and I pointed our shoes in the direction of the Side Street Grill and had a Grey Goose Martini with extra olives.
My stunning yellow party shoes were simply exhausted the next day.
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Wouldn't it be fun to be both the owner of the world's largest cat and the world's smallest dog?
Meet Boo Boo.
Boo Boo is a long haired Chihuahua inching her way to the astounding heights of four inches. She weighs in at the outrageous sum of two pounds.
Simone would like for you all to know that she feels fat now.
This tiny girl weighed barely an ounce a birth and was approximately the length of your thumb. How did they even know Boo Boo was born? That's practically a dwarf hamster baby. Or a kangaroo. Aren't they that small at birth?
She weighed one ounce when she was born. That's the equivalent of ten pennies.
*Record scratch*
I truly wish Scarlett's Magic and Boo Boo had the same owner.
Yes, that's right. Me.
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