So here’s what I learned on this roadtrip: digital cameras can’t take pictures when your memory card is at home, still popped into the hard drive. …
Argh.
I was so frustrated: Angels spring training. With NO camera. I snapped several pictures of Mike Scioscia talking to the crowd; my kids getting autographs from Brandon Wood, Sean Rodriguez and Rob Quinlan; my kids and their cousin playing catch in the parking lot; my husband and his brother in their caps and jerseys … THEN I saw the note. A little message to me in the viewfinder that the memory card was missing. (I have to admit, my vision had been pretty fuzzy up until then, with the desert sun, Transition lenses, glare and whatnot.) Anyway, needless to say, I was frustrated. I guess you only do that once, right? I bought an extra memory card that night and vowed to keep an extra one in the camera case at all times.
Aside from my memory fiasco (in more ways than one), the trip was fantastic. The roadtrip playlist ended up being ’70s music. (“My name is Michael; I’ve got a nickel” always makes me smile.) I didn’t have time to pull together any roadtrip snacks, but that just forced us into gas station marts where we were able to select outrageous treats like Ho-Ho’s and Dibs ice cream nuggets. And spring training is an amazing experience for any baseball fan — you really get up-close and personal to your favorite players. The players are relaxed; they’ll stop and sign autographs; and every seat is field-box level. Sure I didn’t get any pics, but my husband took a few “back ups” with his camera phone. And it just made us realize we’d have to go back next year.
Have you taken a trip that seemed desperate to go wrong, but you refused to let it? Were you (like me) so happy to be on vacation that nothing could have ruined it?
In comments the other day, Bill Q. brought up a topic that tends to slide its way into my family’s dinner conversation from time to time:
Unfortunately, what I recall in my high-school days is that many of the girls seemed to go for the good-looking guys who treated them like dirt.
Hmmm … yes, unfortunately, I remember that, too, Bill. And my 15-year-old son brings it up a lot.
My son considers himself one of the “nice guys.” He bemoans this sad truth and simply shakes his head at the fact that many of the girls he likes tend to gravitate, instead, toward the boys who are the troublemakers, the attention-getters. The boys who shrug off authority and any kind of … well … learning.
I told him that this won’t go on forever. I passed the salt and pepper shakers and said eventually girls will see “his type” as the more desirable. (I believe he gave me that ”yeah, sure, Mom” look.)
But in the meantime I was faced with the question he posed to me and my tween daughter: Why do girls go for the “bad boys”? And why has that been true for generations?
At the time neither of us had an answer. (In fact, I think we both denied it.) But later, I thought about it again and remembered some discussions I’ve participated in on romance-writing blogs, where the “bad boy” is still alive and well in many a fiction setting (usually with boxing gloves, tatoos, a motorcycle and a mysterious past). (more…)
Road trip! This weekend. I’m excited. It’ll be nice to get away, and road trips are the best kind of getting away — there’s all that open road, good music, and your own thoughts to keep you company. While I’m packing the Pringles chips and Jack Links beef jerky, my husband works on oil changes and the all-important playlist.
We’ve come to realize how critical the playlists are to our trips. Whatever songs we choose seem to become the soundtrack for that moment – the background to all our memories of that certain stretch of road – so we choose wisely.
To this day, Van Morrison’s “Madame George” instantly brings me back to a certain curvy road (and heavy pine scent) of Tahoe. James Taylor’s “Carolina on My Mind” flashes me right to the highway near Oak Glen, and coming back with bagloads of fresh-picked apples, saltwater taffies, and three wiped-out kids in the back seat.
Some of the memories aren’t so great – Jason Mraz’s first album, unfortunately, now makes me think of the bridge and harbor leading to the oceanside hospital where I took my mother-in-law for chemo treatments for a year. But, on a brighter note, the Black Crowes make me think of her and my husband’s second-youngest brother when we caravanned to Vegas; my young brother-in-law had had a lucky winning streak at the blackjack tables, and whenever I hear “She Talks to Angels” I can see him slouched in the back seat with a big grin on his face, that desert horizon zipping past. …
So take me on a road trip down your memory lane – what songs do you associate with certain roads?
So I guess the Twilight DVD comes out tomorrow. I have one teen in my house, at least, who’s dreading it.
Why?
Well, because he’s a boy. And if Twilight has done nothing else, it’s ruined life for boys. At least according to my son.
Now if you ask your daughters, they will say that Twilight is the greatest thing since Cover Girl Lash Blast. Every girl I know under the age of 15 has read the book at least four times, and most have read the entire series at least twice. They pine for Edward; they sigh over Jacob; they psychoanalyze the “sparkly” scene and bend their heads to deconstruct the conversation in the biology lab. They have pens, calendars, posters, folders, purses, buttons and necklaces. They proclaim their allegiance to “Team Edward” or “Team Jacob” with rhinestone-studded T-shirts.
But where does this leave the boys? (more…)
Ah, Sunday drives. If you can find two words in the English language that more abruptly call to mind gargantuan Cadillacs, clean-cut hair styles, and slow cruising, let me know.
Sunday drives were a big part of my growing up. I spent countless weekends in the backseat of some Pontiac or another, sliding around with my brothers on the vinyl upholstery, listening to Karen Carpenter on the radio and smelling my mother’s Jean Nate.
My parents were both from Ohio. They grew up there, trudging through the snow (uphill, both ways, of course) and working at various gas stations and five-and-dimes throughout their teens. But about a year after they got married, my dad jumped at a great job offer in the aerospace industry and they moved to California. They drove the 2,500-or-so miles when I was 6 weeks old – two young 23-year-olds, eyes open wide, amazed that they were permanently in a land of squawking seagulls and 70-degree temps. And their amazement at the west coast ultimately resulted in regular weekend awe: every chance they got, they’d get out their maps and explore.
All through the late 60s and early 70s, we drove. My parents and I, then later my two brothers, would drive to Newport Beach in a Pontiac Catalina and watch the waves crash on the jetty. (more…)
My friend over at Incurable Logophilia ran a terrific meme the other day about food and fiction, so I thought I’d copy. It’s a great meme. It really makes you think about how food and fiction can be intertwined. Please add your associations at the end! I love to hear other people’s literary memories. …
Food from fiction that you’d like to sample:
Right away, I think of being a child and reading about the maple syrup concoctions Laura and Mary Ingalls made in Little House on the Prairie (and Little House in the Big Woods, I believe). (I guess that might actually fall under the “nonfiction” category, but I definitely remember reading that item in a book and wishing I could sample.) The girls would pour syrup onto the snow in swirling configurations, let them freeze, then eat them like a cookie. I always thought that sounded fun.
As an adult, though … hmmm … well, I still lean toward the sweets: In Chocolat, I remember the way they described the hot chocolate in the book – thick and foamy, with real milk and real chocolate – and I recall wanting to taste that so badly.
A fictional meal you would like to have attended:
For some reason, the first thing that comes to mind here is The Great Gatsby, and the characters all sitting out on the veranda, the first night Nick visits Daisy. I would like to have been there, drinking claret while the summer wind blew the curtains and Daisy questioned whether the candles should be lit. It was such a strange but romantic conversation, with so many secrets. I always wanted to help Nick sort through the lies. (more…)
My husband has a Happiness Book. I’m not sure which part of this charms me the most: the fact that he thought to start such a thing, the fact that he spent some minutes getting out a piece of paper and making a little cover for it, or the image of him searching for little plastic holder thingys at work every time he adds a page. (Picture this guy with big biceps, carefully putting a tiny little piece of paper – maybe something with little blue clouds on it – into a three ring binder, then clipping the rings shut and staring at the drawing.) It all seems rather out of character for him as a man, yet completely in character as a dad.
The Happiness Book started about 8 years ago, when our eldest son was 7. Our son – like all children, I’m sure – would create lots of drawings: fingerprint characters, short stories he wrote, stick figures playing basketball, and lots and lots of dinosaurs. He’d tuck his little drawings into my husband’s drawer at home so my husband would be sure to see them when he left for his sheriff’s job at the courthouse. My husband dutifully brought each piece to work, but eventually the drawings came to cover too much uniform-locker space, and then too much bailiff-desk space. So my husband got a white binder from the supply room, made a simple cover, and started putting all the drawings in plastic pages. The Happiness Book was born.
The simple white binder stands about three inches thick now, (more…)
Another weekend, another couple hours on Facebook … yes?
Actually, I wasn’t able to spend much time on Facebook this week or this weekend, and I was surprised at how much guilt I felt. I received an “out of office” pingback from a girlfriend, in fact, and when I hurriedly sent a different e-mail to her home to ask about her absence (her pingback mentioned surgery), she said “Check out my Facebook page for details. …” Gulp. (As in “You obviously haven’t been reading my Facebook page.”) More guilt. Am I supposed to be reading it every night? I got on Facebook to have a little fun, but now I’m wondering if signing up is sort of like signing a contract to spend at least a half an hour on it per day. Or else you might get Superpoked.
If Twitter is the great big networking cocktail party (where you stand around swirling your Manhattan, looking for someone to introduce yourself to), surely Facebook is the raucous Christmas party in your family’s home basement, no? It’s the casual-sweater-wearing crowd, where everyone is sitting shoulder-to-shoulder on the couch, passing photos up and down the line.
At first, I really liked this casualness. I loved getting in touch with old friends, and I loved looking at everyone’s pictures. (more…)
Q: I am curious how you got the Yahoo! avatar on your sidebar. I don’t necessarily want an avatar there, but maybe some other kind of graphic.
A: Good question. I had trouble putting graphics in my sidebar on the free option of WordPress. That avatar isn’t exactly a graphic – it’s a feed, believe it or not. So it’s simply HTML coding for the feed. I put the coding in the “Text” box for widgets. Any kind of coding or graphic you simply put in the “Text” box. I find that it won’t take Javascript, though.
Other options for graphics in your sidebar on WordPress are photos, which you do through Flickr. Flickr is also one of your widget options.
Other than that, I couldn’t find any choices! So if you do, Bill, let me know! We’ll share tips.
Q: I tried to subscribe to your RSS feed, but it didn’t work. I’m technologically challenged. How do I do it?
A: Yes, RSS is strangely complicated to set up. I say strangely because it’s actually wonderfully easy to use, once it’s set up. (more…)
I have a few posts lined up about various topics, including one about Facebook (which I can’t wait to ask you all about), and one about little kids and their stuffed animals (!), but first I want to take a quick day or two to do a little Q&A. Some of you ask me questions off-line – about RSS or avatars or writing or whatever – and even though I try to answer you each individually, I may have forgotten. (Sorry if I did!) So please throw your questions back at me! I’ll try to answer everything in one post, especially if it might be helpful info to others. (Like to Bill, who just said in the last comment that he was going to start his own blog – yay, Bill!)
So the floor’s open.
If you don’t have a question, please leave an opinion – I’d equally love to hear from you about what posts you’ve liked or what you haven’t liked. I know I’m a little all over the place, topic-wise (and I can’t say I promise to stay “on topic” in the future!) but if there’s a certain category everyone likes more than others, let me know. I’ll do my best to generate more about that.
Beyond that, have a great Friday! I’m at the Natural Products Expo all day!
