Unlike Me

My blog mentor and friend posted a contest from the Facebook page of The Inn at Weathersfield:

Look what we found in the basement! As far as we know, no one ever swam in the pond. So...tell us how this life preserver ended up at the inn. The story can be true or not. The best - we'll be the judge - will receive major bragging rights and a $50 gift certificate to be used at the inn.

I am not a writer, nor am I a contest person. But I couldn't stop thinking about this picture once I saw it. This story started forming in my mind...it was not like the usual things I think of. There was nothing offensive, or dark, or funny about it. Could I write something like that? Where would I even begin? I paced around a bit, psyching myself up to write. I sat down and looked up the Inn's website, and found a picture of a bedroom with a fireplace in it, which sealed the deal for me (you'll see why later on). I knew I had to write this story. I knew that even though I had made it up in my head, that it really WAS the answer to their question. So, without further ado, I present to you my contest submission...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the summer of 1776 in Philadelphia , a happily married couple spent a weekend in August celebrating the birthday of their 6 year old son, Jack. Jack was their only child after many years of trying, and his birthday riding on the coattails of the signing of the Declaration of Independence was cause for much celebration. Jack's parents knew what an exciting time they were in, and they had very high hopes for their son. They wanted him to go into this world with all of the opportunities that the newly formed country was offering. Jack grew up in a loving home, with the world as his oyster.

  

Dianna was a sweet 4 year old girl the summer Jack turned 6. The stress of her long birth was too much for her mother. Despite the tragedy surrounding her birth, Dianna was the heart of her family. Her father made sure she knew what a wonderful woman she came from, and her grandmother lived with them, along with her aunt and uncle, her 5 cousins, and older brother. They lived as indentured servants, in a small 3 room house on a farm in South Carolina under the t"rule" of a cruel farmer. They knew they were never going to earn their keep to be able to gain their freedom, so one night under the supervision of their father, Dianna's older brother took her and they ran. They lived off of the kindness of strangers, working odd jobs to eat, and made it to Massachusetts the year Dianna turned 16.

 

While Dianna and her brother were settling into freedom and establishing a new life in the city of Boston, Jack had came into his own independence. An 18 year old hard working man, he had been on fishing boats since his father took him crabbing in the Chesapeake Bay at the age of 13. In the spring of 1788 Jack was in Boston working on the different boats and gaining a reputation of a great deckhand worth every share he earned. Dianna had found steady work washing the offloads of the fish and crab boats. From the moment they met during an offload, Jack knew he was in love.

 

Dianna did not want to be involved with Jack. He was a white man, and her brother had told her never to trust a white man's interest in her. But something told her Jack was different. Through his tough exterior his eyes were kind, loving, and pure. Jack was determined to make Dianna his forever. He knew it seemed impossible...he was going to spend his entire life defending him and his wife's pure love from the hate of others. But his love had overshadowed the realities of the world. After a year of secret dates, stolen kisses, and hidden glances, he decided to do something about it.

 

He took her away for a summer weekend in Vermont, to a quiet town in Southern Vermont. Laying under the stars that first night in a clearing he had picked out, they fell asleep gazing into each others eyes, feeling content for the first time in their lives. The next day, he got down on one knee in the middle of the clearing and said to her, "Dianna, I have nothing but my love for you in my heart. You have made me feel like my life is worth living and I am going to live it with you. I have bought this land to build you a home. Here we will live, get married, and have babies. We will turn our love into a family of love and we will share that love with this town and they will have no choice but to love us back. I know this will happen because my heart tells me so...." She smiled down on him and started to ask, "But how..." and he continued, "I have no idea", he said with tears in his eyes, "But we will do it all. I don't have a ring to make this promise because I spent all of my savings on this land to build our home, but I found something that I hope you will accept" He got up, ran over to his bag, and pulled out a life buoy. As he jogged back, she couldn't help but giggle at his innocence and sweetness. Back down on one knee, he said "We use these on our boats. If one of us falls in the water, we throw it to them to keep them afloat until we can pull them back in. It's called a kisby ring and I think it better shows you how I feel than any silly ring you would wear on your finger. It's my promise to keep you afloat, to always be there to support you and to save you if you need to be saved. You will have me to hold onto whenever you need me. Forever" She took the kisby ring and threw her arms around his neck, tears streaming down her face. "Forever?", she whispered in his ear. "Forever", he confirmed.

 

A few years later, they were settling into their new home that Jack built. It was just starting to snow and Dianna was bustling around the house. "Jack, can you come help me hang this over the hearth?". Jack walked into their bedroom, his heart swelling with love at the sight of his wife carrying their first child. "Dianna, why in God's earth are you doing with that silly life buoy?"

 

"I'm hanging it over the fireplace. This is the symbol of our love, and of our family. I want it to be here in the room when the baby is born. I want the story of our love to be the first thing the baby hears. And when they get married and build their first home, they will have the tradition of hanging their own family symbol in their home" He hung the life buoy over the fireplace, and turned to wife, "You are an amazing woman, and you are going to be an even more amazing mother. I love you".

 

"Forever?", she said playfully.

 

"Forever", he confirmed.

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

So, that was my contest submission. I hope you enjoyed it. I feel a little funny about sharing it because it's not funny, or gross. It doesn't even have a swear word in it, but it's still me.

 

Dana C.

Tubin' Again

I should have cleaned today. I should have done more laundry. I should have gone to the grocery store and bought groceries. Instead of doing any of those things, I made a vlog.

I watch YouTube videos all the time. I am subscribed to a bunch of different YouTubers and my husband told me I should make a real video and post it. He says I'm funny. I think it's just because he wants to have sex with me and he knows compliments get me hot.

This "work of shart" took me way to long to shoot, edit, save, convert and upload . Maybe that's because I have no idea how to use or find free video editing software, so I used the free Windows shite that came on the PC? Who knows. All I know is that in just a few short hours, I was able to birth my first actual edited vlog. Boner Petit!

MEOW X 5

If you enjoyed this vlog, let me know and please subscribe to my YouTube Channel (click HERE). I have some footage for Part 2 already shot so if everyone hates it I will delete it off of my phone through a veil of tears...

Dana C.

S: Stuck

I have writer's block. My brain is absolutely empty of things to write about. It's strange because I normally have a lot to say about nothing but for some reason, there's just nothing there. I don't know if it's just this time of year...there's so much distraction with holidays and politics and maybe all that crap just takes the space where my imagination lives. But I need to write. I need to get something out. It's like there's a shit log in my brain and I'm constipated, unable to push out the words.

"In Ernest Hemingway’s memoir A Moveable Feast, (my all time favorite book. If you haven't read it, do it. It's amazing) he recalls days spent in Paris suffering from writer’s block.  Hemingway tells himself, “’Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.’” 


One true sentence. That's scary to me for some reason. What I share something TOO true? What if I write something that, while it may be true, has no value? Whatever. I need to just get over this. Here are some truths:


I love bad TV. I like to watch Here Comes Honey Boo Boo. Jersey Shore, Sister Wives, Celebrity Rehab, etc. I will watch anything that looks like it will make me more stupid. What dumb TV shows or movies do you not usually share with people?

I love bad food. My #1 is Hot Pockets. I love them all: Hot Pockets, Lean Pockets, Pretzel Pockets, Breakfast Pockets. I love them all. There are 2 in the box, so 2 is a meal. They are incredible. I could eat them every night for dinner, no joke. I also love sugar. More than anything...except people. But seriously I will sugar over anything. I love cookies, cake, ice cream, candy...I love them all. I eat so much sugar that I will more than likely end up with some form of diabetes. I hope not, but I would not be surprised.

I am way too afraid of dumb shit. OK, I think it's perfectly acceptable to be afraid of bees so I'm not going to get into that one. But I am also afraid that the front wall of the house is going to fall off, I'm afraid that light bulbs will catch the ceiling on fire, I'm afraid of thunderstorms even though I pretend not to be anymore, I'm afraid that we will leave something out that one of the cats will choke on and die...and that's just the stuff off the top of my head. I basically spend my entire day trying not to lose my shit. 

I hate to clean. I used to have such a clean apartment. People who have spent time in any of my apartments in MA would be horrified to see how much I don't care about cleaning. Cleaning was easy when all i had was one cat. Now I have a husband, 5 cats and the dustiest bird in the world. I gave up very early. I haven't died from it so I don't care if the house is dirty. In fact, I'd like to think it keep people away, which leads me to...

I'm actually an ambivert (50% introvert and 50% extrovert). When I am out in the general population, I can interact and have fun. But the introvert goes home and hides in the nook of her husband. Home where there are no people, no surprise visits. I love them both equally. I used to think I was a fake fun person with this dark secret that I hated people, but that's not true (although some days I do hate people). I need a n equal balance in order to feel whole. 

So, there are 5 of my truths. While they may not have been the most earth shattering concepts, I was able to work through my writer's block, which makes me happy. What are some of your truths? Maybe you can use this technique the next time you need to get through a block.

Dana C.

Racation

I know I'm supposed to blog about something that starts with the letter R but since we just got back from vacation, I'm going to blog about "racation", which is the Scooby-Do pronunciation of vacation. There, done!

I knew it was going to be difficult (impossible) to blog on vacation. We did not bring a computer, and Las Vegas has terrible cell phone reception. In fact, the only place in the hotel that we could even check Facebook on our phones was in the bathroom in our hotel room, and even that took 5 minutes to load. So, hopefully nothing super huge happened on Facebook while we were gone. Before leaving, I decided I would take videos instead. So, here is the fist video I took. It's the "pre-vacation" video:

AND just so you know, I am STILL getting over that cold. In fact, the weather back here has made it worse again. I'm in the "cough till you puke" phase this weekend. Awesome.


Next up is a really cool e-billboard we saw on day 2 (I think). We were walking the north half of the strip and stopped at this. And watched it go though its entire ad cycle. Twice. Jim wanted me to record it, not so we could share it you, but because he knew he'd want to watch it again :)

This next video I took on the way out of Aria. I had just lost money in there and when we came out, we came across this neat water wall. The beauty of this was somewhat lost on me because I was feeling ripped off. Disregard my jaded comments:

This one is a quick video and it really is worthless except for funny I find it every time I see this game. The pandas in China Mystery are wild, and if they can be used, they become animated and look like they are in a dryer...I know I shouldn't find that funny, but it cracks me up...

And, shortly after posting the Panda in a Dryer video on YouTube, someone commented "your face is appalling". Thanks for that, jerk-off :)

Ah, the fountains at Bellagio. It's something you have to go see if you visit Las Vegas. When we went on our honeymoon, we were treated to Andrea Bochelli and Sarah Brightman's "Time to Say Goodbye" which we both really like and enjoyed. This time, the first one we saw was "This Kiss" by Faith Hill. Now, I won't say that I don't like that song, but it was kind of stupid to watch the fountains with it. In fact, we both agreed that it was hokey enough that we would come back again on another night and hope for a less lame song. So we went back on another night and was treated to David Foster's "Winter Games". No offense to anyone, but of all the songs, that one is not a favorite. And I am not picky when it comes to music. We decided to try AGAIN and see what else was on the song list. When this started up, I thought someone was playing a joke on me..

A few weeks back, I hurt my back. I was bummed because I wanted to ride roller coasters and the zipline down Freemont Street. Luckily I was able to rest and take muscle relaxers so that I could walk. When we got there, on day 2 we rode the roller coaster at New York, New York and it was so much fun! Then on a different day, we rode the roller coaster at Circus Circus, which was also fun. We decided to try the ziplines at Freemont Street. You start at about 5 stories high and end about 2. I loved everything except for the end. I slammed so hard at the end of the line that it freaked me out. Of course, it didn't freak me out enough to stop me from doing it again!!! We were able to go once during the day and once at night, and that was AFTER a wicked fancy dinner at Binion's Steakhouse. Thankfully I didn't puke up my scampi :) This video is one I took of other people doing it since you are not supposed to film while on the zipline.

Now, onto the slot machine wins. I had a couple of decent hits while we were there, but nothing spectacular. The losses were slow enough that we were never going back to our rooms with empty pockets, but the wins were more there to keep us floating. On our last night, we went back to the room to do some pre-packing. It was late, after 11pm, and I was tired. We had some 20's left from the day (about $200) so we decided to go down and play them. Here is what happened:

And here is the hand pay. Every time we visit a fountain we always throw money in. Since I already knew we were going to have fun and we weren't losing all of our bankroll every day, every coin I threw in I wished for a hand pay. A hand pay is when you win on a slot machine, and the winnings are over $1200. It is a federal law that you get an attendant to pay out the winnings along with the required federal tax forms. Since we tend to play penny machines, hand pays are not prevalent. But I wished anyways. And now, you get to see my wish come true:

After we got our hand pay, we went back to our room and took all of these obnoxious pictures of the cash we were bringing home. We were so excited to be leaving with a profit!It was nice to be fake rich even if it were only for a night :)

The next day, we got on a plane and came back home. We are both still fucked when it comes to sleeping (we can't get to sleep and end up sleeping way too late) and I can not get rid of this cough. But our credit card is paid off, we have money to get the driveway fixed, and maybe even have a little something left over. Of course with this storm of death coming, maybe we should go get a generator :)

Here's the link to our Vegas 2012 Racaction pictures, if you want to see more:
http://jimanddanapictures.shutterfly.com/pictures/667

Dana C

Q: Quiet!

At night, when we turn off the TV in the bedroom, one of us always says, "Shh, TV! Shut the fuck up." I don't know when we started doing that but it has become a nighttime ritual. When thinking of the letter Q, I was trying to come up with a witty topic...but since I have been playing Word With Friends, all I keep coming up with is QI, but since I really don't know much about Chinese medicine or martial arts, that was not going to work. I kept coming back to the word quiet. That made me think about our nighttime ritual and then, just like that, I was flooded with things about silence, about quiet.

Shh, TV!

There are good quiets and bad ones, and both are different depending on a person's past experiences with silence. A good one is when all is so good and perfect, there is no need for words, no need to fill the silence. Because in that moment the silence is not perceived as a void as much as it is part of the perfect. Summer nights out on the porch, a drive home from a long day at work...even a moment in the shower when the water temp is just right. There are also good moments of quiet after sound. Like when you're with your family and you're reminiscing about the past. Someone starts a story, everyone chiming in with "their version of the events as they remember them"...then there's the punchline, the completion of the anecdote. Everyone laughs. After a short period of time, the room fills with the silence of everyone smiling, everyone remembering. feeling the memory and the warmth of the laughter. It's comfortable, serene, and sweet in that moment.

There are those quiet moments after a loud event, like a concert (or in our case, the casino). When we stay at Foxwoods, there's something so strange that happens when we get back to our room. There's this buzzing silence. It's funny because it feels like excitement but all you can hear is the sound of your blood in your ears. That post-noise quiet always makes me feel funny and slightly uneasy. Sometimes I think that it's never going to stop and I'll hear this blood rushing sound forever. Then I get all panicky and freaked out. But then we turn on the TV (thank GOD for TV) and the sound of the Discovery Channel displaces the buzzing...and the panic disappears and I can feel comfortable in my own skin again.

OMG OMG WTF Was THAT?!?!

Then there are the scary quiets. With 5 cats in our house, nighttime is never totally peaceful and serene. In fact, there are these moments when the cats do something that makes a loud noise (knocking everything off the fridge, knocking over a sculpture, etc) and I wake up at the end of that commotion, scared shitless. In that moment all I can hear is the quiet but I can't tell if there actually WAS a loud noise or if I was dreaming it. So I lay there and listen. I figure if it's the cats I won't hear anything but if it's a killer, I'll hear footsteps or something...I have a very active imagination at night. When I don't hear anything, I am relieved. Until I say to myself, "What if it's a really good killer and the reason why I can't hear anything is because he has hold-still ninja abilities....waiting for an innocent victim to get up and patrol the house, unknowingly walking directly to their death?". So then I wake Jim up and make him go look. I figure he could hold the guy off long enough for me to call 911. When he comes back upstairs, he says: The cats knocked (Insert Object) onto (Insert Surface) which made the noise, OK? And I say OK and lay back down, imagining Jim walking past a dark corner to yell at the cats, not seeing the killer ninja in the shadows. So then I have to lay there and listen for ANYTHING that could be a killer...until I fall back to sleep.

Those are some of MY quiets? What about you? Do have your own good and/bad quiets? Comment and share your quiets with me.

 
Enjoy a moment of quiet today,
Dana C.                            

Pussy!!!

NO, not that kind. The furry kind...er...the hairy kind...never mind. I mean cats. First, let me start off by saying that I didn't always like cats. I thought they were snobby, no fun pets that people who live in apartments had because they couldn't have dogs. Then I met my friend Shelby's cat, Weezy (Louise). I used to go over and check on Weezy when Shelby was traveling. I would go over and sit on the couch (I watched TV over there because Shelby had better cable than I did) and Weezy would come sit right next to me so I could pet her.  Then I go over to the kitchen sink and she would start to dance, because that was where the brush was. It was so cute!

Then I got my first cat, Kitty. What a cat. Picture this: It's the middle of the night. I'm awoken by a sound I've never heard before. It's this weird gag/hack. I turn on the light and there is Kitty with about 10 inches of the elastic from a pair of pajama bottoms down her throat. I had to slowly pull it out (basically from her stomach) while we both were gagging. Then there were the games she would play, like "Middle of the night knock everything off the dresser", and "I want to move into the kitchen sink and live there forever". One morning, I made toast and brought the container of margarine out to the coffee table. I swear I was only gone for a minute and that cat had her face planted in the tub. I hissed at her and she looked up at me, chewing a mouthful of margarine. She swallowed and said, "I can't believe it's not butter!"

Now we have 5 kitties. It's like a zoo here. At night we hear them running around, fighting, hissing...it's insane. I'd like to present to you a list of things I like/don't like about having 5 cats:

Don't Like: Litter boxes/cat shit
Cat shit reeks. It's the worst smell ever. When their boxes are getting changed, they go hide somewhere and eat boxes of Cracklin' Oat Bran, hot dogs, and broccoli. As soon as you're done, they take turns emptying their bowels and high-fiving each other if either of us retch.
Like: Automatic litter boxes
They scoop themselves. You don't have to touch them until the little box is full of poop. Then you replace the litter cartridge and box with a new one. Boom. Done.

Don't Like: Cat puke
We have cats with bulimia. They eat, then decide they ate too much, then they puke. Butters (our most recent addition) can throw up a cat food meat loaf. You can always tell a Rollie throw up because it always ends with a hair ball. It's like a little black exclamation point at the end.
Like: Pollie likes to eat throw up
Our Pollie is a little cat throw up Hoover. He will feast on a pile of "leftovers" so all I have to clean up is the hairball.

Don't Like: Cat hair
Sweet mother of GOD!!!! The hair is everywhere. If I could get them all electrolysis I would.
Like: The Furminator
If you have a pet, get one of these. It's the best brush. Ever.

Now, I'd like to share some "off the top of my head" cat haiku. Please enjoy my half assed poetry.

Night
Black cat, orange cat
Quit fucking with each other.
I'm trying to sleep

Vomit
Retching gagging sounds
I can't see where he threw up
Ew, my sock is wet.

Poo
The box is now clean
Dig, wince, dig, scratch scratch
I need to throw up

So, how about some of your favorite "pet" things? Or, perhaps you want to blow your artistic load all over some haiku? Either way, please leave some comments.

Happy Pussy Petting!

Dana C.

Why October is the Most Awesome Month Ever

October is an amazing month in the New England/ Mid-Atlantic region. You have beautiful warm sunny days and cool extra-blanket-on-the-bed nights. You could have rain OR snow. It's hurricane season in the Atlantic so you may get some remnants (or the unfortunate direct hit) that bring rain, wind, even the threat of a tornado. The leaves begin their change and descent to the earth, diving, floating, spiraling towards the ground to get raked up. The sun gets lower in the sky which blinds me on my drive home. It's a blazing ball of fire that makes me think "I hope no one is stopped in front of me because I will run into them"...but then the sun so low makes some amazing sunsets too.

A beautiful Northbridge, MA fall

Raking leaves sucks. That's why I don't do it.

October is the month I got married in. The weather was perfect that day: bright and sunny and warm. There was a hint of crisp fall in the air, but it was comforting as opposed to feeling ominous.I had butternut squash risotto during our reception that just screamed fall. Our wedding invites had little autumn branches on them. It was the perfect month to get married in.

Beautiful weather on our wedding day, October 9, 2010

Amazing fall seating charts compliments of my talented sister

October means less bees. By now, you must know my fear of bees and how it basically owns my life. In October, the bees are so sleepy that even if you see one, it's too lazy to do anything except sit there and relax. Then I  can squish it with a shoe and dance triumphantly in a small circle with slightly shaking hands (even killing them scares the shit out of me) and feel empowered.

Die, bee. I hate you.

October means the beginning of all things "spice". I buy everything I can get my hands on that makes me feel warm and spicy. Hermit cookies, gingersnaps, hot cider, even apple cinnamon air freshener sprays to cover up the stink of cat pee. The candles have spicy warm smells and come in the relaxing colors of autumn, like burnt sienna and umber.

Warm, comforting scents...

Hermit cookies. Get them now.

October means a change in wardrobe. The summer hues, capris and sandals get stashed in the back of the closet and out come the fuzzy sweaters and scarves. Everyday is perfect for jeans, whether it's with a t-shirt or a sweatshirt. I celebrate the day my little pumpkin earrings make their way back into the rotation.

Cute!!!

What do you like about October? Leave a comment. If you have another favorite month, feel free to share it in the comments below, but don't expect to change my mind.