Mommie Dearest(s)

Often I have found myself FULL of so many useless facts about celebrities, that I must take a step back and shut it for fear of my own menacing banter. I recall a Thanksgiving a few years back when my friend and I were entertaining my family with our endless chatter about the end of the TV show, "Friends." By the end of our babbling discussion about, "Courtney, Jen, David," etc., we found ourselves feeling a little weird about our over-knowledge and "kinship" with people that we clearly DO NOT know, (but could probably call us stalkers in a very miniscule way.)

And beyond just the idle chit-chat, yes, I will admit I am part of the population that pokes fun at the f-ed up stuff that happens in the weird and wonderful world of Celebrity-dom. Yes, I laugh myself silly when I peruse The Smoking Gun's archived mugshots (especially Nick Nolte's). But I do have a heart and I do feel sad (like I would for anyone) that they have such major problems and on top of it, have to face them in public.

After taking a few steps back from reading the "tabs," (that would be "tabloids" to those of you who don't know the lingo,) my mind is at a little more ease and a little more focused in my own world and those around me.

But really, that's all harmless.

What's NOT harmless, are the parents of some of these celebrities that slander their children publicly, waste them with their words, and just plainly show complete and utter disrespect for the word, "parent."

About a year ago, Tatum O'Neal wrote her memoirs. She was on "Oprah." She did the entire big "poor me," on morning shows, late shows and essentially to anyone who would listen . After reading her book, I agreed. Poor Tatum. Of course, after the book came out, her father and ex-husband tried to say she was crazy, blah blah blah. And you know, she probably is partially crazy, but if even a quarter of her book were true, they had MUCH to do with her walk into the blurry world of nutty.

Then there was Jennifer Aniston, whose mother wrote some slag book about her failed relationship with her daughter. Hmmm. How about chatting with your child instead of MAKING MONEY from her. That might be a way to mend fences…if that was really her intention.

My favorite (NOT) pulverization of someone's character was Jon Voight. In case you don't know, his daughter is Angelina Jolie. Right around the time she'd gotten divorced from Billy Bob (and thankfully, stopped talking to her father), and right when she'd adopted her son, her father went on national TV to say that Angelina was crazy, that she should not be a mother, yadda, yadda, yadda…yes. Nice.

But today, this is about Linda Carroll. Who is Linda Carroll? She is a new author/money-grubbing-jerk-who-calls-herself-a- mother to the infamous, notorious Courtney Love.

Here are some excerpts from Loving Mummy (and actually, from Page Six:)

In "Her Mother's Daughter," due from Doubleday in January, Linda Carroll reveals that Love has been getting stoned and causing calamities since she was in diapers. Courtney had a troubled upbringing and her hippie parents split up shortly after her first birthday. When she was 4 years old, her father, Hank, would dose her with "magic pills" and draw psychedelic squiggles all over her naked body. Carroll eventually had to take him to court to keep him from having unsupervised visits with Courtney. Courtney started in therapy when she was 6 years old. She was caught reading porn magazines in an adult bookstore at age 9 and was kicked out of every school she attended.

Now, I don't claim to be a doctor, but something tells me that these particular behaviors at the hands of her parents MIGHT (just a slight maybe), have something to do with her problems in later life. And now, EVERYONE will know even more about an ALREADY totally-outed, public spectacle mess called Courtney Love.

There are many other stories of this, too many to tell. Bottom line, with parents like these jerks, who needs the media??

Makes being beaten with wire hangers seem a little tame, riiight?

When life imitates art, or art imitates life…

Last night I watched "King of the Hill." In last night's episode, Peggy Hill was writing a column of "tips" for the local Arlen newspaper. Her tips were things to do around the house like, how to get oil out of the driveway, how to get lipstick out of clothes, etc. The kicker was, Peggy did not actually know these tips from trial and error, her neighbor Kahn's mother actually gave her the ideas. When Kahn's mother stopped giving the tips, Peggy made one up. She told Hank of her column. He flipped out and she did, too, after he told her what she'd concocted was actually noxious fumes that could make a sh**load of Arlen people sick. That combo? Bleach and ammonia.

This morning, I am watching the news. They spoke of a hotel near LAX that was evacuated due to a toxic-smelling odor in the air….yes, kids, that's right. One of the cleaning people did the death mix of bleach and ammonia.

Did someone from the hotel staff get encouraged from last night's "KOH" episode?? Conspiracy…

Speaking of household tips, can I share the fact that Oxy-products are the BEST?? Not only can you throw the powder in your wash for extra-clean clothes, but if you mix the powder with water in a spray bottle, it gets stains out of carpeting.

Sigh.

It's Monday. I am just trying to make conversation.

Product Junkie

I have an addiction.

I am a product junkie.

My obsession started way back when. You see, I grew up in a Prell (awful, green smelly shampoo) and yellow Dial soap house. That was it. There were no choices, there were no alternatives, you used what was bought and that was that.

My mom always had Ponds cold cream and a good ole' jar o' Vaseline. A few little products, but the woman had her hair done once a week, so she was not styling with the products. And since she was fairly au naturel (and beautifully so), make-up-wise, she did not suddenly spring to keep up with Joneses for products nor did she care.

My sister started to buy Jhirmack. Jhirmack was what I considered a highfalutin’ hair product chain way back when and I just thought we'd become royalty. I was SO sure my hair was 20 times better, that it was outrageously more beautiful and it became a daily discussion in my grade school classroom. As my sister got a little older, she slowly started to accumulate a few more items (which I eventually tampered with and made my own). When she moved out, I was left with the skeleton of what was once a small mesh of products.

My best friend growing up, E, had a product junkie of a mother. Their bathroom counter (a double-sinked one, mind you) was covered inch to inch, corner to corner with stuff. She let us go to hell and high-water to play with everything. Since E was a tomboy, I felt like I had my own boudoir, filled with lipsticks, lip pencils, lip shine, lip crease enhancers, eye shadow, crease filler, mascara wands, eyebrow pencils, cheek highlighters, blushes, rouges and marked bottles of glop that I was sure would transform my rotund, pre-pubescent shape into that of a leggy supermodel.

Not.

When I started to work, I was able to start my slow journey into the world of products. Of course, my first job came around the time that people still bought the white-bottle Aqua Net for 99 cents to make sure their surf-wave of a hair-do could sustain earth, wind and fire. I could afford to buy a little Wet n' Wild (which to people who are not familiar, the line is similar to "Aziza"…FOOF!!)

As the years went on, my small addiction became larger. But these were my "drugstore" addiction days.

My years as a perfume sprayer at the Marshall Fields on State Street in beautiful, downtown Chicago started a whole new, upper-class level of addiction as I was surrounded by the fine and uppity lines from Chanel, Dior, Mac and several others that I got at discount prices as an employee. Since I was sensitive to the smells, I tried to stay far away from being an overzealous sprayer and concentrated on being best friends with at least one person per counter. My little apartment slowly filled up with vials, jars, creams, shower gels/lotions, hair junk for ever type of style, flasks and all sorts of pretty scented lotions.

Working hair shows and getting free bags of goods was like an addict getting their score. For a mere day of getting my hair done into strange do's, I would get my rush. Upon returning home, I would carefully place every jug, every sample, ever beautifully marked family of bottles in special places in my everso populated care cabinet.

These days, I keep it to a duller roar. I don't have the pull I used to with make-up counters, the money or the time. The real irony of this campaign of products is, I really don't wear a whole lot of make-up. I do not overuse or abuse hair stuff. I try to keep the scent-wearing to natural stuff and on the down-low. I wear lotion consistently (and thanks to T for my two new jugs of wonderful lotion!). I have a large BAG of lipsticks, a seperate one for eye stuff, and several small ones for skin-care, etc. I guess having all the product makes me feel like if I should go down the path of needing it, everything I need it at my disposal. My shower is like a small chemistry set. I switch things out every few weeks to keep things interesting. I have a special cabinet chock-full with my goods.

Ironically, I still have bars of yellow Dial soap. Dermatologists says it’s the best thing for your skin AND hair. Who knew? I guess my parents were really onto something and not just making me suffer.

P.S.

Marshall Fields.







If you have never heard of Marshall Fields, it is a staple in the Midwest, but mostly in Chicago. Its an amazing department store that has the feel of Bloomingdale's, but still manages to make common-folk feel welcome. The State Street location I spoke of is one of the most spectacular old buildings from the outside to the inside.

Their windows are a well-known Christmas-time with a location near-to perfect.








Sadly, the new owners are turning this amazing Chicago landmark into Macys in the year 2006. To learn more about Marshall Fields history, check out:

http://www.fields.com/common/store_history.jsp

or

http://chicago.urban-history.org/sites/d_stores/fields.htm

'YAY!!! RAIN!!!!

As I was sitting in harried anticipation for the new season of "Arrested Development" to begin, I heard a sound I had not heard in eons...THUNDER. I thought I'd gone completely daffy. As I laughed my arce off at the BEST show EVAR...I saw a blink of (gasp!) lightening. What was going on??

Apparently, there is a hurricane sitting on the Mexican coast. And happily, its causing little storms here. Waking up to the peaceful sounds of Mother Nature's pitter patterings made me so happy.

"Because I am NOT one of your FANS!"

(Yes, she scares me, too!)

Really, my question of the day? How on EARTH is "Two and 1/2 men" the BEST sitcom on TV??

That's it. Yawm. Boring. Tired. Too much Benadryl.

Quote/thought of the day...

Watch your thoughts; they become your words.
Watch your words; they become your actions.
Watch your actions; they become your habits.
Watch your habits; they become your character.
Watch your character for it will become your destiny.

unknown

Casper/Carl .. the friendly ghost

Gosh, I used to LOVE this cartoon...(if you are younger, you may not remember) cute little Casper, "I don't want to scare people, I just want to be friends"...(famous last words!) I could actually have his catch-phrase wrong, so do share, my pray-tells, the proper phrase if you know it!

My apartment in Hollywood was probably built in the late 60's, early 70's. Much to my happiness, there are barely any earthquake cracks and its very quiet (with the exception of the occasional roaring blare of "Dance Party USA," Russian-style, but that's another story).

I feel very safe there. I know my most of my neighbors and my landlord and his wife are very aware of their tenants and whose coming and going.

About a year ago, I was watching TV, with Kitty, who was fairly new in my life. As I was watching the tube, I "felt" like someone was watching me. It was coming from my kitchen. Since my living room and kitchen are like one, I was not looking too far. I then kept noticing Kitty staring over to the kitchen.

After that night, more often than not, I noticed more and more "feelings," accompanied by shifting noises and such. I would then watch Kitty, staring into thin air.

Chills, right??

Over the next few months, I still felt it. A male presence. Nothing alarming. Just a feeling.

My BF was staying with me for a while this past year. She was home sick and had fallen asleep on my couch. That night when I returned home, she said, "It was so weird. I can't tell if its because I am sick or not, but I swear there was a man in here watching over me."

Ironically, as we spoke of "him," we'd both felt the same: he was big, he was lurky, but not scary. I described him as the Billy Bob's character in the movie, "Sling Blade."

Over time, he started moving a little more. I "felt" him only in the kitchen and occasionally in the living room, but it was never scary, just "that feeling." When I felt it, I would talk. "Hey, how's it going, you. You are fine here. Just don't scare me, aw-ight??"

At the beginning of this summer, I had eye surgery. My friend D came to stay with me. We'd lit candles around my house and were talking. As we spoke, I felt him peering at us, near a wall. My friend D, without me saying anything, was watching that spot and asked how long I'd had a ghost. I spoke of "him" quite openly. She said she sensed a big man, slow, lurky…and almost simultaneously, we called him, "Carl."

Of course, we were both freaked out as we said it. Since that day, I have never "seen, "felt," or "heard" from Carl again. Reminds me of a dyslexic version of "Beetlejuice."

Car Karma

This past April, my car was burglarized, not just once, but twice in four days. It hadn't been enough that my window was busted, my radio was ripped out with radio guts strewn about AND my car alarm had been damaged, but some four days later, once again, my car was broken into AGAIN and ALL of my paperwork was taken. To make matters worse, it occurred in the garage of my building. My neighbors (two of them) were also effected…(which was a good thing, because now one of those neighbors is my good friend, but that's another story).

I got to know the West Hollywood Police AND the Hollywood police quite well over that week. I cried to them, to my landlords and shared a few bottles of vino with the neighbors (which is how one of them became my fast friend). The police and my landlord felt really bad, but truthfully, a city is a city and the chances of finding the perps was quite small.

I grudgingly brought my car in to get repaired. A week later, I went to get my vehicle with all of the new fixings. While the car guy was showing me the repair work, another mechanic was pulling up with a totally shagged Junker mobile. The Junker brakes gave out and slammed into my car…leaving a gaping hole in the passenger side door. I watched in utter shock. The guys were waiting for me to freak out. I maniacally laughed and shook my head…typical.

For my pain, they gave me a brand new, fully-loaded BMW SUV to drive around in while they fixed my car. Let me tell you, I am NOT a fan of SUV's unless you have several children or several big dogs, but this was like a small luxurious yacht on wheels. Expensive for gas, but nonetheless, a smooth, rocking ride. The brakes were tight to a light touch, driving through the canyons (which I did in a field-trip form with several people) was TOO fun and maneuvering through traffic was fantastical because I was BIGGER, BETTER and hell, a BMW.

Three weeks later, I went to get my car back. All fixed, sans the radio. When I returned the BMW, I was told there was a key mark…which I then visibly saw, all across the back of the BMW backside. Mo' money, mo' money.

So there I was, in my trusty little geriatric Toyota, once again. I figured I should break down and get a radio. After a painstaking look-see at Best Buy, I'd chosen one. When I went to get it installed, the guy told me, "They took the guts of your radio system." This meant MORE parts to buy...mo' money.

So, for the past 5 months, I have had NO radio. Imagine. I hate driving for the most part, but now, I have NO radio to ease my pain. And having had to pay out the nose for all of the repairs, the radio parts needed were hardly a necessity. I spent the entire summer in silence, with the exception of the hum of my car, the squeals of other cars and the painful radio noise of other vehicles. (And, of course, my friends called me an awful lot to keep me sane.)

At the end of August, my right headlight decided to die. This was not a worry until the *#*$**#$ days started getting shorter and I realized getting a ticket would be very bad. I decided to take the trek to Toyota, sucked it up and ordered the ridiculously expensive parts I needed for the radio!! (And an FYI, the Santa Monica Toyota people are SOOOO nice and helpful. Much kudos).

And then something interesting happened. A friend of mine mentioned to me that maybe I needed to have a better "relationship" with my car. "Name it," she said (she also suggested doing a few other things in it to "stir up better energy," but I will leave that up to feeble imaginations and dirty minds of all of you, fine people.). Up until now, I called it the "Geriatric Mobile," and sometimes "(*&$*#&(*&$#(*#$(* rust bucket." I suppose, to some degree, when you treat something with little dignity, it will claw your eyes out right back. And I have to say, my other vehicles, "Ole Bessie," "Hearsey," and "ZUMMIE" may NOT have been the greatest vehicles, but reliable, nonetheless.

While driving last week, just as someone cut me off, I hit the brakes with brilliant ease, patted my car and said, "Good job, Duffy." And magically, in the most persnickety, Brit voice, it was if HE answered back, "That's MISTER Duffy to you."

As of this weekend, like a breath of fresh car exhaust, with my spanking new parts, headlight AND new radio in tow (and much peace of mind,) the newly named Mr. Duffy and I jammed out to some tunes and rode off into the sunset!

All the leaves are brown…and the sky is gray

Okay…that's a wee bit of an exaggeration. Its still sunny and happy weather, but alas, Autumn is slowly creeping in and man, its pretty fantastic. Yes, its fairly sensational to live in a place where the sun is shining and its warm, but let's face it, the sun becomes the bane of existence to a degree and we ALL need downtime. This weekend marked the first "cooler" temps we have seen in months. And to me overcast, cooler weather means…LAZY.

With the slow change of season approaching, all of the variables change as well…its getting dark early (much to my chagrin), the nights and mornings are amazingly cooler AND…its time to start considering that Halloween (boo), Thanksgiving (yum) and Christmas (egads and $$$$) are all right around the corner. Bah!!!

P.S.

Please give to Katrina Relief Funds!!!

P.P.S. Power is restored in Los Angeles!

Terminate THIS....

I really hate talking politics but am finding never-ending reasons to complain about our government.

Just when I finally started thinking, "hey, Arnold isn't SO bad," he announces that he is going to veto the marriage equality bill. He had the opportunity to be a man of vision, a man who fought for equal rights. He blew it.

It's SO not fair.

And then we have to hear BARBARA BUSH ramble on about the survivors at the AstroDome: "Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this, this is working very well for them." AUGH!

On a lighter note, I found this today and thought it was SO worth sharing...

How did you become successful?

"Delusional self -confidence. To the point where you think you're better looking and smarter than you actually are. It will give you enormous confidence when you go into a crowd. For instance, I'm not the best looking guy in the world, but I'm taking your girlfriend home when I leave a party. "

- Gene Simmons, front man for the rock group KISS

He rocks!

P.S.

KATRINA

RELIEF

FUNDS...

GIVE GIVE GIVE

"smoking ain't allowed in school..."

I know A LOT of smokers. Younger ones (well, peeps my age), older ones (that have been respectively smoking for over 40 years) and thankfully, no really YOUNG ones. While there was a point when I dabbled in smoking, I don't smoke (except for that occasional social one or two).

Truthfully, I don't care who if you smoke. At some point, you KNOW the hazards, you have read the warnings and you understand...its NOT a healthy habit. That's fine. While I don't condone smoking, I am not the anti-christ about it either.

BUT...what I don't like are people that use the world as their ashtray.

This morning, I was cut-off, TWICE, by a (cuss word) in a SUV. She was weaving in and out of traffic, cut me off (as well as several other folks) and whipped her lit smoke out the window, onto the road. Minutes later, we came to a red light and I watched her DUMP her ENTIRE nasty-ass ashtray ONTO the street. She is SO lucky that I was several cars behind. I may not have noticed had I not been spitting nails at her in my head.

L.A. is dirty enough without morons like her in her BMW SUV, polluting the streets with her cancer sticks. The worst thing was, she did not even look around or try to be sneaky, she dumped it like it was the "normal" thing to do. "Hmm, oh hi! Just cleaning my car out! Wouldn't want this sh** to collect in my BMW SUV, now would I??"

Again. I am not preaching to the choir about smoking. Feel free. Puff away. Just don't litter this city (or any city) with the remnants of your habits.

Speaking of preaching, have you given ANYTHING to the Katrina relief funds yet?? I sat and watched hours of footage last night. I even stayed up for Oprah (1 a.m.!) to watch her tour of the former city. It was absolutely the most horrific spectacle. No one wanted her to go into the Superdome, but she pleaded. She went it with a mask on. Imagine a place with little air, little light, no water, no food, feces, garbage, animals running amuck, children screaming and crying, people dying, gangs doing HORRIBLE things AND...on top of that, dealing with ALL of the loss. She was obviously in there when it was empty, but as the camera panned across the room, you could practically smell the chaos that had been there less than a week ago. PLEASE GIVE. (((JUST AN OPINION))) I believe that this would be the perfect opportunity to make some "real" changes to do what I consider to be, breaking the cycle. Wouldn't it be great if some great educators or heads of constructions groups could go to Texas or the other areas where people are staying and start teaching some of the people REAL skills so that when the re-building begins (or when its time to be in the world again), there will be bounty's of jobs of these people can get themselves into better lives? That's just my opinion though.

Snozberries...

Sigh. I can't believe this weekend is over. I feel like a kid starting school again, only, its called work. The end of the summer. Nights getting dark earlier...soon the time change will go into effect.

On the brighter note, it was a FUN weekend, only, I think I ate enough food to feed a small village...



(psst...that's me in the blue)

Anyway, if you HAVE NOT donated to the Katrina relief funds, PUH-lease open your heart and your wallet and GIVE. Give clothing, give food, give money, give SOMETHING, but GIVE. If you don't know WHERE to give, go to the redcross.org. They have several different links for you!

Intracellular Milieu

Do you ever wonder what ONE thing keeps you from where YOU really want to be?

A wise person once told me that "our souls journey is to find exactly what we were destined to do" or in laymans terms...Our job is to find the life we are supposed to live...What does the life you are supposed to live look like today? Sounds easy enough, right?

Problem is, there are those flakey folks out there that wake up every morning and have bad cases of A-D-D:

Monday: "I want to be astronaut."
Tuesday: "I want to own my own business."
Wednesday: "I want to settle down and just stay home."
Thursday: "I want to be a RICH movie star~!"
Friday: "I want to open my own bar/restaurant/salon/boutique."
Saturday: "I want to be a rock star."
Sunday: "The monastary/convent is calling to me."

I suppose at a certain age, we are SUPPOSED to know where we are, who we are and what all of that means AND what path we are on. A fortunate part of living in Los Angeles, is that you can continue on your OWN path and if that means changing your "direction" 100 times, so be it. And while age aesthetically counts against you here, on a level of "finding yourself," people seem to be quite the cheerleaders. Other parts of the country are not always so forgiving.

But along with all of this directional tranformation comes constant changes, growth, evolving, LEARNING and pretty much, being a virtual sponge.

Its funny that we end up somehow bringing ourselves closer to the things/people/places we need to be and yet, there is still something keeping us from finding our "inner lottery ticket."



Just pondering...

At the risk of being overly political...

This just pisses me off...(this was taken on the 30th of August...)

After spending much of my day home sick in a Benadryl/OTC-counter, drug-induced haze, the horrors of what is left of much of the southern regions of our fair country are just too horrific to ponder or talk about. But this picture just made me enraged.

Glad to know our Prez is hanging with the peeps, while there are millions of people waiting for him to say or do SOMETHING to give them hope.

I am sure they'd all be happy to know he can play guitar.

p.s. PLEASE donate to any of the charities that are available for relief efforts. If you don't want to go that route (some people get nervous giving to just ANY organization), please donate to www.redcross.org. Those people NEED help desperately.