Lately

I would have spent the whole three day weekend binge watching Joe Millionaire but the selfish bastards in charge of the show only give me one episode a week. This isn’t the 1990s. I want the whole season at once. The plot is easy to grasp- two guys- one is worth 10 million and the other isn’t- and like 15 women are trying to win over the guys but they don ‘t know which one is the rich one. Although the not rich one has his own construction company so he isn’t hurting. I wish the selfish bastards in charge did not tell me- the audience which one is rich so I could guess like the women on the show. Some of the women on the show claim that other women on the show are “gold diggers” which I don’t understand because they are all there to make a rich guy fall in love with them. Seems like the definition of gold diggers. I actually like both of the guys on the show. Strangely enough they seem nice.

Pinterest told me that I could use oil paint and water in a pan of water to make marbled paper. I gathered Mim and Katie and Mc Kenzie and it did not work. The oil paint sunk to the bottom. So I got out Crisco oil and stirred up a little oil paint with a little Crisco and we tried that. Dripping permanent colored oil on wet paper- not cute. Those Pinterest assholes.

I’m reading David Sedaris’ Carnival of Snackery. It is his later diary entries. I already read the first diary book. I enjoy it. Reading diaries is like snacking. A smidgeon here a bucket there. I love it. It does increase the number of curse words in my brain and in my writing, apparently. He and Hugh travel soooo much and they never complain about sleep and jet lag. I feel tired at home.

I have this strange new settled feeling. Like sometimes, I am relaxing and I feel really relaxed and I note the difference between when I would try to relax and I would feel self conscious because Walt does not relax.

While I was distracted writing to you, Frida ate a corner off of Carnival of Snackery. That title is dangerous.

Frida is aging more quickly than I would like. If she escapes through our back door when Katie is visiting and frees her, she runs like a bull in a China shop around the kudzu mountain and she stalks the tadpoles in the creek. She acts the same way at the dog park or on a hike. She overdoes it with no regard to her own body. We manage to collect her and she can’t even get herself into the backseat of the car. Her hind legs become one. Her joints stop jointing. Her hips fall behind her and her legs tuck under. She can scoot around when she needs to but she prefers to whine intensely until I bring her bowl of food to her and she shoves her impossibly short snout into the silver bowl and snuffles the food in like Snuffalupagus on Sesame Street. She never has been completely potty trained during the night. BeBe believes it is her poor breeding that leads to a multitude of problems. I have always adored old dogs but those dogs were like 14. Frida will be 4 in March. And I love her too much for a 4 year old dog who is aging too quickly. She can’t sit by you without making you give her all your attention. She implores and swipes with her heavy paw and mooshes into you. She places herself forcefully so that my hand is on her stomach or lower back and she insists. She falls off the couch often because her head is heavy and she is only concerned with getting in position for petting so she allows her head to flop over the side and gravity captures her weight and she crashes in a solid thump. The only way to sit in the living room and not be diverted to Frida’s whims, is to hold a spray bottle. I lie down to read my book and I place a bottle of Windex between my thighs and make a tiny “tsch” noise to be threatening. It works. I say Frida is a rescue. I rescued her from a not so good breeder in North Carolina outside of Charlotte. Buying a bulldog in Georgia is mega expensive. When I arrived down the dirt road, the puppies were kept in a rabbit hutch off the ground- maybe so the poop would fall through the wire bottom. The pups were scrambling all over each other. The kids who showed me around put all the puppies into the back of their truck which was parked in a large metal shedlike barn. Frida Buttercup was the pup that seemed the calmest but still willing to be pet. Our friends have actual bull dogs probably purchased in Georgia and they are at least half the size of Frida. And these bulldogs- Gus and Merle have smooth rounded wrinkles in their sweet little necks. Frida’s head seems more plonked on top of her body. Her wrinkles and creases are crooked. Not to mention the head shakes she is afflicted by. The head shakes look like a seizure. But good news they are idiopathic head tremors- which means they have no cause and they don’t hurt her. But she doesn’t like the head shakes and she looks at you with her weepy eyes sadder than usual. The red of her eye sockets becomes more droopy. The head tremors stop eventually if we distract her with food or a walk outside. If she is scared or surprised suddenly then she almost always gets a head tremor but mostly we can’t anticipate them. But when it happens, we all race around trying to help her and love on her extra. See we did rescue her.

Mim had McKenzie sleep over last night. Nora slept over a few weeks ago. The issue is Mim and I share a room- a bed to be exact. A queen size bed with a lumpy mattress and madras plaid linen sheets and a beloved mish mash of afghans and quilts. I let Mim and her guest sleep in our bed and I pull the back side of our couches off- a 8 foot long piece of foam covered in admiral blue velvet, lay it on the the only floor available in our bedroom and I sleep there. Mim needs me in the room to be able to sleep. And it isn’t really a sleep over of your guest doesn’t sleep near you. So, I am desperate for Mim to experience sleep overs and friendships. The sleep wasn’t that bad.

I walked in the snow yesterday with George holding Linus’ leash, BeBe carrying Posey’s leash and me with Frida. The flakes fell as we walked down the middle of the street and there was promise on the air. Any minute the flakes would start gathering and accumulating inches for sledding. As we passed the familiar houses, flakes congregated on the creases in the roofs and on lucky people’s lawns. George said it wasn’t exactly luck. The yards with snow had good drainage and the snow stayed on the dry grass. BeBe told me that in London they busted some pot growers because when it snowed their roof had no snow on it. The grow lamps hidden away in the attic announced themselves by melting the snow on the roofs.

Dolly got two tattoos. She is 18. She lives with me though so I could have forbid her. I didn’t even try. Should I have? A dragonfly landed on her forearm and Buddy is written in cursive on the back of her other arm above her elbow. My dad called everybody Buddy. And we called him Aubee. My mom is Mum. My kids other grandmas are Sparks and Maudie. I wan the bestest grandma name in the world. But I haven’t figured out what that is.

P.S. Suggestions for grandma names welcome.

P.S.S. Why is the plural of hoof, hooves- but the plural of roof is roofs?