Tag: pony party

It was a slightly chilly day for the Zoo, and the warm weather animals were inside playing poker and drinking coffee. But nobody was there except a few older people walking for fresh air so it felt a little bit like my zoo. I have a membership and while the Memphis Zoo isn’t likely to be featured on Animal Planet for brilliance and innovation any time soon, it is one of my hideaways.

A lot of people attack the sea, I make love to it.

Jacques Yves Cousteau

In the recent spirit of the Anarcho-Syndicalist Pony Liberation Front (ASPLF, it's not just a stifled sneeze anymore, it's a movement) we bring you: Bootleg Pony. An unscheduled moment of pony-ness for your delectation. It also marks your author's maiden diary, so later on you can just shrug your shoulders and say, "well, we knew he was a putz — just check out that first thing he wrote." Read on if you will, and know you'll come out of this story better than I did.

I love to cook.

As openings go, it's not "call me Ishmael," but it does say something true and, for me, important. I do love to cook. I also love the bubbling rush of food blogging that has started around here, too. It speaks to something in our souls as well as our tummies, and to part of the core of ourselves: a better relationship with both earth and us through one of the most fundamental parts of our lives, how and what we eat. I'd like to write some stuff that's a part of that.

This ain't it.

That said, the kitchen offers me home, canvas, and refuge alike. I value it all. The three squares, snack foods, all the different shapes and styles and flavors of food, baking (I'm a pretty fair baker), playing short-order cook to the under-sixes (two of them), holidays, what foods and the ways we make them have meant to different people and cultures, the whole deal. It's a rhythm, a medidation, a craft, a solid kind of work, a source of some real satisfaction in my battered though improving life. I'm not a foodie, nor a snob about ingredients though I like them local (either for me or the recipe) whenever possible. No fancy magazine subscriptions though I read cookbooks for fun; no wierd but lovely gear from the lust-addled pages of Willams-Sonoma. Just a regular kitchen of a pretty poor family where I get some solace and share a little goodness with my wife and kids.

Mostly. Sometimes, though, it can go terribly wrong. Let's move along then ….

Thursdays~  I  Think  Sideways,  About  Serious  Shit

Isn’t this beautiful??

Know what it is?? Here’s a hint….

Thanks for stopping in, so glad You’re here …. (yes, YOU!)

this is an open thread… relax.. Hang out and chit chat awhile…

& when you’re done  check out some of the excellent offerings on our recent & rec’d list.

O &… Please don’t rec the pony party, another will trot up in a few hours.

(^.^)

Soundtrack {h/t roy reed for the great idea (tnx Roy)}

Imagine.

What?

I don’t know.  You choose.

Okay.  I imagine…a loose tooth.

     Welcome to an intensely romantic, tingly all over, pre-Valentine’s Day edition of Pony Party, during which we gaze deeply into each other’s eyes — and whoever blinks first buys the next round. That’s fair, isn’t it? Especially since we’re exploring that vast, uncharted, explosive-laden territory called “love.” (Actually, I’m pretty sure that’s where the “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here” sign was supposed to go. Shouldn’t it at least be displayed at both places?)  

    Tonight, Pony Party is brought to you by Mortified: Love is a Battlefield by David Nadelberg. David’s earlier book, Mortified: Real People. Real Words. Real Pathetic., dredged up the pain of adolescence with actual quotes from diaries, essays and letters.

    Love is a Battlefield narrows that perspective. The book is an ode to love gone bad, a celebration of defeat, disgrace and dashed hopes that are the essence of first love. (In fact, recalling those disastrous days just makes me wonder – why are we so dogged in our pursuit of an emotion that never fails to turn around and bite us where it hurts most?  Isn’t this like insisting on repeatedly flying in an airplane that was specifically designed to crash and burn? But I digress….)

    Based again on diary entries and love letters, Mortified covers “the boundlessly embarrassing topic of childhood love … unrequited crushes, awkward hookups, odd celebrity infatuations and all manner of romantic catastrophes.”

    Hilarious doesn’t do this book justice – here’s just a teeny tiny little copyright-infringement-free sample:

“Introducing Live Evil: Laurent Martini

              Least Likely to … Roll with His Safety On

I was launched to sink. I was short and fat and had braces and huge glasses. My desperate desire to be cool was most likely only surpassed by my extreme desire to have a girlfriend. Knowing that my looks put me at an insurmountable disadvantage, I decided that the only way to achieve my goal was to become a rock star and form the greatest metal band ever: LIVE EVIL.”

Fueled by a fixation on Motley Crue, and with inhibitions smothered in Jack Daniels and Bailey’s Irish Crème (gak!), Laurent created more than 100 songs, including: “Blame it on the Booze,” “Shot of Jack,” and “Shit for Brains.” Yet, mysteriously, both love and rock stardom remained elusive. Now older and wiser, Laurent has at least come to terms with the failure of his bad-boy rocker dream:    

“The only drawbacks? My upper-middle class upbringing in the San Francisco Marina District, elite private French schooling, and the fact that I was too lazy to actually form the band.”

Of course, all good things come to those who wait, and Laurent demonstrated that some old adages are not complete crocks. He did find a woman and get married. And although that proved to be a short-lived state of bliss, he also got around to the rock band part of his dream. Sadly, it’s … well, I’m going to refrain from commenting. You can experience it for yourself at www.lifeevilrocks.com.  

Laurent’s Live Evil saga is just one of many heart-throbbing tales in Love is a Battlefield. It would be remiss not to mention chapters like Marnie Pomerantz’s “Hot for Teacher,” “My Life as a Biker Babe” by Jane Cantillon and Johanna Stein’s priceless tribute to Led Zeppelin, “Stairway to Winnipeg.” In fact, other than a couple of truly weird ones, the entire book is a hoot.  

    Please, do your Valentine a favor and buy Love is a Battlefield, or at least get it from the library. But do not rec the Pony Party. The ponies are all weepy and their mascara is running from remembering their own adolescent heartbreaks, so get off their backs, okay? Record your own lovesick childhood foolishness in the comments (we won’t laugh, promise! ha ha ha). Then be excellent to yourself and giddy-up on over to the esteemed Front Page and Recent and Recommended Diaries, where there are serious people discussing important issues without bursting into tears and wondering how that bottle could be empty already and if the package store delivery service is still available. Pass me a tissue, would you please?  

UPDATE: The ponies are dragging me off the class. Be back later. Don’t make a mess while I’m gone, you hear? Love you!    

Like many people, I really wanted a horse when I was a child. I used to day dream about riding through meadows filled with wildflowers, running across streams and through forests. Our family, of course, couldn’t afford a horse, and I doubt they’d have gotten me one even if we had more money.

So my aspirations were quickly focused on horse-back riding lessons. Well, we really didn’t have the money for that, either. It’s hardly a cheap activity and requires considerable parental involvement, shuttling the rider to and from a stable each week. I did participate in a horse-back riding week-long summer camp two years in a row, but that wasn’t enough to really teach me how to ride.

One day, my family decided to go to a fair. It wasn’t a big fair, by any standards, but they had a number of fun rides, and cotton candy, and silly games, like whack-a-mole. I always felt sorry for the poor mole.

I thought there might be a pony ride at the fair. My hopes were raised when I heard another little girl say that she’d just gone riding. So I looked and looked, but didn’t see any ponies. I did, however, see a camel. With a child riding on its back.

And that’s how I came to ride on a camel. I think I’d have preferred a pony.

G’morning, all.

I watched a classic movie over the weekend – This is Spinal Tap. I hadn’t seen it in years and I was reminded of just how funny a movie it is. Christopher Guest and Michael McKean are hilarious together. So, I wanted to share one of my favorite scenes: Stonehenge.

Simon and Garfunkel II

At the Zoo

Simon and Garfunkel I

Sounds of Silence

My grandmother ended up on the Ortho floor when she got admitted. I think even though her initial problem was fatigue and respiratory difficulties that was the only bed open at the time. She was there for two weeks and frankly probably one of the more mentally alert and physically mobile people on the ward. Although the hospital was in was a bit old and cramped, it was clean and she got good care. I trained there as a nursing student and was astonished at how similar it still looked. The resident in charge of her care was a thoughtful and soft spoken young man who was initially a bit wary of me. I asked so many questions about tests and the plan of care he asked if I was an MD. I laughed, twenty years ago nobody would have asked a middled aged woman that question. He nicknamed my mother and I the “advocates” and when he came in to see my grandmother he asked if “the advocates” were coming in to visit. We were there every day and sometimes not at the same time as him. The local hospital system has a thorough program of assessing all elderly patients who are admitted with a goal of keeping them independent. That was why my mother was taken aback my the probing questions by the social worker upon admission. They did not suspect abuse as my mother feared but were just starting the protocol of team assessment. Health care in Canada is far from perfect, the care people receive in small towns and isolated areas is very spotty, small communities have a hard time attracting MDs, and there are wait lists for non-emergent procedures that are longer than in the US. But, my grandmother happens to live in a city with several hospitals, and the system despite flaws works quite well for ordinary people. Wealthy people or those who want special  VIP treatment tend to complain about it and claim they were forced to go to the US for treatment.

Talked to grandmother today and she sounds alright.

Well… enough rambling… I will show you a few more pictures from the glass exhibit.