Monday, August 5, 2013

Morning Light

Every morning on my way to work, I drive by the reservoir.  It had a small island in the middle of it.  The morning light is always gorgeous by this reservoir.  I am always drawn to take pictures of it.  Here are a couple.


Friday, August 2, 2013

Fare Thee Well, Sir Jeff Corwin The Fish


It was a rough and dramatic evening with Dillan fast asleep on the couch, at the ready in case of an emergency trip to the Vet, and I with fish scooper in one hand and google in the other. 

As I googled "Guppies"(thanks Wikipedia), I had to occasionally (every 5 minutes), give Jeff Corwin, The Fish, a nudge, ever so gently, to wake him up from his weird trans. He was going between flipping belly up, to spazzing out and swimming like Michael Phelps. Google and Wikipedia told me that it was most likely something referred to as "The Shimmies".

Believing I could miraculously nurse this fish back to life, I raised the temp of the water slowly all night long and added Marine salt (ok, it was really just sea salt, but it seems to me they might be the same... no?) to try and get it more BRACKISH (yeah, I had to look that up too!).

The endless gentle nudging of Sir Jeff Corwin The Fish, sadly ended this morning. Somewhere between the hours of 3:30(ish)am & 5:45(ish)am (I fell asleep on watch), he gracefully swam to the ocean in the sky (?).

He was a good fish. He was a fine swimmer, a patient pet, and most of all he was as Dillan liked to call him... "A Disco Fish".

Fare thee well Sir Jeff Corwin The Fish. Services will be held in the bathroom at 305 Indian Way, sometime later this evening.

You can make donations in Jeff Corwin, The Fish's name to the Jeff Corwin The Fish Foundation. :) (Also, if anyone has any fish recommendations we would greatly appreciate them... we are definitely trying again)

Saturday, June 22, 2013

Morning Coffee

My head is foggy, my back aches, my feet are throbbing, but my coffee sure does taste good.  Sitting and enjoying this first cup as the sleep clears from my eyes and my muscles start to wake up is one of my favorite moments of the day.  Good Morning World!



Friday, June 21, 2013

Alter Ego

"I will describe her as shortly as I can. She was intensely sympathetic. She was immensely charming. She excelled in the difficult arts of family life. She sacrificed herself daily. If there was chicken, she took the leg, if there was a draft she sat in it - in short, she was so constituted that she never had a mind or a wish of her own, but preferred to sympathize always with the minds and wishes of others." Virginia Woolf, Describing her alter-ego.

The PROPER way to eat a strawberry!

When I eat strawberries, I like to squish them between my tongue and the roof of my mouth (it feels good)! Also, Blueberries are much tastier if rolled in a little sugar first! My child is asleep and I am taking a moment to enjoy the little things!

Boobie Traps... THAT'S WHAT I SAID!

When your 5 year old is napping, opening a bag of potato chips & a can of coke without waking him is like working around a boobie trap from The Goonies or Indiana Jones. You have to do it very slowly & carefully and hope that the end result is you sitting on the couch eating chips, instead of making dinner for a cranky 5 year old.

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Total Dizzy Spell

Do I think about what to write or do I just write?  That is the question.  

I am approaching this blogging thing as sort of an experiment.  I am thinking of it as an opportunity to explore myself in a therapeutic way without having to go sit and rant to some stuffy therapist who I'm not really going to let in anyway (see, I put up walls).

At least this way I am controlling what I share and to what extent (control issues).  I see it as having 2 possible outcomes. 1) I get more comfortable doing it and start sharing more openly or 2) I get completely and utterly sick of it and give up in a couple days (ugh - quitter).  Either way, I have control, not some overpaid listener.

I am someone who is relatively self aware, but that does NOT mean I make good choices or say the right things.  More often than not, my mouth says what it wants and I feel like a prisoner inside screaming... "NO, DON'T SAY THAT!".

Sorting my life out via blog is probably a ridiculous idea and definitely a little crazy, but I really have a lot to share, and I think that it's time I do.  If someone is supposed to hear my stories, then they will find me and my blog and they will read them.  Ta Da.. the end. 

I have so many crazy life experiences that need to be shared, I need to understand how they have impacted me and made me who I am.  I really just don't know where to start.  There was the time I almost got in a fight with a stripper named Bambi in Tijuana, or the time my best friend and I almost got kicked out of the Navy for making prank phone calls, theres the 20 year battle my mom had with a cancerous brain tumor, oh and then theres the rare disease that my son was born with that prevents him from eating protein, oh and stories from Memphis, Chicago, San Diego, my road trips across the US, my arrest, single parenthood, paranoia, growing up in the 80's and 90's, family, politics, religion, death, UGH... there's just so much.  Where do I start?

Louis CK

I saw this video on Youtube of Louis CK talking about being a father.  It made me sob.  Watch it.  He nailed it.

Louis CK on Fatherhood

Waxing - Letter to an Ex 5/09

I have this folder on my laptop called "Important".  In this folder are things that are... well... important.  Anyway, in this folder is another folder titled "Waxing".  No this is not some fetish thing or anything like that... it has some of the things that I just randomly write (my digital journal, if you will).

So if I am going to blog and I am going to share who I am with random people, then perhaps I should start there. I will share something more recent that the paper journals with tear-stained pages.

"Letter to an Ex" - May 2009

It was so hard sitting next to you in court.  I tried so hard not to cry, not to look weak or fragile.  My focus was on the words I would say and the scenarios that would bring them up.  I struggled to hold my tongue, to control the stutter when it was my turn to talk, and sit up straight with my hands crossed in front of me. I was so nervous, and you seemed so calm.  I really just wanted to run over and hug you. I wanted you to touch my face. I wanted to be closer to you. I wanted to smell you, to kiss your lips and stare into your beautiful blue eyes. Then you spoke. You wouldn’t say my name. You refused to call me by my first name. You kept saying Miss. Miss. Miss. What the hell?  When did I become Miss Nobles.  First of all it’s MS (thank you very much).  And second of all, I spent the last four years of my life with you, shared a child, a home, a car, a life with you.  You can’t call me by my name anymore?  What is going on?  Is this a formality?  Did your lawyer tell you to do this?  

My heart aches for time with you and you antagonize me with spitefulness.  Then as if that were not enough, you turn around and tell me over and over again what a terrible person I am, and how mean I am.  You obviously do not know me, not very well.  This is in part why my heart aches.  The tears I cry for you are not always about what I miss.  Sometimes, most times they are tears for what still lied ahead of us.  The many things we would have done and seen together, the words we could have spoken, the good moments and the bad.  The tears I cry are for the things you are missing; the moments with our son.  Sometimes out of nowhere he will do something incredible and I turn to see if you saw it, but you’re not there.  You’re missing so much, and you haven’t got a clue.  My heart aches for your loss, a loss you won’t even miss.  It’s one that our son will though, and my heart aches for him, as he gets older.


Bloggity Blog Blog Blog

I want to blog, I really do. I used to be a writer... of sorts. I wrote in journals. All the time. I have hundreds of them.... somewhere. I used to write everything, I would write song lyrics, thoughts, ideas, angry rantings, stoned realizations, epiphanies brought on by heartache, frustrations about life and work and family and cancer and death and love. I wrote. I wrote a lot. 

I want to blog. I really do. The part for me that is difficult, is the sharing. Y'see, no one has ever read those journals but me. No one knows my deepest, darkest, most emotional and most intense feelings and secrets. I keep those locked in. I keep a huge wall up. The only thing people who "know" me, really know about me is that I am funny, emotional, passionate, wild, loud, and a little crazy. Yea, I am those things. BUT (& that's a huge BUT- there's a joke in there somewhere)... I AM SO MUCH MORE! 

I am a story teller. I try to tell people about me, but they don't listen. I have tried to show people who I am but they don't see me. I have loved people so deeply and was hurt every time. I, in turn, have closed myself off to them all. Now, I have a role I play. I am the puppet, or am I the puppeteer? Or am I just the poor schmuck who wants to blog, but is afraid to? 

I want to blog. I really do.