Badge of Honor

You may notice a little something new over there ---->

For the past couple months I have been channeling my zoo obsession into a project. How obnoxo is the word project? Pretty bad but if you say documentary or film too early – it tends to freak people out. Anyway, it is finally starting to take shape and one of the first stages is to gather interest at the zoo lovers (or haters) level so be a dove and go ahead and “like” our page.

In case you need a good book, I highly recommend Zoo Story: Life in the Garden of Captives.

YaYa at the Memphis Zoo

Door to My Mind

 

Unlike the Ziggy treasure box I left behind, I brought this WAIS-R Picture Completion Head-Shrinker tool back from a recent trip to Oxford, MS. It is a flip book of pictures that are meant to be completed by troubled souls looking to put their mental health in the hands of someone that went to Ole Miss.

I’m not sure how to use these but who needs to worry about directions when it comes to insights of the mind? Today, I will start with page one:

Imagine how you would complete this picture. Well I guess I would make a bad therapist because I shouldn’t even insinuate that the picture needs completion, who knows – maybe it needs subtraction? Maybe we need to take the hinges away from that damned door! Maybe it is a symbol of the barriers blocking my success as a commercial airline pilot!

Assuming it needs to be completed, I drew up the first scenario in my head:

I’d go and research what this means but I don’t want to ruin the fun yet. Let’s just say that these are the doodles of someone who has sworn to free the cheetahs at the zoo, someone who appreciates luxury and luck, and someone who has an obsession with Nancy Reagan, and now, the USA Network show, Suits.

(ps – there are 20 pictures in all)

The Family Jewels

This is the family that founded the Crater of Diamonds State Park (well they didn’t make it a state park but they were the first miners that found some diamonds). Dad is on the left, mom is on the right.

My treasure hunting friend and I went to the opening of Pink Palace’s Diamonds exhibit on Friday. We had planned on robbing the place of all the diamonds but a bunch of kids were huddled around a giant plexiglas, alarmed-up container holding the really valuable stuff so instead we took a few plastic cups filled with some chardonnay aka: Liquid diamond.

Yet another similarity between diamonds and white wine:

We decide that the next time we went to Crater of Diamonds we were going to use a new “kiss dirt” method to find our diamonds!

Diamond, by the way, is a word that originates from the ancient Greek word, adamas which means INVICIBLE.

Yoopers!

Oh my lands!  Molly asked me for my address last week and I thought for sure I was going to get a visit or a saxogram or something but instead I got the postcard map of my dreams!!  A upper-penninsula-revisionist Michigan postcard map! Love it.

Information on the back tells me:

• Michigan: The Great Lake State Water Wonderland of the U.S.
• More than 3,000 MIles of beautiful Great Lakes shoreline
• Entered Union Jan 26, 1837 (26th State)
• State Bird: Robin
• State Animal: Wolverine
• State Flower: Apple Blossom

Only a truly mystical and magical state could have their state animal be the Wolverine.

Animal of My Spirit

I visit these beauts often. We are plotting an escape. I’m a little worried once I break them free they will run off. I need a run-like-a-cheetah training program so I can keep up.

Head Gear

I’ve been trying for a while to get a good snapshot of the washcloth-on-head fashion sported around Memphis in the summer. I’ll have to settle for this look: the hand-towel-on-your head. Not to be confused with a turban or other full-towel-on-your-head looks..

A washcloth makes more sense to me but both are absorbent and unisex. I like either one better than a straw fedora.

The Many Uses of a Mattress

(driving year 20 of 20)

My last post had a bittersweet tone of regret so it is fitting that I continue with another tale of what might have been.

I have wanted to go to the Kiss My Grits Diner ever since I started my job. I usually am annoyed by people that say they have been wanting to do something forever especially if that something is a restaurant and only one mile away, but just forgive me for not going – I just couldn’t do it.

You see I have a friend that works in a nearby office and we were supposed to met there for lunch one day, but the night before the body of a woman had been found in the boxspring of one of the beds in the hotel rooms. Kiss My Grits Diner is one of those hotel restaurants – apparently this woman had been left there for a couple days. People even stayed in the room and slept on top of her without knowing.

So, we just never got the nerve or motivation to go back.

I was driving by yesterday when I saw this mattress sign announcing the closure. Very interesting use of mattress really. It’s not like you are gonna find poster board or anything that wouldn’t fly away in the wind that is big enough to distract from the Kiss My Grits Sign. I imagine the restaurant collaborated with the hotel got the mattress for cheap since anyone getting a room there now probably prefers to sleep on the floor.

So Long URL

I let my biggestbutte url expire this week (who even needs a URL anymore though really). Maybe only a few of you remember my attempt at a wild and crazy travel website. Most people stumbled on it when they were searching for big butts so there is a lot to say for a clever but clear name. I had the clever part down.

The Biggest Butte was supposed to make you think of the magic of driving over a long stretch of desert highway and seeing a bold, lone butte on the horizon. It was about the ever changing vistas of a road trip and the wonder of geological majesty. It was about America!

But I let it expire. 

Onto other buttes!

(scene from the four-corners area of the US, year 15 of 20 of driving)

2/36

Best Birthday ever.

That looks like a brown cake. Well it IS a brown cake but it is a special caramel cake (a southern delicacy).

The night before my birthday I dreamt of grizzly and polar bears so I made sure I took a walk through the zoo the next day (despite the heat warning) to look for omens. I was walking in the panda exhibit when a giant bird flew over my head and ran smack into the glass window of the panda house. It fell to the ground and starting waving it’s little orange webbed feet. I screamed “Oh my!” I actually screamed oh my – I think I was trying to be sensitive to the families around even though no one seemed to notice. I didn’t know what to do so --

I took a picture:

…and then I reported it to the woman working the panda gift shop. She assured me that the duck was probably just stunned. I assured her I was stunned.  Then I went to see if the polar bears were out in this heat. They weren’t. They are obviously hiding in my dreams.

Bears and suicidal ducks. What does it mean?

Meatballs.

I’m not a plane chatter. I consider those people that like to small talk with strangers during their flight, travel amateurs. I bring lots of stuff to make it look like I am mute and disinterested: literary magazines, ipod, cats cradle, really whatever it takes to not have to hear about someone’s business. Sure some people are interesting but many are not. When I was younger, before I knew any better, I got caught in a one-sided conversation with an aspiring motivational speaker and I’ve been trying to avoid people ever since. Plus, the things that people read depress me. Oh I would have to add that I find those people that get on planes without any reading material or sleeping pills really, really depressing. I’ll take a screaming baby any day over some guy face-forward with his hands on his thighs staring at the cover of the Skymall catalog for five hours. I shiver just thinking about it.

However, on my flight home the other day I was in a section amongst several young guys shipping (flying) off to Air Force basic training and the kid next to me was so young and earnest I had to oblige in a little small talk.  He probably regretted it because he told me he was going into the Air Force to be a Fire Fighter, and my dramatic interpretation of that was that he said Fighter Pilot, so when the flight attendant came to ask us if we were willing to perform the duties of being in an exit row I said, “Are you kidding? This guy is about to be a fighter pilot and save the assess of the whole United States of America. I think he will be able to open that door should we decided to have an emergency landing near Lake Erie.” (the last part might have been exaggerated for this blog)

He was polite enough to later correct me by casually mentioning FIRE FIGHTER in his conversation. I learned he was super good at identifying planes (thanks to a long wait on the runway) and was from a small Michigan town called Dundee and I resisted saying “Oh yeah, Michigan Militia!”

There were two other dudes nearby that were also on their way to basic and I couldn’t help eavesdropping. The conversations were so typical of nervous 18-year-olds that just met each other: what do you like to eat, specifically what do you get on your sandwichs from Subway. Jalapenos, I like those man, I get the footlong and it’s only five bucks. American cheese. Do you like american cheese? One of the guys was talking at auctioner speed, shaking his legs, and looking up and down and at the rows behind hind him. The guy next to him was cool as an Alaskan morning, just interjecting with a I like ham and a mustard is good comment here and there.

After exhausting the subway menu, the conversation switched to spaghetti. The chill guy said he liked meatballs and the nervous guy was like Ha! That sounds kinda gay. You like meatballs. The chill guy was like Yeah they are delicious. Meatballs and spaghetti. The nervous guy leans over and calls out the Dundee kids name and says “Hey soandso, chillguy says he likes meatballs – isn’t that GAY?” Dundee gave him a charity laugh and a small shrug then left them to their conversation.

It went on for a few more sentences before chill guy said, “Hey, you are talking a lot.”  And then silence.

I becha HE is one of America’s future fighter pilots. Less talk. More meatballs.

Septaquintaquinquecentennial

Ralph Fowler looks a little worried but he shouldn’t be – the little village he founded is still going strong after 175 years. He’d actually be smiling if he knew a former resident was destined to have a super interesting blog like this!

I was looking forward to being in Michigan for the Fourth of July so the fact that my little hometown was celebrating its Septaquintaquinquecentential was just a bonus.

I spent the first couple days of my trip touring Detroit and the Detroit metro area visiting my friends and their little babies. It’s so hard to squeeze in every one you want to see so I made a rule that I only visit people that have 1)Tigers or Lugnuts tickets 2)BBQ & Pool Parties or 3) My nephew & a Septaquintaquinquecentential celebration.  Fireworks are always expected.

Anyway, so after getting all those visits over with I headed to The ‘Ville. My mom is the one who is responsible for me being a museum and tourist activity enthusiast so it was fitting that as soon as I got there we went to the new town “museum” which was a couple tables of stuff set up in an antique shop.  They are hoping to get a permanent home for the historical collection and I hope they do. I will donate my Fowlerville Fair purple ribbon and my senior picture (one of the poses that best shows my Lee press-on nails of course).

Speaking of senior pictures – the museum included a book that had composite photos of every graduating class of Fowlerville High School. There was blank space underneath all the photos for comments. No one had written anything and I kind of regret not filling out my extended opinion of the classes of the late 80s and early 90s. But I did draw mustaches on a few people. Kidding. That would have been pointless since half of the classes back then had those ridiculous mustaches anyway.

 

They had all kinds of old village business stuff and info about Fowlerville’s most famous resident:

And we overheard word of a historical walking tour and talked the whole fam into going the next day. It was great because there were people on the tour that were lifelong residents (multi-generational) and added stuff like “I remember taking tap dancing lessons in that basement in the 50s!”

We learned that one of the houses on Grand River was an original Sears Craftsman house so for the rest of my visit every time we drove by we would say “Did you know that is an original Sears Craftsman House?”  Gol darn it is fun to learn new things about your old teeny town.

Before the walking tour I went with my mom to the breakfast at the senior center. They had little kids singing patriotic songs and a quilt being raffled off. I fully expect to win.  

Oh and some church kids decorated the placemats:

AND they had an awesome Ronald Reagan calendar by our table:

If all of that sounds like heaven I have one last magical story to tell you about my visit.

We stopped at the IGA where I used to work (well it is no longer an IGA but a re-done independent grocery store with the same owners) and I saw some of my old grocery store people and mentioned that I was bummed because they didn’t have any sprinkle cake donuts that I know and love. I barely finished my complaint when my old friend went behind the deli to get to work on crafting up some sprinkle cake donuts. “Vanilla or chocolate icing?” Small town service.

CUSTOM CAKE Ds:

I might move back and give ghost tours of the cemetery or maybe a walking tour of all the houses we used to TP or all the trees and cornfields that were markers for keggers. Lots of history in that lil village there – even more than tap dancing in basements, craftsman houses, and famous baseball players. Oh if these donuts could talk…

*the top photos were ripped from the Village of Fowlerville brochure about the Septaquintaquinquecentential. The rest were taken by me. The donuts were mostly eaten by me.

The Works

I do love the Fourth of July and there’s no better place to celebrate it than the north. Our town fireworks started at 10:15 and it was barely dark.

I was home for five days and got to see two baseball games (one major, one minor; our team won both times), three babies (different fams), one historical walking tour, one senior citizen breakfast, one parade, one pool party, one Stars and Stripes festival, and three big fireworks displays. T’was a good time.

Have a Seat

I’m back home. The fireworks (of blog posts) are about to start.

Monumental

I’m headed out of town for nearly a week so I’m going to have to take this road reminiscing well, on the road. Since I am headed to the homeland (Michigan) maybe I can dig up some pictures of one of my old Escorts or maybe interview my parents to see if they ever knew that I would sneak out at night and even take one of the cars (plural because there were four driver-aged people in the house at the time) by holding in the clutch until it rolled out of the driveway and into the road where I would then start the car and blast away to meet my boyfriend, Joe Sixpack.

The above driving photo is from one of my favorite road trips: Monument Valley. 

Ride On Sweet Steeds of Glory

You can’t celebrate 20 Years of Driving without a look back at the machines that made it all happen.

My  Car History:

• 1985 Ford EXP, White 
• 1984 Ford Escort, Burgundy
• 1990.5 Ford Escort Pony, White W/California
  Graphics      
• 1993 Dodge Shadow, White W/Orange Heartbeat
• 1996 VW Golf, Champagne
• 2004 Ford Escape, Silver (company car)
• 2008 Jeep Liberty, Black (company car)
• 1995 Mercedes C280, White

(it is written somewhere that owners of white cars are vain, and look I just wrote it here)

Other People’s Cars I Remember Most:

• Tracey M’s Toasted Marshmallow Escort
• Tracet’s H’s Red Dodge Daytona
• Old boyfriend’s 68 Cutlass
• Kristina J’s Party Wagon
• Cari’s Blue Cavalier
• Brandy C’s Parent’s Grand National
• My older brother’s Nissan Truck
• …and his 73 Cadillac – it had to have been a Fleetwood – it was so big it barely fit in my parent’s garage.
• Sarah’s Blue Buick (aka: Bewy)
• A small wood paneled ford escort wagon I had to share with my brother.

Funny how the cars everybody drives now just aren’t that memorable. I’m sure they are much safer. I think three of the four drivers listed above now drive Audi’s. I really really prefer older cars and I don’t even know what I would buy if I fell into a pile of money and that pile of money said “you can only spend me on a new car” maybe I would just buy a Hummer to teach that pile of money a lesson. And once that pile of money was taught a lesson I would paint my Hummer zebra stripe and start a Benihana and Rendezvous shuttle service and I would use the proceeds to buy THIS or one of THESE.

Ok. Enough. Those are the lists. Stay tuned for the stories.

Road Theme

The above map was made in late 2009 to show my estimate of all the places I have driven (excluding Mexico and France – those are separate maps). I’ve decided to forget celebrating my “36th birthday” (coming up real soon – I have an Amazon Wishlist) and instead celebrate 20 Years of Driving because it is my favorite thing about being alive anyway. So for starters I have updated the map:

…and I plan on recounting some road stories, road rules, and other road reminiscences right here in the coming weeks.

Out the Car Window

This PT Cruiser was COVERED in Skull Stickers from the roof to the boof. The dwarf guy from Lord of the Rings was driving.

The latest craze in child activism! It’s what the anti-immunization movement used to be. 

I bet skull guy doesn’t think that is funny.

Just another Friday afternoon in Tunica, Mississippi.  Trust me it was too hot to be pulled over and standing next to your car, let alone having some furry K-9 rubbing his business in your glovebox. Yaknowwhatimean?

Right after I saw this mess, I stopped at a gas station where I witnessed a guy purchase beer for some minors. Well maybe they weren’t minors. Maybe they were just some hardworking young folk that forgot their id’s at home. All five of them in a red Nissan, just wanting to pick up a few brewsers for their grandpappy and get home to the fam.

It looked like the buyer dude had a partner and they were running some kind of drive-through beer-assistance operation at the BP. How much money can you make doing that? I can’t remember how much we used to pay “Smiley” (the thirty-something-year-old town buyer, who drove a dark blue pick-up and was always around the cruising strip) but it couldn’t have been more than a few bucks. I would never trust a teenager to do anything responsible so my fee for buying alcohol for a minor would be so high they would be better off starting a proper drug habit. 

And that is my humblebrag about my high morals!!

Truths & Observations for Creative Success

Alt Publishing

If starting a hip women’s magazine, in order to be opposite of the usual Cosmo/Glamour style fluff, be sure to photograph, refer to, and interview the following five women as if they were the five elements that make up air:

• Kim Gordon  (nitrogen)
• Miranda July  (carbon)
• Chloe Sevingy (argon)
• Tina Fey (oxygen)
• Zoe Deschanel (small traces of other stuff)

Don’t worry about finding other successful women, the pool is very small and some of the others are fat and unfashionable.

Movies

Assuming we can’t all make a superhero movie…

No matter what your story, it is best if you can use banjo music over any kind of slow motion. If you have to show something violent use some kind of female vocals/tribal moaning or chanting and of course, slow motion. 

Poor people are interesting. Poor people in the south are Oscar material.

Girls in underwear are sure box office draws. Unshapely girls in underwear are brave and artistic.

Music

I’m no expert but it seems like there is one easy formula for success: Scrap original songwriting and just sing a Slayer song in a new folksy arrangement.

Literature

If you aren’t writing a sweeping historical novel you better hope you are working on something that includes a PowerPoint!

 

That’s all I have for now. Let me know how it goes.

Sights Captured While Driving Or Where Camera’s Were Not Welcome

I figure as long as I am not texting and driving it is totally cool swerve across lanes while photographing something interesting.

Tiny ponies in the back of a truck along a Louisiana Highway:

Trees in water along a Louisiana Highway:

The shop clerk may have objected to me taking a picture if I attempted to try this on. A mini-zookeeper outfit I almost bought for my nephew (what does that key unlock?):

I am even more reckless when it comes taking pictures while driving on the lonely boulevard that connects one beige building to another in the depressing industrial park where I give up many of my waking hours:

It’s like I don’t care if I run into the WahteverTECH sign, I WILL capture a photo of that Arkansas plate that says PIGSOOE! Breaking my wrists on the steering wheel and getting out of the office for a couple days is a small price to pay.

Happy Father’s Day (from the Blog)

I already posted this picture on my tumblr but I didn’t have a chance to really comment on this. Target (and god knows who else) has a full line of father’s day cards from the pets. Assuming these are for the use of grown people, I …well, I don’t know. Maybe I don’t have anything to add. I poop, you scoop.

My dad deserves more than a card but that is what I got him (of course he does have the special gift of knowing I am coming to visit soon). It is not easy to pick out a father’s day card because they ALL have a Grilling/Bar-B-Q or Farting or Remote Control or Beer theme. I don’t know about yours, but my dad is a complex man, I mean sure when I called him today he was about to go golfing (which, I suppose, would have qualified him for a decent 35% of the cards) but it’s all too reductive. But, he’s not my mom so he’d be a little confused by a homemade card and terrified by one of those sensitive feelings cards.  Not much to do put choose the most fitting Far Side card and move on.

Pajamagrams next year.

Happy Father’s Day to all!