GYTOFS

Cinematic Moment:  Showing some love

For any of you LOCM readers who are familiar with the Kill Audio comic series (keep an eye out for more info on the debut in print soon) you are familiar with our very talented and wise cracking artist du jour, Mr. Sheldon Vella.  What you might not know is he has another series called Supertron that is definitely rad and is running a competition to promote the second season's debut.   If you love great comics, boobies, showing your boobies or just seeing boobies while reading comics, go HERE .  Where else can you get quality reading and a chance to show the world your goods in one click?  

This cannot be good..

Cinematic Moment:  A haunting in New York.

While we were on the other coast, our house sitter brought it to my attention that our house is situated on old Indian Reservation land.  Thinking she was messing with me, I did a little research myself.  I was horrified to learn she wasn't kidding.  As someone who believes in paranormal activity, probably from watching Ghostbusters one too many times, I am equally as afraid of spirits as I am of home intruders.  I called my mom to whine about it.  She said, "You have nothing to worry about-the Indians were very peaceful.  Plus we're part Native American."

  

"Well mom, I don't think my fractional heritage is going to give me a get out of jail free card.  They may have been peaceful until we stole their land from them and plopped a 3000 square foot house on what may very well have been sacred ground.  Does the phrase "Trail of Tears" ring a bell?"  That said, I decided if I was welcoming to them, maybe they'd leave us alone and we could co-habit--living and spirit alike.  I would offer them coffee and warm goat cheese and spinach salad.  Hey, Chief Running Wolf, how about a game of Scrabble?  Quit cheating-I know you can see right through that dictionary!  

My plan was working splendidly, I have to say--no creepy noises, no TVs turning on and off, no random knives being tossed in my direction from the kitchen--just peace and quiet.  It was this very peace and quiet that I was basking in as we lied down to sleep a few days ago.  I didn't even close the drapes, it was so comfortable.  As I shifted positions in bed, I opened my eyes briefly, glancing towards the window.  WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT??  I know this phrase may be surprising to you, but I guarantee you it's not as surprising as what I saw.  Shining through the glass, like some blazing Batman signal, an image was being projected against the wall.  An image that looked uncannily like a tee pee.  I couldn't sleep all night.  I lied there listening for warrior chants to start.

 The next morning, my frianceband reassured me that it was just a watermark on the window from 2 years of uncleaned gutters and a lot of Spring rain.  I reassured him he is a filthy liar.  I hope he's ready to donate some of that hair when I get scalped...

Proud parent.

Cinematic Moment:  Surprise!

A month or so ago I was at my local pizza joint and overheard the delivery guy talking about his Great Danes having 12 puppies.  I've always been a bit of a sucker for dogs that could be mistaken for horses--the Mastiffs, Great Danes, St. Bernards.  Sign me up.  The idea of checking out a dozen of these little sweeties was far too much for me to pass up.  With the man of the house away, I recruited a friend to go with me, thinking I would just not tell him and then send a pic of the puppy to him when I got there.  He would not be able to say no.   My friend agreed this was a great plan and that she would use the same tactic with her hubby.  So we made the hike to PA with visions of smooshie faced canines dancing through our heads.

Well, the reality is that once we got there I realized no matter how badly I'd love to, we do not live a lifestyle conducive to a 180 pound dog.  This is why we have little ones.  But that is not to say that the animal gods did not shine down on me that day, as it turned out the Great Dane mommy's mommy has a sister (say that 3 times fast...and try to figure it out.)  This sister has a Brussels who is itching for some loving from our little Benson.  We like to think of her as a surrogate for Barbara and Ben,  So yes, ladies in gentlemen, the 2nd week of April, I will be dropping him off for a conjugal visit and sometime this summer, I'm going to be a grandma!!

Bi-focals, knitting puppy sweaters, spoiling the little one rotten--count me in.  Let's take a gander at what my future grandpuppy might look like:

Ages ago...

Cinematic Moment:  Years of prose.

It's only been a handful of years that the night seemed to open up like a hole drilled into the black cancerous mouth of a cavern, exposing the pink spongy flesh of morning.  What was once heavy and uncertain, has the playful banter of a dozen balloons, allowing themselves to fly with whatever breeze comes along, but always remaining tied together.  We sit around in wrinkled cream sheets, rubbing our feet together to remind the other we are still there.  Palm to palm, eating cookies with chunks of powdery chocolate and drinking plastic cups filled with ice cold milk.  We sing our words most of the time.

And we watch the seasons change out the window, while our own faces slowly change from young to slightly impressed with the lines of late night expressions.  I never grew afraid of smiling more wrinkles into mine.  Gone are the days when I tried to scrub them away, like some sort of stain.  The candlelight bounces off the moss colored walls, gloss paint singing back to the flame.  The light continues to catch on a guitar with hardware the color of an Italian gold bracelet my grandmother gave me for my 15th birthday.  The dogs nuzzle as close as they can get.  I study the pattern of his facial hair, how it grows in singularly and coarse, black in some areas and a deep auburn just below the bottom lip.  I listen to breath pacing itself, slowing down from man to beast to ozone.  Listening to the heartbeats of all living things come to a lull.

  

And I sneak across the kitchen for a glass of water, silently laughing at our luck in this lifetime. 

In like a lion, out like a lamb my ass.

Cinematic Moment:  A little Spring Cleaning.

In the wake of a West Coast trip (which has thrown my sleep schedule so out of whack that my usual 7:30 am wake up call has become 11:30) and my man's second annual 30th birthday (that has lasted 3 days) I decided to do a little outside spring cleaning.  Donning some yoga pants, an old green hoodie and 3 year old Uggs that I couldn't care less about destroying, I inhaled a couple cups of coffee before heading into the great outdoors.  Terra cotta pots scattered, bags of planting soil, broken wooden birdhouses, fallen wind chimes--I faced a backyard that appeared to have barely survived a winter rivaling Hiroshima.   But I was fully caffeinated and ready to take on the aftermath.

 With the dogs under foot, we broke up old tree branches, tossing them into the fire pit to await a summer demon fire.  I replaced my favorite wrought iron table on the sun deck where it will see many a morning breakfast in the next few months and hosed down the patios, freeing them from a 5-month old leaf cardigan.  The dogs rolled in the mud the way I'd imagine a pig would, Barbara chasing the falling twigs.  Benson at one point, disappeared, finding an old corn cob from the field next door and attempting to fit the entire thing into his mouth so he could bring it indoors secretly, like a little creepsicle.  We were all feeling alive with the sun smiling down and the sky most blue than the Atlantic Ocean.  

Then, I remembered the 20 gallon Rubbermaid I had bought to start my Tupperware garden last summer, still sitting on the deck railing, neglected.  It was full of rainwater, soil and some remnants of forgotten Brussels Sprouts I'd planted and never actually picked.  Against the advice of gardener friends, I had also never gotten around to drilling drainage holes in the bottom.  It was a task enough to plant the damn Tupperware garden, let alone use a power drill and I recall my attention span was very short on this project.   That would be why it was still festering here. 

As I dumped some of the water out of the thing, a familiar smell wafted up from the ground below.  You know when keep flowers in a vase too long and the stems rot?  It smelled like that, only instead of 1 cup of rot water, there was roughly 16 gallons of it.  I got as much as I could out of the bucket so I could attempt to lift it off the deck railing and bring it into the woods for a proper burial.  Low and behold, as I heaved it off, the weight was too much for me.  The whole Rubbermaid fell to the ground, smashing into little plastic splinters and ricocheting about 13 gallons of rancid Brussels Sprout dirt water back onto me.  Not just onto the tattered sweater and Uggs, but all over my face, pants and squeaky clean Heidi braids.  

Not even the dogs will come near me now because I smell like the ears of a homeless man. Spring, it's on.