Who gets a cold on vacation?  The same person who infects her mother with that cold on her birthday, that's who.

Haikus On The New Mountain Dew Coolatta

First drink of the day
Me, iced coffee; Dew for you
Now both together

Dunks in my future
Too bad you're in Iowa
I'll taste and report

It best not be gross
Don't waste precious Coolattas
Time at home goes fast

Iced coffee is foul
You said, but these are aces
Yes, that's British slang

I don't feel so bad
Dragging you here; we agree
It is wicked good

Right up your alley
A small consolation for
Enduring my 'rents

Who else would concoct
Yellow Number Five and ice
Starbuck's got nothing

No doubt it will sell
But what about the manhood?
Does it affect that?

Braved Houston's east side
In search of the last Dunkin
'For rent'; how I wept!

This week I have three houses (I'm pet-sitting).   Whichever one I'm at, I feel as though I'm neglecting the others.  Sad puppy-dog eyes from two of them and another that is not yet habitable due to the mountain of boxes containing all my earthly possessions, waiting patiently to be unpacked.

Last night's temperature was a mere 84 degrees, making the drive up to the Heights more pleasant with the windows down.  Especially at the light at Studemont and Washington, as the best smell of baked goods wafted in from the Sunbeam bakery down the street.  Fresh bread at a quarter to midnight.  Probably in the top five all-time best smells.  I sniffed as much as I could until the light changed and I was left huffing car exhaust.

 

Kids today and their Bollywood-themed birthday parties.  My 17-year-old self would be thrilled.

[Smith was 29 when she recorded Horses. Joan Didion was 29 when she wrote her first novel. Tina Fey was 29 when she was named head writer of SNL. bell hooks was 29 when she published her first major work. Oprah had just turned 30 when she got her first local TV talk show.
There is a reason ‘boy genius’ rolls off the tongue more naturally than ‘girl genius.’ By the time most of us accept the fact that we have earned this label for ourselves, we are most decidedly no longer girls.]

- Ann Friedman on Patti Smith at This Recording

So there's still hope...?

Ask Ted Williams

Chronologically, I may have just turned 29.  But let's say, for accuracy's sake, that the sub-zero temperature of my new office has slowed my cellular metabolism to a crawl.  Am I in fact aging less?  This could save me a fortune in cryopreservatives.

[I well remember a moment some years ago when I was given a salutary lesson in the rapid transit of worldly fame. I was lecturing that day at a small college in Uvalde, Texas, once home of the redoubtable John Nance Garner, who as Roosevelt’s vice president remarked pithily that the vice presidency wasn’t worth a bootful of warm spit. The college was poor. They had never been able to afford to bring a writer in before. The students, culturally, were like baby birds, waiting with their mouths open for any worm I might produce- in tribute to their need I fed them the fattest worms I could pull up. I wanted the college to get its money’s worth, and I believe it did.

During a short break in a daylong effort, while back at my motel for a nap, I was informed that Lonesome Dove had won the Pulitzer Prize. My informant was my agent, Irving Lazar, living up to his nickname, which was Swifty.

I spoke for nearly eight hours that day. Though it was nice to hear about the prize, a nap would have been awfully nice too. But Irving persisted, determined to communicate to me the majesty of the event. When I finally got him off the line my next call was from the motel office: a reporter and photographer from the local paper were there to get a brief interview and take my picture.

The night before, when I drove into Uvalde, the marquee of the Holiday Inn where I was staying had written on it: “Welcome Larry McMurtry, Author of Terms of Endearment.” That had never happened to me before, and it meant more than the vice presidency meant to John Nance Garner.

But time waits for no author, not in Uvalde, anyway. As I walked up to meet the press I glanced at the marquee and saw that it had already changed. Now it read: “Lunch Special, Catfish: $3.95.” Even as Irving Lazar was telling me how great he had made me, my moment had passed. It was a lesson to be remembered. The Pulitzer Prize was well and good, but there was lunch to think of, and catfish at $3.95 was a bargain not to be scorned. The locals were already flocking to it, and as soon as the needs of the press had been satisfied, I went in and did the same.]

- Larry McMurtry, Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen

Things I Have Done Lately To Occupy My Mind

- thrown away mysterious leftovers from the back of the fridge
- cleaned the lab
- designed and made two necklaces
- cooked lamb stew
- baked a cake and a batch of cookies
- dogsat
- babysat
- went to a concert
- read a book in an afternoon
- bought a bonsai tree from a man on the side of the road
- planted a tiny crop of arugula
- made chocolates from scratch


And yet.. I can't fall asleep at night.

When I said 'home stretch', I was speaking metaphorically along the lines of the Kentucky Derby, not the freaking Iditarod.  Still no end in sight.

the home stretch