It’s the circle of life (and it moves us all)

 

Christian the lion (center) with friends Ace Bourke & John Rendell

In all seriousness, I think I just became a vegetarian. This video is likely the most moving thing I have ever seen on the internet. When I lived in Australia, I had a dog called Jara. I have never, ever loved another thing as much, and doubt I ever will, but when I moved back to New York, I couldn’t bring her with me for a number of reasons. Although I moved back here almost ten years ago, I still dream about her all the time, but lately my Jara dreams have been sad: she doesn’t remember me when I see her. This video gave me hope that she will remember me, and maybe even forgive me for leaving her behind. I know she has a better life over there than she could possibly have here – she’s a runner (half Red Heeler, a breed of dog used to herd cattle), and would be miserable in an apartment. She lives with a friend’s dad, who has other dogs,in a house with a yard that adjoins a large park. Still, my heart breaks a little every day when I wake up and she’s not poking her little head out from under the covers.

 

Also, for what it’s worth, I went to great lengths to find a version of this video that did not feature Aerosmith or Whitney Houston (the song in this version is Sigur Ros).

Shady Pines, Ma!

A friend, and a confidant

This is pretty much Blatant Plagiarism. I love, love, love haiku d’etat, Erica’s site. We used to have these amazing (amazingly entertaining, not amazingly brilliant) haiku email threads back when we worked together. Erica now blogs in 5-7-5, and sometimes, waiting for her pithy wit is all too much, and I sit here, willing her to GET THAT SOCIALLY RELEVANT HAIKU OUT ALREADY, WOMAN!

Anywho, I have sleeping problems, but they’ve been taken to a whole ‘nother level lately. So I pretty much spend an hour watching Golden Girls reruns every night. Don’t judge – I never claimed to be highbrow. My heart broke a little when I read that Estelle Getty, aka Sicilian Spitfire Sophia Petrillo, had given us her final “…but I digress”. So my sorrow was somewhat mitigated when I saw that Erica had felt my pain across the 5 states that separate us, and intervened with:

We had so many
Golden nights, Estelle. Thank you
For being a friend. 

Knowing when to leave well enough alone has never been my particular strength (see also: pithy). So I tried to be clever, too, and I left Erica some memorial haikus, and when she sent me an email that she actually liked them, I was thrilled. I will also share with you my feeble attempts at 5-7-5, but I know when I’m beat!

Purse of wicker and
seashells. Sicilian hexes.
Thank God for re-runs.

Pussycat, let us
pray that heaven is nothing
like Shady Pines was

It’s kind of a moot point, anyway, because I think Erica is the only one who reads this…at the very least, she’s the only one who comments!

For any other Petrillophiles out there, this article will warm the cockles of your hearts:

http://www.kansascity.com/238/story/715722.html

A likely story, but leave a message and I’ll call you back…

 

Answerus Machinosarus

I got a link today to what may be the greatest avoidance enabler ever. First, I, for the most part, hate the phone. I love having a phone, but I get a little irritated at the large amount of idle chit-chat that it promotes. My life is currently pretty boring, and I just don’t have a lot going on to talk about. The other part of the problem is that I have a few friends who seem to call for the express purpose of delivering a monologue, yet have no real desire for any input or feedback, let alone have an actual conversation. Whenever I start to speak, they have an innate gift for turning this “conversation” right back to themselves. It’s an exercise in constant one-upmanship, and I am totally disinterested in these kinds of relationships. They would be having the exact same interaction with a garden gnome or that gorilla who learned how to paint and use sign language (Coco?). 

So Slydial made my black heart flutter. I don’t want to be the Avoiding Asshole. But I am not a therapist, and there’s no point in trying to help people who don’t want to be helped, anyway. So, as passive-aggressive as this may be, Slydia is brilliant. In their own words:

1. Dial 267-SLYDIAL (267-759-3425) from any landline or mobile phone.
2. At the voice prompt, enter the U.S. mobile phone number of the person you want to slydial.
3. You will be directly connected to their voicemail. Leave them a voicemail, sit back and relax.

Slydial is absolutely free! And you don’t have to sign up in order to use it. 

If you’re as anti-social and intrigued by this as I am, check out http://www.slydial.com

I haven’t used it yet, but I am sure I will. Unless, of course, I have your mobile number, and you get a message from me even though your phone didn’t ring…in that case, I have no idea what happened. Bizarre!

Beep beep, beep beep, YEAH!

Who's paying for gas...?

Baby, I can drive your car. I took (and passed!) my road test on Thursday! OK, so I was the oldest person there by far; in fact, the possibility that I could have given birth to a number of people in line with me exists. I am undeniaby a late bloomer, and I am finally OK with that. Better to do things well later, than to do a shitty job on somebody else’s arbitrary schedule, right? Anywho, in honor of my shiny, new license, here are the top 12 songs (I couldn’t pick just 10, so I’m honoring my own aforementioned tradition of bucking society’s trends) about driving that I can think of at the moment:

12. I Drove All Night; Roy Orbison
11. Drive; REM
10. Bigger, Stronger, Faster; Coldplay
9. Taillights Fade; Buffalo Tom
8. Daddy’s Gonna Pay For Your Crashed Car; U2
7. Drive My Car; The Beatles
6. On the Road Again; Willie Nelson
5. Fast Cars; U2
4. Mercedes Benz; Janis Joplin
3. Road To Nowhere; Talking Heads
2. Roadhouse Blues, The Doors
1. Highway To Hell; AC/DC (or Acca Dacca, for the Aussies out there!)