Thursday, November 02, 2006

Big Picture Roundup

I have an important update on yesterday's breaking news that Jim The Small Child Nephew was a leopard for Halloween. Apparently, later in the evening, he decided to alter the costume to "Leopard Roadkill".

Also, my boyfriend loves me:

Now we all know why air traffic controllers are such famous players. I think the only thing more awesome than this would be dating a scoreboard operator.

fever of one degree at: mb@blondechampagne.com

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

The Prince Is a Pea


...and the King is a leopard. Roar. Also, (insert whatever sound peas make here).

Tuesday, October 31, 2006

Postage

Today's Person Who Rocks is whoever invented self-adhesive postage.

I sent out the birth announcements for Drink To The Lasses to family members, older friends who fear the computer (not that I blame them, sometimes), former teachers who thought I went blessedly away, and a general mish-mash of people to whom I wanted to be all, "Yeah, I wrote a book."

They are postcards. The front is the book cover, and here is the back:

My postcard is awesome. Far from awesome, however, is the phsyical act of spreading the awesome.

I put a bunch in the mailboxes of some of my co-workers, and I only counted three in the trash can next to the mailboxes the next day, which means the cleaning crew probably spared me the sight of all of the annoucements in there by removing the bulk of them the previous night. Sweet. Gettin' the word out. I am a marketing juggernaut.

The rest, though, I had to mail. With postage. From the post office. I got a sheet of sticky stamps, then proceeded to stand in high heels for the bulk of my lunch break peeling and sticking and in general arming myself with the ability to commit major crimes because I now no longer have fingerprints.

Far better, however, than the alternative: I remember sitting with my mother and aunts to send out the invitations for my grandparents' golden wedding anniversary, and this was in 1988, when pterodactyls filled the sky and you had to lick your stamps if you wanted anything to go anywhere. So we stamped and sealed all these invites, with the reply cards tucked snugly inside, and were sitting around congratulating ourselves on a mailing well done when somebody suddenly wondered why we had all these extra stamps lying around.

I have not been able to look at the postage aisle of Staples quite the same way since.

So I was going peel-stick, peel-stick, peel-stick, muttering, "I bet they don't make Stephen King peel-stick" when suddenly one of my beloved birth announcements bit me in the hand. Paper cut, author down. No triage available.

But I had to get to class, so onward I peel-stuck. So for some of you who will be recieving these postcards... the... red smears near the stamp area is a... printing error.

peel-stick at: mb@blondechampagne.com

Monday, October 30, 2006

The Mules

Turning thirty was supposed to be about the mules.

You are all familiar with my birthday karma; imagine what the karma might wreak for the year marking the official end of my usefulness to the advertising world. I wanted to do something for my 30th to make it something to look forward to. Hence: The mules.

What I needed to do, I thought, was simply stick myself into the biggest hole the ground I could find on the morning of my 30th birthday. The Grand Canyon seemed adequate; I was there as a small bratty child, but only to the rim. I haven't seen it from the ground up.

So I booked a mule trip to the Colorado River for the weekend of my birthday, because what everybody wants to do, in the dead of January on the day their youth culturally expires, is host themselves onto an easily pissed pack animal for eight consecutive hours. Josh The Pilot wanted to come, too, because he does love his digital camera and probably wished to test the speed frame function as I went sailing over the canyon wall.

But this weekend I sat and looked over the numbers and scowled a lot and then called the mules and told them I wasn't coming. I can't afford it; worse, I can't justify it. I miss the West so much that I actually tranced out while on the phone with the National Parks Service because the hold music was Navajo flute melodies.

Five years ago, I would have gone anyway. Five years ago, I had a lot of growing up to do. At inches-to-thirty, I struggle to keep a mildewy roof over my head-- but it's my roof, soon to be partially financed by my book. It is enough, it is far more than I deserve, to see my nephews unwrap their Christmas presents and to hold the hand of a good man who loves me on my birthday, there beneath the mildew.

And so, I give you thirty: It is about the mules... it's about knowing enough to leave them tied to the rail for the moment.

brighty come back at: mb@blondechampagne.com

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