This was too beautiful not to share. Courtesy of The Chucklehut:

Sometimes I can see it all from the bus and I don't even need to hear a single word:

He sits next to her, young and hunky, tousled blonde locks and a square jaw, plaid shirt jacket, faded jeans and worn sturdy boots. His eyes are on her as she stares out at the street; his body is turned toward her and his arm encircles her shoulder. Their faces are close together, he's speaking softly to her. Her knees begin to bounce, small movements getting faster. She doesn't seem to be in control. He turns her toward him and kisses her, tenderly, deeply. Halfway through the kiss her knees stop shaking. Their lips part; she rests her head on his chest and and he lays a quiet hand on her quiet leg. The bus pulls away, taking me with it.

I've never really liked crows. They're always made into these omens of something bad in movies. Like the scene with all the crows in the cornfield in "The Stand". And that scene with the crow in "The Passion of the Christ" *shudder*. There are a whole lot of crows that like the trees outside my office. I am hyper- aware of them now- crows are creepy.

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PK has a thing for Volvos. At one point, he owned four of them. At the same time. Currently he owns three- the one he drives; the one Sarah drives; and the one that is sitting in his garage with no driver's side doors and no front passenger's seat. Thursday night, Sarah and I were over at his house, and he was showing us the doorless wonder, and decided to take it for a spin. (We're pretty sure it's illegal to drive a passenger car with missing doors, so it took much cajoling to get Sarah to agree to it) First we thought we’d just go up the street and back, but then we thought it would be funny to take it through the In-N-Out drive through.

So we drove, all giggly-stupid, to the In-N-Out, which is maybe a quarter mile from PK's house, but when he saw the number of cars in the drive thru he chickened out and we went back home.

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I've been contemplating the whole "nature vs. nurture" thing about what "causes" someone to be gay. I've heard a lot of people say that it's something you're born, not something you’re made into. I'm not saying that either is right or wrong, but I always pretty much believed that if you're gay it's because you were born that way. But now I'm wondering if the way you are raised can influence the decision, or make you want to think you are something you are not. There is a young lady that I used to baby-sit, Deona, who'll be 19 this summer. And her parents are... interesting people. Probably three or so years ago, Deona announced that she was gay. I don't know that I believe that.

It's not that I don't want to believe that, if it's what she really feels and wants, more power to her. But I wonder how much her parents had to do with that decision. About nine years ago I broke of the majority of contact with them, and I'll go into why in a future post. Deona was about 10 when I did that, her little sister, the Pigchild, was about 3. Not having been around that house and those girls for so long, I might be wrong, and for Deona's sake I hope I am, but the glimpses I've seen over the last several years indicate I have good reason to think I'm not.

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Dinner Monday night was fun. I went to TGIFridays with some friends, and it has been sooo gorgeous here that we were actually able to sit outside. Good friends, good food, great eye-candy. Normally when we go to Fridays we request a table in this one corner- right near the men's bathroom so that all the men in the place have to walk by our table to get to there. Talk about eye candy! Oh, and I had the Ultimate Strawberry Shortcake for dessert. You must try it if you go there, it was decadence in a glass.

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Stacey Ferguson from the Black Eyed Peas is hot. I'm totally straight, but add her to the list of people I'd turn for. (also on that list are Allyson Hannigan and Eliza Dushku, and no I didn't watch Buffy). I never thought she was all that attractive, but that little plaid skirt and those red red hot-pants in the "Hey Mama" video? Mmmm.

1. Find the nearest book.
2. Open to page 23.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post it.

Okay, this sucks. I have seen this on various sites (nifty link format stolen from the ever-clever Jules). I tried to do this yesterday at work, and the only book that isn't a California Court directory is the book I've been reading on and off on my lunch hours for the last 5 months.

Page 23: Sentence 5: "'About a month ago', I said".
From The Object of My Affection by Stephen McCauley.

So I tried again last night, having several books quite near to hand on my bedside table.

The first book I grabbed was Ghost Girl by Torey Hayden (Non-fiction). Page 23, Sentence 5? "'Way to go Glen.'"

So then I tried the next nearest book to hand, The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty by Anne Rice (writing as A. N. Roquelaure, Fiction). Page 23: Sentence 5: “She was crying again.”

Tried again- The Atonement Child, by Francine Rivers (Fiction). Page 23: Sentence 5: "'For Evidence.'" Now grammatically, this is not a complete sentence, but the way it’s printed in the book it is.

So I tried yet again. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire (Fiction). Page 23: Sentence 5?? "'Yes.'"

And again… A Walk in the Woods, by Bill Bryson, thinking maybe if I switch to non-fiction I might get better results. It didn’t work with the first book, but I have hope… Page 23: Sentence 5: ''I thought of that'"

Is this a conspiracy? A curse?? The universe’s way of telling me I need to read more classic literature?? Everyone else I’ve seen post this has had pretty cool stuff (or at least not dialogue in every single book but one) for their Page 23: Sentence 5. But me? No. Even the Bible had nothing worth posting here on page 23 sentence 5. So I decided you know what? You know what you're getting? Page 23, Sentence 5 of this weeks People magazine...

AAAAARGH!!! Page 23 is a full page ad for the movie Plainsong, a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie airing on CBS this Sunday at 9!

Forget it. Forget the nearest damn book to hand. I went downstairs to the BIG bookshelf in the living room, and grabbed my copy of The Scarlet Letter. I knew Nathaniel Hawthorne wouldn’t let me down. And finally, finally, something worthy of this stupidfucking nifty idea: “If, in our country, valor were rewarded by heraldic honor, this phrase- which it seems so easy to speak, but which only he, with such a task of danger and glory before him, has ever spoken- would be the best and fittest of all mottoes for the General’s shield of arms.”

Gah. See? This is why I do relatively few memes.

Forget the caffe latte, screw the raspberry iced tea
A Malibu and Coke for you, a G&T for me
-Barenaked Ladies, Alcohol

PK had a housewarming party on Saturday. It got a lot rowdier than we expected. He had the regular barbeque fare, burgers, hot dogs, chips, sodas and a limited supply of beer. He had mentioned a few days before the party that he was going to get Coors Light. I made a face, said, I know who is coming to this party- Do Not Get Coors Light. So he got Sierra Nevada. People started showing up, and C and K had just returned from Italy, so they contributed wine they had brought back.

Quick cast rundown, so it all makes sense:
PK, me, Sarah, Morgan (Sarah's daughter), D (PK's ex from college), F (friend and J's partner), J (friend and F's partner), C (HMB friend), and K (C's friend, who has a crush on PK) and The Little Prince (shortened to TLP for brevity, PK's roommate).

Most of the people at the party smoke (D, C, K, F, J, and PK, but PK was smoking cigars), so we quickly ended up in the backyard. PK and TLP have an overabundance of couches, so we were very West Virginia and had 3 couches in the backyard. TLP was sitting on one of them, enjoying the sunshine, and *reading a book* while the rest of us smoked, and munched and drank wine. After an hour or so of this, K decides he needs, of all things, Coors Light. Ok, whatever, I never met him before and so can't speak to his lack of taste in beer.

He decides to go to the store, and I go with him because I actually knew where the store was. J handed me 20 bucks and asked me to pick up another bottle of white wine. C wanted one too. I know nothing about wine, so I choose stuff based on the label- cool name, pretty label, whatever. So we ended up with a bottle with a pretty picture of what I can only guess is the vinyard in Italy the wine was from, and a bottle of Goats do Roam just because of the name. I also picked up some apple twist smirnoff ice, because I like it and I know PK does too.

We get back from the store, PK has got the burgers on the grill, and the hot dogs were all black and shriveled on a plate. They were pitiful. But the burgers were great, we all ate and drank (a lot) and were generally rowdy and LOUD. At this point I think TLP was suitably afraid of us, and took off somewhere.

There was a whole lot of drunk dialing going on. But it was all friends and stuff, no calling exes or anything, just some old school friends, and of course my illustrious call to Caryn. Actually, I think there were only three drunken calls made, but C's cell kept ringing and I'm sure her friends now think we are insane.

Morgan is only 13, but heartily embraces her role as "beer slave". She knows she can't drink it, but she likes getting the bottles and opening them and giving them to people.

I've never been at a party where drunk people broke stuff. But a wine glass got broken (glass and cement patios don't mix), and as Sarah was cleaning it up, she knocked over an empty bottle and broke that. At this point, PK and C start kicking stuff off the coffee table (yes indeed, there was a coffee table to go with the couches) but thankfully nothing else broke. The party started to break up about 9ish, since D had to drive home to Sausalito (I'm so jealous), and C and K had to go because C's friends got engaged and C and K had to go be celebrational with them. At this point we moved things inside, because it was getting chilly and too late to be that loud outside.

Sarah and Morgan left a little while later- after a very major ticklefight that left PK on the floor gasping for air- during which Morgan, Sarah and I kept shoving furniture out of the way and fighting to get PK and J to let go of their wine glasses before any more wine got spilled on the couch, or anything else got broken. Things got a little bit calmer, except for a belligerent J who had had a bit too much wine. F and I had an amazingly good talk. A surprise guest showed up at 11:30 (yes, PM) and stayed about half an hour, then he and I left (separately) and I got home about 1.

So, the party was rockin'. My Saturday was good. Which is good, because my weekend was overcommitment central, and it was good to cut loose for a while.

*bangs head on desk repeatedly*

Thank you. That is all.

One of my new year's resolutions was to give up fast food. A couple of friends gave it up with me, and we had a loophole or two, in case we found ourselves on a road trip and fast food was the only option, etc. But I think it might fianlly be getting to me.

Last night I had a dream that I was in the Krispy Kreme drive-thru, and I ordered two doughnuts. The person taking my order asked if I wanted "original or extra crispy", and when I got to the window I got my doughnuts- original- and 10 tacos, extra crispy.

There was more stuff involving the location (Olive Avenue in Merced) a chair, and some people from highschool, but I don't really remember that part, and the food was what I was posting about.

... or Wow... That's really.... orange...

Saturday night I was babysitting Nathan, and I had promised to help PK paint his bathroom. No problem. I had Nathan's mom pack him some clothes he could paint in, and we were good to go. PK chose this really bright orange for his bathroom (don't ask me- he had his reasons), sort of a pastel tangerine.

Nathan was really anxious to help, but he's only six, and a really short six at that. And PK's bathroom has tile that goes more than halfway up the wall, so there wasn't a whole lot he could reach. So we set him to painting the back of the door. PK had to teach him about making sure all his strokes went in the same direction. I set to painting along the top edge of the tile around the bathtub, and the join between the ceiling and the wall. Yes my friends, the ceiling is pastel tangerine as well. We successfully got in each other's way for a while, holding paint trays for each other, getting each other to move out of the space we needed to be in- it was comical.

Eventually we got to the point where Nathan was more in the way than he was helping. There was probably as much paint on him and the floor around him as he had gotten on the door. So I stripped off his paint covered clothes and carried him to the kitchen, where he sat on the counter in his underoos while I scrubbed the paint off his arms and (very ticklish) feet. I got him into his pjs and settled on the couch with a video, and went back to help finish the bathroom.

We finished up in fairly short order, and left the room to let it dry. After that, every time we walked by the bathroom, we marveled at how insanely bright this orange was. It looks really good, but man it's bright. I can only guess that the brightness got more intense when PK put on the second coat on Sunday...

And incidentally, PK's roommate, The Little Prince, gets mad props for playing legos with Nathan while PK and I were getting things ready to paint.

Ok, so my dad may or may not have had pneumonia. On April 2 I got another call from my mom saying he was in the hospital again, with a major infection in his foot, and that he was going to be losing some toes. WTF??

Ten years ago he had an infection in the same foot- he had cut his foot at the beach and apparently there was some foreign matter in it that caused an infection. That was when we found out he was diabetic. Over the years, because of the diabetes, his feet have gotten progressively worse, and this new thing was due to that.

So he was in the hospital for a week. He doesn't listen to me very well (see previous entry). He's home now, seems to be healing, but he only has 8 toes, which is really weird.