Author: Robyn

Bed, Bath and Beyond, which recently opened nearby. Although Fred had suggested I just go to Wal-Mart and buy a cheap comforter there, since no doubt the cats will crappify whatever I buy in ten seconds flat, I didn’t want to do that. I wanted to get something NICE, something NOT in cranberry and dark green, and something that *I* liked. After all, he’s got the colors he likes in HIS room, why shouldn’t I have the colors I like in MY room?, I thought to myself. Once inside B,B & B, I wandered about, looking at comforters. I looked and I looked, and I looked some more. I found some Laura Ashley comforters I liked, but didn’t care for the price – $300 for JUST the comforter? Damn! I found some Wamsutta comforters I liked, but still wasn’t crazy about the price. Finally, I said to myself, Just suck it up. You knew this was going to be expensive. Find one you like and buy it, damn it! So I did find one I liked. It was a bed in a bag set, and I found the King size version of it, and I turned the bag over, looking for the price. $59.99. Hell, yeah. And it’s made of the smooth cotton blend material that will let me vacuum up the cat hair. And there’s matching sheets, and best of all, it’s not red or green. It’s blue: You’ll note that 4 of the 5 cats are snoozin’ on the bed. If you look closely, you’ll see Spanky laying between the pillows. Damn cats. I’m not sure what it says about me that I bypassed the $300+ comforter/ bed sets for the cheap one, but I’ll tell you – both Fred and our checking account were the happier for it. I don’t like soft sheets. Those t-shirt sheets? Can’t stand ’em. I have to have a nice smooth, crisp sheet, with as few wrinkles as possible, to sleep well. Silk sheets? I think not. Any sheet above a 200 thread-count is too soft for me, and makes me sweat. Maybe, coming from a long line of peasants, I have low-class tastes. But what can I say? I like what I like what I like. You look like you’re dying for more cat pictures… Spot, on the outside looking in. No doubt thinking “How the hell do I get back in there, again?”, having forgotten that he needs to, y’know, go through the open door which is about ten feet behind him. Miz Poo, in the midst of her daily sun therapy. And bathing. Gotta keep those paws clean. Tubby makes like a kitty loaf in the middle of the library floor. He just got done sniffing at Spot through the window, and is contemplating taking a nap. It’s all too much for him…]]>

Wish you Were Here when Fred Durst and the Goo Goo Dolls guy (and whoever else was out there) sang it. I was shocked. SHOCKED, I tell you. I thought everyone knew that song. I stared at him in surprise and then said “That’s Pink Floyd! I can’t believe you don’t know that song. I think it was on the same album as Mother.” He didn’t know Mother, either. What kind of planet has the man been living on? “The only Pink Floyd song I know is the we don’t need no education one,” he said. So I killed him and buried his body in the back corner of the yard. Next spring I’ll plant a lilac bush there, and it will be the best-fertilized lilac bush you’ve ever seen. At the end of the telethon when the whole crowd of ’em sang together (and lordy, what planet was Goldie Hawn on? Did she look high as a kite, or what?), before they zoomed in so that you could see who was leading the sing-along, I thought to myself, “Good god in heaven, is that MARILYN MANSON there in front of the microphone, going to lead Hollywood in a sing-along?” It was Willie Nelson. A common mistake, I’m sure. I LOATHE it when Mariah does that shrieky squealy shit like she was doing toward the end of the song. GRRRR. Like I told Fred, I LIKE her voice, until she busts out with the shrieks, and then I want her dead. Enrique Iglesias (son o’ Julio!) is pretty cute, isn’t he? They’ve been playing that song all over the radio stations ’round here, often with WTC-related dialogue in the instrumental parts. Of course, I didn’t know who he was until I asked the spud. “That’s Enrique,” she said with supreme confidence, after taking a moment to roll her eyes heavenward and wonder Why did you have to saddle me with such old, uncool, unhip, know-nothing parents, god? Why oh why? You know you’re getting old when you have to ask a 12 year-old girl who’s on the TV.]]>

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want to be a good recycler, but ignorance is holding me back, y’all! Heh. Typing “ignorance” made me think of Ace and TJ. TJ says “ignernt”, and it always cracks me up. I love me some Ace and TJ. Oh man. I just read Nance’s entry for the other day (I’m behind in my journal-reading as well as my emailing, you got a problem with that?), and read about her falling. On the driveway. In full view of the school bus. Poor Nance! That reminds me of about seven or eight years ago (god in heaven I’m old) when the spud and I were living in a duplex with Deb and Brian. (The ex was stationed in South Carolina, and when we heard that it would take forever to get into base housing, we (I) decided that it’d be best for the spud and I to move to Maine, especially since the ex would be going out to sea all the time. Anyway. One day I was home alone – where were the kids and Deb? I have no idea – doing laundry. Out back, we had a clothesline, which my father had come over and hung up for us. It was one of the ones that was strung between the house and a pole in the back yard, and you’d hang up a piece of laundry and push it out, then hang up another, and push it out further, until the line was full. So to hang out the laundry, you’d stand on the top step of the back porch. This day, I was minding my own business, hanging up laundry like a fiend, when I leaned over just a TAD too far. And fell end-over-end down the steps. Damn it hurt like hell. But was my first concern whether I’d broken anything? No, of course not. The first thing I did was look around to see if the teenagers from next door who were always outside smoking were around. Thank god, they weren’t. Looking back, I’m lucky I didn’t break my neck or give myself brain damage – I weighed a good 85 pounds more than I do now – but it wasn’t witnessed by anyone else, and that’s all that mattered, y’know.]]>

1) I have to wait for the neighbors to come home, check their mail, and bring my mail to me. 2) I have to sit and worry that they’re evil people who will either a) not notice they have my mail or b) keep all my mail for myself (you can laugh, but you KNOW it happens) 3) When/ if they bring the mail over, if they decide to put it in the mailbox instead of bring it to the door (yes, some people are THAT antisocial), and I see them do it (which is likely, since the computer room faces that direction), I have to sit and wait until a decent amount of time has passed so they won’t think I was sitting there staring at the fucking mailbox (which no doubt I WILL be doing) 4) This sort of shit happens ALL THE FUCKING TIME with this asshole. Holy shit, lookit the sky. I’m expecting to see a twister drop down any second now. (No, not seriously.) Just last week, I got the mail belonging to the people to the right of us, and none of our own mail. This means that the people to the left of us got our mail, and we learned that they’re apparently honest people, thankyajeezus, ’cause the title to my Jeep was among those pieces of mail. The week before, I got two pieces of mail belonging to someone three houses away, AND a bank statement that needed to be forwarded to the people who used to own this house. I guess I didn’t appreciate the mail lady at our old house nearly enough, and this bungler is my punishment. I wonder if the mail I mailed today will even reach it’s destination, or whether he’ll just lose it up his ass first. I’d change the address on all our bills to the PO Box address, but twice in the last six months I’ve had people send me packages there and never got them. Grrrr. AND I’M EXPECTING MY 3DAY WRISTBAND AND IF I DON’T GET IT, THEY’LL TOSS ME OUT ON MY ASS OR SOMETHIN’. I hate you, Mr. Mailman. ]]>

The spud came home from school Friday, very concerned. It seems that one of her schoolmates had told her that everyone HAD to display a flag for the next 30 days. I explained to her that we didn’t have a flag, so we couldn’t very well display one. She wanted to know if we were going to “get in trouble”, by which I’m pretty sure she thought perhaps we’d be arrested. Could you imagine? I’ve been ordering stuff for the 3Day like mad – a duffle bag, sleeping bag, stuff like that – and I’m amazed at how fast it’s getting here. I assumed there’d be a slow-down in the mail/ UPS/ Fedex service, but it ain’t so. Man, I feel like I’ve been waiting for the 3Day to get here for, well, 10 months or so… Forever, it feels like. Okay, that’s it for now. I have to conserve my strength, you know. If I owe you email, be patient – I’ve been incredibly lax in responding lately, and I’ll get to the majority of them in the next few days. Really! Hey, while I’m thinking of it, my journal is going to be 2 years old on October 10th! If it were a baby it’d be walking and babbling and potty-trained by now. Oh wait, potty-training comes later, doesn’t it? I can’t remember, it’s been so long…]]>

Entertainment Weekly. Renew your subscription, and give a FREE one-year subscription to someone as a Christmas gift!, they said excitedly. Even though my own subscription didn’t expire until sometime in 2002, I still considered that a pretty good deal. I mean, a year’s subscription of a weekly magazine is pretty damn expensive. I renewed my own subscription and sent the free one-year subscription to Debbie, whom I assume has spent this past 9 1/2 months greatly enjoying her weekly infusion of celebrity gossip. Today, I get in the mail a concerned letter from Entertainment Weekly. Hey, it says, remember that FREE one year subscription you sent to your sister for Christmas last year? Well, it’s about to lapse, and Debbie will be cut off from her link to the world o’ celebrity gossip! Wanna renew it? Renew it? I can do that? Well, sure I can. Except that THIS time it ain’t FREE, of course. Bastards. It’s like those drug dealers who give you a free rock or two (or so I’ve heard) and then want you to start paying. Time to go cold turkey, Deb… I was listening to Ace and TJ the other day when I was out walking (Monday, I think), and TJ, who’s the funny one (well, they’re both funny, but TJ carries the zany part of the act) started saying “crack cocaine”, and every time he said it, he said it faster, until it was one word – crackcocaine – and with a stronger and stronger southern accent, until it got to be particularly funny. I guess you had to be there…

* * * The New York 3Day was scheduled to take place the 21st – 23rd, beginning at Bear Mountain, and ending in Manhattan’s Bryant Park. I wonder how many walkers, crew members, volunteers and their relatives might be missing or dead. * * * How much does it tick me off that our insurance doesn’t cover my birth control prescription? And how much does it also tick me off that the damn pharmacist has decided to give me only one pill pack at a time, instead of the three my doctor directed so that I wouldn’t have to get a refill every month? Maybe the pharmacist thinks I’m one-a them loose women who gets extra pill packs so she can hand them out to other women, willy-nilly, and encourage them to go have sex with strange men. I believe I’ll be switching my pharmacy to another one very soon… Has anyone out there tried the Instead cup? Is it hard to get the hang of it? Is it hard to insert, and does it feel weird? Tell me about your experiences, please. I got a free sample of three, and I’m a little leery of trying right now, for reasons which you don’t really want to know. (Psst! It’s ’cause I’m on a heavy day, and the little instruction book says you should try on a light day.) Okay, I’ve shared enough for today, I think. —– Previously 2000: WHEN WILL THE SUFFERING END???]]>

here, and you can give blood locally – contact your local hospital or health care system. “These acts shattered steel, but they cannot dent the steel of America’s resolve”

* * * The spud was practicing her flute two nights ago, and she was in the midst of a verrrrrry long song, wherein she repeated the same loud, ear-piercing note over and over for, well, forever. Miz Poo, who had been snoozing peacefully on her pillow, finally lifted her head and shot a look of disgust in the direction of the flute-playing. That’s pretty much how we all felt. I dreamed last night not of burning towers or cities that looked like war zones, but that Fred had gone out, in the middle of the night, and adopted a little tan weiner dog, and I woke up to find the weiner dog – Howard – curled against the back of my legs, and when I moved my legs away from him in surprise, he responded by pooing on my pillow and stomping away on his stubby little weiner-dog legs. I also dreamed of third-world prisons. In fact, I was imprisoned in a nameless third-world prison, along with Henry Rollins. We spent the whole time screaming about the rats. Hank, I was displeased to find, was just a big baby about that sort of thing. * * * You know what really gets me? When I was younger, I had a finely honed instinct for when things were about to go to shit. A sixth sense, a feeling that something was going to happen, that “waiting for the other shoe to drop” feeling before something happened. The day Reagan was shot, I was home sick, and I had a jittery, unsettled feeling most of the morning, until I saw the news reports on TV, and then that feeling was gone. The day the Challenger blew up, I had the same feeling all day at school, until we found out what had happened. But yesterday morning, I slept in an extra twenty minutes or so, and when I rolled out of bed, after petting and talking to Miz Poo for another ten minutes, I was in a great mood. Looked forward to lifting weights and maybe cleaning the bathroom (looked forward to getting the bathroom clean, I mean. Not the actual process of cleaning the bathroom, because I’m not some sick person who enjoys cleaning) and doing some reading. I had not the slightest inkling of what was happening as I walked downstairs and set the litter boxes out to soak in the back yard. Not a clue as I sat down at the computer and checked my email. Just a day like any other, right? —–]]>

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And not only would Fred not run from the paparazzi, I’m amazed that he wasn’t jumping in the pictures of random tourists. Could you imagine getting your vacation pictures back and seeing Fred’s big grinning face standing there? “Honey, who the hell is THIS?!” I stole this survey from Noreen, but I’ve seen it all over the place recently, and god knows how much I love to be one of the cool kids! WALLET: A $5 piece o’ crap that I bought at Wal-Mart, of course. I have more wallets than you can shake a stick at, ’cause I get sick of the wallet I’m using, and instead of going through the ones I already have, I go look for a new one at Wal-Mart or Target, and then don’t want to throw the old one away… HAIRBRUSH: I have several brushes – a round one, a flat one, a regular one. I use them all indiscriminately, which probably explains the usual state of my hair. TOOTHBRUSH: Oral-B Crossaction. Purple and white. JEWELRY WORN DAILY: Honestly, I don’t wear jewelry. I used to wear my engagement and wedding rings, but since I’ve lost weight, they don’t fit anymore. I was wearing cat-paw earrings (errr, earrings that look like cat paws, not made out of ACTUAL cat paws, ’cause that would be weird and creepy) every day for a while, because if I go for too long without earrings, my left ear (the pierced part) tends to grow together. SOCKS: White cotton anklets. They have to fit just right, ’cause I can’t stand it when socks are too big and they bunch at the front of my shoe. Drives me nuts. The only time I really wear socks, aside from exercising, is if I know I’ll be doing a lot of walking – ie, a trip to Wal-Mart. PILLOW COVER: You know, I have no idea what they look like. I think they’re gold, tan and white, but I couldn’t swear to it. BLANKET: A dark red and gold comforter, which I absolutely loathe, because it’s made out of material that grabs the cat hair and won’t let it go unless I walk near it wearing black pants, in which case the blanket throws the hair at me. I plan to hit Bed, Bath and Beyond one of these days and pick out something better, something with a lot of blue, but I haven’t yet because I know I’ll end up spending a lot of money, and we’re still trying to recover from the back-to-back move and vacation. One of these days, though, I’ll take a look at that damn comforter, and I’ll just snap, and end up buying something all flowery and girly. And Fred will be maaaaaaaad… SUNGLASSES: LL Bean sunglasses, which I got from Fred for Christmas last year. Very comfortable sunglasses, which given the price, they damn well should be. Much better than the $10 Wal-Mart glasses I used to wear. UNDERWEAR: (I had to stop and look, actually) Right now, I’m wearing dark purple venezia underwear. I go back and forth between Venezia underwear and my old saggy-ass underwear that’s too big for me. As for bras, around the house I don’t usually wear one. When I have to go out or we’re expecting company, I wear one of the bras I ordered from JustMySize.com. SHOES: When I’m going out, I usually slip on the pair of dark-blue criss-cross sandals I got from Land’s End. When I’m exercising, I wear New Balance 1121s, which are the replacement for my old New Balance 572s, which weren’t giving me nearly enough support. Just so you know.

NAIL POLISH: I don’t think I’ve worn nail polish once in the last 10 years. The key to all that is Robyn can be found in the words "low maintenance." HANDBAG: I don’t know. Some crappy faux-leather dark-brown Wal-Mart purchase. It works for me, because it has two side pockets, and I use one to hold a paperback and one to hold my cellphone. KEYCHAIN: A yellow VW bug with a clock inside (which I got from Target), a yellow VW bug which I bought in G’burg, a yellow heart-shaped keychain with a smiley face on the front and some saying about god or jesus on the back, and a small silver smiley-face keychain. If it’s yellow or smiley-faced, it’s on my keyring, by god! COMPUTER: I don’t know. Some Hewlett-Packard slow-moving piece of buymeanewcomputerFred shit. FAVORITE TOP: I don’t have one particular favorite, but if it’s an oversized t-shirt, it’s good enough for me. FAVORITE PANTS: Black cotton. Or the one gray pair of leggings that are too big for me. I dress mighty sexy, don’t I? SHAMPOO/CONDITIONER: Right now, I’m using Basic So Straight shampoo and conditioner. When that’s gone, I’ll probably go back to Thermasilk. But nothing can help the horror that is my hair, believe you me. SOAP: Dove for sensitive skin. PERFUME: I have a bunch of perfume at the moment. Sand and Sable and Dark Vanilla are my current favorites, but I also have Manifesto, Love’s Baby Soft, and some Honeysuckle body spray. Oh, and True Love and Ici, too. CD IN THE STEREO RIGHT NOW: The WordGoddess cd. CAR: ’97 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo, white, and ’97 Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited, amethyst (also known as purple. Fred drives a purple Jeep!) IN THE FRIDGE: A gallon pitcher of iced tea (Fred), diet Coke (me), diet Mountain Dew (spud), water (me), lots of salad fixin’s, carrots, celery, cabbage, milk, organic eggs, leftover taco soup (for Fred’s lunches later this week), and yellow squash. Plus the usual condiments. TELEVISION, STEREO, CELLPHONE: The main TV is a Mitsubishi 60-inch rear projection system (I would personally be happier with a tv half the size, but I don’t get to make that choice), we have a Samsung 19-inch TV/VCR combo in the computer room, and a 27" TV in the bedroom. We hardly ever use any of them aside from the big one, since it’s in the living room. We don’t really have a stereo, and usually listen to cds on our computers, though we have a Bose radio in the computer room so I can listen to the radio during the day. The cellphone is a Nokia something-or-other with a yellow faceplate. I’m sure the yellow shocks you.

* * * Previously 2000: Look! It’s nay-chuh!

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