The Bloggy Blogface!

From the Latin ruber meaning  red , ruby is a gemstone that is pink and blood-red in color and for the longest time I thought sat alongside three other gems on a ring my mother used to wear. The gems on that ring are birthstones - two garnets, one turquoise, and what I thought was a ruby but was actually topaz, for November, my father's birthday. I always thought the ring was a neat little feature, one of the more demure ways to show affection in our home. My parents have been married for a long time. For their silver anniversary, I gave them a fun photo frame featuring them on their wedding day with "25 YEARS" engraved at the bottom. In the photo, my parents are all smiles and looking good like most Nixon Administration newlyweds did back then. My grandparents stood on their opposite sides - my mother's parents next to my father, his folks next to my mother. I wonder if during the days leading up to the wedding if there were any jitters, maybe some slight hesit...

10 better things the puppy justice warrior could have done instead of sticking a note under the car wipers 1.  They could have peeked their nosy asses into the car a little bit more and see the puppy dressed in a warm sweater while wrapped up in a North Face sleeping bag. 2.  They could have seen myself or a friend head out to the car every fifteen minutes to check on him and run the engine some. 3. They could have actually grown a pair and instead seek us out inside to invoke their passive-aggressive wrath. 4. Had they actually grown a pair and encountered us inside, they would see we were merely waiting for our to-go food order. Those do take a little bit of time to prepare, especially when the place is particularly busy. 5. In the time they searched their car or purse for an empty envelope and pen to jot down their perceived puppy mistreatment rage, they could have once again just searched for us inside to inquire. But I understand it’s better to puff on...

January 2015: First email of the new year came from Glimmer Train, listing their 2015 submission schedule. Notes from my mother and sister, the latter's birthday coming a few days after the new year (I didn't send her a card this time around.) Healthcare.gov reminders. An old friend from Louisiana saying hello, who apparently now lives in Australia. More emails from Glimmer Train. Happy birthday emails from my parents and sister. A starred PDF file of a magazine write-up I did for an off-Broadway show in 2013. I check out a poetry slam, my first since moving down here. Parents write to tell me New York City is getting snow. I begin to notice my laptop is dying a slow death. February: More Healthcare.gov reminders. A picture of myself I sent to myself. A Glimmer Train 2/28 deadline reminder. My skin develops a rash from what appears to be the new body wash I'm using. Some strange drama with my niece's family I don't fully understand, but seems unsurprising. Suffer...

   When I was nineteen, I used to send away perforated info request cards to all of the colleges I was interested in transferring to back then. I found these cards inside college guides stored away in a top secret location that definitely wasn't behind the safety curtain inside the campus theatre. Hundreds of these guides shrink-wrapped and stashed away because I guess admissions must have ordered way too many. The school was almost a direct pipeline to the bigger four-year state school system anyway, so for most these guides were pretty pointless. I managed to steal a pack of five guides and stashed them away in my car one morning between classes. My parents were not at home when I returned with the guides, which was probably a blessing of sorts in disguise. I began my research in earnest, flipping through page upon page of stunning campus images and corresponding business reply cards. I didn't have a set plan as to where I might send these cards out to, or if I would actu...

   The other night, I had big dreams I was going to take better control of my awful eating habits.This always begins with emails from my parents. What's interesting is that during their emails, they never mention food. It's a topic that simply never comes up. But, I know what's in their kitchen. I know it's full of packaged nonsense with preservatives and sodium and every possible loaf of bread imaginable, all of it mostly jammed into the refrigerator. My parent's fridge is one of great legend. Friends and lovers are always told amazing tales of the fridge's far-reaching depths of foodstuffs packed to the brim. Unfortunately, it is packed to the brim with utter nonsense. Foods they don't need and loads of dairy products that make my intestines rumble just thinking about it. The fruitless endeavor of trying to get them to change their diets goes in one ear and right out the other. And while I'm not about that packed fridge life, its existence alone reaff...

To the girl I went out for coffee with once, whose email keeps sending me spam now Hello there,    Long time no see! Well, I guess we're not really seeing each other, but you know what I mean. I do hope you remember me. Although I guess you really don't have to, if you don't care to. It has been awhile. It might be cool if you did remember me, though. If you'll recall, we went on a sort of mini-date one time. It was mini because all we did was meet up at a Starbucks for about an hour. I ordered a small black coffee, which you felt the need to comment on how weird that was. And that's okay! You ordered a light triple soy low fat chai gluten free vegan mocha amarettiofrappachiano or something along those lines. You were very well dressed, sporting a fun purple top and nice-fitting jeans for the occasion. It was a fun time! I really did enjoy hearing you talk about your own life for almost sixty straight minutes, topped off with the only query aimed toward me. ...

I am the anonymous person who keeps checking your LinkedIn profile Good Day!      I hope you don't mind my constant, weekly intrusion into your LinkedIn profile, but I just cannot seem to help myself. I do not know if we know each other, or how I even wound up here in the first place, yet here I am. I totally stumbled onto your page, haha! Remember that line? Anyway, let's talk about whatever our connection may be here. I take note of your extremely vague profession listed under your name there. Is it even a real profession? You list three things, one of which is "consulting." Not even sure what that means, but hey. Seems like you have a lot of stuff going on with your "profession" there. A jack of all trades! And this whole consumer goods field - does it entail something important? Again, I am not sure. Perhaps you are a jack of all trades in a variety of ambiguous fields. This sounds like a very keen skill set to have in today's eclectic marke...