"Try never get drunk outside your own house." Jack Keronac

This is a no brainer. One factor, no one should hit the road after having a few but the cost of buying a few cocktails has gone up so high that you need to take out a loan to get a good buzz on at a bar these days! Even at a dive bar, a martini can be as high as $10 a drink, at most bars in LA it's up to $12! There has always been a 100% mark up on liquor but these days I think it has gone up to 150%! Damn! For the cost of three drinks I can buy a full 1.75 liter bottle of fine booze for the same cost and I can make my drinks stringer!

There is a classic 1940 movie titled
The Lost Weekend" where a man with a major drinking problem take $10 and with that he buys five drinks at a bar and buys two bottles of booze! Now that was the good old days!

So here to mixing your own and cheers!

"What we have here, is a lack of communication"

"Submission to everything, open, listening" - Jack Keronac

I once heard a New Age female preacher state, that listening is one of the greatest act of love. There is so much truth in that statement, for how often have you been fighting with a love one and you found yourself shouting at them:"You're not listening to me!" ?

Why do you think people are so willing to dish out $100 dollars an hour to an therapist, just so they can talk to a person , who will just sit back an LISTEN!

One of the most frustrating things a person can do to me, that makes me want to stick a fork in their neck, is to cut me off before I finish a sentence, so they can jump in with their opinion! It's maddening!

The art of listening is also a sign of great intelligence! Any fool can have an opinion but an intelligent person, sits back, observes and listens!

Last night, while having dinner with my friend Steve, at a little cafe in Old Towne Pasadena, there was a very young,attractive, Japanese couple sitting next to us. It was Friday night, Date Night, but these two young people were more involved with their Smart Phones than they were with each other! She was on her Face Book page-heaven only knows what she was texting on it, and he was playing some game on his Apple IPhone! They spoke only a few words to each other, even when their food arrived they barely spoke a word to each other!

I turned to my friend and said:"If they are so involved with their cell phones now, when they are young and in love, can you imagine what they are going to be like 20 years from now, when the mystery of love has faded and they are all too familiar with each other? Most women don't bitch about being neglected until two years after marriage. But the norm of ignoring one another has already been set! What is the bridge that brings these two lovely people together? Sex? And after sex, do they pick up their Smart Phones and text about it?

Has this new technology taken away the art of true communication?

"Winter is coming"

Anyone who is a fan of "The Game of Thrones" will get that jest. Summer is just a few days away from ending and with it begins my favorite season of the year, Autumn! I love Fall, the period of harvest and weather change, shorter days and cooler nights. Indian Summer with it's hot afternoons and it cold evenings But most of all, I love the brilliant colors of the season. Even in California we have some trees that leaves change color of bright orange, deep red and dark browns.

I find myself harvesting memories of my departed, beloved mother and the beautiful road trips we would take up the coast, as soon as the long Labor Day weekend had passed.

Now I must also, harvest ideas for my new life alone and harvest the dreams of my past and plan seeds of a new future. I once heard on the Rosie O'Donnell Show, that sometimes we should treat our lives like a school year, give ourselves a goal and give ourself the time a school year takes to reach that goal.

So, I enter a new school year for my life and put into action becoming the woman my dearly departed parents would be proud of!

Greeting from the edge

Just when I thought all the dust of disorder has began to settle down and I can move on with my life, another monkey wrench of fate has been thrown into the works and my life falls into a vortex of confusion. After our last storm system, I noticed that my roof was showing signs of leaks! Rats! So for the pass few weeks contractors have been by giving me their song and dance and giving me quotes on the estimated cost on installing a new roof. Price quote went from OMG to WTF! The big end construction companies quoted over ten grand!!!! Do they think, I'm made out of money! And I live in a very humble, one story, three bedroom house! What are the cost for the big, two story mansions in Southern California? I feel emotionally exhausted from listening to these contractor give me their facts and figures as if I'm been interviewed by a vampire! This is not the time to give up drinking!

Don't know how I'm going to come up with the cash but I do have a CD that is due to mature. Damn, this house has become a money pit! But, I really shouldn't complain. When I see the images from Japan, i grateful I have a roof over my head, even if it has leaks! It's not just the earthquake but damn; the destruction of that tsunami! My heart went out to they.

This Sunday my friend Steve and I went to Little Tokyo in downtown Los Angeles and there was a group of kids collecting for the earthquake relief and of course Steve and I just had to make a donation. But really, I can't image what those poor people are going through; even with those nightmare photo; those people lost everything!

So who am I to complain over paying for the replacement for a roof!My prayer are with you in Japan!

Mourning becomes Electra

I haven't posted for months-due to the fact that since my mother's death I feel adrift in a sea of grief, What drives me wild, is that in this culture people want to expedite sorrow. I've been told to lift up my chin and get on with on with my life! Really? My mother was my touch stone, the one person I feel who truy love me, for who I am nit who they think I am! She shared all my secrets and my dreams and now she is gone and I have no one to share these things with! I loss my closeness friend and dear companion! For the pass seven years I was her care giver and now I'm also out of a job and it's not easy finding a new job with a seven year gap in your resume. But I don't mind! It was the best seven years of my life, they were golden and I love that fact that I care take care of the woman who took care of me! We made great memories! Now; I'm alone and lost!

Mother's Little Helper

Post Mother's Day thoughts. A few weeks ago the TV program 20/20 did a spot on mothers who abuse alcohol and as usual with TV they highlighted only the dramatic details of devil fire water but didn't really deal with the issues of why these women turn to alcohol to help them cope with the stresses of motherhood. The media, in this post Woman's Lib Era, seems to want to put the glam into motherhood and almost want to canonize famous women who embrace motherhood by not only having their own but adopting children from every third world nation on the planet but never seem to adopt a child from their own homeland. What the media doesn't tell or show is the fact that these women, being rich and famous, have "HELP"! They have nannies and servants to deal with the demands of child care, so they can continue their own brilliant careers. But the average woman must wing this job alone. And raising children is a JOB! A job that is 24/7! And it can be alienating and frustrating and so demanding that a woman can get so lost with meeting the demands of her children, she forgets to take care of her own needs, I use to work with children,. While in college I was a teacher's aide and I loved working with the children but damn; it was the most exhausting work I ever done. I would be so joyful, that after work I could go home, relax, read, study and enjoy alone time, but the mother's of these kids have no evening down-time! All the women on the program, were married and they all seem to suffer from an emotionally detached relationship with their husbands. Little wonder they drink! One needs to be praised and petted for doing a good job but what praises do mother's get? One holiday a year? I recall the big news story of a young woman, who when asked why she left her husband and small child to run off with another married man, she stated that she felt no one would really miss her. My heart broke for her, for you could see, she truly felt that she had no feelings of self-worth within her own family, We all need to feel important! That the work we do in our family does have value and that we our loved! I admire women such as Bohemian Mom, who cope with the stress of single-motherhood, with art and poetry, Art and poetry is hard to do when one minds is on bills and everyday living. So, what is this all about, Hug your mother and thank her everyday! Mothers of the world I lift my glass of champagne to you!

"Put the blame on Mame..."

Ever since Eve talked Adam into taking a bite out of that silly apple, women have been blamed for everything that goes wrong with the the world. Now there is an iranian cleric, Hojatolesiam Kazen Sedighi, who has made the insane declaration, that the cause for all this current world-wide earthquakes is due women dressing immodesty and there for leading men astray from the moral codes of Islam? Say what? What does immodesty have to do with a natural disaster? What :The Gods most be crazy"? Besides, if women dressing sexy keep your men's minds off of making car bombs, then ladies, let's lower that neck line and shorten our hem lines!