the rally

Dave and I went to Key Arena for the Obama rally last Friday. It was the windup...the pitch...the baseball metaphor to the crazy exhilaration home run of the caucuses the next day. We're so glad we went, and we're so glad we didn't take Finn because the outing was long and it was cold and, weirdly enough, the rally was not geared for toddlers. W-e-i-r-d. He would have been out of his mind and we would have had to leave long before Barack Obama reached the stage. Probably during the "Fired Up, Ready To Go" video. Yeah. That would have been when.

But yes! We went, and we even experienced a little drama. Drama! Conflict! Man vs. Nature! Man vs. Man! Man vs. Too Many Men! Man vs. Door! Man vs. Personnel!

Man vs. Nature = I said it was cold out, already, right? It was. It was cold. Super cold. And windy. Wind chill. Cold, brrr, windy. (Everybody who's moving to St. Paul: Stop laughing.)

Man vs. Man = So we parked our car, and then we walked to the Seattle Center to find the line, and found that we might as well have just stood outside of our car and waited for the line to come to us. We had to weave around and chase the end of the line because, as Dave noted, it was getting longer so very fast that it was like dominoes falling. That quickly. Vwoooooooooozh. This section should actually be called Man vs. Line. But that wasn't going to sound good up there after Nature.

But here's a new category!

Man vs. Time = See, all of this was taking place at about 10:45. The door was going to open at 11:00. We should have been there at 8:00.

Man vs. Too Many Men = The line started moving and we got very close to the Key Arena and then an announcement came over a loudspeaker that the event was at capacity. No more us go in.

NO! NO!

Tears truly came to my eyes. You may have noticed that I'm an Obama supporter. But also Dave and I got out of the house without Finn and it took a lot of doing to do it and this was going to be kind of a great date for us. We'd be getting to enjoy the event in carefree style, out of toddler managment mode. A big deal. And Dave's very much in favor of Obama himself. So we were bummed out in the extreme.

Man vs. Door = We just couldn't leave yet. We hovered around one the doors to Key Arena with a largish group of people who also couldn't quite give up the dream. We had our noses to the glass. A disappointed lady from the King County Council was lurking around in our vicinity. She had Obama's astrological chart in her pocket. We had nothing in our pocket for Barack Obama but love*. Everyone near the door was trying to figure out some kind of angle to get in. Nobody had anything.

*Perhaps a banana. Perhaps we were happy to see him.

Man vs. Personnel: A put-upon looking older security fella from Key Arena cracked open the door and squashed our hopes. Go away, people. No dice. You can listen to the speech on a loudspeaker outside**. Hope squasher! You are anathema to the whole Obama campaign, don't you realize it?! You have worked at Key Arena so long that the hope has been boiled out of you. That's it, isn't it? That's it. You're a Key Arena insider, all inside it, while we're not.

**See Man vs. Nature.

You may notice that I'm all out of Man Versuses. This is because the tides were soon to turn! Dave and I wandered away from the Door of Futility and remembered that Obama often comes out and greets the people who couldn't make it in to his events. We tried to figure out where we thought that might be. There were some people bunched up on a line across from where we were, down and then up some stairs. We headed down the stairs EVEN THOUGH WE COULD SEE THAT THERE WAS A METAL BARRICADE BETWEEN US AND THE PEOPLE OVER THERE. It was as though somebody had suddenly set us on 'random'. Hey, there are some people over there! Let's, uh, go into this bush and then try to, uh, jump up on the roof from across the street. And then we'll...we'll...tie our shoes!

But do you know who set us on random? It was angels. Angels set us on random. Or our dead fathers. Dave's dad and my dad. We decided we wanted to give them credit for this. And I'm getting chills as I type this! All right. That's it. The dead fathers are totally getting all the credit for this. Everybody who's like, Tina, dead people are dead and they don't get you into Obama rallies can sit and spin for a minute.

Down at the bottom of the stairs there were a couple of young dudes trying to jimmy a door open. It wasn't working. Dave and I turned to each other to try and figure out our next move when we looked over at the guys again and, instead of them, we saw a girl inside the arena holding the door open for us and giving us the hurry-wave in. Come on, come on!

Woohoo!! We were in! Dave yelled, "Yes, we can!" and we ran inside laughing.

We were just mouths agape at the good fortune. And it was so much cooler than if we'd just strolled in in the first place because we were so exhilarated. Man, I felt like Marcia Brady sneaking into Davy Jones's hotel room in a room service outfit. We ran to the closest, least crowded-looking aisle and headed in. We found a great spot just to the side of the top of the stairs, where we could totally see the stage below us. The stage was facing away from us, but we knew we'd be fine because he always turns around and talks to everyone at these rallies.

Man vs. Nothing! Man vs. Motherflipping Nothing!

We had to be the happiest people at Key Arena. And then, for the sweet little cherry on top, a girl waved up to us and pointed out a couple of empty seats in front of her. Her sister and a couple of friends didn't make it in, so there was no point in saving their seats anymore.

Beneficiaries vs. Further Awesomeness!

Here is where we were.

This, I have determined, is us there in that red circle that doesn't have Obama in it. It just has to be, and is. Tall person next to short person in white shirts standing in the right aisle at the right level in the right area.

We settled into our seats and waited. It was Good Mood Central at Key Arena! Everybody looked so happy, everyone smiling at everyone else. People kept doing the Wave. I love humanity's commitment to the Wave, even when it's minimal. You have to do the Wave, we all seem to agree. You don't have to do it well. You just have to get your arms up there. You can bring it if you feel like it. You can phone it in. Whatever. But very few people reject an incoming Wave out of hand. It'd be like not calling 911 at the scene of an accident, or not doing CPR when you know how when someone needs it*.

*It's not like that at all.

We checked out the crowd. Down on the floor in front of the stage...I saw...a hat on a head. A fuzzy, colorful, familiar hat...on a familiar head...our friend Morgan was down there! With our friend Deb! We stood up and started waving, and she saw us and was as surprised as we were and we laughed and mouthed things to each other and waved and blew kisses and made surprised and happy faces and "call me" phone ear hand things.

Tina, for God's sake, how was Obama! Come on! Shut up! This whole mise-en-scene business is so vastly more interesting to you than it is to us! What else did you do? Take off your coats? Have a sip of water? Shut up! Go on! Tell the part we care about.

Once Obama came out, which was four million years and three trips to the bathroom after we came in, I have to say that I was already sort of sugar-crashing from the exhilaration. He was good. I was tired. I was happy to be there. It was loud. I couldn't hear everything he said over the cheering. There were a lot of flash bulbs going off all over the arena. It was a stump speech that I'd heard most of already, sort of word for word. But it was cool to see the man in person. And there was a girl sitting next to us who was 17 and who'd skipped school with her parents' permission to be there, and she was saying she was going to call in sick to work the next day so she could caucus, since she'd be 18 by November. She didn't seem like some kind of politically active student-body-president type. She just seemed like a regular cool kid who cared. There were young people like that everywhere, and it made me really happy.

The whole day, just being with 21,000 (18,000 inside, 3,000 outside) other people all united for the same thing, felt magical and historical and cool.

i'm eating these guys for dinner

You have probably already seen this. But you know you want to see it again.

self portrait with dysfunctional mouse: pregnant with better self

My pictures keep coming out smaller than I want. C'mon, man.

Note: This is not an announcement of an actual pregnancy. I am just carrying a metaphor at the moment.

anniversary

Three years ago today my dad died. We're not having a bad anniversary. We're doing fine over here, all of us. We're having a much better day today than we did on this day in 2005, and we're appreciating that.

They have these cheap Valentine's cakes in the stores these days, single-layer cakes in plastic heart-shaped trays. I bought one of them in a stupor on the day my dad died, and stabbed at it halfheartedly with a fork right out of its tray. You can buy and eat anything you like however you like on the day somebody dies, with no shame. It's a small perk. I saw one of those cakes today but I didn't need to buy one.

Going through my folder of stuff for my show, I found this. I want to post it today even if I still use it:

When my father died, right afterwards, like in the following two or three days, I was tearing my hair out at night trying to figure out where he was. Where is he? Where is he?

I was angry that I didn't know. I was angry that we hadn't been given this information. Just for two or three days I felt this caged rage, like I had to do something, see somebody about this - not here, like a therapist, but you know, Up There. The Management.

Like, some customer service here, motherfuckers.

And I felt at night,
those two or three nights, in bed,
like a child. Like a real child.
How you don't know how it works.
How amazing it is that your mother or father can drive a car.
How they know how to get somewhere that's half an hour away.
How they know where to go on the freeway, when I can't even see all the way out of the side window of the back seat. I'm too short.
How they can get the car all the way to the airport with me in the back seat lying down looking up at the perforations in the leather on the roof the car. The ceiling of the car.
They didn't need anything from me, I had nothing to give,
no knowledge was required of me.
Squired from point A to point B.

I felt that way when my father died, in my bed those nights,
like I had just been squired from point A to point B
but this time I didn't know who was driving
or what point B was other than backwards to where I didn't know anything at all.

I could see the ceiling of my room, and the red walls leading up to the ceiling, and the white moulding along the length of the ceiling, and then it was just ceiling and all I knew was that my father was somewhere on the other side of the ceiling.
But on which side? To the left or to the right?
When I address him, which way should I look?
Up, right? But up and over?
Straight up? Up and to the left?
How many feet? A hundred feet? Four feet?
Fifteen feet up and four feet to the left, but just out of this world?

And after those two or three days passed I was an adult again and I wasn't interested in where he was. Just how he was.

self portrait: practicing not thinking so much

hasty self portrait in before midnight...

...which looks more like Leslie Caron but whatever. I posted!

of late i am cranky

I don't know who or what is retrograde where but whatever you say to me, whoever you may be, I am liable to take it wrong and stew about it and make up imaginary scenarios that take it one step further and get all worked up - until I catch myself. And then I practice this idea I've been reading about and say to myself, I'm not angry. My mind is angry. Look at my mind. Look at that. It's angry. Hmm. Hmmm. I see. I see it.

And then I'm able to understand that the person crossing in the crosswalk who has a walk sign but who's crossing when I'm waiting to turn left over that crosswalk, that person isn't fucking with me. That person is all right. Free to go. And so are you, whoever you are. You're free to go, too, you person who accidentally with your mouth stepped on a landmine in my head.

But I'm a teeny tiny cranky time bomb/minefield of late. Go figure.

i could be a better time manag-

Happy Holidays, everybo
PANIC
I still have a few presents to wra

!!!!

Gotta g

nablopomo day 30: hoot! hoot! bing bong gong ding ding!

At first I was like, what me thinkin'? Doing National Blog Posting Month like this. But I love it and I'm one of the people who's going to take this daily blogging thing and keep doing it. Except for weekends or if I'm crushed under a bookcase. Earlier in another post I was all, I'm going to do National Blog Posting Thirty Years instead. I was greatly underestimating my love of communicating things to people all the time. I try my hardest not to come across that way in person. It's important to me to be a person who doesn't talk people's ears off. You're welcome!


But I really like writing people's eyes off. I think it's a generous thing to do because I can be rambling on and on and you can simply walk away from the screen and run a bath. And I will never know. Well, I might know. I could see you in person and be like, so tell me what you thought about paragraph four of the post of December 12th! And if you're not like...oh, yes, the Chinese restaurant story, very winning...then I'll know. But I'm not going to ambush you like that, unless you're Dave, and then I'm only going to do that the minute I wrote the post and dragged you over to the computer to look at it and read it over your shoulder while you were reading it and asked you all the time which part you were chuckling about. I won't do it two weeks later. Dave. So don't worry.


Finally, I introduced these guys way back at the beginning of NaBloPoMo and then I totally abandoned them. So here they are in their final star-studded appearance. You will surely have to click to enlarge or else you are truly, truly bionic. If it doesn't work, tell me and I will...do something. I don't know what that would be. I will try and fix it! I don't know how I would do that. But...something!

nablopomo day 29: peekaboo blue

I just got my hair cut short. I believe that I am largely in favor of this haircut. My lovely hairstylist told me of a client who has three subtle areas of "peekaboo blue". This idea pleases me. I want to do it.

Like this, maybe:

nablopomo day 28: i meme me

Oh, will you look at that? I've just tagged myself for a meme. Tina! Really?! You want to know a hundred things about me? Oh, man. That's great.

A hundred things is a lot of things, so feel free to space out or play Free Cell or something while I'm doing this. This shit is self-indulgent in the extreme. I know.

Oh, screw it. I'm just going to do 28 things. For the 28th day of NaBloPoMo.

28 things...I don't even like to say "about me". That should be one. But it's not:

1. When I'm tired, often I will say, "Ooh la la" to express it.
2. I went to high school with a guy named John Belcher.
3. I went to college with a guy named John Burpee.
4. Before every performance, if I take a sip of water, I will burp four thousand times.
5. I get scared that I will go on stage burping.
6. This has never happened.
7. Also before I go on stage, I like to touch the walls backstage to feel their temperature.
8. Noticing cold or warm things with my hands calms my nerves.
9. 1983, end of freshman year in high school, voted Best Personality.
10. 1986, end of senior year in high school, expecting to receive this accolade again.
11. Voted class clown instead.
12. I'm sort of pleased, but also think, "Has my personality eroded?"
13. Also won "Patriot Award" at a special assembly where people's parents come and it's a surprise and everything and it's this deep honor.
14. Missed the assembly because my brother was graduating from Harvard.
15. Found this out after we returned from my brother's graduation.
16. Found out that my parents had known it all along.
17. Never knew why I won that award.
18. Am still mad.
19. When I say "am" without "I", I feel like I'm trying to be Bridget Jones.
20. I don't like to feel like that.
21. When others use the am-without-I construction, I am jealous of their freewheeling, not-caring-if-they-sound-like-Bridget-Jones ways.
22. I care too much what other people think.
23. I work against that as much as I can.
24. When I eat Indian food, I don't know or care if I'm full.
25. I love Gossip Girl.
26. Shut up. I love it. I don't care.
27. See 22 & 23.
28. I feel the pressure of this last item. This list should end with bang. It would be good it if were funny. But also extra-revealing. Shocking, maybe! Okay.
28. I'm pregnant!
28. I am not pregnant.

nablopomo day 27: animal orchestra

Welcome to the homestretch of National Blog Posting Month. We have accomplished a lot, have not we? Nearly thirty posts pressed together, doubtlessly boring my ones of readers with their sheer manyness. Like if you're my friend, and I send you one nice juicy email, that's probably kind of a treat. But if I do it thirty days in a row, you're probably like, okay, Tina. We're all caught up. If I send you thirty emails over the course of thirty years, however, you'll treasure each one a little more. Next time, I'm going to do National Blog Posting Thirty Years.

That said, let's take a look at my favorite of all of Finn's little books.



Animal Orchestra. It came out in 1958, and it's got all the wit and style of its era. Subtle pleasures abound in here! Okay. So, the premise is, it's Musical Day in Animal Town and the town orchestra is going to play and it's very exciting for everyone. I'll just show you my favorite bits.



Man, I love these nattily dressed musicians heading in for the show. The fox, the seal and the giraffe are all working the collar-up look (figs. 1, 2 & 3) and the llama, monkey and leopard are all sporting elegant, colorful scarves (figs. 4, 5 & 6). I want to give it up for the bear's scarf (fig. 7), but I just can't quite do it. That's a muffler. A muffler is a much smaller sartorial risk than a scarf that looks like it was tied by a Frenchwoman. In fairness, I can't see how the leopard's scarf is tied, but his scarf makes the cut because it's fucking Schiaparelli pink.



All right. Here's the audience waiting for the show. The best guy on this page is hands-down the owl (fig. 1). Can you believe how skeptical this motherfucker is? I love it. He's like, everyone is telling me this orchestra is very good but I will believe it when I see it. I could be at home reading Trollope. I also love the Great Dane (fig. 2). This guy is a serious fan. He's a classical music lover and he looks like he's getting into a nice meditative state to savor the evening's offerings. It's also interesting to note that most of the animals are wearing clothes, but some species tend toward nudity. The birds are all nudies, and so are the reptiles. And some of the mammals are like, well, if no one minds, I will also be nude. The baboon, for example, and the mouse. But I just want to give props to the moose or whoever that is (fig. 3) for wearing another of those fabulous scarves. I love men who have the balls to wear scarves. ("Men".)



I just think this fox has got it going on. I love how he's perched on the chair and getting into it. I bet this fox makes great time with the ladies.



The llama! Come on, man. He's wearing a bright pink suit and he's spitting! Balls to the wall, llama. I salute you.



Okay, so the show's over and it was a smash hit. I love the zebra's grin (fig. 1). That guy is a cute patootie. And the manic look in that cat's eyes (fig. 2) is great, too, I think. You know she's going to go home and write a letter to that fox about how she's the president of his fan club. She appears to be underage and so I hope the fox acts responsibly. It's tough to predict. And (fig. 3)the Great Dane! You'll notice in the previous audience picture that he's got a jacket on. Well, he threw it to the wind! It's gone. It's not on his lap. It could be on the back of his chair. But he also could have eaten it, because he is letting it all go tonight! The evening was everything he thought it was going to be. And best of all once again is the goddamned owl (fig. 4). He is a convert. Enough said.



Finally, I want to give a shout out to the orchestra itself. The text (if you can't read it) says:

The conductor bowed, and bowed and bowed.
All of the orchestra players were proud.

I love how just about everybody is letting their pride show on their faces (fig. 1). They're all smiling and bright-eyed. But the Rhino (fig. 2), God bless him, is all dignity. He's a professional. He's not going to show it. He probably thinks he just did his job, and these accolades maybe embarrass him. But you just know he's going to go home and weep into his pillow because of all the love that came their way. There's something behind his eyes that makes it look like he's just barely holding it all together. Rhino's gotta learn to let people in. I love him.

Animal Orchestra, ladies and gentlemen.

nablopomo day 26: self portrait with dave

This is some down-to-the-wire, up-to-the-minute posting. We're watching the movie* right this second. The day is almost gone. This will have to do.

nablopomo day 25: it really looked like it.

So. I was in the bathroom at the grocery store today.

Before I say anything else, I want to say in my defense that I hadn't eaten anything yet all day. I was woozy! Okay? Know that I was woozy.

I was in a stall, and the...personage in the next stall left and I saw the "leg" and "foot" of the personage and I was like

OH MY GOD IT'S A REINDEER. THERE'S A REINDEER IN HERE.

It was total wonderment.

For a second! Then I knew that it was a person with a cane.

But it looked like this!



That looks like a goddamned reindeer leg. It really does.

I wish it looked like that. It didn't look like that, all "sinewy" and "leg-shaped". It wasn't a cane like that. It was, frankly, a cane like this:



Yeah. Just straight up and down like that. So I'm super crazy.

I cannot stress enough the importance of a good breakfast.

nablopomo day 24: aussie! aussie! aussie!

Oi! Oi! Oi!

Elections just happened in Australia, and their conservative prime minister -

this crankypants right here, John Howard - has just been voted out of office after eleven years! The Labor party candidate won! And now Labor is in control all over Australia!



Hello, Kevin Rudd! Congratulations.

PLUS! The Green party now holds the balance of power in the senate, so ain't nothing going to fly without their say-so. Go Earth!



We Aussie battlers - large, small, and ersatz alike - are going to celebrate tonight. We're going to have

meat pie and chips but not with the new prime minister and a morning television personality dancing on it. I will also make it without the words "iStockphoto" on it.

Also, I'm going to make pavlova....



....delicious, delicious pavlova, the nationally beloved dessert of Australia.

Crikey! Have a go, ya mug! Ratify the Kyoto treaty! Be a harbinger of things to come*!

*It's the only kind of harbinger you can be, I think. You never hear about any other harbingers. Poor other harbingers with their low, low profile. Maybe they like it that way. Maybe they're a private people.

nablopomo day 23: no one will care if I don't post

Except me. I will care. But this will be the tiniest post ever because I'm being a pirate on Facebook right now and so is Dave - on different computers - (we are the sexiest! couple! in! the! world!) and we keep throwing bombs at each other and leaving monkey/dynamite booby traps for each other and oh my god you guys it's awesome. It's like we're connecting, you know?

When we renew our vows someday I want us to do it on

this deserted Facebook pirate island. We can SEARCH FOR SOME BOOTY IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN oh man that is rich arrgh I be killing myself. Killin' myself. Killing myself sounds like I am taking my life. I'm not taking this life! I've got gold to live for, and monkeys!

Arrgh, back to enemy waters. Tomorrow I'll tell you about me voiceover I did today. This old salty dog loves doing voiceovers.

nablooblygooble day 22: self portrait

nablopomo day 20: self portrait

nablopomo day what is this? 19?: for my consideration

I'm cooking the Thanksgiving meal this year. Vegetarian, no problem, I grew up that way. As long as I can use butter and eggs and cheese and cream and milk, we'll eat well. The trick this year? Making food for our guests - a pair of beloved, ancient and finicky vegans.

The vegan part isn't even a problem. We'll do a split of lacto-ovo and vegan offerings. No sweat. It's the ancient and finicky part. That's what's freaking me out a little.

we've got a real type of thing going down

Finn constantly wants us to turn this mother out. It's in heavy rotation in that funky little mind.

I'm halfway through a birthday party out in the world. I came home to get Finn to sleep. It's halftime and Dave is the entertainment at the sleeperbowl. I have to get back in there and close the deal. What we don't need right now is the funk. He's a little overfunky in there. That's supposed to be mama's job tonight.

nablopomo day 17: self-portrait