After Birth

Last night, Todd and I watched "Birth" with Nicole Kidman. It also stars Anne Heche, which they don't promote so much, but let me tell you, that woman needs to color her hair blonde again and get back to "Everwood". I think Will would agree with me on that one.

Anyway, this is the movie about the woman (our Nicole) whose husband dies, she wants to remarry, and believes her husband comes back in the form of a 10 year old boy.

If you haven't seen it, I'm not going to ruin it for you. But I will say this, it crosses the line. What line am I speaking of? The line between appropriate and inappropriate interactions between adults and children.

The movie grossed me out. Would I recommend it? Well, I stayed awake. I stayed awake after a big Mexican food dinner, in fact. The movie was just strange.

Go read this.

Jack Unleashed

Last night, I was going to let Jack out for the last time before going to bed, and as we were walking out I lost my grip on the leash. (Well, what REALLY happened was, someone put a flier on my door in hot pink paper with "IMPORTANT" written really big on it. I went to grab it and when I turned, Jack ran toward this nice little dude who lives in my building standing at the end of the hallway.)

So Jack takes off, and he realizes, as he's running, that the leash is, in fact, chasing him. It's making a very loud noise as it's dragging across the concrete, and he starts to run faster than I've ever seen an animal run in my life. Granted, I've never seen a cheetah or a tiger in the wild, but this was pretty damned fast. So after he goes toward the little dude, he turns around and passes me (I could barely see him, he was running so fast) and runs toward the front of the complex...out where the STREET is.

I hear that leash handle just clank, clank, clanking away and dragging across the concrete. Jack ran down the stairs, to the front of the complex, and I followed him. (I should mention that I was also running faster than I've ever run, and experienced an adrenaline rush that I've never had before.) I get to the bottom of the stairs, half panicked, wondering which way he went -- toward the busy street, or along the front of the complex? I stop and listen, and hear the leash being dragged toward the front of the complex and I start running after him. There are cars coming my way, I just run in front of them, toward them, so that they see me and slow down.

I have no idea where Jack is. I can't even hear him (or the leash) anymore. But I see this guy standing in the middle of the street, across the way, and he clearly is trying to help. Jack's not responding to his voice, so I start to yell for Jack again (in a voice that is 1/3 panic, 1/3 anger, 1/3 sweet Mommy voice). Jack starts running toward me...with the leash...from the medical building across the street. When he finally gets there, his torso and the leash are soaking wet from urine, because this dog can clearly run like the wind and piss simultaneously.

I walk him back toward my apartment and he is not interested in going back up the stairs or back to the apartment. He's scared to death. And when we do finally get back inside, he stays so close to me and is so sweet that I can't possibly be mad at him for my shin splints. So we lie down and get a really good night's rest.

This morning he was a little scared to go outside, cautious of everything. I guess a little worried that the leash was going to come after him again. On my way out of the apartment, I thought to look at the "IMPORTANT" thing on the door, to see just what it was. A "Chef Chu" Chinese take out menu.

Screw you, Chef Chu.

Free Bob

This weekend, at the Southlake "Arts in the Square" festival, my man Bob Schneider will be playing *FOR FREE* on Saturday night.

Come one, come all. Because all I want to do is rock this motherfucker all night long, ya'll...

(I have a feeling he won't play that tune, or many others, right there in Suburbiasoccermomville.)

Weekend Re-Cap

Friday night I had to drop some food off at the church that I promised I would bring. I'm not sure why I continue to do this to myself. I never say "no" and I over-volunteer, typically. Todd and I also have gotten to where we make plans months in advance for things, then when they come around, we can't believe that we've crammed so much into a weekend. We're always so busy. Anyway, after I dropped that stuff off, I headed to his house and we went to dinner then watched "Mystery, Alaska" with my teenaged cousin and his teenaged brother. I think there's a little situation developing there...Cute, cute.

Saturday I packed stuff up in my apartment for a garage sale. Or, rather, I got started on the garage sale packing. I have one huge trash bag full of clothes, another trash bag full of shoes, and 8 boxes full of stuff just from the kitchen and my bedroom. I can't imagine where I got all of this stuff, how I accumulated so much stuff, junk. Time to clean out and attempt to make some extra cash for the wedding. Usually, I'd donate it all, but in the interest of me (self interest, that is), I'm going to try to pawn it off on other people for cash.

Saturday night we got dressed up and drove to Ft. Worth for my mom's wedding celebratory dinner. Mom and Mike (as well as my sister and her husband) took a train trip from my hometown to Ft. Worth, on Amtrak. It was one of those wine trips, where you taste wine the entire way. (And if you're my mother, you also take tequila shots in the bar car.) We made reservations at Del Frisco's, as it was across the street from the hotel where the fam was staying. We get there, and mom and Mike haven't made it across the street yet to the restaurant. We found out later they were a little trashed and taking a little nappy-poo. They finally made it over and we enjoyed a wonderful dinner. I think when Mike started to fall asleep at the table, we decided to call it a night. Good times with the family.

I'd had a couple glasses of wine and wanted to continue my little party once we got back home, but by the time we got there I was tired. Sucks driving that far, stupid buzz kill.

Anyway, Sunday we had a picnic with the youth group kids and their families. I watched everyone play Ultimate Frisbee, which I've never seen before. I sat out because:
1. I had Jack, and needed to take care of him.
2. I had on flip flops.
3. I'll just be honest, I cannot throw or catch a Frisbee.

It was a good day, though. Those kids are so cool.

Then I came home and watched movies on TV. Haven't done that in a while. But I watched "Training Day" and realized that I no longer enjoy, in any way, shape or form, action-shoot-em-up type movies. I'm out on those. They leave me in the worst mood.

Or maybe it was PMS.