Addendum and so on...

Point, the First: I sashayed through a local AT&T store to see what they're offering and promising. The guy there (what does one call them these days: clerk? salesman? cell service facilitator?) on hearing where I lived informed me in no uncertain terms that the only cell phone service who actually had service to my area is--AT&T. Actually I believed him, which only made me more pissed off with SPRINT for having strung me along for all this time. Stupid stupid stupid--they got some money from me, and in return garnered a huge amount of ill will. I Shall Not Forget....
Point Two: Twitter is terrific for live blogging a conversation. I watched the Oscars tonight with Neilochka, KarlErickson, Schmutzie, and Suebob--and we were all in different cities, if not states, if not countries.
Number Three: This is the Habu Wool/Stainless Steel yarn. The colors are sort of off: the blue is inkier and the beige is not so gray. It's very, very, VERY fine. Habu sells it as a kit to make a cardigan of sorts, but I don't have enough for that, I don't think. So maybe I'll make a scarf. Or maybe I'll just admire it for a while.

The Grammy's

I don't know that I've ever watched them before. I didn't intend to watch them tonight. But I did and now I don't know why this is my first time. I watch the Oscars, but then I go to movies. I watch the Emmy's, but then I see a lot of TV. The logical assumption, one would think, is that I don't listen to music. I do, except that I resist a lot of the time, and until tonight, I didn't really know why. Now I do.

Music just gets to me too much. Watching the Grammy's, I kept finding myself in tears. I cried over Cirque du Soleil's Love and Ringo Starr presenting the award to George Martin. I cried over Rhapsody in Blue and Great Balls of Fire. I cried when I sang Good Golly, Miss Molly (with Little Richard) to my dog who didn't know WTF was going on. I cried when Josh Groban sang and I cried when Herbie Hancock played.

All night, the tears were there because music--whatever the genre--just gets right into my heart.

Here She Comes...

When I was a kid, watching the Miss America contest was right up there with watching the Oscars. Yeah, it's been a joke all these years since, but I was willing to see if they could actually make it more relevant and contemporary and all those other things that they've been advertising. I watched the Miss America Reality Check where the judges were trying to get the women to lose the makeup and the hair spray--and they did for that show, pretty much. In the ads for the actual contest, you could see that we were supposed to think of Miss America as another American Idol or Dancing With The Stars. But someone forgot to tell the organizers of the state competitions, because by and large what they've put in front of us would be sneered off the stage by the likes of Cowell and Bruno. In the talent competition, there was only ONE contestant that was remotely 21st century. The others were ballet dancers (make that mediocre ballet dancers) opera singers, and a violinist, who wasn't bad but what do I know about violin playing?

I've been live Twittering the finals, so if you want to see my scoop, eyes right:

The Golden Globes

So I did my bit for Hollywood and NBC and watched Dateline. Maybe I'll check out the press conference; maybe not. I'm on strike, after all.

Speaking of globes, have you heard about the newest import from India? It's a car called a Tata. Did no one tell the Indians that tatas are boobs? Yes, yes, I know the car was named after the guy who created it, Mr. Tata--but still, if Henry Ford had been Henry Breast, whatever would he have called his car? Mr. Tata and the Tata.

I'm really looking forward to the advertising campaign on the Tata. Will they have, as usual, buxom beauties hanging over it at the car shows? Or will they just stick a big nipple on the hood?

Doglessness: A Report From the Front

If this were truly a WWII story, it might be titled: Sans Chien. However, not only is it not a WWII story, it is being written by someone who, although she is a WWII buff, and carries the complete set of LIFE magazine from the war years with her to every new place she lives, is not watching Ken Burns documentary. I simply don't have the patience to sit through concurrent nights of watching a doc play out. Better, by me, to program it twice a week, or even once a week. Then I'd set my DVR and watch at will. But recording it as it airs means jamming my DVR with Ken Burns--and then what would happen to Survivor China and Dancing With the Stars and Top Chef? So, I'll forego the pleasure, figuring I'll catch it one of the nine million times it plays during Pledge Week. Besides, since I have no water cooler around which to gather with my workmates, why do I need to be au courant???

So what did I do this weekend?

1. Saturday afternoon I sat at Knitique and pulled out the jumbled rows on my rust swing coat (you do remember that one, don't you?). Unknitting can be slower than knitting, particularly when one has ants in one's pants and can't sit still for very long. However, I persevered and I prevailed and I am now once again at the point of the swing coat knitting where the instructions make no sense and I'll probably fuck it up all over again. I think I'll save it till tomorrow, when the wondrous Danielle can figure it out for me.

2. Saturday night I shed a few tears for the missing Molly and then watched the Emmy's. Yeah, I know, they were on last week, but I didn't watch them because...because....I was trying to be a good housemate and not inflict my trashy TV taste on the other inhabitant of the house.

3. Sunday I got up, drank my day-old coffee, read the paper, and prepared to unpack my Fall/Halloween stuff. But I was totally surprised by a phone call from my stepson and daughter-in-law inviting me to dinner. It was really telling how quickly mymood went from stoic Dealing With Life to over-the-top Joyous. Once again, I'm reminded of how much those kids mean to me, that whatever the BS with their father, they are my kids, my family and I need them.

4. Before I drove to the Bay Area, where they live, I stopped in Lodi, to check it out as a place for my shop. I don't think so.... It was dead, dead, dead on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. Only one store was open in the area that I was contemplating. Well, two stores, but one of them was having a Going Out Of Business sale. And another store had a For Sale sign in the window, and another was just plain empty. I liked the idea of Lodi because it is close to Elk Grove and I could do the shop and stay in this house. But I know how iffy starting a business is, and I'd like to at least give myself a fighting chance by picking a good location. So, it may be the Bay Area or the Coast for me. Which considering the fact that both sons and daughters-in-law are there, would probably be a good place to be.

5. I spent the night, sleeping in their guest room, which always inspires me to come home and decorate.

6. Which I am doing...and I will post photos and other grand illusions--eventually.

the Oscars

It is 10:30 pm EST & despite ABC's efforts to liven the proceeding, I--yawn--don't know how I'm going to make it to the end of the show. I'm already at the "don't really care" stage--and only one of the major awards (Best Sup. Actor) has been announced.

Maybe that's the problem. The efforts to focus on all the unheralded below-the-line categories is admirable...but ultimately tedious. All the SNLish bits can't make them less so.

Okay, the first good award just got presented, but I'm not going to: I'M NO SPOILER!!!