Holy Cow! I'm Famous! (but not really)

I've been really needing some good news, to put it lightly, and it looks like today was the day. Lunch with Evan in the park, which was really nice, and got me in a much better mood. Then when I got home I had a letter from the chair of the department notifying me of a sweet little scholarship. Joy came over and we went to group meditation. It was so good to see her, especially since I've been in a state of utter despair for the last little bit, and really have hardly wanted to leave my bed. But the absolute best news has to be that Napoleon was featured on Apartment Therapy!!!!!! I am so totally stoked and can't even believe it!

I have a lot of things to get done this week before I spend a whole bunch of time out of town. I'm finishing up the binding on Mark's quilt, so I'll have photos of that soon. I'm trying to crank out some Pillow Monsters to take to Tuscaloosa before I leave, as well. Friday evening I'm headed to Atlanta from whence I'll fly to Palm Beach on Saturday. Back to Birmingham via Atlanta on Tuesday, and then I head to NC on Thursday for a visit with my friends and family.

Greg went back to New Orleans yesterday morning after a long weekend visit. We got a private yoga session from Jasper on Friday afternoon, and spent all day Saturday at the last day of my class at the Shambhala Center. Greg was pumped about both activities, which is rad, and a little unexpected, honestly. The all-day session was good for me, too, though it was sometimes frustrating and definitely left me drained. We got a good nap in and dinner at Chez Lulu before the Red Mountain Family Band played at Greencup on Saturday night. Two Tears and Dan Sartain (the bands we opened for) were a lot of fun, as was the afterparty at AC Temple, despite the fact that many a man went shirtless (Why, boys? Why?), and Firewater Charlie nearly fell backwards off the porch.

Three kittens are still mewing away in some remote room of the house, and poor Theresa is working herself ragged keeping them fed, clean, and warm. Kitten poop is not awesome, I'll tell you that much. Hayley has been making the sort of dinners I wish I still made, but don't have the energy for. Jennifer is working mad overtime and planning on moving her stuff in this weekend.

For entertainment and distraction, I still can't beat Avatar, but I've also been reading Gone with the Wind (my first time reading it, though it's one of my favorite movies) and When Things Fall Apart (Pema Chodron). Sleeping is up toward the top of my list, too.

Uploading in Order to Free Space on My Mental Flashdrive

Hectic,hectic,lazy,lazy,lazy. I'm coping by making too many plans and offering favors to other people that I don't always have time for. Schoolwise I'm a wreck until Monday, and personally I have a million and one things to do before I leave for Maine on Thursday, which I'm totally impatient for anyway.

Greg and I are talking every morning, making plans for the day, helping each other out. He's going to visit after I get back from Maine, and come to the last day of my class at the Shambhala Center. Ty is supposed to be coming through town around then, too, which is great, since I always tell him he's my personal bodhisattva. Also, Jasper is going to give Evan, Greg, and me a private yoga lesson. Yay! I'm always so happy when someone starts doing yoga, or even does a couple of classes, because it's so totally awesome for mind and body, but it takes actually doing it to realize how great it is.

I'm going up to North Carolina at the end of the month, too, for a good visit with my college friends and my fam. It seems like a lot of people have been having a rough time lately (to say the least, in some cases), but I'm so glad that Guilford left us with an amazing, loving support system. When I was there it often felt too small, especially since we were young and prone to making many mistakes, but in the end I guess the drama left us all closer and wiser.

I've renewed my efforts to be mindful (read: present) in the last couple of weeks, which has in turn made me think a lot (is that irony?) about the very fine point that is the gap between opposing forces. In a lot of aspects of my life, my goal is to exist in that gap, but it's difficult to find. How do you locate prudence between unneccessary risk and overworrying, the point of being between ignoring and clinging, or forgiveness between anger and exposure to more emotional harm? Its like the gap you look for in meditation, where your inner dialogue stops for just a moment, and that doesn't happen very often for me. I guess right now I'm just glad that I'm looking for it, and that I've become honest enough with myself that I sometimes get close.

Enough personal journey stuff, though. As soon as my last exam is over on Monday afternoon, I'm going to make a whole mess of pillow monsters and bring them to Tuscaloosa to put in a friend's shop. Then when I return to Birmingham it's t-shirt printing time like a mofo. Stay tuned for greeting and news from Portland, ME.

oh, p.s., Red Mountain Family Band and Beaux Animaux played last night with Neeta (sp??), Kirby Russell, and Important Eagle. Way fun. RMFB shows are greatly improved by a reasonable number of mics. BA ruled, per usual, and have several new fans after last night. They're patiently awaiting final cuts from their recording sesh. Gonna be so rad.

Currently reading: Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa
Currently recommending: A Path With Heart by Jack Kornfield (a great book with a really unfortunate title and jacket design); The Miracle of Mindfulness by Thich Nhat Hanh (if you want to know a little about the basics of meditation); drinking lots of water; red Civic hatchbacks; Brass Bed from Lafayette, LA; summer in Birmingham, AL; awesome friends

Birthday!!!

It had been ages since I spent a birthday in a space large enough to fit more than a handful of misfits, but this year that ended. Jacob and Greg came to town for the occasion and Jason and Evan threw a rad party for Jessica and me. I got tons of love on Facebook, which site honestly makes me feel much more connected to people. Weird?

Anyway, with Rodney, David, and Anthony's help Evan wrote and recorded a song about/for me. Pretty much the best birthday present ever. A HUGE and wikkid Taschen publication called The World of Ornament was runner up (Thanks, Anne and Walter!!). Seriously, this thing is massive. It came in its own box with a handle, because it's that heavy. But I received a lot of thoughtful gifts from friends that were really just as sweet.

Evan's foray into party favor selecting yielded stick-on mustaches , so when we assessed the damage to The Rowe School on Sunday morning we discovered that a lot of things (avocados, telephones, etc.) had grown facial hair. There's not much that's funnier than a butternut squash with a mustache. Except maybe Melissa waking up with a mustache stuck to her butt, as she reportedly did.

For the first time in eleven years, there was a king cake in my house. Edible awesomeness brought to me by Greg. I consumed at least half of it myself. But now our guests have departed and the sugar-consumption has returned to normal levels. I'm back to school and work and gym, slightly older, but feeling pretty spectacular about my life here. Thanks for rocking my birthday, everybody!

Observations, Part 2

Technology is conspiring to prevent me from ever posting another photo on this blog. The good news, though, is that Apple replaced my hard-drive and now she's back to running like a dream.

Red Mountain Family Band had a great practice earlier this week. I scored Evan some brushes for his drums and he tuned the kick, so everything sounds great. I'm really looking forward to playing on New Year's Eve. Hopefully we'll be able to get to work on some new songs now that the line-up has coalesced.

Matt arrived today and is staying with us on and off until he gets settled in Birmingham. All of Alabama's children are returning. Should be fun times around here.

I'm cranking on some hand-made gifts for the young folks in Evan's family, and trying not to get sucked into Eclipse, which I decided to buy and read, even though I skipped it initially. Oh, and through an annoying mistake I have an extra copy of Breaking Dawn if anyone wants it. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you should probably keep it that way.

I'm really digging on the idea of girlfriends these days. I've been having so much fun with all of the wonderful ladies of Birmingham and it really rocks. So, stay awesome, chicas.

Google Reader has got me stoked, too. Now that I've finally started sharing stuff, it's pretty fun. And it's sweet to see what other people are into, too.