Arachnophilia?

Had another strangely detailed dream last night (no, not about Lance Armstrong again). This one featured me taking a meeting in a big conference room with my boss and another higher up at work. For some reason, I got a bouquet of flowers, which had a big brown spider on them. First my boss picked up the spider and moved it away, only to have it come back, then the other agent did, only to have the spider come back again, with a bigger and thicker web connecting it to my flowers. We then cut the web, which was practically rope-like by this time, and moved the arachnid away for the third time, but still within the room.

When I told a friend at work the dream this morning, she said it sounded as if there was something I wanted to talk to my boss and the other agent about, but that it kept getting put off. Stangely enough, I *know* I had an office in the dream. So I think that's a sign. And I'm all about following dreams, signs and portents in recent days.

To further add to the wacky heebie-jeebies, I did a quick search online for meanings of spiders in dreams, and found this on the web:

Spiders -- All spiders except tarantulas are omens of good luck. If you see a spider climbing the wall you will have your dearest wish come true and if you see a spider spinning a web you will have an increase in your income due to hard work. A large spider sitting on a telephone shows you will have a phone call that will benefit you greatly. The larger the spider, the bigger the rewards.

And then, as if that's not enough, I got an email from Maureen, completely randomly, with the following bit of trivia:

Do you know that you are never further than 3 feet from a spider at any given time?

Spooky, huh? I think I'm gonna go ask for an office again.

Link-a-palooza!!

Greetings to all my fans and friends! I'm super-psyched to share that I've booked my flight to Nova Scotia for the Celtic music festival I wrote about the other day. Yippie! I was fussing and contemplating, until a friend convinced me that I really wanted to go, and should just do it. So, like a good Nike commercial, I did.

So that's sorted, or at least on its way to sorted-ness, and in the spirit of over-sharing (and what's my happy little blog about if not over-sharing?), I'm delighted to present my first annual Link-a-palooza!!

A completely random collection of links to thing I like and find cool, inspired by the fun new banner on the top and bottom of this page, for the fan site to Joss Whedon's Firefly movie, Serenity. Check out the fan site (duh -- click on the banner), and the official blog from the set.

What else do I like lately? Reading about other people and their lives. For instance, Meg Cabot, author of The Princess Diaries, among other fun teen books.

And following all the latest TV gossip and spoilers, from E! Online's Watch With Kristen.

Also, hours spent playing video games, like City of Heroes.

And checking out the latest from Strong Bad and Homestar Runner.

On a completely different note, did you know you can reserve books and browse the NY Public Library online? You Can! Get on it!

And a couple of fun ways to while away your work day: games, more games, and movie previews!

Or maybe you're trying to find a date. It could happen.

Ok, I think that will do it for now. Now go here and remember, the internet is not the same as real life. Boys, take it home!

Whatta ya mean it's Last Call?

Going to see my boys tonight, and I can't wait!! For the first time since 1996 or '97, I think, when I saw them at the Supper Club, one of them even knows specifically that I'll be there. Though I am certain it will absolutely not end in the same situation. So there.

Actually, I want to talk to Dirk about a children's book -- or a series of them, actually. I think it could be very successful, building on his already well-established fan base. We'll see.

In other news... nah, there's no other news. Maureen and I have developed a fun new (imaginary, but don't tell her) project, tentatively entitled K.B.A. Keeps us entertained.

And now, I'm going off to get some lunch.

Synchronicity: not just a Police LP

One of the major ideas I've taken from our GiveEasy Girls meetings is the concept of synchronicity. Of things happening for a reason, of serendipitous events. It's a bit like fate, but without the sturm und drang overtones that can weigh fate down with leaden connotations. Synchronicity is happier, bouncier. More of a sense of "Hey, check it out! How cool!"

So I've enjoyed looking for the little connections. Today I finished reading a manuscript called "The Love Spell" that was all about synchronicity, and, obviously, love. A little bit wicca and a little bit wise, the author reveals that you can ask for love, can even cast spells to make it happen, but the truest realization of eros comes at the right time for it, not exactly when you're not looking for it, but when you're ready for it.

So on that note, I'm thinking a little bit more seriously about a wacky idea I had. A couple of days ago I got an email from American Airlines advertising reduced mileage awards, and checked it out, to see where I could go for the bargain rate of 15,000 miles, rather than 25,000. Nova Scotia, I found out.

Huh. Isn't that interesting, I thought. I'd never been to Nova Scotia, but something about the idea intrigued me. So, last night, with this phantom thought jogging around in my head, I went to the website of the tourist board for Nova Scotia, just to see what's what.

And found that a major Celtic music festival will be held in Nova Scotia in October.

Is it kismet? Karma? Fate?

It's something I would love to go to, but I'm a little bogged down right now in the details. Could I make it work?

Tuesday morning rant

Nothing much to say, 'cept I feel I should write something. (I'm really getting quite good with this whole html thing. Lookee my italics!)

I'm supposed to have written 8 pages on a taboo subject for tonight's GiveEasy Girls meeting, and I have about two, if you consider a completely tame non-sex scene "taboo." Which I don't. It fits in somewhere in one of the novels I'm working on, except I'm not so certain I have an interest in writing this novel anymore, so what's the point of adding in these extra scenes? It was going to be a single girl in the city style chick lit, with a dash of "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty." The idea was that our heroine imagines having sex with all sorts of men, while struggling through her otherwise tame existence searching for something real.

Jeez, that sounds thrilling. I'm sure a publisher is just going to snap that one up. Not.

I'm much more adventurous in my head. I'm supposed to go out with the girls on Thursday night to a Shecky's event thing, and I have this fab idea of picking up a guy there and finding a quiet corner for some nooky, or full on heading back to his place for some hot summer lovin'. But really, like that will happen. And then I'll just be even more disappointed than if I never thought of it in the first place. Too much planning just equals disappointment.

Take the shore party this past weekend. Or don't. None of my friends did. Which is fine, I understand. Or I can tell myself I understand. After all, it's a two-hour train ride from the city, both directions, and as it's not really my house, I'm not usually in a position to offer accomodation. So a four hour trip to a party? I'm not surprised no one came, especially as the weather was icky. But I'm one of those damn creative writer type people, and my little head can imagine all sorts of things, so when none of them happen, it just turns into a sort of non-party for me.

Plus, monsoon.

Very very tiny, that's how.

For the record, I don't buy into all that horoscope hooey, but for the second time this week, I feel the need to comment on my "quickie" horoscope of the day, as per my yahoo home page.

Ahem.

"Time crawls. Amuse yourself. Imagine how a problem would look from outer space."

Can someone please tell me what these people are smoking, and can I have some?

In other news, this weekend marks the our family's 13th Annual Shore Party. After the exciting attendance last year by a number of my friends, I fear this year I'll be stuck with only my relatives and their friends to hang with. Sigh.

Vlad the Vamp

Ok, I just had to add another blog. Maureen and I just saw Dracula: The Musical. On Broadway. Where people have to *pay* for tickets (luckily, thankfully, not us). But still.

This is what gets a Broadway debut? At least the lovely actors are getting some nice work for a few weeks. I'd be surprised if the critics even attempt to be kind, so these last few blissful days of previews are probably all the joy they have left in the world.

I really don't even now how to describe it. It was camp. It had to be camp. Otherwise, it was the stage version of those really bad, deliberately bad movies we rent purely to make fun of them. Maureen and I kept looking over at each other in our seats, squirming with glee about one or another moment of horridness. It made me yearn for the skillful performance of that thespian Keanu Reeves in Coppola's film version of Dracula, from which this musical seemed to crib costume ideas and even entire scenes.

And the flying. Lordy. Every other scene -- more than every other, really -- featured one vampire or anther winging their way across the stage on wires, floating out of coffins, or hanging upside down like a big ole bat.

Now, I love me some vampires. Used to be obsessed with Anne Rice's novels (before I got exhausted with the idea of keeping up with their publication schedule, or slogging through the florid prose), and you know that I'm one of the world's biggest Buffy fans. I'd even put Bram Stoker's novel Dracula on my list of favorite classics. So at least I could follow the story. But jeez -- there was none of the romance! None of the passion -- all just shouting and singing and the strange homoerotic relationship between Drac and Jonathan, and Van Helsing and Dr. Jack. (Poor Quincey. I mean, at least Arthur had Lucy. For a little while. Though he seemed kinda gay too. But maybe that was just his attempt at acting like an English aristocrat.) I saw none of the fire that should be between Dracula and Mina.

But then again, I keep thinking of her and Allan Quartermain in Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and my mind would get the heebie jeebies.

I need to go rewatch the Buffy episode with Dracula, just to cleanse the palate of my mind. Grr. Argh.

Horoscope, schmoroscope

Today, my quickie horoscope said "You deserve to be in love. Make it happen. Fiery magic just keeps getting better." I deserve to be in love. Nice. As if I didn't know that.

Of course I deserve to be in love. Same as I deserve fame and fortune. And nonfattening chocolate delivered daily.

But if I could just "make it happen," don't you think I would have done so already? Like I was waiting for a sign from the stars -- oh, the portents are good, Venus is in retrograde, blah, blah, blah -- but now, suddenly, now, I can MAKE IT HAPPEN! Simple. Just like that. (You can't tell, but I'm snapping my fingers.) Dude, if I could make it happen, I would so be out there making it happen. You know. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Have you any idea how long it's been since I've made it happen? But truth is, and independent research (i.e. Glamour, Cosmo, Jane, etc.) tell me that it'll just come upon me when I'm least expecting it, or not looking for it, or whatever. How can these two contradicting theories both exist in the self-same dating universe?

What I want is for the perfect guy to just be introduced to me, to be a friend of a friend, and suddenly, it'll all be smooth sailing. None of this trolling in bars, hoping the pickings aren't entirely picked over, and that I'll get picked up, rather than end up in a pickle. After a rather devastating shock and a readjustment of my ideas about some people's seeming "perfect" relationships, I want the fairy tale, the ease of friendship that is more than just friendly. I want the trashy romance novel meeting of opposites, fall-into-bed, meet-each-others-best-friends-and-family, bodice ripping, hunka hunka burning love, intimate connection.

Why is that too much to ask?

Mmwwaaa...huh?

I've been thrown for a loop.

And it's not really personal, though it involves a close personal friend. One of my best friends, in fact, who told me last night that she and her husband are separating, effective immediately.

It wasn't about a big fight, or a sudden change in their relationship, just the final realization of a long-coming idea that maybe, just maybe, they're not marriage material.

And I hate the idea of it. That a couple I saw as having such a fabulous relationship, one that I envied and yearned to emulate, could have so much else going on behind the scenes. That it could crumble so suddenly to pieces.

My friend seems to be taking it well, so far, though I think it's still in the shocking stage of things. Can I love the idea she floated last night of the two of us dating together again, while hating the fact that she has to? (Not dating each other that is, but trolling together again for guys, in a manner we haven't done since our days in London.) And how can I be the best friend I can for her? What does she need from me -- alcohol, and lots of it? Entertainment to take her mind off things? A swank new business deal?

So, ummmm... that's the latest. I'll just sit here and ponder love, then, ok?

Time keeps on ticking, ticking, ticking

Just had a lunch party at work for one of the girls, who's leaving NYC for the greener pastures of Portland, OR. Everyone's just crushed about saying goodbye, but in a sense, I envy her. It's been a long time since I chucked everything I knew and was comfortable with for the unknown. Not since I went to London after college graduation, and that was almost ten years ago now. (yikes! ten years!)

Financially I'm nowhere near a position where I could pick up and go somewhere else, though I dearly love the idea of it. Even just for a few months -- no need to make it permanent. I've thought a lot lately about the island of Inishmaan off the west coast of Ireland, and love the idea of renting a room there for a few months, bringing my laptop, and settling in. And while the possible close proximinity to a certain boy I met there once wouldn't be a bad thing, I really do believe that my interest in going has more to do with some solitude, and time to think and write.

Many of our GiveEasy Girls conversations have revolved around making the time to write, and I know it should really just be a matter of setting a time and sticking to it -- starting with discipline and moving towards an urge to write -- but I can't help feeling I'm stuck before I even get there! Even with our whole media blackout thing of several months ago, there just wasn't enough time to get everything else done that I feel should be taken care of first, before I indulge myself in my writing.

So that's just more of me whining about not having enough time, when the truth is I have chosen to do different things with my time. So there.

Back on the Wagon

Howdy!!!

Ok, so it's been literally ages, but I'm getting my butt back in gear on this whole Bloggerific thing. I spent what seems like hours yesterday and today transfering all my old blogs here to Diaryland, into a format I like a lot better than ye old "throw a bunch of text on a page and see what sticks!" The down side is I no longer have the ability to add pictures, but I figure that should inspire me to be more creative in my writing, rather than relying on the 1,000 word shortcut.

We had a GiveEasy Girls meeting last night, and I'm trying to get back on track with that, and hoped I could use a more regular blog as a semi-substitute for my morning pages. That, plus I want to take my little bitty baby steps towards working on another novel. One at a time, though. Don't want to overwhelm myself before I get started.

I also have another Reluctant Diva article due tomorrow, as a wrap-up from our triathlon adventures of this past weekend. So I won't spill anything on that now, but save it for Yi Shun's site.

So, this is a new start, and a new look. Hope you like it!