A rose by any other name...

Props to everyone who guessed Baby Girl's name is Seven.

But no, it's not.

It's not Apple or Moxie Crimefighter or Zuma or Inspektor Pilot or Sparrow or anything else equally. . . ridiculous.

In fact, let's talk about names.

Although I have lots and lots of concerns about having a girl (I stress a little less every day because to quote the movie, that little doodle can't be undid), the ONE thing that I thought right away was, "Well, at least clothes shopping for her will be more fun."

This was immediately followed by the additonal relief that we wouldn't have to think of a boy's name. Boys' names are hard. Our girl name we had all picked out and ready to go.

I'll announce it eventually, but I'll give you some hints. If you want to guess it, you can send me an email and I'll tell you if you're right. (And no DeNae, the first right answer does NOT win the baby.) Your hints: the name is Biblical, has four letters, and starts with a vowel. Enjoy.

Now, this was the name we came up with before we found out Baby G was of the male persuasion, so we've basically been holding on to it for over two years and we still love it. I think that's a great sign. It's just one HUGE less thing to worry about in a pregnancy during which I am a constant knot of anxiety, convincing myself each day that something new and horribly wrong has occurred to the little jelly bean residing in my womb.

If I had to think of a boy name? Uhhhh . . .

Let me tell you a sad story. For a long time, a boy name would have been no problem. James, my first one, was easy. That's my brother, father, grandfather and his father's name. Duh. I happen to love that name and knew from the time I was a kid that I would name my first son James. Just like I knew my second son would be William (another family name), Will for short. And no, I didn't worry about some vague future husband and his opinions. I can be remarkably bratty persuasive.

But my hopes for a Will were dashed because James got a brother named William from his dad and stepmom before I was even dating anyone. It's not like they knew I wanted the name or that I would have thrown a fit even if they did. Yeah, right. I had no idea if I'd ever even have more kids at that point. The dating pool looked murky with a light layer of scum resting on top.

That was okay, though. My next favorite name was safe: Jacob. Good old Jake.

And then I married a Jacobson. I couldn't convince myself much less my husband that Jacob Jacobson was a good idea. (I even tried it with a Scandinavian "y" sound for the J. Didn't help. Made me giggle, though.)

That's when things got tricky. See, I dated for SIXTEEN years before I got married and I dated A LOT of guys. That's a whole lot of names that were suddenly off-limits. I would not curse a child by naming them Sam or Aaron or any other name I liked if it had been sullied by a--a--a. . .well, a stupidhead of the same name.

Did I mention that was A LOT of names out of the mix?

Oh, and then there was the lovely fact that I taught mniddle school for five years and the handful of names left that I liked had generally been tainted by some middle school knucklehead. Ask a teacher: being in the classroom will ruin most names for you.

And the thing is, I'm not a big fan of trendy names, or unusual names, or made up names. I like traditional names. Unfortunately, that's what the trends are coming back around to, but whatever. That's been my preference for fifteen years and it's not changing. I'm also not a fan of normal names with odd spellings. I think it's mean to do that to a kid. Let them change the spelling later if that's what they want, I guess. And yeah, I realize that offends some of you. Don't be offended. I realize I'm in the minority on MY name preferences and it bothers me NOT AT ALL.

Anyway, had this baby been a boy, I think we finally agreed on Bennett. That's my maiden name. I was still working toward convincing my husband that we'd call the baby Ben, but I was making some progress because I'm bratty persuasive.

It's a moo point, as Joey would say. We've got a girl coming, ready to give her a name we love. And I get to buy lots of pink stuff, so I guess that's all I really need to know before I birth a female, right?

You, too?

I find it really odd the things that draw to me to some people and repel me from others. It could be the smallest thing that tells me that someone and I are going to click and an equally trivial bit of nothing that tells me we won't. My best friend of 17 years and I initially bonded over our shared loved of all things Audrey Hepburn and built from there.

I was thinking about this while I watched the U2 concert on YouTube the other night. I've seen them live once before and I think they're amazing. In fact, I'd say they're my favorite band of all time. Lots of bands sound like U2, but U2 sounded like that first. They're truly original.

That's why I had to quit reading this one blog. I'm going to make up a totally random name for her and call her Lava Girl. I can't say her blog was awesome. It was okay with periodic posts that were so "on" I kept coming around in case it was one of those days. Then one day, she went on a rant about U2, specifically Bono.

Now, I don't care if you don't like U2. My husband could take or leave them and I love him plenty fine. (I love that phrase). Liking U2 isn't the point. A friendship with me will not break on that point. As I remember it, her beef with them was that Bono is a hypocrite because he goes around the world, poking his nose in politics screaming for reform and feeding the hungry, and then builds this massively expenisve carbon-footprint intense stage set for their concert tour.

I get that some people hate when celebrities in music or film get involved with political causes. I don't. I say if your fame will highlight a cause that you believe in passionately, you have a moral obligation to try to do something about it. If you're showing up to support a cause because you want the PR, then you're lame. I suspect, after years of casually following U2, that these guys are the real deal and truly care about the causes they champion. So how come they can't promote awareness and raise millions of dollars for regions like Darfur, why can't they donate millions of their own dollars, AND have a stage set to blow the minds of their fans?

Because that's why it was designed. The "claw" as it's called, is intended to create a concert experience unlike any other that incorporates the crowd as much as possible into the show, to put the band as near to the audience as possible, and vice versa. It's expensive, yeah. But I still don't get the hate. If you've ever seen a U2 performance, you clearly get that this is a band that absolutely loves their fans and feeds off of that energy, then pours it right back. They also sing songs that are about everything they preach.

But still, I can be your friend if you don't like U2. The kicker for me with this Lava Girl person, is that she went on to point out how Nickelback is a far superior band.

Uh, I don't want to insult anyone else's muscial tastes here, so I'll stop at saying that they're music is inarguably derivative and I don't think anyone can make a case that they've been a force for good in humanitarian causes. That doesn't mean to say they aren't a good band or even that they aren't charitable. They probably are. But have they mounted anything on the scale of the ONE campaign?

It doesn't matter if they did. It doesn't make them a better or worse band or group of people. But to say U2 sucks and Bono's lame but Nickelback is the gold standard?

It was just one of those moments where I knew the twain would NEVER meet, and I took her out of my blog reader before my eye could twitch any more. It wasn't even about disagreeing with her opinion; it was about being so far apart in thought that I realized we weren't going to find common ground on this or probably most other things. Unless she happened to mention loving Audrey Hepburn, which would have been enough to close the gap. But she didn't.

I rarely remove someone from my blog reader and if I do, it's usually because I have been consistently bored for months and can't find anything to respond to/relate to in what they're writing. This makes them neither good or bad bloggers. There are some really well-written blogs I've moved on from because I just don't connect. It's rare that this happens, but it does.

You're safe, is what I'm saying. I won't cut you off because you have an open love for the Jonas Brothers even though I couldn't name a song they sing. Or shun you because you eat shellfish and I can't stand the stuff. It's just that we watched that concert on Sunday night and I thought, "How could anyone not get this? Not like it, fine, but not get it?" It blew my mind a little.

I love U2, btw. Did I mention that? Bye-bye, Lava Girl.

P.S. Baby Girl Jacobson (I'm so tempted to post her name and claim it pre-emptively but my husband is afraid other people will steal it, like we're living a Seinfeld episode, so I can't) looks healthy, normal, and right on track per last week's ultrasound.

P.P.S. I absolutely LOVE the new blogger editor but I don't know where spell check went. Sigh.

Busting up the boys' club

I'm having a baby girl. I may not have processed that per se, but I have accepted it.

This is why:

Yesterday my very tired ten-year-old son, J-Boy, was having a post-flu meltdown because I forced him to go out and play, thereby cutting into his TV viewing free time. (I know, I'm so mean.) Anyway, his tantrum was so similar to my toddler's fits that I sent him up to his room for a time out.

After I figured he had calmed down, I went up to talk to him. We had a very reasonable discussion about balancing outside time with inside time and how to handle frustration appropriately. I told him to come down when he was ready to finish his homework.

Two minutes later he hollered, "Mom! You have GOT TO COME UP HERE and see this!"

Now, this could mean a few things. It could mean there was a giant black widow on the loose in his bathroom. It could mean he had just made something cool with his Legos. It could mean he found a penny with an interesting year on it.

But.

I am pregnant. I avoid stairs in favor of saving my breath. So I hollered back, "Is it an emergency?"

A pause. "No! I guess I could bring it down there!"

Which was nice because it meant it definitely wasn't a spider. He hates spiders.

He came down a moment later bearing a large silver mixing bowl. "Check this out!"

And I knew what was in there, and I soooooo did not want to look, but I realized that he was figuratively extending an olive branch and telling me we were cool again.

"What is it?" I asked. Knowing. Wishing I didn't.

"It's my spit bowl! Look what happened to all my phlegm!"

And so I took a peek at the bowl he uses in his bed every night because he refuses to swallow his phlegm when he coughs EVEN THOUGH I'VE HAD THE PEDIATRICIAN EXPLAIN THAT IT'S OKAY TWICE. And folks, his particular strain of flu causes fermented phlegm to turn bright green if left to mix with the air without human interference.

But I smiled and said, "Cool" which meant, "Apology accepted."

A girl would never, ever do that to me.

Right?

Uhhhhhhh.......

The Jacobsons are having our first girl.



Help!

Rainbow Coalition

My husband wants to be an old black man when he grows up. No, that's not right. I think he wants to be an old black man now.

It has something to do with being able to wear an orange or yellow suit if he wants to and no one laughing. Oh, and driving a big shiny car.

You may think this sounds funny, but I have never laughed. Because I kind of understand. One, because Kenny truly mourns the fact that he looks bad in orange, and two, well. . . I want to go to black church. Don't get me wrong, I like our church, too. But it's kind of . . . staid. I suppose if I were in a more proper frame of mind, I would say it's "holy". And certainly there are those moments.

Still, I confess. I love the whole call and response "hallelujah!" and "amen!" element that our pigment blessed brothers and sisters enjoy. It's probably because 1) it suits my personality. When I hear something I like in church, it practically has me wiggling in my seat with excitement. I wouldn't mind letting out a happy yelp to vent. And 2) it may have something to do with growing up in a predominantly black place. In Baton Rouge, I had an all white neighborhood and an almost all black school. Church was more white, but it was getting some nice color round about the time we moved away.

I guess Kenny will have to satisfy himself with bold ties instead of orange or purple three piece suits, and I'll settle for hearty amens at the ends of talks I really enjoy. Because I do like my church.

But I can wish. . .

Driver's ed.

I have picked a new title. It will be submitted with the committee's title and we'll see how they stack up against each other. I kinda like them both.

Anyway, here's the thing. The "winning" title didn't actually come from the comment trail; it came from my brother. Who knew he was a gifted chick-lit-title-thinker-upper?

His title is: (Drum roll, please...)

Love Bytes.

Ha, ha, ha! I love it!

However, I am deeply grateful for all the suggestions you guys gave me, too. I counted 49 total. So using the good old random number generator, it turns out that the winning suggestion is 23, and that means the copy of Aubrey Mace's cute new book Santa, Maybe goes to LT Elliot. Yay!

Now, in other news...we got a minivan today!

Woot!

Of course, I realize that there are a lot of people that would not say "Woot!" to a minivan because they would say "Woot!" to an SUV. But I would not say "Woot!" to an SUV. Um, I actually wouldn't say "Woot!" at all because I only write "Woot!"

Anyway, it's used (because I am imminently practical), it's a Toyota Sienna (because I am imminently practical), and it has some lovely bells and whistles (because not every single part of me is totally practical).

I always thought getting a minivan would be the equivalent of wearing mom jeans with stretched out, faded t-shirts and house slippers. I figured myself for an SUV girl, maybe a Yukon or a Highlander or something. That was until we had to shuffle around a bunch of adults and luggage and we tried both kinds of vehicle.

It was way easier AND roomier in a minivan. And I hate climbing UP into SUVs. I am a young thirty something with the knees of an old, old man. As in, not hairy and knobby. As in, creaky and groany.

And it's way easier schlepping a baby carrier in and out of a minivan than it is an SUV.

Of course, I know you're either one or the other. This is like the Israel and Palestine of vehicle philosophies, so go ahead and spill your guts. There's no brokering peace, so let's all vent our opinions in the comment trail and try for at least a cathartic purging. (This always seems to make the anti-minivan people especially feel better.)

Oh, and so far, the minivan's name is Cute Pearl.

Guess I better tell Kenny that.

It's a Win-Win. One for you, one for me.

You are invited to a meeting of the Brain Trust. (That means if you're reading my blog, you're in the Brain Trust. It's a super exclusive group.)

Here's the scenario:

Twilight is already taken so. . . I need a different title. Want to help?

I helped my friend Aubrey Mace come up with the title for her new book, Santa Maybe. Know what I got? A free copy. And I'm going to pay it forward. If you can help me come up with the new title for my book, YOU also get a free copy of Santa, Maybe which is out this month. I'll tell you all about the total cuteness that is her book in a minute.


This is the dealio. My editor emailed me yesterday to tell me that there was a big pow-wow back at the Bat Cave regarding my book title. Seems that even though I submitted the novel over a year ago, a novel that just came out from them last month has a similar title and so they need a new one for mine. The new title is the subject of some debate and ambivalence among the sales and marketing teams, the retail executive staff, and store buyers, so they wanted my opinion. My opinion is that I'm. . . ambivalent.


While I can't tell you the new title, I have full permission to get your ideas for alternate suggestions. I'll give you a blurb of what the book is about, plus the old title. I'll look at your suggestions for a new title and the one I like best will win the commenter a copy of Santa, Maybe.

Okay, the nutshell: Jessie is a twenty-something accountant working for a major software company in Seattle where she just got a major promotion. Her fun-loving roommate Sandy is constantly trying to drag her out to have a social life but Jessie resists, usually because she has too much work. Mischevious Sandy sets up a profile for Jessie (without her knowledge) on an LDS dating site. At first Jessie is ready to kill her--until she sees a profile for Ben Bratton. Long (but really funny and totally engrossing) story short, Jessie has to work through her hurt from a past relationship and broken engagement and decide it's worth not hiding behind her work anymore to make a go of it with hot, funny Ben. There's lots of texts and IMs and emails in addition to their dates, so it's definitely modern dating.

The original title was Click. All parties agree that this is a great title. It fits because of the whole mouse "click" internet dating thing, and because of how they "click" with each other. However, the novel that came out last month is called Right Click and since it was first, mine has to change.

The only thing I've come up with is something like Working it Out. It kind of plays on the workaholic element but with the right cover, it could come off as light and hip. However, I can't say I love it. So this is where you guys come in. I'd love your ideas/suggestions. You get a new book out of it. . .

This book:I got to read this when it was just a Word file on my computer, but I started re-reading it now that it's an actual book and I still LOVE it! It's a really fun Christmas romance about a girl named Abbie who, to appease her nieces and nephew, writes a joking letter to Santa asking for a husband for Christmas. Guess what shows up under her tree in the wee hours of Christmas Day? A hot guy with amnesia, dressed in his pajamas and intent on eating all her breakfast cereal. Thus begins Abbie's mission to figure out who her handsome stranger really is. There has to be a logical explanation, because there's no such thing as Christmas magic. Is there . . .?

She won the Whitney Award for romance with Spare Change this year, and with good reason. I like Santa, Maybe even better and I know you'll have a great time with it, too.

To enter: throw out your suggestions for a title for The Novel Formerly Known as Click.

Come on Brain Trust. Rock it, my pretties!

This post brought you by a giant box of tissue.

There are certain things and places that are dangerous for pregnant women. I stay away from unpasteurized cheese and red wine, for example. Normally, all I do all day long is eat feta cheese and wash it down with a nice merlot.

Which is, of course, a big fat lie. The point is, there are obvious things to avoid. (Actually, that's not even true either because I didn't know until Baby G was almost due about the soft cheese thing. Oops.)

There are also obvious places to avoid. I sent my brother with my older son to Six Flags for his birthday because as much as I love roller coasters, it's kind of a no-brainer not to ride when your preggers, right?

Add to the list of dangerous places for pregnant women: Interfaith celebrations.

You read that right.

My husband was asked to particpate in our city's interfaith choir for our centennial. Today we walked the four blocks to the beach (because yes, my life is so hard) and found a nice patch of grass where we could sit and listen. I was fine with the boring dignarities who kicked things off.

But then the Boy Scouts presented the colors and when everyone stood to say the Pledge of Allegiance, I cried.

Not a dainty little welling of tears, either. I went straight for the big, ugly snorfling-can't-speak-sobs. Ridiculous.

Then I calmed down.

Then one speaker said the U.S. means "us".

And I cried.

Then the Adventist Apostolic Choir with their congo drums and timbales and whatnot sang and I rocked along enjoying myself. And then they did a verse in Spanish.

And I cried.

Then they introduced the oldest living former elected council member, him in his wheelchair with his WWII Navy pilot hat on, good old Noble Waite who gives me candy during Sunday School if he likes my answers.

And I cried.

Then some kids spoke.

I cried.

I looked out and saw the pretty ocean just a few yards away.

I cried.

Some booty-kickin' gospel singer belted out "This Little Light of Mine."

I didn't cry. I bopped.

But you get the idea.

My point is, if you're pregnant, the world is an emotional minefield. Just sayin'.

Although possibly it's just me. I think commercials with women bonding over their Lean Cuisine frozen lunch choices are kind of beautiful right now.

Congratulations to Eowyn who won the giveaway of any item of her choice from Kenny's website. Yay!

Hurry up!

Don't forget to enter the giveaway for some of my husband's cool handmade wooden jewelry and other cool items. Scroll down to yesterday's post or click here.

Is good stuff.

Want some stuff?

All right, ladies and gents. Mainly ladies...

I don't usually brag about my husband because I don't want to make anyone else feel bad because of his awesomeness, but just so you know:

He is. Awesome.

Anyway, recently he took up woodworking as a hobby. As with most things, it turns out he's kind of super talented at it. He just opened up an Etsy shop online for fun the other day. Monday, I think. He called me from work today all excited because some people "hearted" his stuff.

So cute, right?

It occurred to me that I haven't done a giveaway in FOREVER, so today I'm doing an extra special giveaway. Just click over to his Etsy shop or his website, Jacobson Woodcraft, pick what you want if you win, leave your choice in the comments, and if the random generator comes up with your name, you get it. Cool, right?

He has necklaces, guitar picks, coasters, and business card holders. You can pick out anything you like. He's so generous!

If you want the business card holder, Kenny can take your company logo (or if you want it as a gift for someone else's company) and turn it into a business card holder. That's what he did with his sample one. That's my brother's events company logo and Kenny turned it into a card holder. I looooooves it!

You have until midnight PST on Saturday. Whee!

Also, I'll be giving away my friend Aubrey Mace's brand new book Santa, Maybe as soon as I get a copy, but in the mean time, she's got a giveaway for it on her blog until Thursday night. Just click over and leave a comment to enter. The odds are very good right now! She won this year's Whitney Award for Romance and I promise you will love this super cute, fun Christmas romantic comedy. (Um, also, I thought of the title. Squeeeeaaaal!)

Happy Wednesday!

Live and learn.

I was watching So You Think You Can Dance the other night, because uh, see last week's post about TV.

Anyway, there was this one guy with a total hard luck story. His mom was a drug addict and he was born addicted. He grew up in a tough neighborhood full of gang members and prostitutes. His mother couldn't take care of him so his aunt raised him. He was hoping dance would be his escape route from poverty.

Sad story. And yet . . . something about it rubbed me the wrong way.

Fast forward toward the end of the show and a cute young blonde girl about to take the stage. Turns out she had just found out the day before on the drive down to the audition that her grandfather passed away. She danced anyway. She danced her little her heart out, and if it wasn't the most elegant dance of the night, it was certainly the most heartfelt. Her face shone and she said something about she had always liked the words to her song, but now they told a story. She cried, because who wouldn't, but it wasn't self-pitying. She set her chin in determination, and with a smile, said she figured her grandfather had really just tried to guarantee himself a front row seat.

She gripped me in the way the guy with the earlier sad story didn't. I thought about it for a while and then I figured it out. The first case was a guy who was defined by his tragedy. The second case, the girl, was defined by her reaction to her tragedy.

I thought about it again when I was flipping through pictures in my Facebook album and I ran across this one from our last family reunion three years ago:

See that grumpy looking guy in the middle in the white shirt? The one I'm standing behind? That's my Pawpaw. He laughed all the time but he rarely smiled for pictures. To his left in dark green is my dad. Above him to my left is my mom. I'm surrounded on three sides by some of the dearest people in my life in this picture.

In six months, all three of them were dead. We didn't know this picture would be two months before my dad's first episode of respiratory failure. Or that a week after that we would find out that my mom's breast cancer had returned after four years and it was stage four. We didn't know that my dad would die six weeks before my wedding or that my mom would die a month after that. Or that my Pawpaw would die of a completely unexpected heart attack the day after that.

For the first year, I won't lie: it really did define me. I was the girl who'd become an orphan at 32. I was the girl who had buried her father, gotten married, and buried her mother and favorite grandfather in less than three months. I almost couldn't keep from spewing it out to everyone who said, "Hello."

But now . . . I think it's become more about how I've moved past that.

No, that's not right. Those experiences are a permanent part of me. But they're not an anchor holding me back. They're just part of the fabric of me, something that I've woven in over time.

I'm thankful I know how to do that. Do you want to know who taught me that?

The cute man in the middle. And his son to his left. And the pretty lady just above him.

Breakin' it down.

When I started blogging a year ago, I didn't have the faintest clue about blogs. I didn't know what the unspoken rules were or how to get a custom template, or. . . well, anything. But I know the blogging neighborhood now. I have my favorite walks and stops and vistas. I've told you about many of them before.

And although it's Friday, and I often do my favorites here, I declare today Opposite Day, probably because I'm slightly peevish after wading through too many blogs this morning while dealing with a nagging crick in my neck. I'm going to list from worst to least in descending order the things that bug me about blogs.

Aren't you glad you stopped by today?

(Oh, and if you're, uh...familiar...with any of these [guilty is such a strong word], if I'm still coming around and commenting from time to time, assume I like you anyway.)

1. I don't like it when people don't return the favor of commenting, but I REALLY HATE it when they're the ones begging for/extorting/bargaining for comments in their sidebar. It's like saying, "Hey, validate ME because I'm fantastic but I clearly don't owe you the return favor."

I could probably go on at length on this point alone, but I won't. I'm going to limit myself to only a hundred paragraphs. Here's the thing: several times I've noticed bloggers who hang out on the same blogs that I do. I think their comments are funny and I'm led to believe that we may have some things in common. At the very least I'm sure we share a sense of humor (which, I'll be honest, should worry them). So I go find their blogs and I begin to read and comment. Sometimes they comment back. We become friends. And I feel happy. (Hi, InkMom and Mommy J!)

But sometimes they don't. And it hurts my feelings. I'm seeking them out because I want to be blog friends and I have to accept their rejection at some level. Something about what I do/how I write just doesn't appeal to them. I'm learning to be okay with that. THIS scenario is not one that makes me mad so much as it bums me out slightly.

The ones that specifically make me mad are the ones who go on and on about COMMENT ON MY BLOG! and then don't return the favor. Capische?

Side note, I don't comment on every blog every day and I don't expect others to comment on everything I write. I like it, but it's not necessary. So I'm not talking about occasional commenters. I'm talking about the meanie (and yes, hypocritical) No Commenters.

And now you can see why that made number one. That issue makes me mad. The rest of my list is just stuff that's slightly to barely annoying.

2. Anonymous commenters who say mean/judgmental things. I've never personally dealt with anything mean that an anonymous commenter has said to me, but I've seen it happen to others and I think those anonymous folks are SUPER lame. I don't think they understand that their comments/judgments/chastisements have zero effect in changing whatever it is they disagree with. Other people have said it better, so I'll let the issue go, but either slap your name on your words or don't say them.

And here's where we descend to the merely annoying...

3. People who set their RSS feeds so that their whole post won't pull up in a feed reader, just the beginning. I get why people do it, but I'm lazy and I save those blogs for very last. And if the beginning doesn't grab me, I won't read the rest of it. If the whole thing pulls up, the whole thing gets read and I'm far more likely to comment. Just sayin'. (And yeah, I know I just offended over half of the bloggers that comment here. Not my intention: remember, if I still come around, I still love you. Mwah!)

4. Black backgrounds. Or really dark or busy backgrounds. But especially black ones. It feels like such hard work to read them.

5. Three column blogs. There are a few exceptions to this (Hi, Crash!) but most of them feel too busy and visually overwhelming to me.

6. Don't love the word verification security check. I took mine off three months after I started blogging, and you know how many spam emails/comment trolls I've had in over a year? Two. I can't say I hate this feature, but see the thing above about being lazy. It's just another layer that gets old if I'm doing it twenty times a day.

To end on a more positive note, I want to share a couple of random things about blogging that I love that kind of popped into my mind this week.

1. I had a dream about Crash Test Dummy the other night. Actually, I had it right before I woke up for the day. The whole dream was pretty much her trying to come up with a phone number that also spelled something out. She'd be like, "(801) COOL GIRL. Wait, that's eight digits. I need seven." And she went on and on. For some reason when I woke up, it made me happy that I blog.

2. I've been thinking about Charrette a lot this week and hoping that she's having an amazing time at her painting workshop. And I was happy that blogging has given me a reason to care. Same thing when I kept wondering how DeNae was doing after her recent loss, or when I was worried about why LT Elliot wasn't around for a while. Totally makes up for meanie No Commenters a million-fold.

You know what? I love you guys. All you guys. Even if you restrict your RSS feed.