light my fire

When I was 13 years-old, I was a good little 60's teenybopper who knew her place .... most of the time. My concert experiences were innocent and few: I was in the audience when the The Monkees filmed their Phoenix, Arizona concert (I told you I moved a lot) for an episode of their TV series. During this time in my life, I also saw Sonny & Cher (whom I still adore) and another great band called The Association. Suffice to say that I was as innocent and naive as I could have possibly been.

Until The Lizard King came to town. If my Mom had harbored any clue as to just how un-innocent The Doors -- and their fans -- were, she never, ever would have dropped me and my girlfriend off at the Phoenix Coliseum that night. Of course, it was a night I will never forget.

It was the first time I encountered marijuana -- no, I didn't smoke it, silly -- I was a good girl, after all -- but the smoke hung thick in the air and it seemed like everyone around us was partaking.

Oddly enough, there didn't seem to be much security present -- no one was getting busted for drugs -- and I was able to walk right down to the stage and snap a couple of photos of Jim Morrison with my little Kodak Instamatic and no one said a word to me.

(In contrast, it was just a year or two later that Jim was arrested in Miami .... for exposing himself to the audience. I'm still wondering what effect that experience might have had on my only half-formed 13 year-old brain.)

While I was kneeling in front of the stage snapping the pictures, Jim actually looked down at me and our eyes met for just a moment. I don't think he actually saw me, though -- it was as if his eyes were looking somewhere deeper and far more exotic than my little mod-dressed baby-faced visage. At least I hope they were because, honey, I was anything but interesting.

The concert was wonderful and even though I (regrettably) didn't do a single thing that would have disappointed my parents, I still left feeling a teensy bit more grown-up than when I arrived.

Looking into the eyes of The Lizard King will do that to you.

leaving on a jet plane

Back when I first met her, my best friend Sharon said to me, "You know, you're the only person I've ever known who really reads the TV Guide from front to back." It was an interesting observation and probably the first time I recognized that TV looms bigger in my life than most folks. Heck, I even have a 4-year college degree in it.

Maybe it was because we moved every two or three years and because I had no siblings, I was forced to spend an awful lot of time alone while I was growing up, but TV became very, very important to me. Still is -- if I'm home, it's on -- even though it's usually just noise in the background of my life.

Six years ago, I picked up the Fall Preview issue of the TV Guide (yes, I still read them front to back) and read about a new upcoming show called "Lost." The description absolutely intrigued me but I reminded myself not to get too excited. After all, there have been many shows in the past that didn't live up to the hype and several that did but didn't survive, anyway (Nowhere Man, for example). I warned myself not to fall in love too quickly.

Of course, I fell hard and I fell fast .... as did many others, thank goodness. No matter how brilliant (or not) the the last episode of "Lost" is on Sunday, I'll no doubt be watching with tears streaming down my cheeks. I've seen many TV shows come and go but this one is somehow different -- I will truly miss these characters. They're very real to me.

To everyone involved in creating "Lost" : Thanks for an incredible ride.

(And thanks to The Injustice League for the terrific farewell video!)

a horrible warning

I usually title my posts with a song title from the past but for this post, I thought I'd use part of the wonderful Catherine Aird quote, "If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to serve as a horrible warning."

Today is my 29th month quit smoking anniversary ..... yay, me! But when the wonderful Quitnet website sends me monthly e-mails to remind me to celebrate my anniversaries, they always also include a statistical approximation of how much time I have added to my life span due to my quit.

I have been quit for almost two and a half years and so far -- according to their estimates -- I have added only 4 months, 14 days, and 18 hours to my life. Why so little? Because I was an idjit who smoked for 35 years ..... that's a helluva lot of damage to undo. Someone who has only smoked for 10 years is going to see their regained life span estimation explode compared to mine.

Now I know that the additional 4 months number is far from set in stone -- I could die tomorrow or I could live another 30 years -- but my hope is that there is some young smoker out there who reads this and decides to quit sooner rather than later so that they regain their expected life-span light-years faster than I do.

Let me serve as your horrible warning. Please.

sittin' on the dock of the bay (redux)

Looking at the picture below made me all nostalgic for Middletown and that home, so I looked through some old photos and came upon this one my Dad took around 1968, right after we moved into the house. It must have been very low tide because the ocean easily covered those large rocks most of the time -- but the photo gives you some idea of how right on the water we were. I envy the lucky folks who live there now (unless it's still haunted, of course).

That's my afore-mentioned bedroom window on the upper right -- as you can see, it was cracked open because I loved the ocean sounds and breezes.

sittin' on the dock of the bay

Another Esplanade shot, originally uploaded by G.E. Long.

I was absolutely thrilled to come across this photo in G.E. Long's flickr photostream.

See that little gray house on the far left? The very first house in the row of houses? The one closest to the camera?

It's in Middletown, Rhode Island and I lived in that house while I was a junior at Middletown High School many, many moons ago. Obviously, it was right on the shore and at night I would fall asleep to the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks right beneath my bedroom window. Although I appreciated how special that was at the time, I realize now that I didn't appreciate it half as much as I should have.

The photo was taken from Easton's Beach in nearby Newport .... it's better known as First Beach to the locals .... on an evening with an incredible sunset. What a breathtaking photograph!

I grew up in an Air Force family and it's an understatement to say that we moved a lot -- but of all of the places we lived, Middletown -- and the New England area -- remains my favorite. If my husband didn't hate cold weather so much, I would try to convince him to retire in that area.

One more interesting thing about that house: I'm convinced it was haunted. I'll have to tell you about that sometime.

to sir with love

I unabashedly admit to spending literally hours and hours and hours poring over teen fashion magazines during the 60's and early 70's ... and it's probably not surprising that now that I collect them, I can vividly recall quite a few specific articles, fashion layouts and advertisements.

However, extremely few ads smack my recall button the way this two-page spread from the June 1968 issue of Glamour does. Of course, it's been well-established what a sucker I was for anything from Yardley, so it naturally follows that when I saw how flawless and exquisitely romantic Yardley nail polish made the model's hand appear, I ran out and bought the very same shade that she wore. I painted my nails and then placed my freshly-polished fingers right next to the model's in the ad and wondered why my pudgy little digits didn't look as flawless and exquisitely romantic as hers did.

Obviously, I had no knowledge of hand models. Or photo-retouching. Or air-brushing. I truly believed that virtually everything in the advertisement would look the same way in real-life. I mean, they wouldn't trick us, would they?

I'm ashamed to say I still struggle with that idea today.

I know I must have focused most of my attention on the hand-half of this ad because if I had spent anytime at all studying the young couple, I would have been enlightened about one bit of advertising chicanery: that is the worst fake mustache ever.

(I'm still in love with that red-stoned ring she's wearing)

wild thing

You are looking at my eldest niece, Emma, and part of what she calls her "museum." Emma is the daughter of my baby sister (yes, I still think of her that way) Heather and her terrific husband, Steve. Emma has an achingly sweet little sister named Ellie.

I sometimes think that there is a very eccentric little old lady possessing Emma's adorable little person because she's so incredibly wise for her years. Mostly, though, I think she inherited boatloads of her rather eccentric grandfather's personality. Of course, it's a lot cuter on her than it was on him!

Heather often relates Emma's latest Emma-isms on her Facebook page here but I don't think she'll mind if I quote my favorite (so far) of her Emma stories here:

Emma is "selling" stuff to us for $1 everyday e.g. makers, lip gloss. She takes it back (but keeps the money). She says she's practicing to sell at the Farmer's Market. Her booth will be called "Emma & Ellie's Booth" and sell - mac n cheese, lemons, hot dogs & princess pencils. She said, "would you write that down for me so I don't forget? Thanks."

Mac 'n cheese and princess pencils? C'mon, that's marketing genius!