Birdie My Love

This morning at 8:30 am, the little dog whom I have loved with my whole heart, and who, in turn, has trusted and loved me with all of hers, passed away. Birdie my love. I am bereft.

Where Have You Been All My Life, Jane?

Unlike most women of my age and stage, I had, until recently, neither read Pride and Prejudice, nor seen any of its various film iterations. But, Cheastypants, you ask in wonderment, whyever not? Are you not a great fan of romance? Why yes, of course I am, but that, you see, was the problem. At some point in my life, I had formed the entirely mistaken notion that Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy do not end up together at the end of the book. How this happened, I have no idea, but there you have it. So what's the point, I figured. All that heaving and angst and tension, all for nothing in the end? Not for me, thank you.

Well a friend of mine is getting married this weekend, and for her bachelorette bachellorrette bachellorette bachellorette EFF, HOW DO YOU SPELL THAT WORD shindig, she wanted to have a viewing of the 5 hour BBC miniseries of P&P. Good god, I thought. This is a test of loyalty indeed. Luckily for me, another friend was curious enough to inquire why I would rather go to the dentist, and when I told her I didn't see the point in spending 5 hours watching two people melodramatically not get together in the end, she laughed.

"Oh Cheasty, you're hilarious."
"Why is that funny."
"Ummm... wait. What?"
"I wasn't kidding."
"Hang on. You seriously think they don't get together in the end?"
"Yes."
"WHAT?!! How... why.... how... what the heck? How did you come up with that idea?"
"Um... What? Are you telling me they DO get together in the end?"
"YES!"
"Oh. Well, then. All right, I'll watch it."

But I still wasn't convinced. BBC? Five hours? Jane Austen? To paraphrase Joan Rivers, I'm not sure I even want to do something that feels good for that long. But Handsome and I were supposed to do something that evening, too, so I double booked myself and said I'd have to leave early. Whew, I thought. Well done.

Except I didn't plan for one little thing. I LOVED IT. Loved it, loved it, loved it, LOVED. IT. When I finally had to go, I wanted to cry. How on earth would I know what happened after this?



Lucky for me, I was able to borrow the DVDs the next day and watch the hell out of them. Oh, my goodness, I love it. I've spend the past couple of days re-watching my favorite scenes and generally fantasizing about Mr. Darcy.





Oh, sigh. I'm off to buy the book now.

A Boy and His Dog

My little brother Bug is a cutie. Genuine, bona fide adorable. He's six, he's sweet, he's silly, and full of energy. He's got four siblings who positively dote upon him, and parents who believe that the sun rises and sets by his smile. He lives in the country on beautiful land, he frolics in fields and cavorts by the river. He runs his little legs off and swims in the pool. He's a happy kid.



Up until recently, however, in spite of this glorious childhood dreamworld, there was one little problem with Bug's life. Out there in the country he was all alone.



It's not that he wasn't having fun, for he certainly was.



He had buckets of fun. It's just that he had buckets of fun by himself.



But then came this little guy...



And it was love at first sight. Oh, the frolicking.



Oh, the running and gallivanting and hippity-hoppiting!



These two, in the slightly modified words of the deaf people on the elevator in Jerry Maguire, complete each other.



They are funny and sweet and utterly inseparable.



So little Bug is still having one heck of a grand life out there in the country, but now he does it with a friend.



Welcome to the family, Maddox.

Five Days of No Interwebs

Seriously, when was the last time you went five days without internet access of any kind? I'm asking because I just did, and it was awesome. I've been in the North Carolina mountains - Transylvania County, Land of Waterfalls, to be precise - for a college friend's wedding, and oh my lady gaga, have I been having fun. There's a bunch of us from college that are good friends of such long standing that it's really more like we're family. We even have reunions. So while we went to the mountains for this:



And this:



And this:



We stayed around for this:



And this:



And a little bit of this:



And of course we walked about in places that looked like this:



And had fascinating conversations at beautiful waterfalls:



And generally basked in the glow of being with friends who know you well and love you fiercely. Which, for the record, totally rocks.

Too Much Awesome

Hello there, my darlings, I'm back from the land of no blogging with a report of dazzling excellence. My mother, the inimitable Captain Mommypants, and my littlest brother Bug were in town. And it was Handsome's birthday. And the weather was spectacular. And we had parties. And we went on excursions. And we rode trains. And we played music. And we had so much fun. How much fun?

This much fun:



("Sunscreen? We don't need no stinkin' sunscreen." My poor little redhead.)

And this much fun:



(It's official. I know more protest songs from the 1960s than any other woman my age.)

And this much fun:



(Bug's favorite thing in the world is a hammock. Actually, not true. His favorite thing in the world is a pig, but hammocks run a close second. Handsome's portable one was a huge hit at the park.)

My mother and my main squeeze cemented their budding love for one another.



While Umulu and I generally reveled in getting both our mother and our Bug all to ourselves.



It was awesome.