San Diego Momma

Thanks to all who participated in the Fodder extravaganza! It’s still going, if you’re up for it…Click Here to leave a comment suggesting a post topic. For a list of those who’ve written posts inspired other bloggers, Click Here.

Also, thanks for the PROMPTuesday submissions. I’ll be working on mine a little late, but it will definitely go out to my husband, who patiently sticks around and offers guidance counseling to my neurotic self while I jump up and down and tell him to “Stop telling me stuff.”

Also, did you see the sidebar where I told you my book club read The Cellist of Sarajevo this month? Well, I adored it. Simply, plainly adored it. It’s lyrical, and elegant, and powerful, and spare, and beautiful. I think it’s made it as one of my favorite books of all time, and that’s really saying something. Except for the last year or so, when I’ve barely had time to read the writing on the wall, but still…in aggregate, I’ve read a lot of books in my lifetime.

In other news, I’m going to have to bust out a product review on your butts, and I’m sorry. I plan to develop a separate product review site, because there’s a lot of things I love and want to talk about, but this hardly seems the forum. I tried to make Momma Love its own page, but I can’t program its posts to stay off my home page, so it sucks the wad. Anyway, the product I plan to review saved my finger from possible amputation, so it deserves a mention.

Oh and in addition, I’m editing a piece I wrote for something that pays, and the words will not come. Can you say a prayer that for once I don’t muck up my writing with useless adjectives and made-up words? It seems a problem I can’t quite shake. I had no idea how much I rely on nonsense words to tell my stories.

And finally. Some Moonlighting dialogue for you, as written by a wannabe scriptwriter named San Diego Momma, The Early Years. (Someone asked that I post this, right?)

(Wow, silence really CAN be deafening.)

MADDIE (as played by the illustrious Cybill Shepherd): (Walking to her office) Grrr. (She bursts open the door and finds David seated behind her desk. Her teeth are clenched) Good morning, Mr. Addison. May I ask why you are seated behind MY desk in MY chair in MY office?

DAVID (acted by the multi-dimensional Bruce Willis): I was just waiting for Miss Mary Sunshine otherwise known as Maddie Hayes.

MADDIE: (Gives an exasperated sigh) Da-vid.

DAVID: Hey, you know what I was thinking Maddie?

MADDIE: (Sarcastically) I can’t imagine.

DAVID: (Ignoring her) Well, I’ll tell you. Last night as I was laying in bed, I looked up at the mirror on my ceiling and I saw a handsome face. And do you know what that face said to me, Maddie? It said underwear.

MADDIE: Underwear?

DAVID: Underwear, Maddie, underwear. You know, the little pants you wear under your dress? Just picture our faces on people’s underwear advertising Blue Moon Investigations. (Walks over to her, puts his arm around her and gestures outward). Just think for a minute, we could become a household name! Everyone would know who we are!

************************************************************************

….And there’s more. Involving camels, mental institutions and thinly veiled sexual tension. All the stuff that makes for a good script.

Except in this case.

[This is my contribution to the blog post tag team. [CLICK HERE FOR A PAGE SHOWING ALL TAG TEAM PARTICIPANTS AND THEIR POSTS.]

I’m terrified of the drying well.]

I can’t remember much about the person I was in high school. That teen identity sorta fused with the person I am now (frighteningly similar) and the girl-woman I perceived myself to be during that time. I’m quite sure I came across as goofy, overly earnest, and random. I do know I thought a lot about clothes, and concocted the perfect outfits to wear for each auspicious high schooly occasion: football games, late night Denny’s dinners, barn parties. The labels of my day — Esprit. Hunter’s Run. Guess — whirled about my head at night and I still recall the acrid carpety smell of the Vernon Hills Hawthorne Mall fitting rooms.

Still, I was a girl of little parental money for clothes, so I often borrowed friend’s outfits and conjured money from babysitting jobs to foot the wardrobe bill. What I couldn’t buy, I cobbled together from my parents’ closet. Oversized sweaters from my dad, inappropriately clingy silk dresses from my mom, pajamas. Thank God for uniforms. But every dress-up Friday, you’d find me in either (a) something I made with paint/bleach/stencils or (b) something horribly off in some glaringly disturbing way. Many times, I wore plastic slippers with my plaid Catholic schoolgirl skirt because I thought they looked like stylish flats, or a flannel pajama top that doubled as an oxford. And? I’m totally serious.

I loved bright colors and stripes and patterns and (did I already say bright colors?). Also, I adored juxtaposition, so I’d wear say, oversized sunglasses with a hobo ensemble because no one expects hobos to dress like Madonna from the nose up, am I right?

(These were my artfully bleached pants.) (And my straw hat.) (No relationship between the two implicit nor implied.)

And — I did mention the bright colors, right? Did I talk about the stripes too? ‘Cuz I had big love for both of those design elements.

I don’t think you believe me. So I’ll have to show you.

(Just so you know, this is hurting me way more than you):

(Dad’s sweater. You may recognize the bright color gene?)

(Were stripes big in the ’80s? That’d make me feel marginally better.)

(Eyes closed due to nuclear glow given off by shirt.)

You know what? Drying well be damned. I think I’m done here.

p.s. Just be glad I’m not posting the Moonlighting script I wrote my senior year.

Great! I’ve drawn you in with a clear, concise title to further explain the labyrinth post I wrote last week.

I think I’m beginning to understand why my husband sighs so heavily when I ask “to talk.”

So look. I’m just going to sum up with quick and clear sentences.

• According to my records, I am to write wrote a post on an animal dream or an unsuccessful high school outfit.

 

• MommyTime is to write wrote a post on her most embarrassing sports moment.

 

• Blognut is to write wrote a pitch for a television series. Network or cable. Comedy or drama.

 

• Cheri @ Blog This Mom! is to write wrote a post describing a typical day in the life of her alternate self in a parallel universe.

 

• Karelle is to describe her perfect day…and then her nightmare day.

 

• Stoneskin is to write wrote a post about Elvis, and a pink dressing gown, referencing Election Day 2012 and Madison Square Garden in NYC. (We’re rooting for ya, Mo!)

 

• Cactus Petunia is to tell us wrote about a little thing that made her proud.

 

• Tinsenpup is to write about an unusual/unique teacher, one she loved or hated or was just puzzled by.

 

• She is to write wrote about which city is her favorite and why, taking care to mention how old she was when she lived there, for how long, and any fond memories of the place and if she happens to know, what’s changed since she left.

 

• Jennifer wrote about the woman in the background of her blog — the one who is dancing and jumping and excited.

 

• Katydidnot is to write wrote about a day in her life if she were an animal (of her choosing).

 

• G is to write wrote about her most favorite movie and why she loves it.

 

• Amanda is to write wrote about the worst decision she thinks she’s made in her life and why — and if she so chooses, she can also write the best decision she made and why.

 

• Jessica is to write about a smell that immediately takes her back somewhere or reminds her of something.

 

• Mel is to write about a movie/television star that most resembles her.

 

• Jamie is to write from the perspective of a makeup artist at the Oscars…and must tell us what’s going on there.

 

• Janet at Fond of Snape is to write about her worst kiss. (Because, as Kizz points out: Everybody only talks about the good ones!)

 

• Kizz is to write about an assumption that she would change that people make about her. (Or, why lists tickle her fancy).

 

If you want to play along and get tagged to write a post, read this , or save yourself the brain cells that will die as you wrap your mind around whatever the hell it is I wrote, and instead leave a comment on the post with a post idea for the commenter before you. THEN, check back in the comments box for your post topic.

 

Oh Good Lord.

 

I’ll get clear and concise one of these days.

 

If you want to leave a link to your post inspired by commenters, do so here:

 

 

Or, for a link list of those who’ve written posts suggested by readers, click here.