Doing right by Monsieur Beauchamp and Madame Hughes

Hey, Internets! I’m in France! Actually, I’m on the plane to France, but by the time this posts, I’ll be in France! If you’ve been around me for the past week you already knew this because seemingly every other sentence I’ve uttered has pretty much been, “When I’m in Paris next week, because I’m going to Paris and going to be Paris,” or something akin to that. To say I’m excited about this would be a slight understatement. I’m freaking ecstatic because, uh, PARIS! FRANCE!

A little over a week ago I got an e-mail from a colleague asking for my help at a leadership conference in FRANCE! It was short notice, but it’s PARIS! FRANCE! So of course I cleared my calendar, and voila! On y va (away we go… which was also the title of the series of textbooks in junior high and high school French).

For the next week, I’ll just be hanging out, in FRANCE! The first part of the week I’ll be outside of the city with the work conference and then LMNT has the weekend to herself in PARIS! FRANCE! I’m armed with multiple suggestions of cafés, patisseries, fromageries, et plus. A weekend in PARIS! in the springtime. Exhilarating and terrifying. Seven years of French, but it’s been 15 years since I’ve used it. I know more than “Bob,” but not much. I know it’s all going to be fine, more than fine, it’s going to be fabulous. But I do kind of wish I would have bought a book or a map or something before I left. Ah, adventure. And can I just tell you that packing for PARIS! FRANCE! is really challenging. It’s like packing for New York times thirty-eight. Because it’s PARIS! You want to impress the city and look cute and not like a back-packing American tourist. Phew. That’s tough, but I’m pretty darn sure I accomplished it and I’ll be looking cute, sitting at the cafes, sipping wine, eating chocolate, and loving every second of the fact that I’m in PARIS! FRANCE!

Okay, mes petits choux, more for you later. From PARIS! FRANCE! Wish you were here.

Six-word Sunday: May 8, 2011

Mom, thank you for everything. Always.
As much as I love, living in Seattle, it sure would be nice to be able to see mom (and dad) more often. I can't believe it, but this is my 10th long-distance Mother's Day shout out to you.

Love you. Miss you.

Cock-a-doodle-don't

So, last year was the "Year of Urban Agriculture" in Seattle. When the Mayor made that declaration urban farmers around the town rejoiced because he and the city council also passed new code which allowed everyone five more chickens per residence within city limits. For those of you counting at home that's a total of eight chickens per residence. Hey, urban farmers, how excited are you?

Apparently the urban farmers that live on my block are REALLY excited.

Internets, let me remind you that where I live is not really a neighborhood that would strike you as a hotbed of agriculture. Which is probably the premise of the whole urban farming revolution: Old MacDonald can have his farm anywhere. E-I-E-I-O.

I can understand how some Seattlites would be all into the urban agriculture thing because they are Seattlites after all, and that's what they do. Drink Starbucks, listen to grunge music, and build chicken coops in their tiny backyards. But my neighborhood isn't really typical Seattle, it's a neighborhood in transition. And even though I sometimes (lovingly) refer to it as the hood, it's not that bad. But the hood better watch out, because the hipsters are a-comin' and they've got EIGHT! CHICKENS! EACH! And they also might be packin' something else, too.

Late last summer I was getting ready for work one morning, when I heard it. The crow of a rooster. I froze because did I just hear what I thought I heard? And then he crowed again. Yes. I'm living next to Farmville. Joy. At the time I didn't think much of it, except I did pause and smile about some cheesy thought that where I live is truly a melting pot where MacBook toting gangsters and chicken-raising crazies and everything in between could all get along. And what a happy lovely thought that was. But that was all before what I will now declare in retrospect the "Year of the Faulty Rooster."

As it turns out, there is quite a debate over roosters within city limits. And I now know why. Uh, urban farmer neighbors? Your rooster is broken. It crows at first light, second light, third, fourth, and 379th light. It crows all day long. I often wondered this since I've only noticed it in the morning when I'm getting ready, but the other day I worked from home and heard it in my living room all afternoon. And then the other night at 10:22 PM. Seriously. Broken rooster.

But there's not much that I can do. If I lived in the master-planned-covenant-controlled-suburban community of my youth, I could call the Covenant Police (seriously, they would patrol our neighborhood looking for scofflaws who had broken the covenant by painting their house non-approved colors, keeping garbage cans in a place where they are visible on the street, building non-approved gazebos, having a satellite dish and then disguising it as an umbrella for your picnic table--all true stories). But there are no Covenant Police in the hood, and it looks like roosters are okay because they have been grandfathered in so they "can live out their lives with dignity and in peace." Dammit. This means I have to respect broken grandpappy rooster. What gives? Where is my dignity and my peace? I think someone left the barn door open.

It also cannot go with out saying... Note to self: if you happen to be flipping through the TV channels and the University of South Carolina is playing a televised baseball game on ESPN, do not assume the rooster call you hear is from your friendly neighborhood barnyard animal. It's actually on the TV, because they are the Gamecocks (but it truly is a spot on impersonation of your grandpappy).

Conflicted

I feel like I need to preface this post with a couple of very important facts: I consider myself a proud American and I support our troops. I love my country and the freedom I have been afforded as a citizen. And I respect the men and women who serve in the name of our country to protect that freedom. I may not agree with all of the political decisions that have led us into or kept us at war, but I do fervently believe that America is a great country, democracy is a wonderful thing, and those that put their lives on the line to defend that should be honored and respected (so long as they are acting with integrity, upholding our standards and acting in accordance to the values upon which our country was founded).

As the news spread on Sunday that we had killed public enemy number one, celebrations erupted. Crowds in Washington D.C. and New York grew exponentially on the TV screen, Facebook exploded with celebratory status updates, and I even heard several rounds of fireworks in my neighborhood. Myself, I found it really hard to be in the mood to celebrate. Do I think that he was a terrible murderous person? Absolutely. Please don't mistake that, I believe he was horrible and evil and killed thousands of innocent men, women, and children--and no doubt had plans to kill thousands upon thousands more. Tracking him down and killing him might have been the only way to stop him, unfortunately. But the fact that we did that doesn't make me happy. Relieved, possibly. Ready to run out into the streets chanting "USA, USA, USA?" No.

Like I said, I think the only way we could stop him was through this course of action. But stopping him doesn't necessarily keep us safe. There is still evil out in the world, and in my mind evil begets evil. Violence begets violence. We just added to it. He murdered, so we murdered, and then who murders next? The vicious cycle continues. What's our responsibility in halting it? Has it already spun too far out of control for us to be able to halt it? Are we doomed to keep the cycle spinning? I hope not, but I fear yes.

In the midst of all this I found myself wondering how all of my friends who are parents handle these situations. When the media is overtaken by stories like these how do you explain it to your kids? If I had kids, how would I explain it to them? Murder is bad, but it's okay that we murdered this guy because he is really really bad and we are in the right? Yes, I think he was really bad and that we are in the right to protect ourselves, but I just can't get excited about killing people, no matter how bad they are. I was mired deep in these thoughts when I came across this link. It doesn't necessarily make my spirit feel like rejoicing, but it does normalize things for me and make me feel better about not feeling like we just won the Olympics.

How to feel really old

Last night, I was driving a couple of friends back to their apartment and I was more than delighted to play for them one of my twenty-five cent cassette tapes. I was trying to get my friend, who is around six years younger than me, to guess the artist. The song "I Saw Him Standing There" was playing:

Younger Friend (YF): Ooh. I know this song.

LMNT: Yeah...

A group of women standing on the corner hear the song playing and start dancing and singing along, because it's that good.

YF: Wait isn't this a Beatles' song?

LMNT: Yeah...

Her boyfriend, who is around my age, chimes in from the back seat.

BF: Madonna? Sheena E?

LMNT: No! You guys! It's TIFFANY!

YF: [stares blankly at me]

YF: Tiffany who?

LMNT: Tiffany!

YF: What's her last name?

I died a little right then and there.

Six-word Sunday: May 1, 2011

Sinuses attacked. Breathing impossible. Commence coughing.

Pretty much sums up my week... at least the last four days of it anyway. Here's to a new week and the new found ability to breathe, smell, and taste my food.

A second helping of cheese

Note to self: Be ye not tempted to shop for music under the influence.

Apparently this is a lesson bound to be repeated. Back when I was a senior in college my parents and I were at some pre-graduation wine and cheese reception (emphasis on the wine) and somehow, post-event, we ended up at Bed Bath and Beyond. Tipsy.

Left to our own devices, we waddled our way to a CD kiosk of "The Sounds of Nature." You know, the one where you push on the small thumbnail of the CD cover art and it plays samples off of that CD. Ooooh. We were transfixed and listened to every sample. Twice. Maybe three times. Before my dad could find us and save us from ourselves, we had bought at least 4 CDs (one of which was Loon Song, and it was just as it sounds, loons set to song. In a word: AWESOME). And we knew while it was happening that it was a bad idea, and by bad I mean AWESOME.

So there I was this week, post-happy hour with AP when we waddled across the street to the Half-Price Books where they also sell way-less-than-half-price cassette tapes. And guess who has  two thumbs and a cassette tape player in her car? That's right, this girl. And because I was two margaritas in, every tape I saw was a MUST HAVE (even though I had already bought most of them at full-price back in the 1980s when cassette tape technology was king). Honestly. Most of these tapes are already at my parents house, but a lot of good that does me when I want to listen to them in my car now. So, at $0.25 a pop (you read that correctly, one quarter each) I bought the following masterpieces:

• Duran Duran, Arena (recorded around the world in 1984!)
• Kenny Rogers, The Gambler (I don't know any songs on here but the title track, but it's gotta earn me some street cred to own a Kenny Rogers tape, right?)
• Neil Diamond, 12 Greatest Hits Vol II (mostly because "America" is one of those 12 great hits)
• Prince and the Revolution, Music From The Motion Picture Purple Rain (yes, somewhere doves are crying)
• John Denver, Take Me Home, Country Roads & Other Hits (a collection of some of the first songs I ever fell in love with on cassette tape)
• Amy Grant, Heart in Motion (Baby, baby, I LOVED this one when I bought it the first time in 1991)
• Huey Lewis & the News, Fore! and Sports (yes, it is hip to be square, don't hate the playa...)
• Bette Midler, Beaches (Thank you. Thank you. Thank God for you, the wind beneath my wings)
• Whitney Houston, Whitney Houston (the one where she's amazing before Bobby Brown ruined her)
• Michael Bolton, Time, Love & Tenderness (I know. There are no words, except maybe... AWESOME!)
• Ace of Base, The Sign (which I never actually owned on cassette, but overplayed the CD my junior year in high school)

And the piece de resistance...

• Tiffany, Tiffany (Oh, yes! Yes! A thousand times yes!).

Four dollars later (much cheaper than Loon Song), I was out of there and jamming in the Jetta. Turns out it was a good idea, nay, a great idea. Maybe purchasing music whilst intoxicated is actually an AWESOME idea. And in case you didn't know this already, I believe that children really are our future.