Congratulations to my sister and . . .ahem. . my brother-in-law, Lisa and Mark, on their one year anniversary. I can’t believe y’all have been married for a year!
Love,
Annie
p.s. Sorry Rollie was such a shit last night. If you have a baby soon, you can repay me.
My grandfather turns 91 today. You ain’t seen nothin’. He’s seen four wars (not including these two latest ones), the holocaust, the coming of electricity, running water, automobiles, the telephone, the radio, and television. I’m pretty sure he thinks the way a mouse operates is simply magic.
I wrote a really long post about him for his 90th last year. My mom thought it was cool. Yes, my mom reads my blog; Frightening, no? Just what you want your mama to read: This, or this, or this. She printed the post out and showed it to him. He read it, smiled, and was quiet for a few seconds, then said, “I guess she’ll just put the death dates on later.” He is a funny guy. Happy birthday, Pop! I love you!
That’s us together in Christmas of ’77: From left – Dad, Me, Grandma Smith, Pop, Lisa, and Grandma Palmer.
New year, new Dogwood Girl template. Okay, not really new, just tweaked the old one a bit, because I was tired of it. My HTML ability is almost nil, and my eye for anything artistic or graphic is non-existent, so this is the best i could do.
I like the cleanless of it, though. Like a clean slate for a new year, or a quiet blanket of freshly-fallen snow. Speaking of, God, send us some snow. My kids don’t even know what it is.
Night started off slow, with me laying a base of soup and salad at the nicest Olive Garden ever. Todd’s Mom says so, and she should know, because she lives in that mecca of fine dining that is Dadeville, Alabama. I also had a latte at Starbucks in an attempt to jumpstart my very hung over body while Todd chatted with the Turks. No doin’ on lighting a fire under me; It wasn’t until I arrived at Iain’s and choked down that first beer that I started feeling a little better. I had grandiose plans of dressing up, even maybe wearing a skirt, but I was lucky to get there in one piece, much less to change out of jeans and t-shirt. I threw on my fluffy-fringey sweater in an attempt to give myself some style and just ended up looking like a Smashing Pumpkins’ D’arcy wanna-be from 1991. You will notice only one picture of me in the whole New Year’s set on Flickr. This is not coincidence.
Highlights:
The only thing missing was the people that I couldn’t be with this year, but they are always in my thoughts, and just as soon as I make that first million off Dogwood Girl, I am going to buy a farm and start a commune where we can all live together. Right after Lisa and I buy the Sea-Doo. It’s gonna happen – 2007: The Year of Big Dreams. Who’s with me?
Always do sober what you said you’d do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut. – Ernest Hemingway (1899 – 1961)
Well said, Mr. Hemingway.
I don’t buy CDs as often as I used to – We only bought 20 albums this year. We downloaded a few songs, but this just isn’t the same rabidity with which we voraciously devoured new releases before having kids. I also find that I end up listening to more of the “Coffee” music, as I call it, because that is what goes well against a backdrop of Sesame Street. It is strange how having kids changes your tastes and how you listen to music.
Without further ado, my 2006 Top Ten:
Honorable Mentions:
Favorite Songs of 2006:
TV on the Radio – “Wolf Like Me.” Good God Almighty. This one makes me wish I played an instrument and that I had written this song. Hope this is inspiring some sixteen-year-old girl somewhere.
Gnarls Barkley – “Crazy.” I read that they did this track in one take. Awesome. Pure magic.
Band of Horses – The Great Salt Lake. This is my kitchen song, 2006.
Regina Spektor – “Fidelity.” Beautiful like fine porelain. Translucent and unadorned, but not plain. Cool video, too.
Flaming Lips – “The W.A. N. D.” This one is catchy, but doesn’t make up for a crap album.
Snowden – “anti-anti.” Atlanta band. Fun driving song.
I Just Don’t Get It, or Todd Bought It, but I Never Would Have:
Belle and Sebastian – The Life Pursuit. They bore me.
The Essex Green – Cannibal Sea
Starlight Mints – Drowaton
The Streets – The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living
Wolfmother – Wolfmother. I have already listened to everything by Led Zeppelin.
Complete Disappointments:
The Flaming Lips – At War with the Mystics. The most universally disappointing album of the year. Did anyone like it?
Granddaddy – Just Like the Fambly Cat. You already made this album. Twice.
Tomboy in red dotted tulle, lipstick, Dorothy Hammill hair. Alpharetta, Georgia.
Pure Christmas magic.
You know that show, “My Boys?” No, I didn’t either, until my outing with the Creekers, wherein almost every person there told me I would love the show. These days I actually have girlfriends (see Girls Gone Mild, for example), but growing up, with the exception of a few solid girlfriends like Karen and Camille and little Lisa, I hung out pretty much exclusively with the boys.
I’m happy to say that we still hang out, even if it is just a couple times of year. Most of us have families and responsibilities now, but put us in a basement together and give us a few cases of beer and we will quickly regress to our sixteen-year-old selves. With maybe a little more clothing kept on and a little less smoking and puking. Exact same amount of laughter. I love my boys. (From left: Owen, Dan, Me, Jason, Ev, John, and C.J.)
More pics from the Creeker get-together here on Flickr.
*Apologies for it taking so long to get this post up. I have had nothing but trouble with my internet connection this month. Oh, the troubles I’ve seen. Woe is me. Hope to start blogging regularly again come the new year.
On Saturday, we took Rollie and Tiller to see Santa at St. Paul’s Methodist in Grant Park. Although I am unsure about my thoughts on God, I am sure about one thing; I love old, beautiful churches. St. Paul’s is really gorgeous, but in a lived-in, non-museum-like way. You actually feel welcome and warm when you are there.
Santa was upstairs in a back room and you had to wait in a not-too-long line to see him. The line wrapped out the door and down the stairs. Rollie and tiller were excellently-behaved, much to my surprise; I guess they were mesmerized by all of the other kids. Living in East Atlanta, I often feel cut off from other people with children, until we attend something like this Santa event. Then I realize just how many young children are living and being born here and I realize that in ten years, this will probably be a really family-friendly neighborhood, and a great place to raise kids. I sometimes wish that I had the confidence to make my children urban pioneer children, working to make the schools in this area better, but I just don’t think that is going to happen, nor do I think I am the Mom to attempt it. I just don’t want my precious little ones to be guinea pigs in an experiment that might fail. Selfish, I know, but also my decision and we are the ones responsible for their educational raisin’, as they call it here in the South.
I digress. We finally entered the Santa room, and then rounded the corner, where we could actually see Santa. He was a great-looking Santa in a traditional Santa suit with the belt and all. He had his own Santa chair and a Christmas tree and we were allowed to take pictures with the digital camera for free, which is really more in the Christmas spirit than those mall Santas. Plus, less waiting in line.
When it was our turn, Rollie hopped up in his lap without hesitation (unlike last year – tears and more tears, making for hysterically funny Santa pics) and told him what he wanted for Christmas (choochoos and cars). We snapped some pictures of them together, then threw Tiller up with them. She was surprisingly good, too, and in fact just seemed enthralled with his beard and stared at him. We had a hard time getting both of them to look at the camera, and of course, our camera acted up throughout, so the shots aren’t great. But hey! They are free!
Cheap Santas are great. Free Santas are the best.
