R.I.P. Ben Chapman
The film world has lost another icon with the death of actor Ben Chapman. I'm sure you're familiar with his work....if not his face.

Are Women Human?
Ah yes, the ever-delightful Oddest Book Title Awards. Interested in a copy of I was Tortured by the Pygmy Love Queen? How about How to Write a How to Write Book? Maybe Cheese Problems Solved is more your speed?

Finally, some good news!
OK, I think I'm in love with my acupuncturist. Yesterday was only my third session with him and he treated me with indirect stimulation. Needles in my hand, arm, head, foot and ankles. The result was the best night's sleep I've had in over a year. When I came home I was completely exhausted and (thank goodness for being unemployed) took a 3-hour nap. Last night I turned into coma girl and slept for nearly 11 hours. No back pain at all!!

This, friends, is huge. My typical night is sleep for an hour, wake up in terrible pain, be awake for 2 hours trying to work out the pain. Sleep for another hour, repeat. Last night I woke up a few times but not because of the pain and I was able to go right back to sleep. The last time I slept this well I was recovering from surgery.

Obviously it's too soon to call this a total success, but even for one night's relief I am incredibly grateful and, for the first time in recent memory, incredibly rested.

What's on my mind
Inspired by something I overheard, here's a list of the ten things on my mind at the moment. Some important....some silly.

1. The election. (Go Obama!)
2. My show tonight....I've been sick for the past two weeks so this is my first show in a while. Now I'm beginning to wonder what to play. New stuff? Raid the library? Bring stuff from home?
3. My health. Why did I zarf right after this morning's bowl of cereal when yesterday the same cereal sat just fine in my tummy?
4. My friends. How can I ever tell them how much I love them and how much they mean to me without sounding like a cheesy Hallmark card?
5. Saltines. The perfect food when one is nauseous.
6. The History Channel. What would I do without it?
7. Cipher, the world's most perfect cat, screw you if you don't agree (TM). How is it possible for her to sleep so deeply all night when I can't sleep at all? And why aren't I jealous?
8. Native American art. I really, really, really want a Native blanket.
9. What's next? Can I ever find a way to make a living saving the world?
10. Agatha Christie. Why are the BBC adaptations of her books so wonderfully cozy to accompany a sleepless night?

So, what's on your mind?

Music and drugs
You know, when you hear those words "music and drugs," you think of 70s hair bands doing way too much coke and/or acid and ending up on VH1 Where are they Now. You don't really think "reviewing KZSU's world music under the influence of percocet and valium."

Ever since my two trips to ER this month I've been hitting the painkillers on a regular basis. (Unfortunately, I'm running out so I have a feeling I'm gonna start hurting again real soon.)

Part of my role as World Music Director is to review the music we add to our library so that our DJs know what they're getting when they pick up an unknown CD. Fortunately for me I had built up a cushion by reviewing 6 CDs last week so that this week, when I was really out of it, I didn't have to worry about meeting this week's quota. I tried listening to music, I really did, but the drugs pretty much wiped out my critical ability. Everything sounded pretty. It was impossible for me to come up with anything insightful or even useful to say. That, combined with the fact that I couldn't seem to type, pretty much ruined my ability to do anything productive this week.

In other news, I had my first acupuncture appointment on Friday. It went well. Mostly a consultation, but I really liked the doctor and was encouraged by what he had to say about my condition. I'll keep you posted.

And back to ER I go
Yeah, the "no visits to the hospital in 2008!" resolution lasted about as long as a Pamela Anderson marriage. Yesterday, after 30+ hours of total back pain agony, I ended up back in ER. In addition, this time my old pal non-stop vomiting came with me. Between Saturday morning and last night, here's my food diary: a half piece of toast, a bowl of cereal, two oatmeal cookies, a home-made burrito. That's it for 4 days. Since then I've had 8 saltine crackers, a half cup of milk, and a small bowl of cereal....at this rate I'm going to get huge.

But the point of all this is not to complain (sorry if it seems like I am) or to praise the wonders of Percocet and Valium (which I do), but rather to thank all the ER nurses at Peninsula Hospital in Burlingame. Every since time I've been to ER (probably a dozen times in the past 18 months), the nurses have been exemplary. Kind, compassionate, gentle. Even when rushed off their feet, as they were yesterday, my nurse, Lynda, took the time to check in periodically to make sure I was OK, see if I needed anything, and generally make me feel like I wasn't being forgotten.

And she's just one example. Each nurse, from the quiet, middle of the night shift to the busier than hell on a Saturday morning shift has been fabulous. Sure it's the doctors who make the lovely pain-go-away drugs possible, but it's the nurses who give you the most one-on-one attention -- and they do it with admirable skill. They've never failed to make me feel like I was being taken well care of and for that I am beyond grateful to these unsung heroes and heroines.

The two times I was admitted for a week, the floor nurses were equally wonderful. I will always be thankful for those middle-of-the-night chats when I was wide awake and they had time to spend in between seeing to other patients. They make me laugh, gave me a much-needed dose of human contact while being stuck in a hospital, and in all ways were warm, extremely capable, and delightful.

On a side note, I must once again praise Husband for staying by my side during yet another ER trip. In spite of the fact that he's crazy-busy at work, he made me his number one priority; holding my hand, keeping me company, and making sure I was OK. Even after I got out he took care of me; picking up prescriptions, getting me water, and once again treating me like I'm the most important person in the world. Husband, you are amazing. Thank you.

Searching for Mr. Goodchair
Cipher, the world's most amazing cat screw you if you don't agree (TM), has one nasty habit. She has claws of death that she has used to great effect on the chair in our living room.

We tried to prevent it at first, and then gave up and let her have it. After all, the chair is about 15 years old and cost all of $20 at Salvation Army, so it's hardly an heirloom.

But she's done her work well and it's now in shreds. Literally. The cloth has been ripped up, the stuffing pulled out, and it's down to bare wood in parts. It's so hideous that we've been longing to replace it for months now. But it's surprising hard to find a chair.

For one thing, we're pretty sure she's have her way with the new one as well, in spite of whatever efforts we can make to prevent her, so we don't want to spend a fortune on something that won't last long. But even shopping within a budget we find that there are really only two kinds of chairs: ugly and uncomfortable.

Even if we didn't have a budget we find that the $800 chairs are also ugly and/or uncomfortable.

Today we went to a home consignment store where the prices were reasonable (the chair we liked the best was $299) but again everything was....well, you know.

What is it with furniture designers that they don't realize that comfort is a quality people might actually find desirable? There are chairs that force you to slump (great for those of us with bad backs). Then there are those that force you into a position so upright that they should come with a corset and a Jane Austen novel. Others with big huge arms so far from the seat that you have to rest them at shoulder height -- very comfortable. Or seats that so deep that my feet don't reach the ground. Oh good, I'm five.

And the lovely color options. Green plaid. Black with green and purple flowers. Stylized "modern art" fabric that manages to combine the worst of cubism with the worst of surrealism. (Think Dali meets Helen Keller in a field of dead wild flowers.)

Is it too much to ask for a chair that costs less that $300, is comfortable to sit it, and doesn't actually cause visual offense?

At this point, we'll be living with the chair of shreds until it's just a pile of fluff and threads.

Scenes from a marriage
I'm reading a fascinating book. Uncommon Arrangements: Seven Portraits of Married Life in London Literary Circles by Katie Roiphe.

So far I'm only halfway through, but it's a wonderful look at just what the title suggests: uncommon arrangements. The book is full of marital secrets. Nearly all these marriages (including those of writers such as H.G. Wells, Vera Brittain, Katherine Mansfield, and others -- both heterosexual an homosexual) were extremely untraditional. Couples with acknowledged lovers or mistresses. Couples who didn't live together. Secret children. Society images to be upheld or conventions to be flouted. It's a very well-researched and written book, but it's gotten me thinking about something I've pondered for a while. Namely - marriage.

What exactly makes a marriage work? And how can there be so many flavors of one institution? Every married couple I know has a relationship that is different from every other married couple I know. And that just fascinates me. Husband and I have many married friends whom we love, but whose way of conducting their marriage is markedly different from how our works. Why do some couples look forward to separate vacations while others want nothing more than non-stop couple time? How can some happily married couples spend every weekday evening apart -- at classes, rehearsals, the gym, work, etc., -- and yet others will cut themselves off from outside activities in order to just be together? I know of couples who are madly in love, happily married, and each other's best friend -- and yet I've never once seen them hold hands or kiss in front of anyone else. Another duo bicker like like two cats in a pillowcase about everything from dinner to politics, and yet they still look at each other with the misty-eyes of newlyweds.

My ex-husband and I have been fortunate enough to have stayed good friends. Both of us are remarried. And we seem to have married someone quite opposite from our original spouses. Oh sure there are some similarities: intelligence, sense of humor, kindness, generosity, etc. But in other ways night and day from our first marriages. Luckily we both seem to be extremely happy in our second (and last) marriages, but is it because we changed our definition (or expectation) of what a marriage should be or is it because we realized what we first wanted wasn't right for us. On the other hand, I know a man on his third marriage and I swear that wives #2 and #3 are all but interchangeable. Like the theme song to the old Patty Duke show, "they look alike, they walk alike, they sometimes even talk alike"). Will this one work, or is he doomed to repeat the failure because he didn't change his tastes enough?

Marriages are fascinating. And to an outsider, every one is something of a puzzle. I'm just happy that for all their crazy differences, my friends all seem to have found their own unique flavor of marriage that works for them and makes them happy.

CD Pick of the Week: Ladysmith Black Mambazo
Ilembe: Honoring Shaka Zulu is another delicious release from LBM featuring the fabulous vocal harmonies and a capella music for which they are justly famed. Warm, glorious and all wonderful. This is music that is truly life-affirming. It's joyful, pure, and completely without pretense. Just gorgeous.

The Super Bowl of Sickness
While most of the US wallowed in junk food and first downs yesterday, I just wallowed. It was another sick day for me. A semi-sorta-kinda repeat of my ongoing mystery syndrome. So no chips and guacamole for me. Just zarfing.

I was sick the whole day. And not just sick, but miserable. I'm not sure how people who are sick all the time deal with it. One day of feeling like crap and I was totally upset. Of course I did spend Wednesday in ER, so it hasn't been a great week for me health-wise. But it's just so awful being that out of it. There wasn't much I could do except lie in bed with a hot water bottle on my crampy tummy and wait for the next round of throwing up.

Now I'm not saying all this to feel sorry for myself, I'm just honestly wondering how you keep your spirits up when you have ongoing health problems. When you don't know from one day to the next if you'll feel like getting out of bed. When you spend entire days in major pain, with no end in sight, knowing there's nothing you can do but get through the day and hope the next day will be better.

And today, I am better. Not perfect but definitely better than yesterday. I had a half a bowl of cereal and it stayed where it belonged. (Yesterday I couldn't even tolerate water.) I'm weak and wobbly but not in pain. But today I'm wondering how you stay optimistic. How do you stay strong, stoic, and brave when you feel like your body is working against you?

So much for resolutions...
My number one New Years Resolution: No visits to the hospital in 2008!

Well, that one didn't even last a month. Yup, Wednesday morning found me and long-suffering Husband in our old familiar stomping grounds, ER.

This time it wasn't my mystery illness, it was my back. While I'm used to being in pain everyday because of my bad back, the past few days have been absolute hell. After not being able to eat, throwing up from the pain-induced nausea, and no sleep for two days, I broke down an said "I need help." Two butt-shots of painkillers later, they sent me home. I now have Valium (as a muscle relaxer) and some sort of extra-strength (i.e. stronger than my usual Vicodin) painkillers, and I seem to be doing OK.

The very nice ER doc said the key was to break this cycle of muscle spasms, which these drugs seem to be doing. I'm in pain, but no more than usual and certainly much, much better than the agony I was in earlier this week. There are even moments (fleeting though they may be) where I don't hurt at all -- a wonderful release, I must say.

Last night, though, I took both pills at 4 am after waking up in pain (and induced to get out of bed by Cipher the world's most amazing cat, screw you if you disagree TM). I found out that these two pills, in combination, followed by sleep, produce some really weird, really vivid dreams. Even while dreaming them I remember thinking "wow, this is trippy." Bonus!

Anyway, I hope all your resolutions last longer than mine.

Highway to Heaven
Sigh...

You know, Christians are just play wacky. It turns out that for a frighteningly large group of holier than thou-ers, I-35 isn't just a road....it's a sign. According to the Bible, Isaiah 35:8 reads: "And a highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Holy Way; the unclean shall not pass over it, and fools shall not err therein." Seems to me that fools are actually erring therein...

Send in the clowns. No! Don't!
Like all sane people, I hate clowns. Freaky-faced, big-shoed, red nosed gnomes force feeding glee on an unsuspecting world. Well, turns out I'm not alone. A recent UK poll of 250 kids aged between 4 and 16 reveals the startling fact that every single one of them hates clowns!

I feel vindicated.

Floor 97 please...

Oh those wacky Japanese. According to the BBC Japan's Mitsubishi Electric Corp has just opened what it says is "the world's tallest elevator testing tower." Who knew there were such things? You live and learn.

2008: The Year of Pictures
Thanks to Husband, I now have a spiffy new camera to indulge my shutterbuggery. Thanks to flickr, now have a page to show things off. I'll get more interesting (and better) as I become more familiar with the equipment (both camera and modern technology) but I invite you to check out our life in the coming year.

Happy new year!

Won't you blog about this song?
At the risk of parodying a parody, check out this spot-on video by the Richter Scales an a capella group who obviously know the Silicon Valley score.

CD Pick of the Week: Kitka
Kitka, 9-member female choral ensemble from the San Francisco Bay Area turn to Slavic folksangs in the Rusalka Cycle; based on “restless spirts, thought to be women who had died unjust or untimely deaths.” As you’d expect it’s dark, disturbing, and haunting. Amazingly beautiful vocal harmonies combine with unpredictable rhythms and dissonant counterpoints to produce gorgeous sounds; lightly backed by cellos & percussion. It is powerful, mystical and truly scary at times with an other-worldly evocation of ghosts. Wonderful and chill-inducing. One of my favorite CDs of the year.

The School of Brutalism
Of all the ridiculous (and yet somehow fitting) names for architectural styles, the School of Brutalism has to take the prize. And I bet I don't even need to describe it, do I? Check out this article from The American Spectator about a crappy "Brutal" building and why it won't (or can't) go away.

Knit one, purl death
Death by knitting? Check out Sock Wars "the bloodiest extreme knitting tournament."

According to the rules of Sock Wars, participants must knit a pair of socks for another player and then mail them to the "target." Players are "killed" when they receive their socks in the mail. There's more to it, but I'm just amused at the concept.

You know, the can walk....
Now in the people are WAY to freaky about their pets department

Check out Just Pet Strollers. The "Burley Tail Wagon Stroller w/optional ski attachment" is only $400.
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