Too much of a good thing

Hey there.  Remember that photo cult I got kidnapped by last year?  Y’know, the one where they brandished red hot pokers at my nipples and swore to shove Cheetos up my nose if I didn’t take a picture.  Every.  Single.  Day.  Of.  The.  Year.  Remember that? 


(Ahhhh, good times.) 


Well, I did it.  I survived.  I completed the whole project and then frantically made a hasty, scream-filled escape, and hid, sobbing, in my closet with my sweater pulled over my head as soon the cult looked the other way. 


(Okay, not really.  But it kind of feels like that.)


Now that I’ve been plopped out the back end of the project, I realize what a freaking ridiculous undertaking it was.  Sure, maybe it sounds simple enough to take a measly little picture once a day for a whole year—pffft!—how painless, right?  But it isn’t.  No.  You see, the cult headquarters (aka the official site where you upload your daily 365 pictures) is…. well…. a wee bit more complicated than that. 


Let me explain….


When I first joined their cult, things were all hunky-dory, kumbaya, hakuna matata, and shit like that.  I was learning a lot—I mean, A LOT—about my cameras, Photoshop, Picmonkey, and digital photography in general, and I was enjoying the journey.  I was having fun.  But it didn’t take me long to notice the nasty undercurrent lurking beneath it all. 


Man, people are competitive there.  It’s like Thunderdome!  I mean, if someone posts a picture of…. ohh…. I dunno…. say, a bowl of Skittles, for example, the others on the site would all ohh and ahh at first, but then run off like thieves and post their own pictures of bowls of Skittles too with captions saying ‘Look!  Look at ME!  Look how much awesomer MY Skittles picture is!’ and soon there would be hundreds of near-identical pictures of Skittles floating around, each topped with a heaping helping of attitude. 


And then the bickering and bitch-slapping would erupt.  Over pictures.  Of Skittles. Oy.


I never realized how much fighting a handful of non-Paparazzi produced pictures could whip up.  It really started to get to me.  I stopped interacting with the other cult members months ago and just kind of kept on posting my pictures there late at night once every few weeks, hoping not to be noticed.  In all honesty, I’m glad it’s finished. 


Frankly, there are days you just don’t feel like taking a picture, okay?  There are days you are just too busy to take a picture of anything more than a half-assed snapshot of whatever crap you bump into.  And there are days you just want to take pictures without being judged.  That’s what it all boiled down to for me.  I realized about half-way through it that producing a photograph worthy of judging every (!) single (!) day (!) for (!) a (!) whole (!) year (!) is just unnecessarily stressful.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, there were times I loved the project and enjoyed the heck out of it…. but, all in all, I think I bit off a bit more than I could chew.


But anyway….


The project is now complete—yes, I finished it; I didn’t quit—but I’m waaaayyyyyyyyyyy behind on posting the pictures here.  In fact, it appears the last time I updated you on the project was October. 


(October?)


(Really?)


Well, crap.  I suppose I should really get on that.  Like, now.  Here we go….



Day 288 (2012-10-14) ~  I got this spooky Halloween banner in the mail from my awesome friend, Callista. I hung it up on the wide window above our backdoor for Halloween and I loved it.





Day 289 (2012-10-15) ~  This was one of the local high schools back on October 15th. The walkway was soooooooo gorgeous with the trees all covered in orange and yellow Autumn leaves.





Day 290 (2012-10-16) ~  I saw some Halloween skulls on sticks in the ground while I was out walking on some errands and I thought they might look exceptionally creepy with Picmonkey's Ghostly filter.  Oh, yeah.  Definitely creepy.





Day 291 (2012-10-17) ~  Yeah.  It rained this night.  IN.  THE.  HOUSE.  It even warped the wood trim above our backdoor.  It’s times like these when I wish I was still a renter.  Grrrr.





Day 292 (2012-10-18) ~  And this is how the cacti grow in Chicago.





Day 293 (2012-10-19) ~  I saw this wee, little dude guarding a car in a dark parking garage and he made me giggle.





Day 294 (2012-10-20) ~  Wednesday was busy, busy, busy making clay puppets for another stop-motion movie she had in the works.  This was one of her latest clay buddies.  In fact, this puppet right here earned her $2,000 in a film contest—but you’ll have to wait a couple of posts for the rest of that particular story.  (Sorry!)





Day 295 (2012-10-21) ~  Another retro Strawberry Shortcake doll that I have in our den.  This is Apricot.  I have no idea why she's just named after a fruit when all the others are named after desserts though. (????)  Kind of odd, huh?





Day 296 (2012-10-22) ~  And this is what it looks like from the third floor balcony when some construction crews show up at 8am and dig big holes in the sidewalk and block off the only two exits out of the building (besides the back alley).  No warning.  No notice.  Just—BOOM!—you’ve got no front doors until further notice, suckers.  Grrr.





Day 297 (2012-10-23) ~  Wednesday saw this Jack Skellington fondant cake sculpture in the front window of a local bakery and she about fainted from joy right there on the sidewalk.  Her 16th birthday party was a couple of days after Halloween, so we ordered her a Jack sculpture for her cake.





Day 298 (2012-10-24) ~  Our pumpkins were waiting on the deck, ready to be carved for Halloween night.  (ACK!!  A slight cheat on this picture.  It was taken on the 25th, not the 24th. Whoopsie!)





Day 299 (2012-10-25) ~  Ooooooooooooh!  I love this one!  This is what it looked like on my walk to meet Scope after work on October 25th.  Halloween was definitely in the air!





Day 300 (2012-10-26) ~   Okay, there was a lot of stuff going on this particular week, so I missed a couple of days by accident.  Fortunately, Scope, Wednesday, and I went to an incredible blown glass gallery, so I have lots of pics to make up for it.  Like this one.  (Taken on the 27th, not the 26th.)





Day 301 (2012-10-27) ~  Another shot from the blown glass gallery. This one is called "Scene of Japan #59" by Hiroshi Yamano.  The fish was soooooooooo realistic!  Just amazing.





Day 302 (2012-10-28) ~  Another shot from the blown glass gallery. There was no artist's name on this one, as it was an unlabeled bowl on a desk in the back office.  I love the colors all back-lit in the sunshine like that, all bright and rainbow-y!  (Taken on the 27th, not the 28th. Sorry!)





Day 303 (2012-10-29) ~  Another shot from the back office at the blown glass gallery I visited on the 27th.  This one wasn't labeled either, so I have no idea who the artist is.  I loved the three white apples propped in front of the book like that.  If you look closely, you can see the images of white apple blossoms on the apples.  Wow.  (Taken the 27th, not the 29th.  Whoopsie!)





Day 304 (2012-10-30) ~  We carved our pumpkins on the night of the 29th, but this one of Oogie Boogie from The Nightmare Before Christmas really dried out and shriveled up overnight, so we had to light it a day early before it caved in on itself.





(If you want to see all the previous Project 365 posts, click HERE.)  The rest of the project is coming soon!






© Coracabana

The Mr. Wrong Diaries

I’m getting serious now.


I have this friend that I’ve known practically forever.  She married Mr Wrong when she was too young and, in a nutshell, he was an abusive jackass from day one.  There.  Even after they split up, he was constantly pounding on her front door and showing up at her workplace, hounding, assaulting, and tormenting her.  He was an angry, scowling, belittling, cruel, and violent kind of creep, and she was terrified of him. 


Let’s call her Lily.


Lily was too afraid to call the police or even tell anyone what was happening because she knew that would just make Mr Wrong even MORE angry, so instead she tried whatever she could to keep him calm.  For years she tried to handle it all by herself and for years she suffered alone with it. 


Sometimes people would notice things weren’t right.  They’d see Mr Wrong storming around.  They’d hear Lily crying.  They would ask Lily about it when Mr Wrong wasn’t nearby, but Lily would always say things were fine when things were definitely NOT fine.  She was ashamed of the way things were and felt like maybe there was something wrong with HER because of the way Mr Wrong treated her.  She didn’t want anyone else to see her the way Mr Wrong did, so she tried to act like everything was normal…. because when she pretended things were okay, everyone else thought things were okay, and then things kind of felt okay, okay?


Yeah.  It was complicated. 


But, even more complicated….


They had a child together before they split up.  Let’s call the baby Daisy.  Daisy was adorable, chubby, and such a happy little thing!  Mr Wrong—who didn’t pay child support or daycare or contribute a single penny towards the child for a long, long time (until the child support officers caught up to him, of course)—used that child as an excuse to stalk and berate Lily.  She could never, NEVER get away from him. 


Somewhere along the line early on, Lily got some secret legal advise behind Mr Wrong’s back.  She was told to write down everything Mr Wrong did to her and the baby, to keep a record of it all to use against him some day.  So, she did.  She amassed a huge box full of journals detailing all her interactions with Mr Wrong.  However, years later, she found out that her journals were useless and couldn’t be helpful in court against Mr Wrong because the only kind of proof that the court wants to see is police or medical reports, and Lily had none.


Disgusted, Lily boxed up her diaries and gave them all to me.  She said she couldn’t stand to ever see the damn things again because she felt like they had kind of betrayed her.  She had poured all her misery out in those little books all those years, thinking she was doing the right thing and that those books would swoop in and save her one day…. but they didn’t.  Instead, they left her alone in battle with Mr Wrong all over again, just like she had always been, and she hated them for it.


She said I could read them if I wanted to, she didn’t care anymore.  I didn’t want to for a long time, but eventually curiosity got the best of me and I broke into the box of books.  And I have never been the same since.  My heart physically hurts, you guys.  I can hardly stand thinking of my friend and her bubbly baby going through shit like that!  Domestic violence and emotional abuse is never pretty, everyone knows that, but here in my hands I have a blow-by-blow account of it, spanning over a decade.  I can’t believe no judge would accept this as evidence for Lily against Mr Wrong!!!!  


I’m going to share snippets of a few of the many, many entries here in Lily’s own written words (with names altered to protect the innocent—and the guilty).  Tell me what you think about the court system ignoring all of this either in the comments below or in email, as I know a lot of you prefer.


Domestic violence is not always like Law & Order, chock full of black eyes and restraining orders.  Here’s what abuse more often looks like….



SNIPPET #1 (written one day in the Summer of 1997 when Mr Wrong flew into one of his many rages in front of Lily and baby Daisy while they were still living in the same house and Daisy was about eight months old): 


“I don’t think I will ever make it out of his grip alive.  He is getting more and more enraged over little, little things.  I don’t know what to do.”….

“I’m not ‘allowed’ to touch his things anymore in case I somehow break them.”…. 

“He started yelling at me and getting in my face, saying, ‘you will treat my things with respect!’ and ‘if I come home and find my things ruined, you will be SO SORRY!’”…. 

“I didn’t break and ruin any of his things.  How many times do I have to defend myself on that?”…. 

“He had his finger pointing in my face.  He was yelling on and on about what a terrible person I am.  He said I am ‘pathetic’.  He said I am ‘hopeless’.  He said I am ‘just a bitch’.  He said I am a ‘fucking idiot’.  He said I am ‘stupid’.  He said I am a ‘moron’.”…. 

“He told me repeatedly to ‘fuck off’ and he told me all our problems are all my fault.”…. 

“He said that I ‘don’t deserve’ his ‘attention’ and I ‘don’t deserve’ his ‘respect’ and that I will never get it from him.”…. 

“He said I have nothing ‘important’ or ‘interesting’ to say.”…. 

“During his rampage I was feeding [Daisy] some cottage cheese, and right there in front of her, he kicked her Donald Duck toy across the apartment and it hit a wall by the front door.  She burst into tears, with cottage cheese falling out of her mouth, tears running down her cheeks, and her arms up by her face, shaking in fear!  I scrambled to get her out and comfort her.  He didn’t feel bad, he didn’t stop to see if she was okay, he continued his yelling and accusations and went past us into the kitchen and kicked Donald Duck around some more until it broke!”….

”He told me that he thinks I don’t love [Daisy], that I was only comforting her to make myself look good and to feed my ego!”



SNIPPET #2 (written in the Spring of 1998, eight months after Lily and Mr Wrong had been separated, and the day baby Daisy had just had surgery in the hospital):

”He followed us home and while [Daisy] was sleeping off the anesthetic in her crib, [Mr Wrong] was pulling me around and trying to talk me into having sex with him!  He offered me money for it!  That makes me so sick.  He leaves us dead broke, then thinks he can get my pants off by waving money in my face.  This is not the first time he has tried this!  That is his opinion of me?”….

”After all that has been happening and his not paying child support, the only way [Daisy] and I will get money is for me to have sex with him?  We don’t need the money if that’s how we have to get it!  I am not a prostitute!”….

”I kept bluntly saying no and he kept asking for it.  He wouldn’t stop!”….

”He said he could ‘rape’ me if he wanted to.”….

”He even offered me $100 to just drop my pants and let him have a look!”….

”Then when I made it clear I didn’t want to be poked, tickled, or otherwise touched by him he started making fun of me.  He brought up all the physical things that are ‘wrong’ with me.  Then he said that he knows that a lot of the things he said and did to me during our marriage were ‘physical and emotional abuse’, but that I ‘had it coming’.  (I could just scream!)  He said that he knew when he was doing it that it was ‘wrong’ and that he ‘should stop’, but he didn’t because I ‘deserved it’.”….


SNIPPET #3 (written one day in the Summer of 1998, a year after Lily and Mr Wrong had separated):


”[Mr Wrong] came over unannounced again today.  He kept grabbing and touching me and trying to talk me into sex.  He pinned me to the floor, got on top of me, and was trying to pry my legs apart, all in front of [Daisy].  I fought and kept yelling no, but he wouldn’t listen or stop.”…. 

“Then he kept trying to kiss me on the lips.  When I guess it finally became clear that I wasn’t going to give in, he said something mean about my weight and then kicked my stuff across the room.  I could just puke!”….


SNIPPET #4 (written one day in the Summer of 1998 when Mr Wrong was in Lily’s house to, supposedly, have a visit with Daisy who was one and a half years old):


”[Mr Wrong] refused to leave me alone.  He kept sneaking up behind me and jabbing me in my sides.”….

”It didn’t matter how many times I told him to stop it, he just kept doing it.  He pulled me to the floor and dug his fingers in my sides—it is very painful, he just digs his fingers in my sides as hard as he can and grinds them in me and ignores my crying, my telling him it hurts, and my telling him to stop it!”….

”I hate myself for not punching him in the face.”….

”[Daisy] kept shouting ‘Stop it! Stop it!’”….

”’It wouldn’t hurt if you didn’t struggle,’ he said.  ‘Don’t fight me!’”….


SNIPPET #5 (written the morning after the previous snippet):

”I woke up today with bruises all up my sides from what [Mr Wrong] did to me yesterday.  I’m still in pain!  He has no business touching me!”….

”I am SO ANGRY!”….



SNIPPET #6 (written one day in the Summer of 1999, two years after Lily and Mr Wrong had separated, and the day after Lily had told Mr Wrong to stop talking about her body in a degrading way because it made her uncomfortable):


”[Mr Wrong] told me he is mad at me for telling him my breasts are none of his business.  He said it was ‘shitty’ of me.  He told me he is a ‘smart’ person and ‘smart people should never be questioned’.”….

”He yelled at me every time I said a word.  He said ‘I can’t have a conversation with you if you talk!’”….

”He told me to never say it is none of his business again, because when I did that, I was being ‘disrespectful’ and ‘discourteous’ to him.”….


SNIPPET #7 (written one day in the Summer of 1999, two years after Lily and Mr Wrong had separated, and when Lily was having trouble with Mr Wrong stalking her):


”Today [Mr Wrong] called my workplace and my chiropractor’s office looking for me.  When the receptionist at the chiropractor’s office told me he had called, I figured something terrible had happened, so I called him back.  But he had called me there just to tell me he wanted me to go out to dinner.”….

”When I got home, my caller ID showed he had called [my home] 5 times this afternoon in addition to calling my workplace and my chiropractor!”….


SNIPPET #8 (written one night in the Fall of 1999, when Mr Wrong was in Lily’s house, supposedly, to visit Daisy who was two years old):

”[Mr Wrong] kept telling me and [Daisy] again and again that he is ‘evil’ and a ‘monster.”  He actually put his face right into [Daisy’s] face and told her he is a ‘monster’.”….

”He was saying he can foresee a day when [Daisy] will understand what he is and will want to kill him for it!”….

”And he said ‘in five years, we will be friends or I will be dead’.  I can only assume he means suicide.”….

”He kept trying to hug me.  He kept talking about my body.  I was trying to hide my body under couch pillows again so he couldn’t see it.”….


SNIPPET #9 (written one night in the Fall of 1999, over two years after Lily and Mr Wrong had separated, and when Mr Wrong kept hiding in the dark to startle Lily outside her house and Daisy’s daycare night after night):


”[Mr Wrong] snuck in the dark and followed me.  I didn’t know he was there until I turned around to find him behind me, glaring at me with a really frightening look on his face.”….

”A chill ran right through me and I felt like running.  He looked furious and I couldn’t think what I might have done to piss him off.  I felt trapped in a spider web.”….

”But it turned out [Mr Wrong] was just following me to ‘scare’ me.  Mission accomplished!”…. 


SNIPPET #10 (written one night in early 2001 when Mr Wrong was at Lily’s house, supposedly, to visit Daisy, who was three years old):


”[Mr Wrong] said he threatened [an acquaintance] with a baseball bat and hid the phone so [the acquaintance] couldn’t call 911 during ‘the beating’ and now [Mr Wrong’s sister] is ‘afraid’ of him and thinks he is ‘a monster.’  That’s what [Mr Wrong] told me while sounding all proud of himself, acting like being seen as ‘a monster’ appeals to him.”….

”He told me not to tell anyone and told me he would come after me too if he ever hears back from anyone that I told them what he said.”….


Wow.  Can you believe the legal system just dismissed all of that because it was written in journals instead of police reports?! 


That was just ten diary entries.  Ten out of hundreds and hundreds of them!  That was just a small sampling of the earlier stuff Lily and Daisy went through.  I haven’t even gotten to the more recent diary entries yet, because I could only stomach reading through the first couple of books on the pile, but I do know that in more recent years, things were really no better for Lily and Daisy at the hands of Mr Wrong…. although Daisy’s school did end up calling the police over red flags they picked up on regarding Mr Wrong’s behavior, and that changed the dynamic somewhat.


Why am I telling you about this?  Well, because it dawned on me that just because Lily’s journals couldn’t help protect her from Mr Wrong within the legal system like she had thought they would, that doesn’t mean they can’t still be helpful.  What’s that saying?…. If you can’t be a good example, at least be a horrible warning.  (Or something like that.)  Maybe by talking about it here, someone in a similar situation will be helped by it and then it won’t have been for nothing.


You guys, if you get the feeling someone you know is in an abusive, controlling, or otherwise twisted relationship, you are probably right.  And, if she is, she likely feels that reaching out for help will only make things worse and that it’s best if she just handles it by herself.  Don’t just ASK her if things are okay, because you probably won’t get an honest answer:  GET HELP.  Just do it.  Do whatever you can to help her get out.  She needs you, even if she can’t say so.


If you, yourself, are in an abusive relationship, please, PLEASE get help.  If he is hurting you, threatening you, degrading you, scaring you, stalking you, or doesn’t understand that no means no, YOU NEED TO GET AWAY FROM HIM.  Tell someone who can help protect you and whose statement will carry weight in court—a therapist, a doctor, or the police—but also tell your friends or family members as well, because the more people you have in your support system, the better. 


One of the things I read in Lily’s journals that really crushed me was how much her friends and family disliked Mr Wrong, so they would just scatter like cockroaches whenever Mr Wrong showed up because they didn’t want to be in his company.  That meant that, over and over again, Lily and Daisy were abandoned and left alone with him, and that’s when the abuse would occur.  Mr Wrong knew Lily didn’t have much of a support system to protect her, and that’s why he kept doing those horrible things.  Because he could. 


Abusers can’t do what they do best in a crowd, they need their victims isolated.  If someone is mistreating you, keep your support system close, tell people what is going on (even if your abuser tells you no-one will believe you—as Mr Wrong kept telling Lily), and always remember that what he does to you does NOT define who you are. 


Abusers are just assholes.  Plain and simple.  It’s not YOU, it’s THEM.  They don’t outgrow it.  They don’t change.  They don’t magically wake up one morning with newfound respect for you and realize what shitbags they have been.  They just keep abusing people and convincing themselves that their victims ‘deserve’ it….  Like Mr Wrong, who just two weeks ago called Lily his “adversary with benefits” (in front of a court-ordered therapist!!!!—can you believe that????) when she attempted to confront him about the times in the past when he sexually assaulted her.


Wow.


Assholes never learn.






© Coracabana

Okay, boys and ghouls, gotta make this one a quickie!

It’s Halloween! My favorite holiday. I’m in a full-on obnoxious panic this morning though because I’m not yet done making both Wednesday’s and my costumes for tonight.

(Eeek!)

However, I can’t let the day wither away without watching Thriller!



Ahhh…. now I feel better.

*le spooky sigh*

Okay, gotta run. I need to make a pair of boots, make a whip (don’t ask), sew stitches on a black dress, and buy green eye shadow, elastic, garment tape, and ivy vines. Ugh.

(Any guesses what we’re going to be? Hmm….?)

Happy Halloween, Bloggers and Bloggettes!

© Coracabana

Because Sometimes Facebook Is Just Easier

Hmm.

So.

I was over on my hubba hubba hubby Scope’s blog the other day when—*gasp!*—I saw it. Something shocking. Something disgusting. Something big, burly, zitty, unshaven, and downright ugly!

*gulp*

I shielded my eyes. I pulled my hoodie over my head. And I curled my flexible self into a cramped, uncomfortable ball in my chair, bellowing, “GAWD NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!” out into the merciful universe.

*sniffle*

On Scope’s sidebar was this:

Five weeks, people. I haven’t posted on my blog (nor religiously haunted YOUR blogs) (*guilty squirm*) in five weeks….? Really? Wow. I’m—I’m sorry. I guess life got the better of me lately.

However….

Five weeks is long enough. Too long, actually. And since I still don’t have my bloggidy groove back yet, Blogaritaville, I’m going to give you my Facebook status updates instead. Here’s what’s been going on in the Land o’ Cora the last five weeks:


May 11:

A new neighbor moved into the 'hood. I don't like him. At all. He kept giving me the stink eye as I walked by.

May 13:

Marizpan cake makes everything better. EVERYTHING. Swearsies.

May 17:

Clearly, my hubby still thinks it is April Fools Day. He has been leaving fake spiders EVERYWHERE for me and Wednesday to stumble upon. Wednesday found one in her sock yesterday, and this is what I found when I opened the fridge this morning. MUST. GET. REVENGE.

May 18:

Holy shi tsu! I think I just had a heart attack. I opened our door to let air in and then suddenly *BAM!!* there was a big car crash right outside our house. Luckily everyone is okay, but I think I left a dent in the ceiling, I jumped so badly. Yeesh.

May 20:

‎*hic* I have had the hiccups all morning long. *hic* I had to run errands in three different stores while sounding like a harbor seal the whole dang time. *hic* Totally embarrassing. *hic* Holding my breath didn't work. *hic* Weird, 'cuz it usually does. *hic* So, I'm about to go drink water from a cup upside down. *hic* Wish me luck. *hic* *hic* *hic*


May 20:

I spent all morning cleaning the house because my mom and nephew are flying in to visit today. My lovely daughter just got home from school, promptly announced, "Wow, Mom, it looks beautiful in here!" and then immediately dropped a scoop of ice cream. INTO. THE. SILVERWARE. DRAWER. Really, girlie? Really?
:-P


May 21:

Just got back from the aquarium!

May 24:

Hubba Hubba Hubby wasn't looking so peppy tonight. I summoned all my ninja-like nanny skillz and promptly attacked him with a thermometer and, just as I suspected, he has a fever. :-( Now I've drugged him up and tucked him in bed. Seriously, fevers of the world, what are you thinking?! I can spot a fever a mile away, you know, so don't mess with me and my loved ones, got it?!?! Jeez.

May 30:

I don't know why these strawberries I'm growing are taking so long to ripen. There are just green berries as far as the eye can see. Hurry up, dangit! I wanna make a shortcake out of you!



May 31:

"I don't know what I'm training for but I hope it never happens" - LOL!!

June 2:

I haven't eaten chocolate in over a month. I know! Who am I and what have I done with the real Cora?! New vice: marzipan cake. Mm-mm-mmmm.

June 2:

Right this very second Scope is giving Wednesday lessons on how to shoot a rubber band at me more effectively. But I'm not worried because she keeps getting the rubber band stuck on her own thumb. Yep. These are the people I live with. ;-)



June 10:

Okaaaaayyyyyyyy. Wow. I have no words.

June 12:

We have a harvest of strawberries! Mmmmmm.

June 15, 2011:

Dear 14 Year Old Daughter; The term is "BUCKET seats", okay? Bucket with a "B," not an "F". And, no, that was not an "inappropriate" song I was listening to. But thank you for the laugh! *snicker* :-)

June 16:

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!! I don't even know what it is yet, but I am SOOOOOOO EXCITED!!!! http://www.youtube.com/JKRowlingAnnounces

June 18:

Just saw a firefly for the very first time. Wowza! Soooooooo cool! I was squealing like a pig on the sidewalk watching it light up and fly around. Too bad dogs and cats can't light up their butts like that. Think how handy that would be in a power outage....

© Coracabana

Playing Catch-Up: Snow Day!

Okay, so last I showed my bloggy face around here, I promised you a stupendous slew of stories, didn’t I? Ohhhhhhh, I’ve got stories for you, alright. Mm-hmm. In fact, dare I say it?—EEK!—I just might have too many stories. I can’t even really decide where to begin, so I keep putting it off and neglecting the blog, and then the problem just grows bigger and hairier and soooooooooooo much worse.

Kinda like moldy cheese in the back of the fridge.

Or Kirsty Alley.

Whatever.

The point? Much has gone on in my wee wittle world the last month or two…. hence the fact that I only blogged a pitiful, inexcusable three pointless posts in December.

Three!

Pfffft! Sad, wasn’t it? I know.

*cough slacking-good-for-nothing-clown cough*

It may take me a little while to blog it all, so bear with me. However, God forbid, if I’m still slogging my way through it and still blogging about Christmas in June, someone slap me. Okay? Okay.

Anyway, on with the stories….

Snow.

I used to dread snow when I lived in Seattle. Stupid sucktastic snow. Every time it snowed there—*POOF*—the whole city turned Stone Age. No cars, thanks to the rollercoasterish hilly streets being lacquered in an inch thick layer of ice, forcing everyone to ditch their cars and attempt to hoof it like we were in the dang Ice Capades! No electricity, thanks to the snow-encased trees all choosing to fall on the power lines, leaving everyone shivering by candlelight in their chilly homes for days on end! Basically, life would come to an abrupt halt and we’d all turn feral. And, my friends, THAT is NEVER pretty.

Snow was a terrifying monster which I feared all winter long.

But here in Chicago snow is a tame and docile beast. More of a pet, really. The kind that follows at your heals when you go out for a walk, licks your face, and occasionally leaves puddles on your floor. Not the least bit threatening.

Snow doesn’t bring this city to a grinding halt; snow doesn’t seem to impact anything here much whatsoever. It’s just kind of there. And for the first time in my entire adult life, snow doesn’t stress me out.

In fact, I think I like it. Whodathunkit?

Our first big snow day here was at the beginning of December. We awoke one Saturday morning to a scrumptious-looking city which seemed to have been generously frosted with Marshmallow Crème….

And Gwen was THRILLED!!!!….



There was a Bake Sale/Christmas Fair at Gwen’s school that day, but, unlike it would have in Seattle, the newly fallen Chicago snow did NOT take a steaming poo on our plans to go. Nope. We bundled ourselves up and walked a block and a half to school, hucking snowballs at each other the entire way. (Heh heh heh.) I may have also attempted an artsy fartsy snowy picture or two as we went….



The Bake Sale/Christmas Fair was fun. We sampled some delicious treats (my favorite were the “Oreo Balls”) and looked at lots of crafts and handmade trinkets. But my favorite table was “Santa’s Gift Tree” where I won myself this marvelous monster finger puppet, which I thoroughly enjoyed taunting Gwen and her friends with! Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!….



After Gwen’s friends bailed (was it something I or my finger puppet said?!?!), Gwen, Scope and I took a whack at the Cake Walk where Gwen won the first prize: this uber-yummy chocolate M&M cake….



Then Gwen, Scope, and I ventured back home to nosh on cake and rush up to the roof of our condo to see our winterized neighborhood from above….



Up on the roof we made a snowman, which Scope (always the gentleman) so gallantly gave his hat and scarf (awwww)….




….and we had another big ol' snowball fight. Duh.

Then to top of the perfect Snow Day, we piled into the car and drove a few streets over to take pictures of ourselves outside the Family Matters house (think Steve Urkel) (or, eww, don’t)….



(What?!)

(Doesn’t everybody take mini road trips to cheesy sitcom houses on Snow Days?!?!)

(No?!)

(Oh.)

The moral of the story? People might tell you that Winter in Chicago is a big. bad, ugly thing, but I’m here to tell you that those people are ignorant. So there. :-P

© Coracabana

227-248/365

And now for an update on my attempt at Project 365! Here are some of my favorite photos I’ve taken lately:

Day 227 (March 2, 2010)

I was sTrEsSeD oUt (!!!!!!!!!) and needed a break, sooo I took that splendiferous new camera I got from Scope to a park along the edge of Lake Washington just down the hill from my house, and drop-kicked my sTrEsS right into that lake by letting my snap-happy demon loose, and taking picture after picture after picture. *deep happy sigh*….











Day 232 (March 7)

Okay, so I know the almighty Wedding Fairies have strict orders to spit on my cake, bludgeon me with my bouquet, and/or shoot my garter belt at my rear like a fiercely-fancy rubber band if I dare break wedding protocol by showing you a picture of my wedding dress. But—eh—I figure a wee itty bitty teeny peek can’t really hurt. Much. R-r-right?….



Day 244 (March 19)

The morning dew on my lawn….



Day 247 (March 22)

Remember those Camera Toss experiments I’ve been toying with? Yeah? Well, I’m still at it, only this time I added another element to it inspired by an idea Scope sent me: overexposure. The camera was set on bulb and focused on some flowers which were backlit at a window, then I swooped the camera off to the side. The long exposure time turned the entire background white, while the movement of the camera created a kind of painted look to the flowers, and I just LOOOOOOOOVE it!….



Day 248 (March 23)

Ummm…. it’s a garden statue of a frog. Of course. *croak* ….


Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand with that, I’m outta here! Scope is flying into town tonight (squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!) so don’t expect to see much of me again until next week. Have a spectacular weekend, Blogaritaville!

© Love Letters By Cora

There's no place like home.

At 5 am last Friday *prolonged dramatic yawn* I sleepily stumbled my way into SeaTac Airport to curl into a ball in an uncomfortable chair down at ye olde familiar Gate B-10 and await my flight to Chicago to see my sweet fiancé, Scope.

But wait a minute, wait a minute. Let’s back up for just a second: have I mentioned I’ve been sTrEsSeD oUt lately? It’s true. I won’t lie. The move + the wedding preparations + problems with someone I'm no longer allowed to mention here + guilt at leaving my daughter at He Who Must Not Be Named's house while she didn't want to be there + a million other things = panic. Plain and simple. Thus, it was a frazzled and very fragile Cora who curled up on that uncomfortable black faux leather chair, clutching a pile of legal forms and wanting to suck her thumb Friday morning.

As much as I desperately wanted and needed to see Scope, there was still a small and worried part of me which felt woefully irresponsible for flying 2000 miles away when there’s so much that needs to be done back here. But….

My plane took off as the sun started to rise and I was treated to breathtaking views like this one of Mt. Rainier through the grimy airplane window….


….and suddenly about 30 minutes into my flight *POOF* all the stress just magically disappeared. Just. Like. That. I was glad I was on that plane!! I needed a break from it all!! And even as we neared Chicago and all I could see was this kinda sinister-looking snowy-white frozen checkerboard landscape below me….


….I still felt relaxed and giggly and like me again for the first time in weeks.

*happy deep sigh*

Then just as I stepped off that plane into Midway Airport, it happened. I felt like… I felt like I was home.

Yeah.

I didn’t feel like I was visiting Scope, I felt like I was coming home. That’s the first time I’ve felt that. And it was an amazing feeling!

Wow.

And soon there was Scope, towering over the rest of the crowd beyond security, grinning from ear-to-ear at me. Then I was racing up to him. And then I was definitely home.

:-)

Scope and I took my bags onto the “L” train and headed into the city where we had a delicious lunch at Miller’s Pub; we took a mini look inside the fine arts school my daughter will be attending once we move to Chicago; and we bought (….wait for it….) (….wait for it some more….) wedding rings.

That’s right. Wedding. Rings.

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

And to top off the perfect day perfectly, Scope took me out for a scrumptious Valentine’s Day dinner at Bob Chinn’s Crab House. I had the tilapia with fried rice….


….and, ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh myyyyyyyyyyyy gawwwwwwwwwd, it was sooooooooooooo gooooooooooooood. And so was the Chocolate Cake Sundae too. Mmmmmmmmmmm….

As for Scope, he had crabs. *ba-dum-bum-tish*….


And then after dinner we drove home together. And all was right with the world.

:-)

[….to be continued….]

© Love Letters By Cora