Beautiful Winner

Saturday, Feb. 10, 2007 - 2:03 a.m.

I was supposed to see JJ on Friday, and the dear girl even took the day off to do it.

Instead I had a sleep-deprived meltdown, argued with my husband, and called her, in tears, asking for a rain check. Thanks, JJ. I'm all better now that I've slept.

I will see you on a weekday evening.

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I won something.

It's the first time in many years that I've actually won anything.

Two tickets to see Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band.

And now I find that I don't want to go. I want to either sell them to somebody seeking a cheap pair of tickets on craigslist, or offer them to my friend Dan up in Sacramento, who is a diehard fan.

I'm going to be forty-two years of age in a couple of months, and Bob Seger & The SBB haven't charted since immediately after I hit puberty.

Besides, NOTHING is going to beat our most recent Keane concert experience.

John is proud of me for winning the tickets, and is thankful for my entry in the contest in hopes to win something for him.

Heh. Turns out, he's not a big fan after all, either, and says to go ahead and do something else with the tickets.

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I have nothing to add to the melee that currently surrounds Anna Nicole Smith, except to say that she was a combination of fragility and glamour that we have all seen before, and will probably see again -- and I will ponder how frequently we forget that people in the spotlight are nothing more than human beings with feelings and needs and famlies and emotions.

Somehow we think celebrities are required to eschew some or all of those things once they achieve fame, and I don't know how we keep arriving at that conclusion.

If anybody wants to speculate on this, please do. Because I'm at a loss.

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On the last Wednesday of my stay in Anaheim, I switched Dave's computer on and activated Yahoo Messenger.

A friend of mine was online. A friend I have not seen in person in nearly a decade, but one whom I adore dearly.

He thought it was entirely appropriate and even humorous to tell me that, golly gosh darn, we just missed one another! Had to fly to the Bay Area for a sales conference or some such thing and had a free evening, and wasn't it a pity that I was in Anaheim.

Yeah. Thanks a lot for sharing.

If you know my schedule, and you know there's no way within acceptable time/space paramaters that I can meet with you and you know that I've missed you very much -- then why on earth would you actually tell me you were in town and that we were going to not see one another?

That's like making a starving person watch somebody else eat a meal.

Don't do that again, please. Thanks.

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Friday Five:

How far back can you trace your family tree?

I'm related to Pocahontas through my grandfather. That's why I only sang 'Fever' on stage once with Bob Chance, because he chimed in on that verse and substituted the word 'Fever' with the word 'Wampum' to try and go for the cheap laugh. Inserting a reference that implies that one of my ancestors was a whore is not a really good way to keep me in the mood to perform that song.

What is the most interesting (or strange) thing you've heard about one of your relatives?

My Uncle Ira had a wooden leg as a result of his service in World War II. He became a substitute teacher, and would walk into the classroom with an obvious limp, and tell the students they were allowed to ask one question about him, and that he'd leave the room so they could decide what to ask. He would return, and face the inevitable query: "How did you lose your leg?" ... to which he would answer "It got bitten off." And of course, as he had stated earlier, he'd entertain no further questions. I never met him, but I love him.

How do you feel about legacy names like John Henry Smith IV or naming children after other relatives?

I know somebody whose first two names are Harry Simeon. I wouldn't do that to a child.

Would you consider yourself and/or your family to be traditional?

My ancestors? Marginally so. Currently? There are traditions that we observe, yes.

What is one tradition you have passed on to your children and/or plan to pass on to them?

No particular traditions, but if I were to have children, I'd refer them to something I wrote a few years ago, entitled "Letter To A Friend's Daughter."

All right, there you go. Link is to the left.

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I think that's it. I'm going to spend the day looking for Clambake coverage.

Anybody my age or older knows what that is. :-)

Have a good Saturday.

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