Crackbook

I recently joined Facebook.

I swore I never would.  Really, swore. Out loud. MANY times.

But then I found an old high school friend I really wanted to get in touch with. The only way to get his contact info was to succumb and join. Reluctantly, I put up a profile. I figured if I was looking for people, maybe people were looking for me. I’d put up one profile. One picture. Have one or two friends. Three, tops. That’s all I needed. No more. Really.

It all started out innocently enough. 

Now I know why a friend of mine calls it Crackbook. It sucks you in and gets you addicted.  It makes you write on people’s walls. It makes you comment on their photos. It makes you send out useless ‘status reports’ that are nothing more than telling somebody some stupid ass thing that you’re thinking or doing at a given moment. Who the hell cares?

Apparently, everybody.

Seriously. EVERYBODY.

EVERYBODY is on Crackbook. The number of people I have found that I haven’t heard from or about in 30 years is astounding. Men are easier to find than women. Women change their names. Other than when it’s required by the witness protection program, men don’t. Even then, I bet there’s some witness protection program version of Facebook. Maybe it’s called FaceLessBook.

Facebook makes you forget things like the fact that if you haven’t had contact with someone for 30 years, maybe there’s a reason for that. But suddenly you simply HAVE to put them on your friends list and look at their photos and read their personal information. Why? Why now?

Because it’s Crackbook.

It IS like a bad acid trip sometimes. The interface is horribly done and entirely user-unfriendly. Whoever designed it should be shot, run over with a steamroller and left for the buzzards. It’s a visual cacophony of photos, links, comments, status updates and other crap (my fingers slipped when I was logging in the other day and instead of Facebook I typed Fecebook. I laughed out loud at the appropriateness of my error).

A friend of mine (a real friend, not a Crackbook friend) described Facebook as a way to be connected without having to be TOO connected. That’s true. It sort of gives you an omniscient look into everyone’s lives, like you’re some all-knowing being looking in on your children.

Of course, that street runs both ways. Friends can look in on YOU.  People you hoped to never see or hear from again can find you.  Girls that wouldn’t give you the time of day in high school suddenly WANT to be your friend (fortunately, Facebook has the IGNORE button). You’ll get bombarded with crap like ‘who’s your celebrity friend of the day’ announcements and ‘how well do you know’ somebody quizzes. Like any addiction, you must take the downers along with the uppers.

Still….I have to admit…..verrrrrrry reluctantly…..that it IS sorta fun. In a sick, twisted, time-wasting sort of way. I might just been a teesny-weensy bit hooked on Crackbook.

But I can quit any time I want to.

Really.

note: before you send me, or anyone, a friend request on Facebook, you should take a listen to this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7MuwPlOiNQ

Ants in My Pantry

I started seeing them earlier this week.

Scout ants – the lone soldiers that precede the invasion. Their job: to gather intelligence and map the location of unguarded foodstuffs then return to the nest and issue the order to invade.

They’re patient. They’re waiting for me to make a mistake. They’re waiting for me to leave toast crumbs on the counter, a Starbucks cup on the desk or a dish with a little bit of food on it in the sink. They’re waiting for me to forget to put the blackberries back in the refrigerator. 

They’re thorough. I see them in different places every day.

They’re careful. There aren’t enough of them to constitute a trail that I can follow to find out where they’re coming from. Yet. 

It’s a game we play several times per year.

I don’t so much mind a few ants. I admire ants, actually. They’re clever. They’re industrious. They’re organized. This is more than I can say for myself most days. No, I don’t mind a few ants.

I mind when a few ants invite their four thousand buddies to join them. It’s like telling your kids they can have a few friends over and discovering the entire junior high school population in your swimming pool when you come home.

So, much as I hate to do it, I kill the scout ants, because I know if they find a morsel of food they’ll sound the alarm and my kitchen will be ant-central-station. If I thought they’d just carry off a few bread crumbs to their pals and be done with me, I’d let them go.  Of course, if I permitted that, I could be opening up a whole ‘nother can of worms. If I let them take a few bread crumbs, what next? Would I put my sandwich down to answer the phone only to come back and find it gone? Would I catch them trying to sneak a beer out of the refrigerator? I know it would only be a matter of time before I came home from the movies one night, looked around my studio and thought “Waaaaaaiiit a minute……where’s my TV?” No, ants are a little TOO industrious. It’s best to nip their aspirations in the bud.

Ants get in to EVERYthing. They get into places where you didn’t even know you had places. High places. Low places. Odd places. Like your iron. I discovered this when I was ironing and steam-flattened ants appeared in burgeoning patterns across my favorite blouse. You could tell some of them had been trying to run. It was obvious that most of them never saw it coming and were plastered with WTF expressions permanently steam-seared onto their faces.

Ants get into light sockets. Did you know they make little popping sounds when they reach a certain temperature?

Ants get into plants. A blow dryer on the lowest heat setting will get them off the plants, but will also fling ants and dirt all over the room. I found this out exactly the way you might imagine.

I don’t like waging chemical warfare. So I’ve tried other methods of ant control. I’ve tried cloves. I’ve tried cucumbers. I’ve tried ant bait. I’ve tried hairspray (not spraying it on them, just bashing them with the can).  I even used a lint brush once. Okay, twice.

But the best solution, by far: the vacuum.

No crushing little ant bodies, no scraping up and disposing little ant remains. No little CSI ant investigations. The ants are sucked away leaving no clue as to the cause of their demise.  It’s quick and I imagine it’s painless. They never know what hit them.

Or, maybe they do. Perhaps some enterprising little ant with a little ant digital camera caught the incident on video. Somewhere on some tiny ant computer screen logged in to AntTube.com, perhaps I am starring in a shaky video titled The Redhead Vacuum Massacre.

If I am, I can only hope the video wasn’t taken one of those times I was vacuuming in my underwear.

Un-Domestic Goddess

For a woman, I am embarrassingly un-domestic. I don’t cook. I don’t sew. I don’t grow things. I don’t host parties. I wouldn’t be able to tell you which utensil to put on which side of the plate. I was simply born sans the domestic gene. And I am surrounded by people who serve as constant reminders of my own shortcomings.

I have a friend who hand-weaves her own scarves and blankets on a loom. She probably even built the loom from homegrown bamboo or something (she has hundreds of species of plants in her yard, all meticulously cataloged). I have no doubt that the only reason she doesn’t also produce her own wool is some pesky city ordinance that prohibits Alpaca herds in the neighborhood. I could no sooner hand-loom a shawl than win the Tour de France. If I can manage to sew a button on straight and not skewer myself in the process, it’s a major coup.

Said friend, who I’ll call Joan (because that’s her name) cooks and bakes the most amazing things from scratch. I gave her a grocery sack full of plums and overnight she magically transformed it into perfectly packaged jars of jam. (I didn’t ask her, but she probably collected sand from beaches around the world, melted it and blew the glass for the jars in her basement). I’d probably have to study the plums for a week just to figure out how to get them open. (Don’t laugh. You should have seen my first experience with an avocado).

Don’t ask me to cook, bake, or jar. Anything. If it involves more than one pan or two ingredients, I’m calling out for pizza. 

I know people who take great pains finding the perfect wrapping paper and ribbons for gifts. They make their own paper. They make their own bows. They mold and bake ceramic adornments to go on top of the boxes. The packages look like works of art – the only fitting receptacles for hand-loomed scarves and homemade preserves in hand-blown jars. I can’t even cut the right amount of paper or get the tape to stop sticking to itself. The ribbon falls off when I try to tie it. And no, I don’t make hand-cut lacey snowflakes to use as nametags. I’m lucky if I remember to find my purple sharpie and write the recipient’s name some place on the wrapping before I forget whom the gift is for.

I was also born without the ability to accessorize. People with accessorization skills amaze me. They have a purse to match every outfit. Their earrings match their necklace, which complements their bracelet and rings. And their shoes always match their belt.

Judging by the way I dress, you would peg me as color blind. On a good day, my socks match. I mix patterns, wear lipstick that clashes with my shirt and wear white after Labor Day. Belts are purely utilitarian; they hold up my pants. Shoes? Forget it. Years of living in barn boots and sneakers have destroyed my ability to walk in anything remotely resembling fashionable footwear. Put me in a shoe with a heel and I walk like Bride of Frankenstein after a few too many shots of tequila. My medical records are full of scribbled entries like “fell off shoes again.”

I have friends who have amazing gardens. They grow their own vegetables, spices, fruit, lumber. I am the plant kingdom’s version of the Grim Reaper. If I so much as cast a glance at a flowerbed, it withers and dies. I have one houseplant that has ever lived; it must be some sort of genetic freak.

It’s too late in life for me to change, and I doubt I could do it if I tried. Instead I’ll embrace my position as the Lady with Unmatched Socks Who Lives in a Garage Surrounded by Dead Plants. And when I’m gone, you’ll have no problem finding where I’m buried. It’ll be the only plot in the cemetery where the grass won’t grow.

Stranger than Fiction

Disclaimer: Some of you may have already read this on my Guest Blog entry at Karin Tabke’s site (www.karintabke.com, check her out!). Not that it isn’t worth reading twice – I’m just sayin’.

Lately I’ve become fascinated with the whole concept of writing queries. For the uninitiated, a “query” is what an unpublished writer sends to agents to try to sell a manuscript they have already written. In a nutshell, it’s their story condensed into a few succinct paragraphs. The query hits on key plot points, characters and conflicts and gives enough info to entice the reader to want know more, but doesn’t give away the surprises or ending – think of it as a movie trailer in written format.

I have had individual works published, but the Road to Publication for the humorous essay is quite different than for a full-blown novel. There’s a real talent to capturing the essence of a story in a quarter-page query. I wondered if it was something I could even do. But I didn’t want to have to write a whole novel to find out. That could take…..hours.

But life itself is a story, isn’t it? And often it’s stranger than fiction. So instead of inventing a story, I took a day in my life and captured it in query format. Here it is, for your reading entertainment:

Introverted, menopausal redhead Jody Werner has finally arranged her life exactly the way she likes it: simple and drama-free. She works at home doing the artwork she loves, has a cute little studio in a blissfully quiet neighborhood and gets to spend the glorious California summer afternoons at the barn with the horses. The cherry on top of the sundae that is her life: she has the freedom to nap anytime she wants. Ah, life is good.

She’s looking forward to another blessedly uneventful day in her “I-refuse-to-turn-on-the-tv-and-hear-any-bad-news” paradise….until the phone call from the mysterious entity known only as The Banker.

The Banker tells her that before her loan application can be accepted, she has to come up with two years back tax returns. Oh no! That means a journey into the black hole that is her filing system; the swirling, bottomless abyss into which paperwork disappears, never to resurface. 

Aided by The Ladder (which creaks and wobbles the higher she climbs) and The Flashlight (which takes sick pleasure in randomly blinking in and out of usefulness) she embarks upon the treacherous journey into The Attic in search of The Box.

But finding The Box is not enough. Working against time, she must assemble two years of back tax returns in the proper order AND find a logical explanation for the decided dip in income for 2007. There is only one way to summon this kind of creativity on short notice: she must sacrifice herself at the altar of chocolate and caffeine.

With a solution (and chocolate-smeared tax returns) in hand she hurries out the door only to discover that her car has a flat tire! While waiting for the roadside assistance people, she gets a call from the barn. Her horse has lost a shoe! Now she has to get the flat fixed, deliver the tax returns to The Banker, locate her farrier and still find a way to get in her afternoon nap. Will she make it, or will the universe add insult to injury by extracting the ultimate price of unplanned expenditures AND sleep deprivation?

I am seeking validation for the non-fictional masterpiece that is my life. Jody’s Day is a complete waste of your time at 75,000 words. I’d be happy to submit the full manuscript for your consideration, provided you give me ample time to find it in The Box.

Is your life stranger than fiction? If so, express your sentiment with Stranger Than Fiction merchandise, available here, at the Misfit Designs online store: http://www.cafepress.com/jlwdesigns/6823909

   

Vaulting: It's Not Just for Kids

Writer’s note: This is a slight revision of a piece that was published in Vaulting World Magazine in June of 2006, reprinted here by popular demand.

Not long ago, I watched an exhibition of vaulting. I don’t know what ‘vaulting’ means in your world, but in mine it refers to gymnastics on horseback. It’s lithe-bodied little (and not so little) girls and even some boys performing all manners of moves, poses, athletic feats and gravity-defying stunts on a moving horse.

I’ve ridden horses since I was ten years old, and the First Commandment has always been to stay on it. In the saddle. Facing forward. Even slight variations of this standard were met with disdain.

Riding backwards and standing up on the horse’s back and doing headstands?  Our instructors always discouraged that sort of thing. Just like they’d get all pasty-faced and panicky if we tried to teach our ponies to rear so we could do our Lone Ranger “Hi-Ho Silver” routine. Any deviation from The Norm would have them running for Valium and liability release forms.

As for getting on a horse while it’s moving - my cronies and I do well to haul our sorry backsides onto a stationary horse with the help of a mounting block or a friend to give us an ungraceful “leg up.”

These little vaulting sprites stride up beside the horse (which moves in perfect cadence in a perfect circle) and hop right on it – at all gaits. Walk. Trot. Canter. No problem. Somehow they never end up hanging under the horse’s belly with their heads plowing up the earth as I imagine I would. 

The littlest people who get to perform the most death-defying acts are known as the “flyers.” In my discipline, a “flyer”is what you do when your horse skids to an unscheduled stop and you keep going. While equally dramatic, our flyers are more verb than noun and less about form than distance. 

Vaulters also have an impressive repertoire of ways to get off the moving horse. They may slide off, or flip over the side, or do a roll or even a back flip off the horse’s back or butt. On purpose.

In my style of riding, we have two kinds of dismounts – Get Off, and Fall Off. If you want to split hairs, Fall Off can be subdivided into Bail Before It Gets Worse and the more common Never Saw It Coming. If you ever see us exiting our horse when it is doing anything other than standing like a statue, it’s because something has gone horribly wrong.

I can also imagine my horse’s reaction if I ever tried to run up and throw my leg over his back when he was trotting along. Assuming he’d let me get close enough to spit on him, I’m sure he’d take my ungraceful floundering as permission to flee into the next county. Even if he were on a longe line, his most likely response would be to drag me through the peony bush. As for what he would do if I tried to stand up or do a headstand on his back...I might as well just hurl my body face-first into the ground and save him the trouble.

But I have to admit, I’ve actually tried it. Vaulting, I mean, not hurling my body face-first into the ground. I took vaulting lessons one winter, and I loved it. It was completely different from anything I’ve ever done on horseback. It was exhilarating. And there’s something about the oddness of looking up at the sky from your vantage point lying across a moving horse’s back that just appeals to my inner sense of weirdness. However, I draw the line at wearing the slinky little full-body leotards that the little girls do. I’m not leaving the house looking like a florescent super hero unless it’s Halloween and I’ve knocked back more than a few shots. I think at my age leggings and a baggy tee shirt are more appropriate.

I’m going to try vaulting again this summer, and I am preparing for it even now. I remember what parts of my body took a beating last time I tried it, so I am attempting to condition said parts to better withstand the demands of the sport. I’m doing pushups for my upper body. I’m jumping on and off of my little trampoline to strengthen and stabilize my ankles. Perhaps I’ll even practice a few moves on those big propane tanks out in back of the barn. I may give new meaning to the term “flyer” if any of that propane goes up.

I will approach it with a youthful exuberance and a can-do attitude. And perhaps a couple of pillows tied around my body, because the ground is a lot harder than it was when I was a kid. Assuming the emergency room has internet access, I’ll let you know how it goes.

Jody Werner is a writer, artist and semi-professional horseman who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. A successful hunter/equitation rider and competitor, she also enjoys an occasional foray into the world of vaulting. She has a Thoroughbred gelding who would never let her stand up on his back, and who quite frankly would prefer it if she’d stay off of him entirely.

A Tale of Two Bales

We’ve got “hay reserves” in back of the barn that consist of a couple-three bales of hay tipped up on their ends and leaned neatly against the side of the building.

Last week I was walking my horse behind the barn. He decided to grab a mouthful of alfalfa off the bale. You could hardly expect him to pass it by, any more than you could expect a cop car not to stop for a guy on the corner holding out a fresh cup of Starbucks.

Unfortunately, my horse decided to grab his mouthful from the BOTTOM of the bale. This is like doing the old yanking the tablecloth out from under the dishes trick and not yanking fast enough. The alfalfa bale toppled.

It fell sideways into the bale of oat hay. Alfalfa is heavy. Oat hay is light. It was like the Budweiser Clydesdales falling into the Taco Bell Chihuahua. The oat bale crashed to the ground and the flakes splattered like a bag of ice cubes heaved off the back of a speeding truck onto the highway. Hay slid everywhere.

Picking up the alfalfa flakes was easy. Alfalfa flakes are pressed together harder than particleboard. You’d have better luck disemboweling yourself than getting alfalfa off the flake. Really, you could fire alfalfa flakes out of a cannon, take out a small town, and the flakes would still be perfectly formed when they landed on the other side. They’re nature’s perfect bricks. If the ancient Egyptians had used alfalfa brick instead of bedrock, the Sphinx would still have its nose.

It was easy to put them back into a neat stack – kinda fun, even. It brought back memories of playing with Lego and Lincoln Logs. I suppose I could have built a duck blind or my own version of Burning Man or something useful, but the daylight and my jocularity were fading rapidly.      

Oat hay does not stack well once it has come un-flaked. It has no cohesive properties. Trying to stack oat hay is like trying to stack a pile of those colored plastic drinking straws. Try it some time. Take a big handful of soda straws and try to press them all together into a pile and make them stay put. That’s pretty much what it was like trying to pile the oat hay back up. I’d scoop up an armful, get half of it into the stack and half of it would slide back to the ground. What’s the name of that guy in the Greek myth? You know, the one who was condemned to forever push a boulder up a hill, only to have the rock slip and roll back down every time he neared the summit? It was like that.

After a lot of re-scooping and re-piling interspersed with creating new ways to combine cuss words, I had the oat hay arranged into something that looked almost exactly but not quite entirely unlike a stack. Although it yinged this way and yanged that way, it was arguably upright. But as I bent down to scoop the last bit of hay from the ground, the stack reached some sort of critical mass and collapsed in all directions. Oat hay slid willy nilly, the way skaters would scatter if you tossed a few well-timed bowling balls out at the Ice Capades. It was carnage. The Hindenburg would have been easier to clean up. 

I never did get the hay back into a neat pile. Out of daylight and patience, there was nothing left to do but pull a tarp over the mess and flee the scene of the crime. Tomorrow, people would discover the destruction. They’d blame our Mexican groom Antonio. He’d never be able to summon up enough English to defend himself. I’d be safe. I’d just have to wear long sleeves for a week to hide all the scratches I’d gotten wrestling with the prickly hay.

And next time I took my horse walking behind the barn, I’d be sure to keep the hay bales out of his reach.