If I played the guitar I think owning this amp would be a kick!

The Pine Music (reviewing) club I belong to had been listening to classical music for several weeks. Holst’s The Planets is great but Bach’s concertos have left m–zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Give me Rachmaninoff!  Now I am not the fan that these kind folks are http://www.rachmaninoff.org/home/home.php but I think it is wonderful that people can and do follow their passions.

     Their eyes sparkle, and they lean toward me as they try, each in their turn, to convince me that the thick white beverage with yellow butter floating in the cream, was the most delightful treat.

     Jeannie’s mother would give her a pail and send her to fetch buttermilk from the dairy. So across the bridge over the pond and down the road Jeannie and her friend would walk. Jeannie’s uncle worked at the dairy and he would oblige the girls with a pail of milk which they would go sit on the corner and drink down to the last succulent drop. Then, they’d return to the dairy, pay their 50 cents and return with a pail of buttermilk for Jeannie’s mother to use to make, “the best biscuits.”

     “Buttermilk today does not compare,” Jeannie said.

     Admittedly, I have never liked the taste or smell of buttermilk, yet clients and acquaintances of a certain age, salivate and lick their lips at the memory of this drink from days of yore.

     When I told two other clients I was on the lookout for fresh buttermilk, the both scoffed at the notice of my finding anything that compared with the memory of their taste buds.

     “You’re going to bring me fresh buttermilk? Do you know any dairymen? In Payson? Ha!” Frieda laughed.

     I am looking. Vita Mart sells products from an organic dairy. Maybe I will get lucky.

     A recent veteran of a diet that worked, I still consider myself a foodie.

     When you are writing your story, incorporate, where appropriate, how food was a part of your life, how it tasted, how it made you feel.

     Some tidbits to get your creative juices flowing:

• Did you ever cook with your mother? Grandmother? Child?
• What is your favorite food?
•                                 Do you make it yourself?
•                                 Is there a ritual to eating it?
•                                 Why does it taste so good?
• Is there an entrée or vegetable you detest?
•                                 When did you first eat it?
•                                 Did someone make you eat it?
•                                 What made it icky? Flavor? Texture? Odor? Looked unappetizing?
• Were family dinners and all-out affair?
• Who taught you to set the table?
• Do your parties revolve around people or food?

Remember, keyboards do not react well to spilt buttermilk.

Happy writing!

I crave unusual jewelry. Maybe it is not that the earrings, pendants, broaches and bracelets are so unusual, but that they are uniquely suited to my tastes.

For instance, Rowena Tank ‘s Lampwork bead charms from bracelets are made from recycled Merlot, Chardonnay, Riesling, Pinot Noir and Kahlua bottles. http://rowenablog.typepad.com/rowena_bead_and_fiber/

I’m not terribly “green,” (partly because the only recycling available in the rim Country is paper, dropped off at Wal-Mart or burned in the fireplace in winter) but I collected pretty bottles as a child and I like the idea of wearing part of them as jewelry rather than collecting dust on the shelf.

I also like Jonquil Juice’s red leather rose ring:

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=28601056

And how about Stuck on Art’s beaded bangles, including this great black and white number: http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11682954

On the high-end of jewelry design are Chad and Melissa Overman.

Overman Designs, a fine jewelry store in Payson, Arizona, belongs to Chad and Melissa Overman. Chocolate pearls, strawberry gold, dazzling diamonds and turquoise so pure it looks surreal are just some of what you will find behind the counters. The Overmans are not only fabulous designers, they are thrilled to show you their wares. No hard sell here, just contagious enthusiasm.

Owning and wearing un unique handmade jewelry makes me feel pretty. Sing to me Elton John!

In a cavern
In a canyon
Excavating for a mine
Lived a miner
Forty-niner
And his daughter
Clementine
She was nutsy crazy freaky
And her feet were rather large
But her ducklings they did follow
When into the creek she charged
Oh my darlin’
Oh my darlin’
Oh my darlin’
With big feet
Your can’t swim like the ducklings
For you’ve no flippers on your feet.
Oh my darlin’
Oh my darlin’
Oh my darlin’
With big feet
You are lost and gone forever
Next in Heaven we shall meet

Did you recognized this poem as a song and thought, the writer has the lyrics all wrong?

Well, it may please you to know that you are right… as well as wrong.

This “nusty, crazy, freaky” version is from a filk song, a sort of rewritten folk song, I think I heard at a science fiction convention in 1987. I even called my ex to see if he remembered the lyrics, but he did not.

The actual folk song, Clementine, has no clear author or copyright status.

Percy Montrose and Barker Bradford have each received credit as writing Clementine in the 1840s.
The 1863 song, “Down By the River Liv’d a Maiden” by H. S. Thompson could also have provided source material.

Author Gerald Brenan attributes the song’s origins to an old Spanish ballad sung by Mexican gold rush miners.
Yet an older version I ran across, hints that the lovely maiden Clementine was a soiled dove.

No matter the origins, many of us probably know just the first part of the song that ends with our sandal wearing maiden drowning in the creek. However, Boy Scouts in the audience may be able to sing you these verses, sans refrain:

Ruby lips above the water
Blowing bubbles soft and fine
But, alas, I was no swimmer,
So I lost my Clementine

Then the miner, forty-niner
Soon began to peak and pine
Thought he oughta join his daughter
Now he’s with his Clementine

There’s a churchyard on the hillside
Where the flowers grow and twine
There grow roses, mongst the posies
Fertilized by Clementine

In my dreams she still doth haunt me
Robed in garments soaked in brine
Though in life I used to hug her
Now she’s dead, I draw the line

Now you Scouts may learn the moral
Of this little tale of mine
artificial respiration
Would have saved my Clementine

Oh, my darling, oh, my darling
Oh, my darling Clementine
You are lost and gone forever
Dreadful sorry, Clementine
And the final verse of the last part of the purported Scout version:

How I missed her, how I missed her
How I missed my Clementine
Till I kissed her little sister
And forgot my Clementine

Although Clementine’s popularity has dwindled over the years she has not been forgotten. Clementine the school marm was the love interest of one of the Earp bothers in the 1946 film, My Darling Clementine. Cartoon character Huckleberry Hound was known to sing Clementine horribly off-key. Tom Lehr, a 50s Harvard math professor with a bar act, also sang of Clementine, off-key.

Clearly, Clementine is not Natalie Cole, but she is an unforgettable part of the West.

What if you are running from home and a man who beat you with nothing but the clothes on your back? What if you were incarcerated and truly trying to turn your life around? What if you had to return to the job force on a shoestring budget?

It is rare that I complain about it being a man’s world, but when it comes to this aspect of bras, I just might.

You can go to Wal-Mart and buy a cheap, as my dad would have termed it, “over the shoulder boulder holder” for maybe $8 to $10.

But not if you are a double DD and want to be comfortably supported during the work day. Then the price easily doubles or triples.

Want to feel sexy? Lace and colored fabric cost you too.

While many have bought bras determined by a shoestring budget and diligently washed them on delicate and hung them to dry so the elastic would wear longer, how many of us have considered that when a woman leaves a DV situation or prison that one of society’s requirements is that you wear a bra?

The kind people hosting Karma Cups on September 29, 2009 have.

Karma Cups: An Uplifting Affair, is billed as a “Bra Vogue” event.

Creative participants can decorate a bra and enter it for $15. Additional entries are $8. The Grand Prize is $200.

The sponsors, National Advocacy and Training Network‘s Seeds program, Bosom Buddy Bra Recycling and Bravery Project Recycling are educating families in a fun way, collecting bras (bring a clean, fresh, new bra and get in for $5 at the door instead of $12), and raising money for their organizations. There will be music, food, vendors, silent auctions and raffles.

A “bra” way to spend an eventide.

Details: September 29, 2009 from 4 to 8 p.m. at Karma Cups, 1710 W. Southern Ave., Mesa, AZ, 85202. Click on Web links in article for more information, or type them into your browser:

http://www.natn-az.com/home

www.brarecycling.org
www.braveryproject.org

Mom would bake these rolls in pie tins then have me deliver to her friends around the neighborhood.

“Add to one cup warm water in a large bowl:

An egg, a jigger or two of oil, a pinch of salt, sugar to taste and one packet of Fleishman’s yeast.

Let sit until bubbly.

Mix in 3 ½ cups of flour until ball of dough forms.

Let rise until double.

Punch out bubbles, rolls out to about a ½ inch thick, then cut rolls and place in pie tins or on cookie sheet.

Let raise until double.

Bake. Butter tops.”

She also made hot dog things. Good eatin’ cold the next day on family road trips.

My translation

In a large bowl mix:

One cup warm water

One egg

1/4 cup vegetable oil (Note that at some point in her later years she swears that she uses the white Crisco that comes in bars, but Carol swears this is absolutely not the recipe she learned.)

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup oil

1/3 cup sugar

One packet of yeast

Stir with a fork and let sit for about 10 minutes until bubbly.

Then, gradually add in at least 3 maybe 3 1/2 cups of sifted flour as you stir/knead to form ball of dough. (If you use a big enough bowl you do not need to turn it onto the counter—it can rise in the bowl.)

Let ball of dough raise for a couple of hours until it about doubles in size.

Tear ball of dough in half. Knead air bubbles out then roll out on lightly floured counter top to about a half an inch high. Cut out rolls.

(Or make hot dog things by slicing a kosher hot dog not quite fully through the center and stuffing with diced green chili and cheddar cheese before wrapping in dough.)

Place rolls on pan with sides barely touching and let raise again until double.

Bake at 350 degrees F until tops are golden brown—about 12 minutes. (Hot dogs things need a 400 degree oven and a little longer to cook.)

Butter tops.

Try not to eat them all, rolls or hot dog things, until dinner or wherever you are taking them.

 Carol’s roll variations:

• Olive oil—if you use this in place of vegetable oil, your dough will be heavier and take longer to raise.
• Crushed garlic and/or other dried spices—yummy! Goes with olive oil. Add to during initial mix.
• Yogurt and mint—add to during initial mix. You’ll use a bit more flour for consistent dough.
• Grated cheese—I add maybe a half a cup during initial mix.
• More sugar—sweeter rolls.
• You can get them to raise faster on a cold day in the kitchen by pre-heating the oven and letting the dough rise on top of the stove.

Hearing that the movie was “not your daddy’s Star Trek” mollified me not in the least. Reading the Wired Magazine article about monsters on the ice planet increased my level of skepticism.

But of course, I had to go… (Pun intended.) … revisit the characters I came to know in the mid 70s.

I remember playing Star Trek with Matt G. and Brian W.—bet they don’t want that fact put on my wall on Facebook. I read every Trek story I could get my hands on as a teen. “The Price of the Phoenix” by fans Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath was my favorite. I was not a fan of any of the 90s spin off series because Kirk kicked butt and saved the galaxy. Picard just talked the aliens to death.

It is so nice when one pays $8.50 for a movie that they get to spend a couple of hours enthralled, disbelief suspended, with the story. It is an especially nice feeling when the rapture is unexpected (and may I say Star Trek completely washed the nasty taste of the most recent Terminator installment out of my system).

And seeing Star Trek once, I had to go see it again.

It was even better the second time for a number of reasons, in no particular order:

1. The Spock, Uhura love connection. In all my years of watching it, I must confess that had not occurred to me—even when they made music together in Charlie X. In one of the movies she and Scotty were paired—that made a limited sense at the time.
2. Karl Urban’s portrayal of Leonard McCoy. Applause to the writer, the casting director and the actor.
3. When Captain Pike asked Sulu if he was a pilot.
4. The poetic weave of “not your daddy’s Star Trek” with canon. (Unlike Star Wars, there is no person designated to keep the franchise in order.)
5. Great FX.
6. The Los Feliz Three where Ray and I saw Star Trek the second time.

Rave review follows:

     Ray and I were in Los Angeles, California to visit family, and we had planned to take the opportunity to see a couple of movies on the big screen with killer sound. Alas, we missed the evening show in Hollywood, but there was a 9:45 showing in Los Feliz about 10 minutes from our downtown hotel.
     The door to theatre one opened to a room with an isle to the right and six seats (maybe 8—it was dark) across on the left. We both burst out laughing. “Do you want to get our money back?” he asked. “No we might as well stay,” I said. We picked seats three rows from the back (maybe a dozen rows from the front) and noted that the screen size was maybe 15-feet across. Maybe.
     A few minutes later a man and his date joined the half-full theatre and exclaimed, “It’s like seeing a movie in the bathroom.” There were a few chuckles. As the couple took their seat, the man said, “It’s really intimate. I feel like I should introduce myself.” More laughter.
     A couple of previews—no ads! Are no ads a California thing? At our local theatre we see more ads than trailers.
     Crystal clear picture! Dts sound! The small screen was perfect line of sight! (For a couple of years I had to drive 90 miles to see a movie, so I appreciate the folks that installed the Sawmill six-plex. However, I never realized how muddy the projection is and how much a good sound system adds to a blockbuster.) What a treat!
     No one’s cell phone went off during the movie, because film industry audiences respect the art.
     The butter on the popcorn of our movie experience was real butter.

     If you’ve not seen Star Trek, this momma recommends you do so. It is at least as good as Wrath of Khan or Star Trek IV.

A couple of months ago, March 4 to be exact, the Queen of Distraction followed the pattern of lawyers in offices past and present. These suited upholders of legalities and loopholes documented all of their time so that they could bill their clients.

While there is obvious merit to this line by line detailing of minutes spent, minutes wasted and minutes justified, the Queen of Distraction finally realized that she needs to retrieve her former title, the Lady of Lists.

The Lady of Lists once kept a daily to do list.

“My list had baby steps such as ‘call NVM editor’ and broad jumps like ‘WRITE whr story’,” the Lady of Lists said. “It is how I was able to write 6,000 to 10,000 words per week as a reporter. There is a visceral satisfaction to be gained by making a large strike-through on a task completed.”

On one such list, a colleague wrote: “Circle K w/ Erin ,” because she said there was “nothing fun” on the to do list.

After being deadline driven for four-plus years, the Lady of Lists never would have thought setting and keeping deadlines of her own would prove difficult.

“The Puritan work ethic my grandparents instilled into my being meant a guaranteed sense of accomplishment at the end of a 12-hour day,” she said. “What I did for a payroll check, I can do for me. Right?”

The Lady of Lists can be a compulsive list maker if she does not carefully guard against her basic nature.

However, the life of a freelance writer is ever a learning process, so as the Queen of Distraction and the Lady of Lists merge minds they have made The Confine Distractions List:

1. Check e-mail first thing, but only respond to writing gigs
2. Work on client A’s project for at least three hours (I love paid assignments.)
3. Kiss sweetheart (Ah, the joy of working at home.)
4. Work on client B’s project for at least two hours (Did I mention that I love paid assignments?)
5. Feed pets and water plants
6. Work on client C’s project for at least an hour (Money is a nice thing to have in one’s wallet.)
7. Write fiction – one hour (One day soon, this will replace working on client A, B and C’s projects.)
8. Then, answer e-mails, return phone calls and work on non-paying assignments, bill clients per contract
9. Check in on blog, Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter Sundays and Wednesdays
10. Surf net

The Queen of Distraction and Lady of Lists are imperfect sides of the same personality equation (an equation possible for writers, not mathematicians). Both outlooks have merit when getting it comes to getting the job done, knowing what it costs in time, and being able to live well.

On that note, item Number 3 should have a repeat clause. Just one. Even Puritan work ethics can be derailed.

Check out Cory Doctorow’s excellent article  Writing in an Age of Distraction for more advice.