Category Archives: Uncategorized

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The Next Project

My focus has suddenly come back. With the little one coming into an age where he actually enjoys naps I can finally focus back on my writing. I’m finally back into a groove with my blogging here, and I’m starting a nice groove on my Hubs. This is important to me, because it’s encouraging me to find my way back to my goals. I needed to refocus, I needed to set up goals to hit to force me back into my projects. My head has already started writing a new project, and trying to finish the next 3 done.

My next project, which I know I’ve promised already, is essentially done. It’s an anthology of short stories and poetry. Most of the poetry was written in high school, and though there’s something awful about them in quality, there’s a sort of purity in the rawness of it. I feel that poetry is something written from the heart and soul, and to do anything to edit that (no matter how awful) seems to ruin its integrity. That part makes the anthology easy in the editing department. The rest of the story anthology is another story.

It’ll be done, I’ll dedicate the rest of my weekend to it. It’ll be up, and my husband has volunteered to do the cover art this time. I wondered if he offered because he’s awesome, or because I asked him to help me with my blog and Hubs by getting him the camera of his dreams to be my personal freelance photographer. He can add that title to his “read to tell me if it sucks” one that he does for free. Well not for free, it costs me in time making sandwiches and coffees. But for more free than getting an editor or publishing company to do the jobs for me.

With any luck, I can add my second book onto my Kindle e-publishing author page. Which you should check out and maybe even buy my first publishing while you’re there, the link is on the side bar. At $0.99, it’s cheaper than a candy bar or a bag of chips. And if you enjoy an off color sense of humor, you might enjoy it. I’ll keep you guys posted when it gets put up for sale. I also apologize for the boring blog post, but I felt like sharing this for people who are also writers who understand the long process this finishing projects entail. Also, check out my Hub page, which also has a link to the side. Bookmark it, because I post there Tuesdays and Thursdays.

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All About Politics, and the People Who Discuss Them (Rejected Blog Post)

I watch the news daily, I read about current events. I cry a little when I read the top headlines, because rather than any news of substance I see things like “_____ celebrities ate tacos”. I don’t care if some celebrity was walking around with a Cheeto bag, and when I do care I will read “Celebrity” news, not the top headlines of the day. Actual news should be separate from useless nonsense. It’s not hard to wonder why American’s need to be told “Chechnya is an entirely different nation than the Czech Republic”. All foreigners are the same and celebrities are more important than current events. Amurica. (Purposeful and sarcastic misspelling.) So this brings me to an Election Day post I rejected. I agree with the main point of “celebrities need to worry about being celebrities”, but I felt the post felt flat otherwise. Happy Friday!

I watch the news to see the pundits argue out their points. I watch entertainment to be entertained. I watch the Daily Show and Colbert Report to be entertained by comedians mocking the news. I don’t watch an interview with a celebrity to hear their political views, I want to hear about their new movie or something funny that happened while filming said movie. Likewise, I don’t want to hear a politician giving a review about a movie. I don’t care what they think. It’s great that they want to indulge themselves in whatever philanthropic pursuits they wish or is the “in” cause. It’s good that they incite the masses to donate whatever time, money and resources we have to help others and some of them actually put their money where their mouths are. That’s using their celebrity for good.

However, I don’t care who you vote for or what your political views are. You’re actors/singers/models, there to entertain. I will listen to your songs, political or not, because I like them and not because I want to vote for whomever you’re voting for. I don’t want to listen to an actor telling me what to do in elections, I pay you to at least decently act in whatever movie I’m choosing to see. I’m glad you’re voting. But I don’t care if you tell me to vote for Obama or Romney, because your opinion doesn’t matter to me and I’ll take whatever you see with the same grain of salt I’ll take the major news channels on their election information.

So my lovely celebrities, save your money from those commercials you make to try to sway our vote. I don’t care how many Academy Awards you have, reasonable people won’t vote for people because you tell them to. Everyone (whether they admit it or not) has pretty much decided how they are voting. Most of them are just going to vote along party lines like good little ducklings following along. And those that aren’t voting “the way they should” are probably too smart to care what an overpaid privileged celebrity says about elections or really just don’t care about voting. Maybe you should put that money someplace useful, like the open pantry or soup kitchens or battered women shelters.

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An Angry Rant I Won’t Regret Until Comments Are Posted

Even then, I can’t promise a regret. I’ll start this with an acknowledgement that I am a Democrat, a reasonable one anyways. I’m not reminding you in the sense that Newsroom reminds us that Will is a Republican, though you know they only say that as a way to prevent people from thinking the show has a biased agenda. (Not that I have a problem with that, it’s a television show for entertainment that can have any agenda it wants and some that I agree with personally.) I know people need help, and they should be helped. This isn’t about that. This anger goes towards people who don’t need help but get it anyways.

I remember being ashamed to be at the WIC office every 3 months to collect funds to support my son. I felt like the waiting room having a storefront window was supposed to make you feel guilty for being there. I would look out the window, then away, afraid someone would see me there. I needed the help, working 80 hours on a minimum wage paycheck wasn’t anywhere near enough for myself and a newborn. With the state health insurance, I could hide it. Here, I sat looking at the other people in the waiting room. No fail, every time I was there so was this woman with her special needs child. I wouldn’t normally note it, except this child was always bruised up. I wondered how the office could just ignore it, that made me more ashamed of sitting there. The rude staff wasn’t much better, and the minute I could, I never returned. I vowed never ever to be in that position again. I never had problems with my health insurance either, never had to argue over bills with a stubborn person in billing who insists they were right even though you knew they were very very wrong. I never even saw a bill.

It was after that I realized that I didn’t get the best care. But I realize now that getting the best care is a lot more expensive. I looked over my hospital bill from having my baby and saw that one Ambien cost me $60. For one pill, that was the size of a Tic-Tac. I’m glad I didn’t have an epidural or C-Section, I would’ve hate to see how much that cost. I looked down and kept seeing $3 for every Advil I took, a charge for time in the Labor room, Delivery room, and Recovery room. That’s even funnier when I inform you that they were all the same room. I looked down the list and I couldn’t believe it at all. When laughing about this bill aloud, I was told “you have to pay extra to make up for the people that can’t pay at all”. I don’t know if that’s true, it may be though. No one will ever admit it though. I’m not sure who or what to blame, but it takes a lot of number crunching to afford these piling bills. And when the doctor’s office double charges for everyone and their brother, and you can’t do a thing about it, you really just get pissed.

When I found out I was pregnant, I looked to see what my options were for help. I knew that Massachusetts had supplemental insurance, and I looked into that. My husband made too much money, by $2000 a year. When ranting about it with a friend, she told me about  how she tried to get help too only her and her boyfriend made too much money. She was given $8 a month in food stamps to help her. It’s sad we live in a place where people who just don’t make enough can’t get help, but some people can get paid because they just don’t feel like working. (“Not feeling like working” and “can’t find a job” are two very different scenarios.) I won’t deny that with parts of savings and part creative budget works I wasn’t able to figure out how to pay it. But the system needs help. A lot of help. No system is going to be perfect, but something needs to change. Everyone talks about how “oh the poor people need help” or “screw the rich people”. I haven’t heard a word about the people in the lower middle class bracket. That’s the worst one. You need the help, but make just enough to not qualify for any. Those are the people we should consider when decisions are made.

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Inside the Life of Boston Fans

Prior to last night’s disaster of a game (looking at you Pats), a sportscaster said “with the Patriots first Super Bowl win with Brady started a trend of Boston teams being very successful and winning championships.” It’s true, our children are spoiled as the Boston teams we have now have an expectation to win because they have consistently won. Since then, we’ve had the pleasure to see all our sports teams succeed. Not sure about our soccer team or if they even exist, I don’t really care. Our children didn’t grow up with the sort of heartache that generations before us have.

Once in college, I had a bizarre and elderly history professor. He could’ve written much of the history companion book that came with our text book from living the history and not just studying it. He was an absurd man, but I remember a few things he distinctly said. One was a discussion of “don’t feel sorry for the slaves, they sold themselves into that mess. Feel sorry for the prejudice the Irish had to suffer in America, am I right?” ::looks at me, the only non-minority in the class:: That was awkward. But to the point, he also said at the beginning of the semester, while handing out the syllabus “Every year, I promise that if the Red Sox win the World Series, everyone will get an “A” on their final. I’m sad to say I can get away with saying this because they have never and probably will never win while I’m still alive.” The joke was on him, that was the year that the Red Sox came back from a 3-0 series in the playoffs to make it to the championship game and win the World Series for the first time since 1918.

Since that point, Boston has jumped up to be one of the most championship wins behind only New York. (If my research is accurate, I’m by no means a sports stats person.) Now when our teams have terrible seasons like last year’s baseball season with the Sox, our children are starting to truly understand what we went through as Boston fans growing up. To be so close to the Super Bowl only to fail so miserably in the conference championship or even making it to the Super Bowl and choking. They truly understand the morning after, where you want to hang your head lower or make yourself feel better by saying “well we made it further than most.” Or like me, watch Honey Boo Boo afterwards to make myself feel better because how can you not feel better by making fun of them. Well a nicer person than I probably wouldn’t, but seriously have you seen that show?

We’re spoiled sports fans in Boston with all the luck we’ve had this decade with wins across the important sports. But it’s really time for the morning after where we realize that we’re no “pink hatters” and we’ve lasted this long with our teams failing and supporting them through heartbreaking losses, why would we stop now? We don’t want to ruin the biggest thing we have going for us: us Boston fans are the most fiercely loyal fans in sports. If we can make it through Missin’ Sisson and every failed year with the Red Sox, we can survive anything.

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Football and Other Jaw Dropping Moments

For starters, I would like to thank the Patriots for winning yesterday. Wait, I said this wrong. I would like to thank the kicker for missing the field goal which allowed the Patriots to make up for their mistakes and not lose the game. We couldn’t have done it without you Billy Cundiff! (Also, the looks on everyone’s face when that kick missed was priceless. I laughed for hours.) Can’t wait to see the Patriots redeem themselves after the last time they faced the Giants though, I hope so anyways. First though, we have to suck a little less at the Super Bowl.

Next on my moments of awe this weekend, I saw a 9-year-old turn into a high school-er, but more useful. First I find out there’s a school dance he would love to attend. I walked out as my hormonal self cried a little over this, but agreed to work it out with him. Then as I became overwhelmed by cooking for the game and my husband was at work, this little adult announces that he will be doing the laundry to help and lugs a basket larger than himself down the stairs. I should also mention that the laundry came out flawlessly and I realized that he was now more useful than most men I knew. It was refreshing to know I did something right.

Finally on my list of shocking moments, Newt wins a primary? I’m personally shocked by this. He’s not a likable or charismatic person by any means, and I’ll admit I’m not a Republican but I’m still lost here. He should thank his speech writers, those unsung heroes of any successful politician. Or, give a shout out to the same person that made Cundiff miss that field goal, because those were both miracles we didn’t see coming. I assumed Romney, the more charismatic and likable guy would’ve pulled it off and not walk away with half the votes Newt did. I suppose we’ll see what happens in Florida, and I hope that my son won’t become a janitor at school because they both got rid of child labor laws and minimum wage. Go America!