Becky's Greatest Hits Vol. II

Little Boy's current favorite household obsession? Being covered with clothes fresh from the "driver". As soon as I take the clothes out he runs to me and says "driver?" Sometimes it really is the little things that keep Little Boy happy....

Lately, Tyler Durden describes my life better than anyone. If you've never read Fight Club , you need to. If you've never seen it, you need to rent it. Or own it. And even though I will still probably struggle (like most) to get out from under the bullshit of economic status, I am still happy that I crawled out quicker and less scathed than most. You buy furniture. You tell yourself, this is the last sofa I will ever need in my life. Buy the sofa, then for a couple years you're satisfied that no matter what goes wrong, at least you've got your sofa issue handled. Then the right set of dishes. Then the perfect bed. The drapes. The rug. Then you're trapped in your lovely nest, and the things you used to own, now they own you. This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. If you don't know what you want," the doorman said, "you end up with a lot you don't." "It's only after you've lost everything," Tyl...

I saw this movie a few years ago when everyone was buzzing about it, and I didn't really like it that much. But this book......wow.....I cannot put it down. I think I basically like everything I've read by McCarthy including The Road and All the Pretty Horses , but now I think I'm going to just have to read everything he has ever written. With the holidays now upon us, I will also have to resort to my favorite comfort read Like Water for Chocolate . I read it pretty much every year at Christmastime as my retreat from the holiday madness and it never disappoints. AND it's one of my few novels that I house with my cookbooks......you'll just have to read it to understand!

Thanksgiving 2010 Food, wine, tv, games, relaxation, pajamas.....a lot to be thankful for!

I was recently talking with one of my buddies who shares good taste in music about different kinds of music from different times in our lives. I don't seem to listen to them much anymore, but there was a time when D.M.B was on heavy rotation with me. A lot of folks came to like D.M.B. much later on, but I was in love with them from Remember Two Things . Sheesh, I loved that album. I had it on cassette. I wore it out. Under the Table was also pretty fantastic. Really fantastic, actually. The first time I saw the band was in 1994 and then there were many shows after that. I feel like I have kind of outgrown them now.....the shows, the music.....I'm not even really familiar anymore. But I still know what my favorite tunes are. So here goes the Friday playlist. I will jam on back to 1994. See you there..... My D.M.B. Faves (in no particular order) Warehouse The Song That Jane Likes I'll Back You Up Crush Lie in Our Graves Jimi Thi...

I have officially finished my Christmas shopping. This is news from the girl who said she was NOT buying Christmas presents this year except for the children...and that should have been all of two kids. But as I tried to spread my message of "let's all not buy gifts this year......" I realized it was just not going to happen. Oh, well. As I continue to navigate the perimeters of my "life after divorce" I realize I just have to keep finding what works for me and my boys. New traditions, new ways of looking at things, new places to go.......etc. I think this year I am actually excited about holiday decorating, fun new adventures, parties, and yes, even the gift-giving. Scrooge be damned!!!! I have to admit that I'm actually pretty excited about my Thanksgiving week/weekend this year too. And that's funny because it's never been a holiday I cared too much about. (Maybe it's in my genes or my college education ? Story for another time......) But yo...

I recently purchased Charlotte's Web for my niece's upcoming birthday and decided to renew my own affinity for it by re-reading my own copy from my own shelf. What a beautiful book! It is just filled with so much spirit and love and humility and full of lessons for adults and children alike. There have been a few updates.....television specials and movies featuring famous voices......but you just can't ever beat the book.....the original classic by E.B. White. Leafing through those old pages and the familiar illustrations just really took me back in time. I remember checking this book out repeatedly from my school library. It was so dog-eared and loved. I think someday my own copy will be the same as I hope to share it with Little Boy someday. But I also think it will always have a lot of love from me!

Yesterday, songs by The Beatles finally became available on I-Tunes. So what was the biggest seller? I Wanna Hold Your Hand ? In My Life ? Sergeant Pepper ? Oh, no. It was Here Comes the Sun . A great song by a great artist, great guitarist and very interesting man. You know how we all remember specifically when certain famous people die? Princess Di.......Elvis......Michael Jackson? Well, I remember when George Harrison died. I still feel like he made the world a little greater with this music both with The Beatles and afterward. And it's further proof that Little Boy has great taste in music......

Currently, life revolves around a timer. And the potty. I know that Little Boy and me and several other people will be sooo glad when life no longer revolves around a timer. And a potty. And diapers.

Crowders Mountain State Park North Carolina November 2010

Sheesh! To say it hasn't been an easy week is a big understatement. I am missing my boy while he's away with his dad. I've been Christmas shopping and realizing how tight the monies are this year. I've had a few things in our culture that have gotten to me this week (see previous blogs from this week). See here's the Friday Playlist. It is meant to invigorate. Remind you that you can do it. You can overcome. You can come out on top. Just press play and learn to fly again...... Lean to Fly by Foo Fighters Alive and Kicking by Simple Minds Do Ya by E.L.O. It's the End of the World as We Know It by R.E.M. Today by The Smashing Pumpkins Dance Tonight by Paul McCartney (with my apologies about the post title) Fighter by Christina Aguilera Don't Stop Believin' by Journey All Fired Up by Pat Benatar Little Fighter by White Lion Take Hold of the Flame by Queensryche Fight the Power by Public Enemy I'm...

After getting totally annoyed with the douchebagery that has become Facebook and the fact that I'm really missing my son this week, I turned to my good ole comfort past time......reading. I have been on and off reading this fabulous book which I won from Skirt! (thank you very much) and actually learning something. It even made me want to do some study on a woman named Lorena Weeks. Lorena Weeks was a woman who successfully sued the very powerful Southen Bell telephone company in Georgia in the 1960's. There was even a film recently made about her! There are so many good things to learn out there in the world if you just log off from the mindless social networking and conduct some study in other places. That's what I gonna do right now!!!! BTW, that post title references the School House Rock series as well as a great song by The Clash. Take a break from social networking and check that stuff out too!!!!

A few weeks ago, I went to a Halloween party. It was fun. It was sedate. The usual suspects. Some friends and some people I hardly knew or didn't know at all. We had some food and drinks. Stood around the fire. Chatted with some people about this and that. We had fun. We got tired. We left early. Last week there was a terrible car accident on my sister's road . It's a bit of a dark and windy road. It has way more traffic than where I'd choose to live. She was shook up in telling me about seeing and hearing the accident especially once she knew that someone died in it. It turns out, the guy that died, was one of the people standing around the fire at the party. I never even got his name at the party. I heard him talking about politics and listened with mild interest. He seemed to also know a lot about military history and I recall a vague discussion of digital camoflage and how it doesn't show up (or does it?) on radar screens. He wore these weird sh...

It was soooo nice driving into work this morning in the daylight! (I have one of those white/blue collar kind of jobs that requires an early start!) So for that reason, I love the end of Daylight Savings Time.....for the moment. At first, it will be great. I will enjoy getting into my jammies at 6 pm and having the extra snuggle time with my boys. Some nights I may even go to bed by 8:30 or 9.....heh! But then after a while, like all things, I will get tired of it and miss the long well-lit days. Sigh. It's so hard keeping a girl like me pleased!

There is one great thing that happens when a movie like For Colored Girls is made. It opens up a whole world of discovery for poetry and artists that your average person probably isn't familiar with. After posting this morning, I had to grab up one of my anthologies this afternoon to read all I could about Ntozake Shange . I feel inspired now to find her poem's interpretation on stage somewhere because from what I'm reading in the reviews.....that is really the way to see it. But I also wanted to share a few other artists for your consideration...... Nikki Giovanni . Aaah. I referenced her work sometime back on Skirt! and got some great comments. Her style, her words, her views. All of it. She's just fantastic. I love For Saundra for the capturing of the moment that was 1968. But I also have a huge affinity for Beautiful Black Men for the pop and groove of the words like lyrics and it's capture of the beginnings of the Black is Beautiful movement. Amir...

For Colored Girls is going to be one of those painful movies. Just like Precious was a painful movie. And probably so was The Lovely Bones . Any movie about the hurt and pain of women hurts. They are hard to watch, but always so sincere and true. And I rarely see any of them. I did. At one time. I really wanted to share in the experience of women. Some of it was my experience and some of it was not. I wanted to be in it.....with all the other women. So for those reasons I have seen: The Color Purple Woman Thou Art Loosed SherryBaby The Accused If These Walls Could Talk (Parts I & II ) And these were all great movies. I learned from them. I cried with them. They kept me up at night. And I so believe in the power of movies....they way they can touch you and teach you in a way that other mediums can't quite reach. You come away from something when you see a powerful movie. Being a big fan of indie and made for cable films I could recommend these too: The Woodsman H...

Halloween 2010: 2 hours of "fake" tattooing that many peeps thought were real. 10 minutes of time for E-Roc to get dressed and then squirm the rest of the night. 2 parties. Stop in the middle to McDonald's and an employee who admired my ink. Fun with friends. Beer for E-Roc. Red Bull for Becky. Very long shower at the end of the night watching red dye and various inks swishing down the drain for Becky. An overall great night and lots of fun...... Becky as Kat Von D. With tattoos of my own choosing. But I did have the stars and lightning bolt just like Kat. E-Roc all prepped up. He was embarrassed to even walk to the car. But the outfit was made complete by the silver chain single diamond stud. Both, he borrowed from me.