Scottie News gets big scoop

Barely a week old, Tearfree's new blog uncovered a Scottish Terrier scandal in the U.S. Congress.

Scottish Terrier and Dog News is not just the talk of the dog world, but the talk of Kentucky.


Do these guys have anything to do with softwood lumber, do you think?

Another Roundup, for Tanya E.

Things I have noticed:

1. Often it is not good to listen to heartwrenching breakup songs on one's iPod while walking home from work. I wept openly listening to Ryan Adams' "Harder Now That It's Over" while making my way through Chinatown today. I frightened the shoppers, who thought I was a crazy white lady. I was recalling a year ago this weekend, when we spent time with my husband's family in the country and had loads and loads of fun. I played disco music and everyone danced. My husband and I got it on lovingly when we retired to the bedroom. This would have been well into Round 2 with the unspectacularly racked so-desperate-for-a-man-I'll-help-myself-to-someone-else's-thanks girlfriend, I realize now.

2. Why can't you go to get a passport photo taken and then choose the best one on the digital camera? I went to a place today -- he pushed the shutter twice and handed them over. I look like an angry, violent lesbian prison guard just waiting to have my way with Paris Hilton. It just seems unfair in this digital age. Can't they just keep snapping til they get to one we like?

3. The avocado BLT recommended by Granny might have been the most delectable sandwich ever. Thanks Granny.

4. My son got dumped by his tall chesty girlfriend on Saturday morning and by Saturday night, she wanted him back. He took her back. I think this was a mistake. Now she has the upper hand. But is it wrong to counsel young teens to play games in relationships? If he wanted her back, shouldn't he have taken her back? I think pride is childish, when you really think about it. It also requires a denial of what you really feel and want. Your thoughts?

5. My hot yoga date's ex-girlfriend wants him back. I told him he was a wonderful man with a body that should be in use, and if he wants to get back with her, I would totally understand, since I am nowhere near putting his body to use. I reminded him I am ruined for men for the time being -- I just can't go there. He said he doesn't want her back and can we still do hot yoga once a week? How sweet is that?

6. Go Anaheim!

An eyebrow apology

Eyebrow fan and writer, Blu, dropped by yesterday to comment on Famke Janssen's eyebrows:

I agree with your comments on Famke. On some metaphysical level, her current brows just "don't make sense."

I am disappointed that you think my blog is "kind of lame," but I'm interested to know how you think it could be improved. My blog will never be a "how to" and I will likely never discuss techniques, specific trends or anything else in any detail. Mostly I will just post comments and pictures of things I enjoy personally.

Now that I see there are some others commenting on brows (I never really checked), I will link to you from a typelist of "Related Sites" or something.

Tearfree revisited Blu's Eyebrow Blog, and has completely revised her opinion of it; it's not lame at all. Great brow shots of both famous people and regular gals. These arty eyebrows are Tearfree's current favourite.

Worst Youtube Video Ever

Catch it at Tearfree's dog blog.

Causes of cancer

This morning's Globe and Mail has an article on supposedly rising cancer rates in animals of which I am deeply suspicious. Consider this paragraph for example:

Until recently it was widely believed that cancer was caused mostly by our lifestyle and dietary choices, with a little bit of hereditary bad luck thrown in. It is not only humans, however, who are getting cancer. The evidence of cancer in the animal realm is one of many factors that are fuelling a sea change in public thinking about the causes of cancer.

Now, maybe it's just me but I always thought that most cancers were pretty much a lottery with the cause still to be determined. Aren't tobacco-and-asbestos-caused cancers the exception rather than the rule?

People who can't explain their jobs

A friend of mine is going out with a new guy, but she can't explain what he does, meaning what his job is. All she knows is that it's something to do with organizations and social media.

Now, my friend is a smart woman who works in communications and is used to explaining complicated issues to people in terms they can understand.

"You know," I tell her, "I'm always deeply suspicious of people who can't explain what they do. Really, how hard can it be?"

My friend tells me that her boyfriend, who spends half his time in New York, claims that in New York no one even asks him what he does because it's all so obvious.

"That's really pretentious," I say.

"Yes," says my friend, "I know. I quoted that Jay McInerney line at him about how people go to New York to reinvent themselves."

On top of all this, my friend's boyfriend, who seems to be quite a nice guy, is also pretty broke although apparently, at other times, he has been rolling in money.

Dear readers, what do you all make of this situation?

Rebecca Eckler's Wiped! moving up list!

We've done it! We rallied our forces to move Rebecca Eckler's Wiped! Life with a Pint-Sized Dictator onto one of the most important indices there is. Click here to move this "parenting" book into the number one spot on lumber and wood news. A book as scintillating as the softwood lumber issue deserves no less.

Reading Horoscopes in Times of Trouble

I always know I am going through a scary and transitional period in life when I start religiously reading horoscopes. Not just mine, but those either in or recently out of my life. Because I don't believe in astrology at all. Yet for some reason, I read those little nuggets every day and either take comfort in them, or feel they are sending me messages. Can you say: "Cuckoo bird?"

Anyway, I have been reading my estranged husband's horoscope since the day he left. Strangely enough, he's been on a definite "work'' theme. Very little about love, all about his professional progress. I have taken heart in the odd personal one because they are always along these lines: "Don't be pushed into a more serious relationship than you want. Take some time for yourself and concentrate on your career. A love interest is self-motivated and not what she/he appears to be." Nice! I get scared for him when I read that someone is plotting behind his back at work. I feel proud of him when his horoscope reads that his bosses love him and that he's brilliant. On those days, I want to e-mail him and say: "Hey, I hear you're doing great at work! Good for you!" But then I have to remind myself: Ummmm .... Sidney Omarr told you that. You might not want to send that e-mail.

I also know his paramour's sign. Many of hers have read along these lines: "Stop pushing so hard for what you want; it is turning off your love interest." Or: "If it's lasting love you're looking for, you should find another partner." Or: "Your current partner is still harbouring feelings for a past love and her far superior rack (OK, I added that last part). Give him some space or move on." Sweet.

Lately, I have been reading the daily horoscope of a dear and beloved friend who's at the end of his rope, maritally speaking, despite my advice to try to work it out. Today, his read something like: "Stop battling what you cannot defeat and do what must be done, as painful as it might be." I e-mailed it to him.

As for me, eerily enough, almost all of mine for the past few months have told me I am emerging from chaos, despair and darkness and that life will get better eventually. To just hang in and not give up and believe in myself. To stop beating up on myself. To let myself off the hook, yada yada yada.

What is so ridiculous about all this is that it's all bullshit. I realize that. For all I know, my ex has completely forsaken his career and is pleading with his girlfriend to marry him. She may be the one having to keep him at arms' length. I wonder why I pay so much attention to crap when times are difficult. When I am happy, I don't even glance at my horoscope. It all makes me feel like a 16-year-old girl.

Rebecca Eckler's Wiped! What's up?

Tearfree has had a reader requests to find out how well Wiped! Life with a Pint-Sized Dictator by Rebecca Eckler is doing. Is it still atop the softwood lumber charts, they want to know. And what about the regular charts?

Good question so Tearfree went and checked it out.

Unfortunately, because Tearfree hasn't compared Wiped Life with a Pint-Sized Dictator to softwood lumber in some time, Wiped! has fallen out of the top spot on lumber and wood news. With any luck, this post will help it work its way back up.

PageSlaves reports, however, that for the week of May 20th, Wiped was number nine on the Canadiana list.

Since the Canadiana list sounds about the same as the lumber and wood news list to Tearfree, that means Eckler could use a little boost.

So here it is, you go girl.

Summer camps for dogs

Talk about a win-win situation. You pack off the kids and dogs together and with any luck, both come back better trained. Whoever came up with the idea of summer camp for dogs was a genius.

Check out Scottish Terrier News

It is Tearfree's new dog blog -- Scottish terrier news, facts and trivia -- and she would appreciate your feedback.

Today's Scottie Youtube of the day is highly recommended although she's still partial to the foreign film one even if its production values are nowhere near as good.

More ballet teacher tyranny

Tearfree has blogged before about the bad influences of ballet and the control freak personality of ballet teachers. Well, more evidence emerged this past weekend as Tearfree's daughter was invited to a five-hour ballet recital with two intermissions.

This event was sadistically constructed as five separate shows. To avoid having parents and guests showing up only for their special ballerina's show, the ballet teachers gave kids one main part and then bit parts in two or three of the other shows thereby holding the unwilling audience captive.

Help stop the madness of three-hour-plus children's performances, which are especially prevalent at this time of year. Be it a ballet recital, a concert, the school play or a synchro swim gala, we parents cannot be held hostage any more.

Famous people wearing Crocs

Yikes!

And now this. George Bush in Crocs
and socks and shorts.

Since We're on About Food

Since we are on a food theme right now, I thought I'd share this: I have become obsessed with avocadoes. I can't stop eating them. Yesterday, I had an avocado sandwich -- just sliced of avocado, salt and pepper, a little lemon juice, some tomato, on toasted multi-grain bread. It was really, really something -- perhaps one of the best sandwiches I have ever eaten, although maybe anything would have tasted delectable after an hourlong spin class.

I could just cut one open, remove the stone and just eat it plain, actually. I love them so much.

President's Choice Pineapple Upsidedown Cake

Inspired by Jacy and a special sale price, Tearfree bought these and served them with fresh pineapple. They were good but a little on the sweet side. Fresh fruit cobblers and crumbles are still way better.

Entertainment industry deserves what it gets

Tearfree has little sympathy for whiny entertainment execs being dragged kicking and screaming into the digital age. They did it to themselves and continue to do so. First there were the expensive CDs with one or two decent tracks. And now, even in the days pf music downloading, TV moguls are packaging their DVDS as if it's 1995 all over again.

Recently, Tearfree, who is now hooked on Nip/Tuck, became infuriated by this practice. Luckily she owned the first and best season so she did not discover what was going on until she had to rent season two and found that Disc 6, the one with the season finale and only the season finale, cost just as much to rent as the first five discs which had three episodes each.

Now since a DVD can easily fit four episodes this is just a money-squeezing scam, which will backfire by pissing people off and making them feel completely fine about using free aka illegal downloads.

When will they ever learn?

And while we're at it, what about the video stores cashing in on this money suckage. Perhaps they know they've got to get it while they can as they're about to go extinct as well.

Update: Tearfree will not rent the final episode partly on principle and partly because she knows that it's a prequel to Season 3, which is supposed to be a disaster. Can anyone here offer their opinion on Season 4?

What Songs Are in Your Head Right Now?

Because I have five, count 'em five, swirling around in my head for reasons that mystify and confound me. I always have songs in my head. Usually I can figure out where they came from and why they're there. But I can only do that with three of the five songs in my head right now.

I look forward to reading your songs, and your explanations for how they got there. Here are mine:

1. How Soon is Now? The Smiths. This one got in my head because I listened to it on my iPod coming to work this morning and appreciated it anew for the masterpiece downer anthem that it was. "I am human and I need to be loved, just like anybody else does."

2. Take Off (to the Great White North), Rush: Because I keep seeing those Bob and Doug McKenzie promotional advertisements on the CBC.

3. Half Breed, Cher. No idea. Not a single clue how and where it came from, and why it's in my brain.

4. Fame, Irene Cara. Ditto. It's just there. Every lyric, too: "Baby look at me, and tell me what you see? You ain't seen the best of me yet! Give me time and I'll make you forget the rest!"

5. Lover's Spit, the Feist version. As mentioned previously, it's been in my head for about a month and a half.

What is wrong with me? Is it an illness? Please share with me your own songs so I know it is not just me afflicted with this condition.

Chicken Tandoori Pizza

For years Tearfree wondered if she should try barbeque chicken pizza, but she could never quite bring herself to take the leap of faith required. Then one day, she was on a business trip with her boss who suggested they split the bbq chicken pizza giving her the impetus she needed to finally try it.

Even though the rest of the food in the little pizzeria was good, the pizza in question was awful and tasted just like you would imagine bbq chicken on a pizza would taste. Zero chemistry. Fusion that never should have been. No magic to make it work.

However that was a while back and being the naturally curious, tandoori loving person, she is, today Tearfree purchased a chicken tandoori pizza.



Update: The Chicken Tandoori Pizza was decent. Tearfree served it with a cauliflower and cashew curry and some plain yogurt for a nice light supper.

Unreasonable Accomodation

Me thinks.

Is The Charo in Me Causing Me to Notice Certain Things?

So tonight was another hot yoga date.

And for the first time, I noticed what a smoking hot body my yoga date has. A young man's body. Toned, sinewy and taut legs, arms and abs -- I believe I have never seen a body like that on a man of his age.

Now don't get me wrong -- I usually don't care at all about a man's physique. One of my old boyfriends had the most ridiculous feet -- they were practically webbed. If I am in love, I am in love. The physical packaging doesn't mean anything to me as much as the soul within.

All I am saying is that I noticed today, for the first time in the almost 20 years I have known him, that my neighbour/yoga date has the body of a 20-year-old plus a husky, raspy voice. That is all.

You asked:

What do Canadian dogs look like?



We answered:

Like this



Like this



And, of course, like this.

A picture's worth 1,000 words...

...unless you're a non-Canadian, in which case, go here.

More Ethel Kennedy Coverage

We've mentioned Ethel Kennedy twice here at RTK so Tearfree was rather intrigued to welcome this visitor:



Unfortunately we don't know the answer, but any excuse to show Ethel and all those toothy Kennedy kids.


If you have links to more Ethel-with-the-kids photos, please send them along.

Jan Wong Dawson Debacle Update

RTK covered the Jan Wong/ Globe and Mail/ Dawson scandal when it happened.

Now comes an update in Toronto Life. Apparently, everything didn't just blow over.

A Roundup of Information and Observations

OK, some things to share.

1. Check out my new profile photo. How funny is that? I am going to Spain in July, so I thought it fitting.

2. My darling 12-year-old son, turning 13 next week, has a girlfriend. He is not yet five feet tall. She is five seven and has huge knockers. She is also known as being the biggest skank in the school. And he is totally smitten. My 16-going-on-17-year-old daughter is freaking, and actually said to me the other night: "If he loses his virginity before me, I will kill him." I have had many, many talks with my son about the importance of NOT DOING ANYTHING EVEN REMOTELY SEXUAL UNTIL HE IS MUCH, MUCH OLDER. But any advice you have to give, I'd be most grateful for.

3. I have no libido since my marriage busted up. The only sex I have, in fact, is in the sex dreams I disturbingly have on a fairly regular basis about my husband -- a sort of highlight reel of our finest carnal moments. Then I wake up all hot and bothered, or feeling strangely satisfied, and remember none of that is ever happening again, and my libido once more goes into hibernation. I have never had no libido. It is very strange.

4. I am terrified of dating. Had to tell my neighbour/suitor that I have no libido and no desire to reawaken it because I am too heartbroken and must get over my husband. He was very understanding and kind. He still wants to do hot yoga once a week, though.

5. I never went on the anti-depressants. I battled through the worst period of my life, and am sort of starting to feel OK now, and I am glad I didn't do it. My shrink was right. You have to feel it. I don't even get drunk -- have really been drunk only once since he left. Tipsy a few times, but never drunk. I am glad I soldiered through without self-medicating in any way.

6. The ants have left my bedroom and are now in the bathroom. The bathroom!! I declared a Raid war again and delivered a near-fatal blow, I believe, but I wonder where they'll turn up next? And why?? Why are they here??

7. Paris Hilton is infuriating me with her virginal white frocks and church-going. For God's sake, woman, grow some balls, do a Martha Stewart, serve your time and grow up.

Top 5 Most Despised Celebrities

Today at the office we were in the midst of a tedious monthly chore, and so in order to wile away the boredom, we began discussing our Top 5 Most Despised Celebrities. They really ran the gamut depending on one's interests. But even though hatred is a very subjective thing, there were quite a few that many of us agreed on, although a bitter dispute broke out about Jessica Simpson (see previous love letter from me -- I still like her. Even though she is not looking her best these days, and needs a new stylist badly). Anyway, here are my picks, in no particular order, and a brief explanation -- please send yours along.

1. Paris Hilton. I become enraged just looking at her. No explanation really needed, is there? Just go onto any celebrity gossip blog, read the comments -- that pretty much sums up how I feel.

2. Sting, also known as Stink. Ruined The Police with his ego, and then even after they got back together and performed Roxanne on the Grammys, he had to go and ruin the song by Sting-ing it up with his stupid jazz guitar crap. The tour is going to be a disaster, with him Sting-ing up every fabulous Police song. Imagine Next to You with a jazz guitar solo in the middle? Oh, the sacrilege! He is a colossal egomaniac. No wonder Stuart Copeland loathes him.

3. Heather Mills. Mean-faced sympathy-card-playing gold-digger. When I watched Dancing with Stars, I wanted someone to club her over the head with her fake leg. I am not proud of that. But it was a visceral desire over which I had no control.

4. Jay Leno. Not at all funny, and that ridiculous high-pitched fawning laugh. Please, please, retire now, and let the far more worthy Conan have your job.

5. Celine Dion. While my hatred has eased slightly over the last few years, it's only because she hasn't been around much. Her hammy, chest-pounding, attention-mad antics when she's in the spotlight, however, cause me to cringe in embarrassment that she's a Canadian. Watch how, when she's interviewed, she starts speaking directly into the camera while mugging ridiculously.

UPDATE: I hadn't realized that Beaver Magazine .... yes, Beaver Magazine ... already has a Most Despised Canadian contest going. I see I am not alone in my Celine Dion loathing. I think it was when she was sporting the blonde buzzcut and jumped into a pond all muggy and hammy to congratulate a triumphant female golfer, thereby making the golfer's once-in-a-lifetime moment all about her, that I really started to despise.

More warm weather tales

1. I am riding my bike when a fat heavyset guy asks me if I can give him a ride.
2. I am jay walking on Mont Royal Ave. when a pair of cops tell me to wait for the traffic light. Never in my life in Montreal has this happened to me.
3. I am out on the mountain when I notice that everyone has hiking poles. What's up with that? Does anyone know when this trend began?
4. I am at the dog park when a dog pees on me.
   

Laureen Harper, take our cats

Tearfree has read numerous reports on how Laureen Harper has helped convince our P.M. to foster stray cats at Sussex Drive.

Well that is great. Hats off to Laureen, but Tearfree has noticed that the cats in question are cute little kittens.

Would Laureen be prepared to take on Tearfree's cat Fonzie, or Jacy's cat Stevie Wonder, who is now biting her along with the ants, or, in a trans-border act of friendship,Mummy de Gallo's cat, who sounds as wicked as Fonzie?

Should we write to Laureen at pm@pm.gc.ca and ask her for advice on our cats or if they can be fostered on sussex Drive?

Ants in My Pants, Literally

For some reason I cannot understand, there are suddenly ants in my bedroom. Little ones that bite. I have never eaten so much as an apple up there, on the third floor loft of my house, and cannot figure out where their nasty little arses have come from. There is a deck off my bedroom -- could they be sneaking in from outside?

One of the little pests even climbed up my pajama leg last night and started chowing down viciously on my flesh. I was literally jumping around trying to shake it out of my pajamas. The back of my leg and my bum are now covered in angry red welts.

Do normal ants bite? The kind you see wandering around your garden? Not the big carpenter ants, nor the little tiny microscopic ones, but the average-sized ones? Who are these little invaders, and why are they chomping on my arse? Do they not realize I have to bare my leg flesh at hot yoga tonight?

As well, Stevie Wonder, the horny old perverted cat, also bit me tonight. He was getting so agitated while on my lap, dry humping as usual, that I started to push him off in disgust. He chomped down, hard, on my hand and wouldn't let go. So I figure the time is near. The time is near!!!!

I look like my dog (now updated)

Note: If you came here for news on Scottie haircuts, check out the Scottish Terrier and Dog News.
-----------------------
I have always liked short hair. And throughout my life, I have periodically gone and gotten all my hair chopped off. Back in the sixties and seventies, this was considered a normal thing to do. Lots of girls had pixie cuts. Now, however, they all have long flowing tresses. My daughter just doesn't get why anyone would have short hair.

If I could pinpoint the time when short hair went out of style, I would have to say 1990. I had been chin-length to shoulder-length and curly for almost a decade when I decided I needed a change. The day after, someone from marketing and sales at my place of work accosted me in the bathroom. "Oh my gawd," she said. "How could you do it?"

"I like short hair," I said. The idea apparently was clearly completely beyond her sphere of comprehension.

Now, I know that not everyone likes short hair, especially men, but men with taste do like short hair on the women it suits. Think audrey Hepburn, Wendy Mesley, and Mia Farrow.


In fact when I told my hairdresser last fall I wanted to go short, we google imaged Mia in Rosemary's Baby and then he did the deed. I had it cut even shorter last week for summer and I love it.

Today, I took adorable long-haired but matted Bridget for her first Scottish terrier trim. Much as I like short hair on women with the right bones, I'm not wild about Scottie cuts that accentuate the breed's boxiness. But Bridget definitely needed something cooler for the summer so it seemed the way to go.

It wasn't until we were walking down the street together, with people looking at the two of us, however, that I realized I had become one of those people who resemble their dogs. There we both were -- shorn for the summer.

Update: Somewhat predictably, my daughter hates Bridget's new short look. The Dog Walkers at the park, on the other hand, showered her with compliments including the gay couple. While it's tru they're hippy gay guys as opposed to Queer Eye gay guys, the straight ex-dancer father of one of my daughter's daycare friends complimented me on her cut and then mine as well. So did the lone straight woman dog walker out this a.m. and that was before her dog peed on me, which I will address in a separate post.

Warm Weather Brings Troubling Byproduct

So the neighbours are out and about, puttering in their gardens and pulling weeds in their driveways just like me. And all of them are seemingly afraid to talk to me. Instead of the usual chats over the fence and hearty hellos, they now politely say hi, glance at me with deep sympathy in their eyes, and then quickly look away. Yes, the minivan is gone, and I guess everyone's put two and two together -- hubbie has left home.

I only told one neighbour, very early on, what had happened, and that was because she was out walking her dog and caught me weeping while taking the garbage out. She is a sweet woman, and religious -- she is actually a preacher -- and she gave me some vaguely spiritual, yet comforting, pep talk as I cried. Because I had to go away for a week on business right after it happened and my husband was coming back to stay while I was gone, and I actually feared he would bring his girlfriend to the house, I asked her to keep an eye out and inform me if she saw a needy-looking brunette woman with a sadly unspectacular rack sneaking into my house. She saw nothing of the sort, she assured me.

But I guess the word got around. It is weird to be openly pitied. I almost wish they'd just come out and ask me what happened and whether I am OK, rather than being too scared to chat. I like most of my neighbours. Even the previously bitchy one is now very nice to me, nicer than she's ever been.

It is such a strange and weird time. The agreement is all signed and done and all of my friends say I should celebrate, I got a great deal, I won't have to move, everything will get better. And yet while I am grateful for that, in the grand scheme of things, I'd much rather have him, or the him he used to be, back. I'd take the old him back in five minutes, shower him with love and affection, put the past behind us, and trade this house -- the house where we exchanged vows in the living room -- and everything else material for him. He was worth much more to me than a comfortable home and financial security.

Oh well. Hot yoga and spinning, hot yoga and spinning. And hopefully neighbours who will soon chat!

Crocs traffic surges

RTK has been getting a lot of Crocs traffic lately. We seem to have become a destination blog for ridiculous things. As Tearfree mentioned a while back, Crocs have been banned at a Swedish hospital -- not for hurting sick people's eyes but rather for generating static electricity that can knock out medical equipment.

Tearfree has to admit she's a little sceptical about this story given that a new study has just revealed that cell phones, whose use has been banned in hospitals for years, have no effect on medical equipment.

Just another morning at the park

Bridget's new favourite thing to do at the park is to wake up the homeless people who've taken to sleeping there now that the weather is nice. One guy has even brought along his queen-size mattress, which Bridget jumped on to so that she could better access his face. After that she polished off the remains of the gang's President's Choice raspberry cheesecake.

I have mixed feelings about her behaviour, but I don't want to leash her because there are only so many leash-free hours at the park, and the cops enforce those laws much better than they do the vagrancy ones. Plus, early to bed, early to rise and all that. On the other hand, I do worry she might get kicked one of these days but I suppose that would solve the problem.

Flower Blogging: New Favourite Bloom

Last fall I went nuts and bought a ton of narcissus bulbs. It seems fitting, now, because in my heartbreak I have become a total narcissist and am completely obsessing over myself and my life as many of you may have noticed and I do sincerely apologize. My shrink tells me this is good because I have been far too much of a caretaker my whole life and need to now be paying attention to me but whatever ..... zzzzzzzzzzzz ..... borrrrring.

Anyway, I now have a garden filled with the most delightful varieties of narcissi. These ones, above, but also other ones that are just as lovely, including ones with creamy petals and a pale-pink trumpet. Big pale yellow double ones. Little tiny almost orange ones. And soon to come up, narcissus poeticus, which are stunning -- pure white petals with a brilliant red ring around the trumpet and the loveliest fragrance.

If you are into gardening, I can't recommend narcissi highly enough.

A. The squirrels won't touch the bulbs.

B. The blooms last a long time, almost a month.

C. They spread and multiply every year, unlike tulips, which will start to diminish after a few years.

D. They are delicate, lovely, and some of them have the most unbelievable perfume.

I can't wait til the fall to buy even more!

Words of Wisdom from the book Eat, Pray, Love

So this woman, Elizabeth Gilbert, went through a miserable divorce and decided to go travel for a year in order to recover. She goes first to Italy, then to India, then ends up in Indonesia.

Anyway, while in Italy she gets hit on by all sorts of lusty Italian hotties and she refuses to sleep with any of them because she has taken a yearlong vow of celibacy. She finds herself lonely, but she admonishes herself and writes:

So be lonely. Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experience. But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearnings.

She goes on and on regarding this theme in a very profound way, about how she would always throw everything into a relationship in the beginning, would lose herself, was a total love junkie, usually to avoid dealing with her own issues, but then those issues would slowly rear their ugly heads. I saw myself and those closest to me in everything she wrote, and I really believe reading that chapter may have changed my life. My pattern has always been to go from one relationship to another to heal myself and because I didn't want to be on my own. But what do you learn about yourself when you are constantly jumping into another relationship and focusing on them instead of you, particularly when you've been through something traumatic and you need both to mourn it and understand your role in it?

Those days are finished for me. NO MORE!!!

Hot Yoga Date

So tonight I went on my second date with my neighbour. The first one was sushi and it was all above board and pleasant and friendly. The second one involved 90 minutes of hot yoga. No, that is not a euphemism. I mean we went to a hot yoga class.

Observations: Hot yoga is really ridiculously hot. Imagine the top floor of your house, in the worst heatwave you can imagine, with no AC. We are talking that kind of hot. I am not a big sweat-er, but the sweat was pouring off me and everyone else in 10 minutes. It felt great, actually -- very good for your skin. And if you are flexible, as I am, the poses are simple.

Date observations: My date is definitely hot for me, and apparently has been for some time. He remembers in great detail the time I came to the front door wearing my husband's oversized shirt, bare legs, with a young baby in my arms, many years ago. He says he is haunted by the memory. After 90 minutes of hot yoga, he also told me tonight my body is better now than it was when I was in my 20s. He also kissed me on the mouth when we said goodnight.

What effect has this had on me? Complete and utter panic. He is a good-looking man, and smart and sweet and kind. Yet I now equate sexual desire with severe pain. My husband passionately and feverishly came after me the night before he left me. What am I to make of that??!!?? Now I associate anyone lustful with someone who is going to rip my heart out.

This is going to take some time. Curious to know what my secret admirer has to say about that.

Happy Birthday to RTK

One year old today and still going strong. And purely FYI, that's a Swarovski cake. Maybe Jacy's fan from the culinary world will bake us a real one.