What I mean to say is, I enjoy cinematic entertainment. And most of the time I can take it for what it is. Be it a Moving, Whimsically Tragic Love Story, or a Wham Bam! I Just Shot You In The Shoulder While Flying Through The Air While Doing A 180 On My Motorcycle sort of movie most likely starring Angelina Jolie.

Chris has come to the slow realization that there are few things I would rather be doing than watching a really good (or see: really bad) movie. I certainly don’t waste my time (Exhibit: I did not, will not ever see Glitter, or The Love Guru, or White Girls, etc. etc.), but have I mentioned that I am endlessly entertained by movies?

OK, then.

Cue our Netflix queue. And the fact that Netflix sends reminder emails to account holders a day before said movies are to be arriving in your mailbox, looking mostly irresistible in their scantily clad red covering, especially when sitting next to a heaping stack of boring blue-collar bills.

Chris, being the afore-mentioned account holder on our Netflix account, receives those emails notifying him that he might want to be out of the house from 6-8:30pm, because Kerri’s rented another movie centering on being or wanting to be Jane Austen another movie will be arriving promptly.

As of late he has taken to forwarding those emails to me.

Even when said arriving movie might star Kevin Costner, an actor Chris might loathe more than the reality that many people can’t properly use their, there, and they’re.

Now while everyone is entitled to have their wrong opinions, especially when they haven’t even SEEN any of an actor’s best movies (I’m looking at you, baby), I will go on the record as saying I happen to very much like Kevin Costner, The Actor.

I don’t know Kevin Coster, The Person, but I imagine him to be as hip and suave (and quite possibly, drunk) as his character in Tin Cup, as hilarious and witty (and quite possibly, drunk) as his characters in Bull Durham or The Upside of Anger, and as fantastically hero-worthy (and quite possibly, drunk) as his characters in The Guardian, Robin Hood, and The Bodyguard.

I will also go on the record to proudly say Field of Dreams is a fantastic movie, and if you have no idea what I’m talking about, and have only seen Mr. Costner associated with such potentially bad decisions as Waterworld, Wyatt Earp, or The Postman, all I have to say is: DANCES WITH WOLVES, people. DANCES. WITH. WOLVES.

Netflix that shit.

My father died a year and a half after his oldest sister did. How my grandparents kept steadily breathing was always a mystery to me. I anticipated one day opening the back door to their cozy one-level home built when trees and trails still ruled the outside terrain for miles in every direction, to find they had peacefully expired on their couch following afternoon tea, suffocated by the weight of such immense grief. To watch your first-born daughter suffer, and eventually die, and then, not two years later, to bury your son after an accidental drowning: how did a parent bear such unimaginable pain? They were quieter after Anne and my father left. Emotionally still as a stagnant pond in hot July heat, and yet still strong. Still together. For years to come they would remain steadfast in their belief that one day they would understand why they were forced to endure the misery of outliving two of their six children.

My grandfather left suddenly, after being diagnosed with a form of stomach cancer so rare as to be hardly ever seen in first world countries. He was an anomaly, and before that, he was misdiagnosed. Labeled with an ulcer, food allergies, improperly treated for two years before they realized his symptoms–his heartburn and inability to keep most of the food he ate in his stomach–were the result of a losing battle he had no idea he was fighting. One of the healthiest people I ever knew, my grandfather walked and hiked at least five miles a day, swimming, downhill and snow-shoe skiing steadily throughout his life. He was lean and quite tall, handsome. He never smoked, never drank. Two weeks after being diagnosed with cancer he lost consciousness in his bathroom and my grandmother rushed him to the hospital. It was only two miles from where I was living at the time and I went to see him that night. He looked exhausted, but was in good spirits and seemed resilient, his voice quiet and kind. He smiled and talked with me. He held my hand and kissed me goodbye, told me he would see me tomorrow. Neither of us knew it then, but that was to be our final farewell.

“Hi!”

“Hi! How’s your day going so far?”

“Good, but BORING.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, definitely. There is hardly anyone here and I’m not feeling motivated at all.”

“I have something that will make your day exciting. What would you think if I told you had a surprise for you?”

“Um, you didn’t buy another plasma t.v. without telling me did you? I’m pretty sure we can’t fit another one in our living room.”

“And what if that surprise was: drumroll…”

“Two tickets to Amsterdam?”

“Better!”

“Umm…”

“I just bought two tickets to see RAY LAMONTAGNE at The Schnitzer in Portland November 5th!”

“WHAT WHAT WHAT?”

“YES. PRESALE.”

“REALLY?”

“Yes! We are sitting Orchestra level, in the middle.”

“NOVEMBER IS GOING TO BE THE BEST MONTH EVER.”

“I know! That has been such a hard secret to keep. I found out about it yesterday and I knew that I was going to buy them this morning when they went on sale at 10am, and I was waiting to tell you and it was KILLING me.”

“I’m fighting amazingly intense urges to turn into Mary Murphy right now and take my GOING TO SEE RAY LAMONTAGNE TRAIN choo-chooing and woot! wooing through the office.

“Be strong.”

Strangers looked at me with tears in their eyes. Teachers spoke gently, pulled me aside before and after classes to offer condolences. “Was there anything they could do?” they asked a little too loudly.

I despised their gentleness. I abhorred being special in the way I now was. Every teenager wants to be recognized, to be noticed, to be praised for exceptional test scores, for record-breaking attendance, for unparalleled athletic ability. No one wants to be the girl without a father.

No one wanted to be me, but they all felt sorry for me, and I felt sorry for me, too. “Why did she make me go to school today?” I wondered silently as the flood of unwelcome well-wishing rushed onward. The notes, the cliché and abundant pats on the back, the “While you’re grieving” cards. All of it a cruel, unfunny, pathetically maddening joke.

I wore my grief like a badge I had not earned. I smiled wryly as classmates who once ignored me now looked on, interested. My best friends had little to say. Their mothers had advised them to be calm, to be quiet. I wanted to scream, to slur profanities like sloppy joes across the cafeteria, to kick and fight, and flee every wayward glance that sought to canvass my grief. Grief I had not yet been given ample time to process and actually feel.

I was twelve, almost thirteen. No one had taught me how to lose my father.

I would have sooner kicked someone in the shins than cried. I wouldn’t realize I was allowed to feel anything but sorrow until college. Someone kind, a Professional, would tell me anger is normal, to be expected. One of many phases I would be forced to traverse on a rocky road to healing.

That Monday I mostly felt nothing. I walked around a mere shell of myself, stoic and uncompromising in shoes wherein I had so recently stood outspoken and confident. I wasn’t accustomed to everyone staring. There were questions. Too many questions to which I had no answers. Not then, not yet. He was dead. Yes, he died. Drowned. I don’t know. No, no funeral yet. Maybe. Mike. His name was Mike. Michael Francis Ladish. He was my father, the deceased. What does it matter if he’s being cremated? I DON’T KNOW.

Years later I would fabricate a conversation in my head between my mother and myself.

“Mom, you know you shouldn’t have sent us back to school the day after he died.”

“I know, dear. I thought it would help.”

“You only thought it would help you.”

“I know, dear.”

“Awesome.”

“Yeah, this show is pretty uplifting.”

“Ah, Science, never quite putting it gently.”

The History Channel: “At that time humans will have to look to other planets to inhabit in order to ensure their survival.”

“I really don’t want to be around when that happens.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure we won’t have to worry about that.”

“Yeah, I know, and GOOD. Star Trek was always so dark and depressing, with everyone swirling about in endless space, isolated and yet stuck on a ship together. And why was everyone on the ‘civilized’ planets always wearing dreary and ridiculously tattered clothes, like they just escaped from a mental institution laden with tigers?”

“They were training to star in Waterworld?” 

“Nice.” 

A few moments of silence

“And in space THERE IS NO INTERNET! Can you imagine?” 

“It’s ultimate horror, magnified.”

Speaking of non permanent body art, on Monday of this past week I added a bit of ink of the permanent variety to my body. Seven smallish stars to be exact, behind my right ear, to coincide with the seven that I have behind my left ear. The original post about my first set of stars inked in August of last year is here, and the original set of pictures is here.

These are my newest additions, done by Todd J. at Imperial Tattoo in NW Portland:

Todd is professional and courteous and I highly recommend him. He himself came highly recommended from friends of friends and I plan to visit him again whenever I next make the decision to add more ink. I’m already fighting urges to go back next week, but I want my next piece to be (bigger, and) definitely thoughtful in its choosing, and while I have a few ideas, I’m not one-hundred percent committed to any of them.

Last month I fell into sweet gooey love with strawberry rhubarb pie. Until Meggan’s birthday soirée last month I had never eaten rhubarb anything. I hereby declare it Amazing and my Third Favorite of All Pies, second only to huckleberry and pumpkin.

I recently stumbled upon a few national news articles centering on religious groups meeting to “Pray at the Pump.” The extent to which praying at gas pumps makes no sense to me is as endless as our country’s reliance on foreign oil. I’m sure The Almighty LOVES that we are raping our natural resources to such a ridiculous extent, but don’t worry! If we pray hard enough we will surely be delivered from evil high petroleum prices of our own creation, amen.

While I fully intended on joining the ranks of those who were going to spend their “economic stimulus” checks on Nothing In Particular Whatsoever, I’m still thinking I would rather spend that check on plane tickets. To Lithuania. Or Frankfurt. Or Somewhere That Is Europe, and Portland flies directly to Amsterdam, so perhaps there. I can’t fully explain my newfound travel bug except that I think it’s always been with me, resting just below the surface, and with my new position at work requiring me to organize a large amount of international travel on a weekly basis for Travelers Who Are Not Me, I’m feeling an overwhelming desire to fly out of my comfort and time zones. Thankfully Chris is being endlessly patient with me as I send him a slew of random Kayak fares three times daily.

(Seeing as I took my characteristic fifty gazillion pictures over the course of the trip, I will be traipsing through them day-by-day, and will be uploading more continually this week, until there are no more pictures to upload, amen.)

Moving right along then to the 5, 7, 5s:

Hayes is quite cute;
Poor Jigsaw, covered in pee.
Blue Bottle coffee!

Laugh so hard you cry.
Lefty O’Douls, how we love
your mashed potatoes.

Traipsing about town,
a horn honking symphony,
randomly sunburnt.

Soirée in the lobby;
Westin bouncers can’t be bought.
No Fail Whaling allowed.

A hugger finds her
people. Next year’s schedule needs
blog karaoke.

————–

As a bonus that you didn’t even have to ask for (I’m so GENEROUS, I know!), and in the spirit of all of the flight-related travel this past week, I bring you:

Kerri’s Top Six List Of Things That Should Be Confiscated Before Anyone Is Allowed To Board A Plane, Ever, Amen

6. Your power trip. I’m looking at you, TSA employees. I know that “heightened security” is a priority, and far be it from me to interfere with your ability to scowl at an entire airport full of travelers do your job, but when I provide my passport AND my birth certificate AND my driver’s license AND my marriage license, I’m pretty sure I have all my bases covered to an obsessive degree, and the least you could do is SMILE for even point five seconds. You aren’t curing cancer from your little stool; you are double-checking boarding passes.

5. Your screaming child. Children=yes, sure. Screaming children=fine, at your house. Screaming children on an airplane that is not your house=tranquilizers. For me, I mean.

(On the flip side, you can also earn bonus points in my air travel book if your kiddo starts enthusiastically clapping when they board the plane, or as we’re taking off, asks in a concerned tone, “Mom, where’s the ground?”)

4. Your need for five or more alcoholic beverages. If you’re that scared of flying: DRIVE. Or, take the train. The smell of bourbon and luggage doesn’t mix well. It also doesn’t help your breath any, and no, thank you, I don’t want to hold your hand.

3. Your pathogens. The least you can do when you decide to become airborne is make sure none of your germs are, because, honestly? we all well know that planes are to petry dishes like Tyra is to a vat of vapid.

2. Your Loud Cell Phone Voice. Not everyone in the entire cabin cares to know that you forgot your toothbrush at home, or that you had a great flight except for the fact that the lady sitting in front of you smells like Gouda cheese.

1. Tuna sandwiches. Now I like tuna fish as much as the next girl, but in such close quarters “ewh” doesn’t really even begin to cover it.

————–

Welcome home! guys and dolls. It’s pretty incredible to me how much I miss you all already. A special thanks! to my hilarious roommate, for making me laugh, and for being exceedingly rad, and for trying to warn me how much the water I was snuggling with on Thursday night was going to cost me in the morning.

(But, aha! The water that was once thought to be $25.00 a bottle ended up not being $25.00 a bottle, and I might have stuck my tongue out at The Westin to celebrate my water bottle victory, because it was just the right thing to do, and also I am 12 sometimes, and never mind that I could have just drank from the TAP (The horror, the horror!), as Jen so helpfully pointed out later on in the weekend.)

And for those of you who never left: hello! again. It’s good to be back.

Overall I would say my trip was, if I had to use one word: insane. And by “insane” I mostly mean “crazy, sexy, cool, with endless one-liners and mountains of awesome.”

See, me using one word to describe anything is tricky. Mostly because I can rarely do it.

Speaking of things I cannot do, I would promise this would be my last post about San Francisco, and BlogHer, and the heaps of rad and the tiny piles of less rad I experienced therein (I’m looking at YOU, sunburnt shoulders), but I would be lying. And I don’t want my pants set afire. I happen to like my pants.

That being said, I promise not to be (too) annoying with said stories, because I like you, too, and I know it’s hard to read endless accounts of high-flying adventures boasting inside jokes and burly security guards, and a guy who could quite possibly be the worst Piano Man of all time, when you weren’t there. Believe me when I tell you I’ve been on both sides of this situational coin.

But there is indeed still quite a bit I want to say, especially because my friends are amazing, and San Francisco is, shall we say for now, interesting, and I want to talk about both sans haiku at some point.

For the time being I’m finding that:
1. Work, it waited for me (LAME, yes, I know).
2. My amazing husband, while I was traipsing about a new city, wearing a McDonald’s hat on my head, cleaned the entire apartment AND organized our storage space, AND cleaned the car, AND bought me a beautiful bouquet of flowers.
3. Our poor forlorn little puppy has taken to sitting on my feet whenever I stop moving for five seconds.
4. Both afore-mentioned amazing husband and forlorn little puppy are requiring quite a bit of my attention, and, honestly, I can’t think of anything I’d rather do than give it to them in full.

At least until Project Runway and SYTYCD come on tonight.

(I’m KIDDING. That’s what Tivos are for!)

I’ve been working over-time for the past month in anticipation of having the entire next week spent non-working, and while I left myriad notes and instructions to be used in my absence, I still might have forwarded my work email to my home email account because (I’m crazy, and) I’m pretty sure someone is going to have a crisis mid-week, and I’d like to be able to anticipate a crisis, should there be one, so I don’t answer the phone drunk “Kerri’s BlogHer Bungalow, how may I help you?”

Friday afternoon I also decided that my newfound ability at losing contests I enter should not deter me from showing the entire internet what I look like when my hair is committing hari kari, and do you have any idea how hard it is to spell hari kari correctly when your name is Kerri and all you want to do is write Hairy Kerri? REALLY HARD.

What was I saying? Oh, right. So there is this contest, wherein if I win someone much wiser and more hair stylish than I tells me how to cut and potentially color my hair, and then I obey, because much wiser and more hair stylish, remember? And also? The new ‘do is on the proverbial house. Which is decidedly quite rad.

So, without further adieu, here is my blast from the past hair picture, alternately titled In Fifth Grade I Totally Had A Mullet, Thanks! Mom:

I’m sure you can plainly see The Mullet, in all its top-heavy glory, but can you also see that on this particular school picture day I saw fit to CRIMP my hair? This picture is a large percentage of the reason I believe hair crimping outside of Halloween or 1980’s parodies should be outlawed, and crimping itself should be one of the Seven Deadly Sins Of Hair, secondly only to feather bangs.

Exhibit: Kerri with an OK hair day, though I can’t remember the last time I had a good! or even great! hair day, because my hair, it is pesky, and difficult, and my “best” hair day might have been this day, which was YEARS ago now, and that picture was taken directly after I walked out of a salon where I had just left half my checkbook’s soul:

That picture was taken last weekend, pre-date night.

And one more from the Really Horrible Hair archives, for good measure:

To this day I remember (how ridiculous my hair looked, yes, and) how ridiculously uncomfortable that bra-forsaken dress was that I am wearing in that picture. The fake rhinestone studded top dug into my real non-rhinestone studded chest, and by the end of the day I vowed that after the reception I would dig a hole in our backyard garden and bury it.

To summarize:
Dear Hair Thursday, I need help. Please.

Forever frizzy,
Kerri Anne

Saturday

After a three-steak laden Last Supper in honor of Chantel’s last official night as an Oregon resident, we met her and her San Francisco Man & Co. for brunch at The Doug Fir, wherein our not so topical mid-morning meal conversation most likely offended nearly everyone sitting within earshot. I take no responsibility for the afore-mentioned offending, if only because I was not one of the three psychologists who have taught human sexuality classes at PSU sitting at the table, and also because I did not start the conversation about Mardi Gras in New Orleans which frighteningly segued into the right vs. wrong way to birth a child.

Despite the fact that our conversation was probably a bit too, um, crazy? for so early in the morning, it was also hilarious, and while it surely hasn’t sunk in that as of Saturday I’m no longer going to be able to see Chantel’s lovely face whenever I want to, I am very much looking forward to seeing her lovely face again this upcoming week, when I visit her new city for the first time ever. I’ll be sure to wear some flowers in my hair.

On Saturday night our favorite newlyweds! Meggan and Daniel came over for Ridiculously Awesome Movie Night, The First. There were also ridiculously large amounts of cheese. And grapes, for balance.

We watched Cloverfield, which was actually quite a bit better than I expected it to be, mostly because it wasn’t nearly so topple-camera-in-The-Blair-Witch style as I had heard it was, and thus, I wasn’t dizzy the entire time. There was actually some really great cinematography, and the ending, although mostly sad and disappointing–from a We Have No Idea What Happened, And Did The Creature Ever DIE? standpoint– it was also well done and realistic. You know, except for the whole Giant Maybe Sea Creature That Doesn’t Ever Die part.

Sunday

My first ever! manicure: $20.00. A relaxing pedicure with foot and leg massage + leather chair massagers that made every woman in the place look like they were doing the shimmy: $30.00. An afternoon with Rhi + an amazing new lunch destination within walking distance to love + toes that I’m not embarrassed to proudly feature via sandals: priceless.

For everything else, there’s Mastercard cash, because the nail salon doesn’t accept anything else.

Operation: Procure Another Portable AC Unit was a complete fail. How Chris feels about Operation: Procure Another Portable AC Unite being a complete fail:

That’s his I’m Quite Annoyed face. Long live the box fan.

In other weekend-related news, we found all of these in the car on Sunday afternoon, right after we finished weeping and gnashing our teeth about our impending non-air-conditioned living room, and right before we realized that an apartment that doubles as a sauna in the summer could have its perks (see: limited wearing of pants):

(They were all empty.)

Apparently we feel rather strongly about having minty fresh breath on a routine basis.

“Ah, old Van Morrison. Yes.”

“Van Morrison. Of ‘The Doors’ right?”

“Um, no honey. That’s JIM Morrison.”

“Oh, right. I always! get them confused.”

“Because Van Morrison sounds NOTHING like Jim Morrison?”

“No, because they have the SAME LAST NAME.”

“Wow. I’m so glad we’re in the car and no one could hear you just compare Van Morrison to Jim Morrison, based solely on their last names.”

Exhibit B:

Exhibit C:

Exhibit We Decided We Would Rather Watch A Scorsese-Directed Biography On Bob Dylan And Anyway, Iggy Was Trying To Eat Slugs In The Rose Gardens Where We Were Standing To Watch The Fireworks:

(Though I would argue we weren’t really “free” until hundreds of years after 1776, and we as a country are still oppressing people daily (Hi! Gay Rights) ) Happy! Independence Weekend, America.

Now how about some government-assisted healthcare?