happy birthday, super nana!!

 all y'all know how much we love a party down heah on the plantation, so even though super nana is on the other side of the country, i hope all y'all will help celebrate this lovely day with our sweet angel baby!







 and because no coconut krewe party is complete with out maz...

and now, a few words from. . .

been a few weeks since i've sat down to write anything, but i'm glad all y'all had a chance to read Khanh Ho's piece and i hope you'll check him out in the future!

i'm just checking in and thanks for continuing to stop by. 

i'll see you tomorrow.

(Guest Post) Every Writer Needs a Muse: Mine Was Viva

Khanh Ho is writing the first Vietnamese American Detective Fiction ever.  Why?  Because being the first is a power trip.  Follow him on twitter @LAMysteryWriter or visit his website at www.losangelesmystery.com

Viva used to come over and get naked.  She was our next door neighbor, a roley-poley girl.  I didn’t find her attractive--I was too young--but she would cut up apples in wedges and put salt on them.  Then, she would serve them up to me on a porcelain plate.  They were pretty good.  So, I would let her come over and get naked.

Viva was my introduction to fiction; with Viva, I became a real honest-to-goodness writer.  She was game for anything.  So I let her become my muse.

We would play in my unfinished garage, among the stacks of undelivered Reader’s Digests.  Stacks and Stacks.  My brother was addicted to working—he had three different newspaper routes and was always looking for extra cash.  So he picked up this Reader’s Digest Route.  But the stacks kept growing.

They kept growing.

And growing.

I don’t think he ever delivered them.  They became a forest—like the trees in Where the Wild Things Are…or some installation at a fancy museum.

Viva was always trying to escape her house.  She was a child of divorce.  Her father was a drummer.  They didn’t own; they rented.  There were always wine bottles at her house, which smelled like cats and cigarette smoke.  I know:  that year, my teacher kept on asking us to bring empty wine bottles to school for craft projects.  But my family didn’t drink.  So I would come over to Viva’s house and get her father's empties.

There were always empties.

“Do you know what Viva means?”  her father asked.  He was really cool-looking for an old man:  bearded and lanky in that seventies polyester-shirt way.  “It means life in Mexican.”

Viva came over and we played soap opera.  She would take off her clothes and then I would pretend I was shocked to catch her in a compromising position with a stranger—a dark, handsome stranger--and then I would accuse her of infidelity.  I would point my finger at her--lightning in my eyes.

The scenario was always the same—her lounging in an imaginary bath tub.  Me:  angry as all heck, busting in.  She:  begging forgiveness.  I was a regular playwright.

Once, my brother came in and caught us.  It was my fault:  I had forgotten to lock the door.  He was really stern.  “If you want to get naked, you should do it in your own house.”  Viva hid behind the towers of Reader’s Digests, and made the pile of magazines tremble in terrible shame.

Then, Viva moved away.  And there were no more apples with salt.  Sometimes, I will eat apple wedges with salt and think of Viva—my first muse.  I’m eating apple wedges right now and guess what I'm thinking.  I'm thinking that Viva means life.

is it tuesday already?

why, yes, it is, gracie, and you've been MIA!

no excuse, no reason, just . . .

dunno

but, last night the new orleans saints beat the miami dolphins 38-17!  i watched the game and cheered as if i were at the super dome surrounded by the Who Dat Nation! it seemed the only antidote to the fiasco going on in our nation's capital. (end of sports AND politics here today)

the MITM is still on the med side of deepestdarkestafrica, so no news from him directly, but The Doc who IS in deepestdarkestafrica has spoken with him and it's all good.

the coconut krewe is fine and that has to be the best news today!

total aside, but thanks to a certain store that shall remain anonymous HomeGoods and their continuous background music, THIN LIZZY and specifically, Phil Lynott, played a huge part in my one of my dreams! (ok, it wasn't THAT sort of dream!) in my dream, he was standing on my porch with his dog and we were talking about how difficult it was for him to keep them on leash (right, wtf is THAT about) if that isn't strange enough the house was a sort of mashup of two homes i've lived in and absolutely loved. the other funny bit? super nana was in my dream and she kept asking who is that guy? does he live around here?  here's what started it:



~~~~~~

these made me laugh:

BBC, the surfer yogi

BGM, just because