Amber & Tabula Rasa

Remember those days?



I do.  And I remember this song.



Although I like to think of it as being about Tara and Willow rather than Michelle Branch and either her goldfish (?) or her hobo friends (?).

Amber & I Love You, New York

Now, more than ever, New York is my city boyfriend.

Amber & River Nights

This is apparently what Woody and I look like at night when we are sleeping at the River.

I wonder if we look like this almost every night, only people don't feel compelled to photodocument it.

Do you see his paw on my head?  I am so in love with him.

Amber & Looking For Trouble

I am currently in love with this song.  Like: I want it to make romance with my ears.



"Seems the longer you live, the more there is to know."  Like how fun it is to play with the focus and depth of field.

Amber & Bunkered Down

You may be asking yourself, how is ALH surviving on bed rest?  Are the kitties scooping their own boxes and making her meals?  No, they are busy with their own lives (napping, chewing boxes, grooming my head while I am captive).  No, the answer to the success of my bed rest is:

Preparedness.

Before I bedded down yesterday, I ran errands.

These errands included: trips to two different pharmacies for three different drugs (drat the NY state law that says my doc can't call in pain pills, making me have to go pick it up), buying a pill organizer box (you should SEE the pills I have to take), picking up my work laptop for next week (I am way to stoned on pain pills today to circulate), getting my day planner (there's sooo much to plan for when you're on bed rest), buying a treat soap bar and a stop at Lush for seven bath bombs-- one for each day on bed rest.

Also, perhaps most importantly, I picked up a the office mail and lo!  There was a package containing seven packs of M&Ms, all in different flavors.  There are plain and peanuts, classics of course.  But there are also coconut (pukey), dark chocolate, pretzel (disturbing), almond (sooo good), and peanut butter.  I ate the peanut on Day One and the peanut butter today.  Many, many thanks to my kind benefactor, Erl. This kicks the ass of the fruit basket I got that year I called in sick on Shane's birthday.  This human appreciates your resourcefulness, Erl.

And I got this cutie house dress, Le Sac.

Don't confuse it with LaPerm (which very excitingly got its own Wikipedia entry).

But, lest my mother be crying right now because I plan to survive on soap and candy, let me assure you that I have real food, too.  Thank you, Fresh Direct.

I got those 4-minute pre-made meals, juices, yogurts (probiotic!), cherries (ha! take that, farm share that I missed this week!), bread and sandwich stuff, toilet paper, paper towels, tea, pickled tomatoes, milk, cereal... and Ginger, apparently.  That boy sure was disappointed there were no fresh veggies for him to sample.

There were, however, cherries, with which he proceeded to make sahelu with his face.

That boy loves produce.  And I love him.  Even if he isn't supposed to be on the counter.

See, mom and dad?  I am FINE.

Amber & Overwhelming Emotion

Sometimes, you are so in love that you just don't know how you can go on.

What am I supposed to do about how much I love you?

That's why the call them crushes.  If they were easy, they'd call them something else.

Amber & Epic Stories

Some days, I miss Veronica Mars.



Maybe there's just not enough sassy girl detective in my life these days.  Kate Beckett comes close, but her hair isn't nearly as flippy.

Or, maybe I miss teen romances that span years and continents--lives ruined, bloodshed-- and summer break.  They don't write songs about the ones that come easy.

P.S. I snost and lost, too.

Amber & Desire

Sigmund's astral body chuckled with contentment yesterday as I learned an important lesson about the nature of desire.  It all started with an afternoon sweet treat craving and an ad for a Frappuccino on a cup holder that I played with on my desk during a conference call.

Now, it's no secret that I have long been a fan of Starbucks's product, highly-available coffee.  Given my love for the brewed bean purveyor, you might be surprised to learn that I had never tried a Frappuccino.  They just seemed so expensive (I get the misto although I really prefer a cappuccino mostly because it costs about a dollar less) and more like a dessert than a beverage, really.  I've had the ice coffee, of course, and the weird Vivanno blended smoothie drink, too. But, until yesterday afternoon when I succumbed to my yearning, I had never had the Frappuccino.

Well, desire sure is the yearning for a fundamentally lost object, Sigmund.  I'd even go a step further and say it's a yearning for something that one cannot have, that may never have existed.  The Frappuccino?  Crappuccino, people.  Not only wasn't it as good as it was in my imagination, but it was just plain pukey.  It didn't taste anything like coffee, was way, way too sweet, and had a certain waxy thickness about its texture that seemed highly unnatural.  Gross, gross, gross.

Some things we think we want, with all our hearts, are only wanted because they can't be had.  Some things look like delicious sweet treats and we might fantasize about them as afternoon snacks, but in reality those frozen coffee drinks might have been serial womanizers who have horrible, violent tempers who are are registered Republicans.

Ah, desire.  First it's red and then it's blue.  And every time I see a Frappuccino, it reminds me of you.

What flower expresses the kisses, the kisses?

Amber & Ducks Mate for Life

If nothing else, I am consistent in my adorations.  See for example, pickles.  (Not Pickles.  About him I can be very fickle especially when he puts the fleece wand on my face at 4 am and then sits on my chest and mews.)  This especially true of my crushes, which I hold onto like Eva Marie Saint clinging to Cary Grant and the eyeball on Mt. Everest (thanks to Steve, who knows the difference between Mt. Rushmore and Mt. Everest).

Speaking of Cary Grant, I am incredibly loyal to my actor crushes. Once I love you on-screen, you can do just about anything, take any bad role, grow old, change your hair and guest star on NCIS, and I will continue to love you diegetically, aesthetically, and dreamily.  Only maybe I will blog about you a little less.  Take, for example, Johnny Depp.

Sigh.  If you've known me for any length of time (or ever had tequila with me), it's likely you know the root story of my love for Johnny.  If you haven't been that lucky (or were just Googling "puff coats"):  In 1987, I watched the premiere of 21 Jump Street, and started to sob--not because the show's tackling of trouble youth was especially effecting, but because Johnny was so damn pretty.  And, I knew I could never have him.  Ah, desire. First it's red, and then it's blue. And everytime I see an iceberg, Johnny, it reminds me of you.

I've seen everything Johnny has made, even Sweeney Todd, even though "seen" there really means squinted at out of one corner of my eye while the window on my laptop was only about two inches wide.  (I don't like scary movies.)  You can make that third lousy pirate film, Johnny, and I will go see it--in the theater!  And I will like it because you are pretty in a white flouncy shirt with bad teeth.  So take that.

The latest test of my love is the Alice in Wonderland posters in the subway.

Now, I love Alice in Wonderland.  (It even inspired my first born laptop name.)  And I love fake eyelashes. And I totally am all about dyed red hair, and hats, and tea, and madness.  But that poster just scares me!  And, I don't think it's a coincidence that I dreamt that I had a weird gap between my teeth last night.  I even tried to avoid the poster by taking a different entrance to the A after Awesome Club, but then I had to sit across from one on the train for 161 blocks!

But, Johnny, I will go see your latest endeavor in the theater, even if it proves to be your scariest role yet.  Because, Johnny, I would pay to watch you breathe.  And my love is nothing if not eternal and hopeless.

Amber & Mrs. Peel, We're Needed

With the holidays leaving my Hulu queue as dry as a dessert, I've been watching the 1967 season of The Avengers over on Netflix Watch Instantly.

These are the episodes I remember most vividly (in color, one might say, or colour) from my youth.  Obviously, I wasn't quite alive for the original run, but I think they aired late nights on PBS, after my other favorite and fellow British Isler, Doctor Who.

As an adult, the highlight is the charm of Mrs. Peel and John Steed.  Their banter and chemistry is superb, as are Mrs. Peele's outfits.  She karate chops and flips her hair and makes puns, all while looking lovely with fake eyelashes.

Steed remains dapper and with-chapeau while mayhem swirls around him.  I still find him irresistible.  I'd take Steed over Johnny Depp any day.

Another highlight is the surprise special guest stars that I doubt I noticed on first watching.  A super special treat was a bespectacled Jon Pertwee (the third Doctor on Doctor Who) in full brigadier gear.

And, later in the season, there was a bearded young Donald Sutherland rocking pin-up girl bangs and a weird Eastern (cold war) accent.

But, even with my new adult skills and a BFA in program watching, I still find the villains just as creepy as I did as a wee lass.  Only now, I just make the window smaller on my laptop rather than hiding behind the couch.

But then, as now, I knew things would end well with mystery solved, Steed and Peele quipping and flirting and being suggestive in a distinctively British way with that peppy, and happy music in the background.

And that lavender outfit!  I still want to be Emma Peel when I grow up.

Amber & Goats

This is a blog post about The Men Who Stare At Goats, the book versus the movie.  In the movie, there was no Uri Gelle, but there was a George Clooney.

I had read the book, which was a gift from CRD, and had been riveted by its recounting of our government's research into creating psychic spy Jedi warrior soldiers.  They did a fair job adapting an investigative report into a cinematic narrative and there were lots of Sparkle Eyes, the psychic weapon I utilize most often.  I like goats, and I want to believe that we could prevent war by carrying flowers and walking through walls.

Did I mention the movie had George Clooney in it?  He is second in my daydreams only to Cary Grant.  Like Cary, George just gets more and more.  And more.  I would pay to just watch him breathe.

I even like him with the gray beard scruff.  They should make a sequel called The Ambers Who Stare at George Clooney.

Amber & the Bobby Soxer

To gear up for my Fabulous Shirley Cinematic Monday, I watched The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer on Netflix's online Movie Viewer. In addition to an Oscar-winning screenplay by Sidney Sheldon, it has an amazing cast: Myrna Loy, Cary Grant (I luf him) and a teenage Shirley Temple!

Ms. Loy plays a lady judge-- a 1947 version of Judge Judy, only more screwball. Shirley is her younger sister who develops an age-inappropriate crush on the title-named bachelor and lady-magnet, Cary Grant. Mayhem ensues! And I won't spoil things by telling you who winds up with whom but there's a girl-on-girl bar-fight, a town picnic, snappy screwball banter and plenty of pouty Shirley.

Luckily I found this on YouTube, lest I should think I had dreamed it up.

Amber & Kate

I have had a Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn weekend, having watched both The Philadelphia Story and the freshman Cinema Studies fave Bringing Up Baby. I have always loved Cary Grant, and I especially enjoy his work with Kate. He has very opposite relationships with her in these two films and only wears a lady's bathrobe in one.

My high school, college and sometimes holiday party friend David Semanki was a huge fan of Hepburn and interviewed her on at least one occasion for his work at the Harriet Beecher Stowe House where Kate lived at some point in her life.

David was captivated by Kate's grace and beauty and, I think, her upper class New England persona. I am attracted to her daffy, clumsiness which makes her likable.

Maybe if I wear more wide-legged pants and grow a foot taller, I too can win the hearts of Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart and that other guy when I get to Heaven?

God bless, Katherine Hepburn.

Amber & Cary Grant

I love Cary Grant: his perfect dimpled-chin, the dark and dancing eyes, the absolutely bizarre accent. I adore him as the older, presumptuous, rogue bachelor trying to woo ladies into his bed without wedding them first in That Touch of Mink and Indiscreet. I'm tickled by his wackiness in Bringing Up Baby and Arsenic and Old Lace. But he is at his best amidst the tension and mystery of Hitchcock. Among those, Notorious is my all-time favorite.As my former classmate, Cosimo once described, the film is held together by "the kisses...the kisses...the kisses."