"Whatever"

"What did you say?" My icy voice followed my daughter as she scurried into the hallway.

"Whatever, that's fine," she enunciated without breaking her stride. Had I imagined it or was the original "Whatever" delivered in a dismissive tone? I'd spent the whole summer reminding my kid to dig into her rich vocabulary and pull out language that was more precise than her usual "Whatever," but it was a losing battle. I'm convinced that she favors the term because aside from the implied neutrality, it can be delivered by a teenager as a sort of passive resistance while she drags her feet to do her chores or in the face of some other unreasonable authoritarian command.

Yes, that's right - I have a teen at home. High school started a couple of weeks ago. She's a freshman this year and had to attend Freshman Camp to get acclimated to her new surroundings. I drove her to camp the first day and walked with her into the gym where the students were gathering. My daughter promptly walked to the other side of the gym and after a few minutes walked back and politely asked me to leave. I shuffled off with my tail between my legs, looking back at her as I walked out the glass doors, wondering if she'd get lost, if she'd make friends, if she'd survive without me.

A few hours later when I went to pick her up I was all smiles, eager to hear about her first day at summer camp. I parked the car, got out and stood near the entrance as the freshmen poured out. Finally, I spotted my baby.

"How was your day?" I asked, all sunshine and lollipops.

"It was great. Can you wait for me in the car next time?"

"Oh..." I said, looking around and noticing that only a handful of parents were hovering at the school entrance, their respective offspring looking every bit as embarrassed as mine seemed to be.

"You don't have to get out," she said, rolling her eyes as if I'd neglected to read the memo.

"Whatever..." I thought to myself.

Once real classes started (as opposed to the fun and games of Freshman Camp) my daughter had to catch a new bus to the high school, so I walked the few blocks to the stop with her and took our dog for a walk at the same time. I repeated this pattern for about a week until my husband came into town. When I told him that he needed to walk our daughter to the bus stop, he gave me a funny look.

"Does she really want us to do that?" he asked.

"Yeah, I want to make sure she's OK," I replied.

"I know what your motivation is; I'm wondering how she feels about it though," he mused.

Greg walked out the front door with our daughter. He returned just a minute later, then he informed me that we would not be walking her to the bus stop from now on.

"Don't you think it's ironic that someone who had so much freedom as a teenager should be so overprotective of her own daughter? Didn't your mom drop you and your friend off to go rollerskating on Hollywood Blvd when you were her age?"

"But there are coyotes out there early in the morning, I've seen them..." I protested.

"There were plenty of wolves in Hollywood when you went rollerskating," he laughed.

"We'll see who's laughing when a coyote bites her butt."

The latest of my adventures in parental humiliation ocurred during Open House. Students were supposed to print out a copy of their class schedule for the parents to follow when visiting their child's classes. When we first got there, we raced to get to first period but once that presentation was over, the real race began. As she led me to the next classroom, I found myself having to walk ten paces behind my long-legged baby girl. I had to jog to keep up with her long, steady I-know-where-I'm-going stride. Of course, I wanted to look at the campus, but she'd have none of my rubber necking and pulled me to keep up with her pace on an invisible leash.

"Can't you slow down? I don't want to walk behind you." I was breathing hard now.

"I don't want us to be late. Do YOU want to be late?" she asked, deftly turning traditional parent-speak against me. Although I was fairly certain that there were other parents there that night who hadn't trained to sprint, I grudgingly trotted behind her, my wooden clogs making pony sounds across the commons, feeling like the old gray mare who just ain't what she used to be.

Cinny Crybaby Bread

Lightning in the desert can be a spectacular, awe inspiring display of nature's power, beautiful to behold... except when you have a wimpy ass dog that keeps you awake all night with her whining and trembling. I thought our dear little Cinnamon was going to have a heart attack with each strike of Thor's mighty hammer.

The storm finally subsided in the wee hours and I was able to get some sleep but a really annoying thing happened. The alarm clock went off. This can't be right, I thought to myself but sure enough it was 5:30, time to rise and shine. I poured myself a cup of hot black coffee and decided to bake myself awake. Here's my RX for a sleepless night:

Cinnamon Crybaby Bread

Ingredients:



2 cans of refrigerated biscuit dough (the cheap stuff is fine)
1/3 cup of granulated sugar
3 Tablespoons of cinnamon
6 Tablespoons of butter
1/4 cup of pecan pieces (optional)

Directions:

1.Preheat oven to 350F, butter or spray a round cake pan.

2. Sprinkle about half of the pecan pieces into the pan (if using pecans)

3. Mix granulated sugar and cinnamon in a plastic zip bag or bowl.

4. Cut the biscuits into different sized (random) halves and quarters and roll into balls.



5. Drop a few balls into the cinnamon sugar mixture and coat. Small batches work best or the dough sticks together and the balls don't get coated properly.



6. Arrange the coated dough balls in the cake pan.



7. Melt the butter and brown sugar over a medium flame, stirring constantly until it starts to bubble.



8. Pour the mixture over biscuit balls.



Place your pan in the oven for 25-30 minutes. If you use a small cake pan, put a baking sheet underneath in case the sweetness bubbles over. Cool about 10 mins, then invert it onto your serving dish.



Bad Housewife tip- Pull a piece off with your finger and clean that messy pan, yum!

Back In The Saddle

I've been absent from blogging for too long. It's easy to get sidetracked and once that happens, it's hard for me to get back in the habit of writing. That's why I'm happy that my husband is so persistent about nagging...I mean motivating me to write.

My husband Greg has been working in Houston while my daughter and I have moved back home to Arizona. Greg and I talk to each other on the phone several times a day and he comes home for extended weekends about twice a month. It's been tough for all of us but we try not to complain because times are hard for everyone.

When Greg was home with us, he and I would often walk the dog together in the evenings; it was our time to transition from the work day to home life. Last night during the walk (the dog's and mine) Greg talked to me on the phone and tried to inspire me to start writing again by being generous with the compliments. He told me my writing had really improved when I was working on my Violence Girl blog and we both agreed that it was the daily discipline of journaling that had forced me to improve.

I have a rebellious spirit, so feeling like I had to write every day became something I wanted to rebel against. As soon as I was done with Violence Girl, I took out my old workout tapes, cookbooks, incomplete sewing projects and in a very short time I filled in the hours that had once been reserved for writing with other fun projects. I pretty much ignored my blog.

Last night my chat with Greg helped me realize that I haven't really been getting as much out of blogging as I should. I've let Diary of a Bad Housewife get a bit dusty. What it needs is for me to inject some of the enthusiasm I feel for the new projects I'm involved with, so you'll be hearing from me more often. I'd like to share some of my patented bad housewife tips with you, so I'll be adding a few tutorials along with my occasional rants, reviews and travelogues.

Let's start the tutorials off with an easy summer drink recipe, perfect for cooling down on these last few days of the season.

Gin Gimlet

Two oz. gin (the very best you can afford because you're going to taste it)
One oz. Rose's Lime Juice*
(Can be made in equal parts but I'm giving you my preferred measurements.)

*If you are feeling ambitious, use fresh squeezed lime juice and simple syrup instead of Rose's. I'm not that ambitious but if Greg is home, then I insist upon it!

Pour into a shaker with ice, shake for at least thirty seconds, then pour into a rocks glass if you prefer ice or strain into a cocktail glass if served without ice, a la Thin Man. Garnish with a lime wedge.

That should wet your whistle!

Colorado Socks It To Me

I'm happy to report that I recently signed on with Feral House publishing. I'm not going to write too much about The True Life Adventures of Violence Girl because I'm superstitious about the projects I work on. I don't like to talk about something and then have something go wrong - not that I think anything will but that's not my style.

My advance check was burning a hole in my pocket and I didn't have to think too long before I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it. My husband's birthday is this month and my daughter is about to go back to school. I decided to seize the opportunity to grant Greg one of his long unfulfilled wishes: to spend the night at the hotel that inspired Stephen King to write The Shining, the famously haunted Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado.

The Stanley is located about an hour outside of Denver so the first leg of our adventure starts in Denver, a town I couldn't recall ever wanting to visit. Not being a skier or an outdoorsy type, it was hard to imagine what attraction Colorado could possibly hold for me. Aside from the fact that it's the place Nina Flowers (the first runner up in RuPaul's Drag Race) calls home, I imagined Denver to be culturally delayed but I couldn't be more wrong. Not only does the place have awesome natural beauty, it knows how to get a little dirty and funky.

We did some of the touristy things like watching a screening of the 1970's version of Willy Wonka outside on a giant screen in front of a grand old clocktower and taking in the Molly Brown House tour (love her!). On Sunday night, my husband and I went to a bar called Charlie's where a local promoter hosts a drag revue called Vivid. OK, so maybe a drag show is not cutting edge but the vibe was so good, the admission was free, the bartenders poured with a heavy hand and the audience was an unpretentious mix of gay, straight, glamorous and slovenly drag enthusiasts that I had a wonderful time. I was really hoping for a chance to see Nina Flowers but she was out of town. Still, it was a great time and I recommend Charlie's if you find yourself in Denver on a Sunday night.

I've already mentioned that The Stanley is the hotel that Stephen King credits with inspiring him to write The Shining. My husband loves ghost stories and every time we go out of town, he tries to find the haunted sites so we can visit them. The Stanley had been on his list for a long time and I have to admit I was afraid to stay there, but love is stronger than fear so we made the hour plus drive north to the foot of the Rocky Mountains. The Estes Park area is beautiful, very green with a mountain stream running alongside the winding highway. A few teenagers walked on the side of the road carting their inner tubes, disheveled and wet, looking like they were having the best time. Almost as soon as you get into town, you can see the hotel in the distance up on a little hill. The Stanley really does "shine." Maybe it just seemed like it to me but as soon as we started to drive up the hill towards the hotel, I felt like I was transitioning into a different reality. The Stanley Kubrick movie wasn't shot at the hotel so it doesn't look the same but you know how some places (like some people) just seem to have loads of personality? Well this place has got it. I quickly went from feeling scared to feeling excited.

We got there early and our room wasn't ready so we got a bite to eat then walked around exploring and taking pictures. When check-in time finally arrived my charming husband received an upgrade from the front office clerk who put us in a large, supposedly haunted two room suite on the 4th floor. It just kept getting better after that. The early evening was filled with a staff guided ghost and history tour where we had the chance to meet other ghost hunters of varying levels of commitment. We took the last ghost tour of the day and I got an orb in one of my photographs. My husband observed that the Stanley Hotel is like Disneyland for ghost enthusiasts and as the evening progressed, the regular tourists cleared out and the ghost hunters took over.

My daughter and a couple of teenage boys put candy out as bait in the 4th floor corridor where the nursery used to be and where the sound of spectral kids playing and apparitions of children have been seen and heard. This led to more orbs in the photographs. Groups of investigators armed with electromagnetic frequency detectors and other gadgets combed the darkened hallways searching for cold spots and energy spikes. We caught a glimpse of a professional video and sound crew taping a "ghost session" in a bedroom. Around 11:30pm, we decided to go back out and look for ghosts on our own. The lunatics had taken over the asylum - I mean the ghosthunters had the Stanley to themselves. With foot traffic at a minimum it was easier to hear. We walked past the music room where I thought I heard the sound of a piano playing a melody that was incongruous with the classical music that was being played in the lobby.

"Can you hear that?" I asked my husband incredulously and he gave me a puzzled look. Feeling brave, I decided to walk up to the piano to see if the sound would get louder, but I was distracted from the sound when I saw a faint cloudy film moving in front of the piano. I thought there was something wrong with my eyes and exclaimed "Oh my god!" I'd been carrying my cell phone in my hand and started snapping pictures as quickly as I could with my cell phone camera. Greg rushed to me when he heard me gasp and looked over my shoulder.

"What is that? It's moving around!" He could see the white mist on the digital camera screen as well.

I don't know!" The hair on my arms and on the back of my neck stood at attention, then as suddenly as it had appeared the cloud vanished. We looked back at our photos and realized that the substance appeared in some shots but not in others.





Three shots of the Music Room at The Stanley Hotel, Estes Park CO. Shot by Alice Bag on August 3, 2009 with an Iphone camera.

We wandered around a little more after this excitement and finally crawled into our beds around 1:30 am, thoroughly exhausted but enchanted with our experiences. I slept soundly and didn't wake until the next morning but my husband reported that sometime between 3 and 4 am, he was awakened by the muffled sounds of children having a conversation overhead. The only problem was that being on the 4th floor, we were at the top of the building and no rooms were above us. Tapping and knocking sounds kept him awake for awhile before he pulled the blankets up and fell back asleep.

We left Estes Park the next day to catch our flight back home, sad that our mini-vacation was over so quickly but happy to have had the chance to scratch off one of the stranger items on our quirky little family's list of places to go and things to do.

On The Passing Of Heroes

I started writing this blog to mark the passing of two of my personal heroes, both of them very different but both of them artists in their own right. It occurred to me that when a person achieves a certain heroic status that they can never really die. They've achieved immortality because of the lives they've touched, the young people they've influenced, the indelible mark they've left on the world.

I was still a teenager with dreams of becoming a singer when I first heard Koko Taylor, who passed away yesterday at the age of 80. At that time in the seventies, there weren’t a lot of contemporary pop role models for girls like me who were ready to challenge gender stereotypes and play just as hard as the boys. That’s where the blues came in. Blues had a long tradition of powerful women who weren’t afraid to speak their minds and who sang with a raw, sexual energy that I found lacking in female pop singers of the day. Listen to Koko Taylor singing the classic “Wang Dang Doodle” and you’ll instantly know what I mean: the swaggering, in your face, no-holds barred attitude is all there in that three and half minutes of sexual bravado. Or sample her recording of “I’m A Woman” – no man ever rocked harder than Koko.

I had the privilege of seeing Koko Taylor perform live at a blues festival just a couple of years ago. Thanks to my friend Candye Kane, I was able to go backstage and see Koko before her performance. Having listened to her powerful voice for years, I was excited to meet this Amazonian woman so I was surprised to see that she looked a little frail and was being supported on the arm of her daughter as she shuffled towards the stage. I hurried around to the front so I wouldn’t miss her performance and I witnessed the magical, transformative power of music. Gone was the shuffling, fragile, elderly female I’d just said hello to backstage and in her place was the legendary powerhouse Koko Taylor – a still vital force of nature, dominating the stage, the crowd at her command. A consummate professional, she gave us her all and never let her age or her infirmities stand in the way of a great performance.

Thank you, Koko. Thank you for the inspiration and the music. Thank you for breaking down barriers so that other women could follow in your footsteps. We are forever in your debt.

Also a brief mention of the sad passing of David Carradine. It's hard to explain but for those of us who came of age in the seventies, Kung Fu was an incredibly inspirational television show. Who didn't want to snatch the pebble from the master's hand and head out on a spiritual journey, kicking bad guys' butts along the way? For me, David Carradine will always be Kwai Chang Caine, the half Chinese, half white seeker of wisdom who never looked for a fight but always seemed to find one. David Carradine created much more than a television character, he created a hero for my generation.

Deep In The Heart of Texas

With June busting out all over and my daughter safely tucked into a cruise ship cabin alongside her school friend on a week long sail to Alaska, I finally got a chance to hop on a Southwest jet and fly out to Houston to visit my hubby. The economic recession has hit many industries, including the travel industry that employs him. Texas is one of the few western states with a relatively sound economy so he went where the work was. It's a hardship being apart but it makes the much longed-for reunions sweet. My husband made this reunion even sweeter by greeting me at the airport with a bag of freshly baked pan dulce from Houston based Arandas Panaderia.

"The first thing you have to know about Houston..." my hubby explained as we crawled to a slow roll behind a line of brake lights on the freeway, "is that it's very much like L.A. It's spread out all over the place, most people live in the suburbs and there is almost no public transportation, which means you have awful traffic during rush hour." He dutifully pointed out downtown, Minute Maid park ("where the Astros play") a new outdoor venue called "Discovery Green", the museum district and the area he described as one of the original four wards of the city. "Houston was originally divided into four wards and slaves were almost half of the population of the city. After the civil war, some of the former slaves created an area in the Fourth Ward called Freedmen's Town and part of it still exists. They're practically the oldest buildings in the city but they want to knock them down to build luxury condos." I realized that he was right about the city resembling LA; even the attitude towards architectural history was similar.

As we headed north, I was struck by how lush Houston is: acres of tall trees form green borders alongside the roadways. We continued driving northwest towards Austin on Hwy 290, passing through gently rolling countryside and cattle ranches, punctuated only occasionally by a small town where we'd gawk at signs for the local taxidermist, like the one that read "Blast 'em and Cast 'em."

In Austin, we decided to check out the historic and supposedly haunted Driskill Hotel. We found some friendly spirits at the upstairs bar, where the bartender poured with a heavy hand. After a couple of rounds, we started our ghost investigation. In the Maximilian Room, where we went to view the Carlota Mirrors (a gift from the Mexican Emperor to his wife) my husband noticed a dark shadow rise up in the reflection of a mirror hanging on the opposite wall, right after he'd seen my reflection pass through the same spot. "You're not going to believe this, but I just saw a shadow pop up behind you in the mirror." He had no idea that a few seconds before, I'd suddenly gotten very cold and the hairs on my arms were now standing up on goose pimples. As we looked for more apparitions in the mirrors, one of the overhead light fixtures flickered. Thoroughly excited by these occurrences and inspired by my viewings of the Ghost Hunters Sci-Fi Network show, I attempted to provoke the spirit by daring it to touch Greg. He shot me a worried look but apparently the spirits decided not to come out and play.

We found a great place to eat called Mr. Natural where we enjoyed the $6.99 lunch special: tofu and black bean gorditas, mole cheese enchiladas, spicy pepper potatoes, zucchini and chickpea poblano, homemade tortillas, veggie tamales...I was in VEGGIE HOG HEAVEN and decided it would be ok to live in Austin if I could live within walking distance of Mr. Natural. We both gave it thumbs up.

Later that evening, we made our way to the Congress Bridge to watch a local phenomenon: the flight of thousands of bats from under the bridge to begin their evening feast of insects. But first, we had to wait. And wait. Hundreds of people showed up, lining the bridge and the banks of the river: adults with batman shirts and capes, kids with bat t-shirts, people camped out with snacks and six packs of beer, all awaiting the emergence of the nocturnal creatures. Excitement mounted as the squeaks from under the bridge grew in volume and a few random bats took tentative test flights, circling out from the bridge for a few feet then circling back. It seemed as if the bats needed to build up steam in order to take flight, either that or they were waiting to build the crowd's expectations. Finally, the cloud o' bats emerged in waves, starting at one end of the bridge and rippling across the river. They flew off in a serpentine pattern toward the forest alongside the river and just when you thought they must surely be done even more emerged, darkening the sky with their multitudes.

Although part of the trip was for pleasure, there was also work to be done. I wanted to help my husband move into his temporary home in Houston, so upon returning from Austin we got to the business of stocking his new apartment. It was nice to be able to help Greg get settled. I wanted to make sure that despite his being away from home and family he would have a place to call his own. It's difficult being apart and having to commute such a long distance but I try to remind myself that economic hardships are cyclical and I have faith that things will get better and our family will be together again.

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

"It takes no compromising to give people their rights. It takes no money to respect the individual. It takes no survey to remove repressions." - Harvey Milk

I'm sad to write that I'm truly disappointed with my country on this day. This day, which started out so promisingly with the announcement that President Obama had selected a liberal Hispanic woman, Judge Sonia Sotomayor, to be the next US Supreme Court Justice was tainted by the damnable decision of the California State Supreme Court to uphold Proposition 8, which defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman and thus denies legal recognition and protection to same sex unions.

I have to admit that I've missed living in a so-called "blue state" for the past couple of years. California, which I used to think was so much more liberal, so much more enlightened than some of the so-called "bible-belt" states has proven itself to be just as ignorant, just as conservative and perhaps even more hypocritical than the red states. The liberal west coast loves gays in the entertainment and fashion industry, just not enough to extend them the same rights as straights.

I found my own identity and consciousness as a bisexual woman around the same age as I found my identity as a Chicana and I've never had to think twice about defending the rights of my gay, lesbian and transgender friends to enjoy the same freedoms and protections I enjoyed. It's sad that even as President Obama makes one giant step forward and leads our country towards a brighter future (yes, I'll admit that I was wrong about him - he makes me proud and happy to eat my own words), narrow minded bigots beholden to the social conservative Neanderthal constituency insist on dragging us two steps backwards.

Shame on you, cowardly Justices of the California State Supreme Court. My fellow Californians, I urge you to take to the streets and let your voices be heard! In the words of Harvey Milk, hope will never be silent!

Belated Mother's Day Post

Michael Gira, Alice Bag, Rick Jaffe, originally uploaded by alice_bag.

This snapshot is from one of the old photo albums that my mother saved. I'm guessing this photo was taken in late 1978 or early 1979. Michael Gira (later of Swans and Angels of Light), me and Rick Jaffe/Morrison (BPeople, Catholic Discipline) are sitting on the steps outside my parent's house on Ditman Avenue in East LA. We were all experimenting with new musical styles by this time as early punk was splintering into post punk, dance, noise and hardcore.

The reason I've chosen to post this photo is that it reminds me of my mother, who was always warm and hospitable to my friends when they came to visit and hang out with me. She's probably in the kitchen while we're posing for this photo, whipping up some bean and cheese burritos to feed my hungry friends. She never made anyone feel strange or unwelcome simply because they had crazy colored hair or wore clothing that was considered "weird" at that time.

I'm very grateful to my mother for being so supportive and caring. If I hadn't had her and my father's unconditional love, I'm not sure how my life would have turned out.

Happy Belated Mother's Day to all the loving mothers out there.

Keep On Trekkin'

OK, I'll admit it. I can't wait to see the new Star Trek movie being released tomorrow. I've been a fan of the adventures of the Starship Enterprise since I was a young girl and I've never quite gotten over my childhood crush on Mr. Spock. I mean, what sensitive young female could possibly resist that tormented half-vulcan, half-human psyche hidden behind an (almost) impenetrable mask of stoicism? The infallible use of logic in the midst of chaos, the one eyebrow raised to indicate bafflement or surprise, the pointy ears with the bowl haircut and the (swoon) tapered sideburns?

But the hottest crew member hands down was Lieutenant Uhura, who helped define what it meant to be a strong, sexy woman for young girls like me. She wasn't just a sex kitten; as the ship's communications officer, she was smart and in control and quite possibly one of the first true feminist role models on TV.

It's probably obvious to people of my generation, but Star Trek is arguably one of the most influential cultural touchstones of the past fifty years. Sure, there have been more critically acclaimed plays, books, films and television shows during that time, but I can't think of one that touched on issues of war and peace, racial and gender equality, good and evil, the merits of unbridled technological advancement, the very nature of reality and the universe like Star Trek did. Perhaps Twilight Zone but that series never had the staying power of Kirk and co.

So I'm looking forward to seeing the early stories of some of my favorite fictional characters. I'll take my daughter of course and I'll bet you that she falls in love with Spock by the time we leave the theatre.

Live long and prosper,

Alice

Bring On The Heat

It’s been over a month since I’ve posted anything on my blog and it’s finally time for me to get back into the habit. Six months of almost daily writing while I was working on my Violence Girl stories really took a toll on me and I was very much looking forward to a nice long break upon finishing, so I guess you could say I treated myself to some time off for good behavior. In the meantime, I’ve kept myself busy with lots of baking and cooking, sewing an Elizabethan outfit for my daughter to wear to a school presentation and plenty of daily walks in the increasingly hot mornings and evenings.

It’s the time of year when Phoenix starts to heat up and the reptiles come out of hiding. So far I’ve seen rattlesnakes, a huge white lizard that scared the hell out of me and either a king snake or a coral snake; I was too busy screaming and hopping around to be able to tell the difference. It did have lots of yellow along with the red and black and I vaguely remember something about "Red and yellow, kill a fellow..." but all in all, I would say that I’ve adjusted well to desert life.

I’ve learned that a lot of the plants and animals living in the Sonoran Desert are naturally more dangerous than anything I grew up with in the city; they have to be tough just to survive in this arid environment. A couple of friends from LA, Colin and Jessee came out to scan some of my punk collection for the UCLA archives over the past few days. As we were walking through my neighborhood I told them about the jumping cholla, a type of cactus that is rumored to literally jump onto animals that get too close. They didn't believe me and insisted on seeing it so I walked them over to one, whereupon my friend Jessee went right up to it and called out to the cholla "Put up your dukes!" He bounced around a little like a prize cactus boxer but while he was looking the other way, the cholla bit him in the butt, attaching itself to his denim pants. The plant seemed to have launched two or three little cactus grenades at Jessee who made the mistake of trying to brush them away with his hand. He was visibly in pain.

"See, I told you," I grinned at him. Colin came over from where he'd been inspecting the other side of the cholla.

"Aww...I missed it, do it again!" he told Jessee.

"Fuck you, you try it, you wuss! Go on, you do it now, see if it bites you!" But Colin declined, pronouncing that he was now a firm believer in the legendary jumping cholla. The poor guy walked home with a bloody hand and liitle barbed spines sticking out of the tops of his fingers, pants and shoes. We all walked back to my house with Jessee holding his porcupine hand up like a spiny Edward Scissorhands. The patient required two shots of vodka before allowing us to removed the fish hook-like barbed spines from his fingers and from under his fingernails with a pair of pliers, "Count to three, OK? Just hold it... don't pull it yet!" he pleaded with me and Colin through red, watery eyes. We eventually got the nasty little pricks but we practically had to sit on him to get him to hold still.

Round One went to the cactus but Jessee cursed and promised he'd take revenge by peeing on it the next day. We advised him against it and the thought of a second attack from the Cholla on an even more sensitive part of his body was no doubt a strong deterrent.

The next day my city friends accompanied me on my dog walk again and as we walked on the opposite side of the street from the Jumping Cholla, Colin and I swore we could hear the cactus laughing and calling out to Jessee, "Why you walking on that side today?" So believe me when I say you should never, ever pick a fight with a jumping cholla cactus.



We are still in the process of editing and rewriting my autobiographical series, The True Life Adventures of Violence Girl. Several exciting developments have come out of my writing of Violence Girl but the most exciting and rewarding has been one that was completely unexpected. After almost thirty years of not speaking with my old friend Patricia, we are once again in regular email contact with each other. It took the process of writing about the breakup of the Bags to force me to examine my own motives and actions and to admit my own fault in the messy breakup. That led to our reconciliation, for which I am so very grateful. As difficult as I found the process of writing this book, every second of it was worth it because I have my old friend back.

Realizing that one can still change at age 50, that there is still time to learn from one’s mistakes - that’s the real reward of writing for me and so I’ll continue to blog on my Diary of a Bad Housewife.