A couple of people have found me because they were looking for old friends. They were looking for Sceverenia, found my blog and emailed me about her. That’s cool, I forwarded on the emails to her and she’s so nice that she responded to both of them.

Because of all this, I looked on Flickr to see what they had as far as pictures for Kearns High School. Here are some of my favorites:

Home Of The Cougars by williams.mark48 from Flickr

That soaring cougar is just so 1976. I’m glad that it has survived as long as it has. I love the green and gold swoop under the cougar. Seeing this photo just filled me with all the old school pride.

Kearns High lockers by Hailey Baker from Flickr

Every year, I had a green locker. I never really envied the yellow lockers, but this photo looks so pretty I wish I could feel nostalgic about it. I still have vivid dreams about forgetting the location and what the combination of my locker is. Will it ever go away?

kearns high school crest by emmanuel trujillo from Flickr

Don’t step on it or the Seniors with make you clean it with your tongue!

Whats up at Kearns High? Nothing. by erinb.tulips from Flickr

Past, present or future, it’s nice to know that those SAME desks are still there. Those were the perfect desks. I could lean my back over the edge of the chair and it would pop my shoulder right into place. It has taken me twenty years to find a replacement for those perfect desks.

landscapes/ back of kearns high by larissa L from Flickr

This photo reminded me of a picture I took back in 1985 of the same part of Kearns High School. I took it with my beloved 110 camera that my grandma gave me when I was in fifth grade. I cleaned it up a little, but it looks pretty good.

Sunrise at Kearns 1985 by Laura Moncur from Flickr

Okay, I’m done with nostalgia for now. I think I should spend some time and get all my photos scanned. It would be nice to have them all there at my fingertips… err… hard drive.

By the time I played on this rocketship at Southridge Park, the “authentic” U.S.A. markings and decor had all worn away and all that was left was the bare metal.

I always imagined that playing on this to be much more fun than it actually was. I envisioned all of the kids on the rocketship pretending to be on the Starship Enterprise. I didn’t care that the ship didn’t look like the Enterprise. I imagined that I would be the captain and that I would have a good friend to be my Spock.

I NEVER had that experience.

Whenever I was taken to Southridge Park to play, the rocketship was full of unimaginative kids who just wanted to climb. They didn’t want to pretend to have adventures.

As an adult right now, I don’t know which is better: the kid who wants to pretend to have an adventure instead of enjoying the one she’s having or the kid who has no imagination.

Via: Explorer Rocket I Retro Playground Equipment I 1974 Catalog I Plaidstallions.com

Here is an amazing documentary about people who hoard.

POSSESSED from Martin Hampton on Vimeo

Like my grandfather’s house, you can barely walk through their homes. There is no room for another thing, their areas are so packed with items. They are in debt by the spending or spilling out of their one-bedroom flat with over 6000 books.

Just like how all my hobbies devolve into a spreadsheet, the first hoarder had a database for all of his books. How many ideas did I get for storage of books from that man? So many that I can feel the hoarder in me get a little excited.

The French woman’s voice could have been my grandfather’s voice if he were more self-aware.

“It’s very difficult to let go of things. They are like a time capsule. My stuff is sacred. It might be rubbish, but nobody is allowed to touch it. Unconsciously, I must need it somehow. I can’t get rid of it. It happened before that I managed to get rid of things, but then I have been fishing them out of the bin, you know, while everyone is asleep.”

When Stacey threw out his newspapers, he went out to the huge garbage can to retrieve them. I don’t know what he said to her that day. We still don’t talk about it much.

To see the dust flying at the last hoarder’s home with all his mail, magazines and random papers was enough to remind me of those horrible days right after his death. He had over fifty magazine subscriptions, some of them in languages that he couldn’t read. Every newspaper, every piece of mail and every television guide was important to him. Those stacks and stacks of paper were the result of SORTING. They were the things that he wanted.

The last hoarder said, “It would be nice to have gotten her clothes back.” He was talking about his mother. He had been grieving her and wished for something more for his already overfilled house. Just like my desire for The Ancient Ones or my childhood toys still left at my grandparents’ house, I saw myself in him.

Half of me is reviled and wants to get rid of all my stuff. The other half learned how to cram more books into my tiny home. Which road will I walk down? Do I even have a choice?

Via: Mind Hacks: Possessed

Read Braidwood’s most excellent post about hoarding as well:

• Authentic Threads · Hoarding- a brief digression from Women’s History Month

Sometimes I think that house was cursed. The minute we moved out of it and into this tiny home, our lives got better.

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

Many thanks to Discopop Directory for reminding me of Voice of the Beehive. I haven’t listened to that old and warped cassette tape for a long time. I guess it’s time to buy it on iTunes.

Here’s the video for “I Say Nothing.” The best line:

“I drink at parties so I’ll be who they think I am.”

Here’s the video for “Don’t Call Me Baby.” The best line:

“Don’t call me ‘baby,’ when she is waiting in the car.”

Somehow YouTube magically knew that if I loved Voice of the Beehive, I would also like seeing this video from Strawberry Switchblade. Mike and I found this one on CD the first year we were married, but the sound of those horns brought back all my Ritz memories.

Here’s the video for “Since Yesterday.” The best line:

“When tomorrow comes, you’ll wish, you had today.”

Back in the Eighties, when I listened to this song, I truly believed that line, but now that I’m living in tomorrow, I wouldn’t go back. The Ritz was fun. It encompassed my entire life, but I enjoy being 38 years old. I have FAR more freedom now to do whatever I want, even with life’s responsibilities.

The MySpace page was blaring the song, “Chasing Cars” by Snow Patrol. I was sitting in the dark, half-awake, trying to figure out how to turn the damn song off. I finally found the pause button below the fold and the computer stopped singing. Mike walked into the living room, illuminated by the glow of my screen.

“What are you doing?”

I looked at the MySpace page, disappointed.

“I’m looking for Chelly Bird,” I replied, “This is NOT her.”

It looked like it was going to be her. Female, 38, right name, but she is definitely NOT Chelly. For a moment, before the page started yelling, “Let’s waste time, chasing cars,” I thought, “Wow! Chelly is in the UK now. That’s awesome!” Instead, a different Chelly Bird is back in the UK with her brother and sisters.

“Are you awake?” Mike asked. After several bouts of sleepwalking, I can understand why he would ask me that. It was four in the morning and I was staring at the computer like a zombie.

“I just had a dream that I saw Chelly Bird. I thought I’d google her name, but I’m the second entry for her name.”

“Not everyone is on the Internet.”

“I know, but sometimes I get surprised by that fact.”

“Think about it. If she was on the Internet, she would have already emailed you to complain that you’re the first on Google for her name.”

“Yeah… I know…”

I returned to Google, but the rest of the listings were less my old friend than the nice girl in the UK with a Robbie Williams fetish. I tried other friends from my grade school past. Stefanie Pillaris? Nothing… Kirstie Salamanikas? NOTHING! With a name like Kirstie Salamanikas, she definitely would have shown up if she had logged into anything with her real name. I tried LinkedIn, Facebook and LiveJournal. Nothing.

Not everybody is on the Internet, I know…

But then I tried searching for myself. Back when they knew me, my name was Laura Lund. Okay… there I am. Halfway down the list, but there. I guess if they are looking for me, they’ll find me.

Apparently, 1980 was the peak year for me and Barbie. Plaid Stallions has the 1980 Mattel Catalog, showing some of my favorite toys:

• 1980 Mattel Catalog I Barbie Skipper and Ken – Plaidstallions.com

I earned half the money for my Barbie Star Traveler. It was forty dollars at Gibson’s Discount Center. My mom fronted the other half. My dad helped me put it together because it was REALLY complicated. There were a million stickers that had to be stuck correctly on the frame of the toy. I played with that thing long after it started falling apart.

I ended up giving it to The DI just a few years ago. I hope another little girl had the luckiest day ever at the DI and is still playing with it today.

I also saved up the eight dollars to buy the Barbie Starvette. I felt so proud because I put the car together myself and even put on the stickers correctly.

She could carry one friend in the seat next to her and two friends on the back. The seat belts were so impossible to use that they were removed the first day I owned the car. I always worried about the friends sitting on the back when we were driving because I knew that it wasn’t safe for them to do that.

My sister, Stacey, had this Ken doll. He came with a marker to draw on a beard on Ken’s face. Unfortunately, we didn’t realize that we shouldn’t draw on his face with just any marker. Ken ended up with a permanently blackened face within days.

We eventually shaved his hairy head. His hair wasn’t nice like these pictures show it. It was a full-on afro mop-top mess. I convinced Stacey that he would look much better if we just cut off all his hair. He didn’t.

Sorry, sister…

If you didn’t see your Barbie here, Plaid Stallions has a bunch of other stuff:

• 1973 Mattel Spring Barbie Catalog I Plaidstallions.com

• Mattel Superstar Christmas Fun Book I Pulsar I Barbie I 1976 Catalog I Plaidstallions.com

• True Value Toy Catalog from 1976 I Barbie I Tuesday Taylor I Plaidstallions.com: Check out this one to see the Tuesday Taylor doll that I had when I was a kid.

Update 04-05-10:

Here is a better picture of my Barbie Star Traveler from the 1977 Sears Christmas Catalog:

I still have the table, BBQ and plate from that set. The chair, pitcher and glass are long ago lost.

You can also see my Superstar Christie on that same page:

I also found Tuesday Taylor wearing the same outfit I still own.

She was a cool doll because she could have brown hair or blonde hair with a swivel top head. Now, though, her hair is matted and unbrushable. At least she still has her awesome Maude-like fashion sense.

You might not be able to see it. Not because I had a good dentist or anything. It’s just that it’s not something that people really notice unless you’re missing a whole tooth. A tooth broken in half and haphazardly fixed with a bit of porcelain on the top held in by a metal pin is hardly noticeable.

The porcelain has worn away over the years and the metal pin has become visible, but you can’t even see it in this photograph.

In fifth grade, we were having a bake sale. My mom made some awesome brownies for the bake sale. They were dark, chocolately and they were decorated with half a walnut on the top of each one. They were beautiful, simple and I KNEW they would sell out immediately at the bake sale, so I wanted one of my own.

Unfortunately, she had put them in the green FAKE tupperware container. You know, the one that little fifth grade hands cannot open, not by design, but by lack of it.

I was determined to have a brownie before I relinquished them to my teacher, so I took a butter knife and slide it under the lid of the container. I figured that with gentle prying, it would come off. It didn’t. I tried prying it harder, but the butter knife slipped out from under the edge of the lid and hit me square in the mouth.

I had a piece of tooth on my tongue and a bruised ego.

I have no idea where my mom was when I broke my tooth, but I got her. There was scolding and telephone calls to the dentist. They couldn’t get us in until the afternoon, so my mom sent me to school with a broken tooth in my mouth and the impenetrable box of brownies in my hands.

I visited the dentist while my mom’s brownies sold out at the bake sale. It didn’t matter. I never had money to buy things at the bake sale anyway. At least, that’s what I told myself. I never did get one of those brownies.

Over the years, I learned to smile without showing my bottom teeth (or upper gums, but that’s another story). If you look at my photos, you’ll hardly ever see my lower teeth because I have been hiding them for 28 years. When I look at that broken tooth now, it almost serves as a indicator of my gluttony. I wanted brownies for breakfast and I was punished for it. I still think of it with shame even though it was so long ago.

I really should get that tooth fixed…

The Elvis Fan Club didn’t forget, but apparently I’ve missed another birthday. It was January 8th.

I’ll never forget the day I found out Elvis died. A neighborhood boy came up to me and said,

“The King is dead.”

I replied in all seriousness,

“We’re America. We don’t have a king.”

No amount of explaining could save that conversation, mostly because we were only eight years old.

• At Bloghaus watching the Bill Gates Keynote stream at what looks like 300 baud. #
• Scoble just put me on http://www.qik.com He’s streaming live video with his Nokia 95. #
• The Gear Live guy with the cool new iPhone update is showing off his iPhone on http://qik.com/ces #
• Back from Bloghaus. Thanks for the specific link, @libel_box #
• Up and ready to go to CES. I promised Mike I wouldn’t wake him until 8am, though. :( #
• @davidlaplante We’re hitting the Sands today. I don’t know if we can get over to the Convention Center. #
• @basykes Have you not figured it out yet? The news is ENTERTAINMENT now. If you want to be informed, you have to read the Internets… #
• OMG! Barbie Girls rocks CES!! #
• Finished with lunch & ready for the 2nd half of the Sands CES floor. #
• @libel_vox No, the was Barbies computer games for girls! You know, in PINK! #
• Finished with Sands. Headed to the LVCC for the rest of CES. #
• Shuttle bus hell. Where’s the press shuttle?! #

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When I was in fifth and sixth grade, this is the menstruation video they showed us. I had no idea it was a Disney film and I’m shocked to find it here. I distinctly remember the girl riding the bicycle and telling me that it’s okay to exercise while I’m on my period. I had no idea that it was ever considered NOT okay to exercise while I was on my period, much less shower.

There is nothing inaccurate about this video. It explains things well. The only thing is it isn’t PRACTICAL. I didn’t need to know why I was menstruating, although that information is nice to know. I needed to know how to use those sticky pads. My mom had long ago moved on to tampons. The last time she used feminine napkins they were kept in place with a belt. A BELT!

My mom actually gave me a feminine napkin belt when I started menstruating because she hadn’t even heard of those new fangled pads that just stick to your underwear.

And all of this was before the invention of WINGS.

My biggest question was how do I attach this pad so that it doesn’t move around? How do I prevent stains on my undies? What does menstruum look like? How do I get the thing off without grossing myself out? How do I dispose of it?

NOTHING on the Internet tells me how to do this. Seriously! How can it be that I can search for this and get a ton of video responses on YouTube of girls giggling, but no helpful information? Sure you can watch a maturation video from 1954 showing you ovaries, fallopian tubes and uterii, but if you want to know how to use a pad when you’re on your period, I’m your only hope. Click on read more for all the gory details without giggling or diagrams of organs.

(Continue Reading…)

Stacey has been sick. I remember her coughing at the Halloween party, so she has been sick for almost two months now. She coughed through our entire trip to Las Vegas last month. She coughed through our Sub-For-Santa shopping last Sunday. She coughed when I talked to her on the phone today.

There is something about her coughing that brings me back to our childhood. She coughed all through our childhood. I used to be able to find her in a crowd by the sound of her cough. Her coughing now sounds exactly as it did when we were children. Her voice may have changed when we grew up, but her coughing hasn’t.

When I hear her cough, it stirs a childhood protection in me. I’m the older sister. I’m supposed to watch over her. I’m supposed to boss her around. We lost her and Dan in J.C. Penney’s on Sunday and I heard her cough from across the store. I was able to tell which department of the store they were in solely by ONE cough heard from yards away.

I feel like I should be worried because this cold has clung to her lungs and throat for so long, but instead, I feel like I did when we were children. Every time she coughs, it feels like I’m a child again. Grandma and Grandpa are still alive. We still live at home. Mom still protects us from Dad. The worst thing we can imagine is elementary school drama. And Christmas is coming…

PostSecret usually posts their secrets on Sunday, but I noticed that they didn’t post last Sunday. This Wednesday, however, a group of secrets showed up.

This postcard from PostSecret sounds so familiar I could have written it myself. I love that it got a little damaged in the mailing process and part of it is ripped off.

I am still haunted by the thought, “I want to go home.” I hear my inner voice saying that a lot and I have no idea what it means. I’ve talked about it before here:

• Pick Me! » I Want To Go Home

Do I want to go back to the house on White Cherry Way? The family that lives there probably wouldn’t appreciate me barging into their house. I’m sure they don’t appreciate how many times I drive by.

Do I want to go back to being a child and living with my parents? No. I’m happy as an adult.

Do I want to go back to Montana? Hell no.

Have I never truly found a home since I left my parents? Maybe that’s it, but if I can’t create a home of my own by now, will I ever be able to?

Hello, mystery postcard sender: I just want to go home too. Can you point me in the right direction?

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

I thought it was just Utah, you know? I thought that all those billboards all over the city telling people to spend a boatload of money on their wedding was a Utah thing.

Apparently not.

According to One Perfect Day by Rebecca Mead, the wedding industry has grown to be a 161 Billion dollar industry.

That’s $161,000,000,000 for people like me who have a hard time imagining what one billion is, much less 161 of them.

I feel guilty for blaming the Mormons for all of this. I thought that it was a conspicuous religiousity that was like an announcement to the world, “Look at me! Not only am I getting married in the temple, I’m spending a lot of money to do it!”

Man, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

All of it just seems wasteful to me. Mike and I didn’t even want a wedding and our parents forced us to have a small ceremony in the backyard. It cost about $2000 and I still feel guilty for it. I remember how proud my mom was that we had a wedding for “only” $2000.

After spending all that time the last two months scanning every photo we found in my grandpa’s house, I’ve see a LOT of wedding photos from the twenties until present time. Most of them were very quiet ceremonies with parents for witnesses.

The most endearing was my great-aunt Dixie’s wedding. There were no photos in the collection, but my grandmother had saved a newspaper clipping from the announcement.

In a church ceremony, Sunday, August 23, at 7:00 pm in the Salmon Medthodist Church, Miss Dixielou Lipe, daughter of Laurence Lipe of Salmon, exchanged wedding vows with James C. Allen, son of Morgan Allen of Salmon and Florence Thurber of Montpelier.

The Rev. Don I. Smith performed the single ring ceremony against a background of baskets of gladioli.

Miss Lipe was beautiful in a gown of white taffeta with a white satin cummerbund. Her finger-tip veil was held by a white cap. She carried a corsage of white roses and carnations.

White taffeta and a satin cummerbund is a far cry from the gowns of extreme now.

More importantly, the wedding is just one day. After scanning all those photos, the wedding photos are just a very small percentage of the whole life that was my grandmother’s life. I have a hard time with the “Your Day, Your Way” idea. It’s just one day. Is it really worth $30K?

This is the original header for Pick Me! The current header is just a squashed version of it. I found it in a royalty-free collection of old illustrations. When I saw this drawing, I imagined myself as the little girl raising her hand.

I imagined the bored boy at the right to be Real Live Preacher. He was the first blog I ever read. He is an old pro at this blogging thing and I thought of him as a little bored with it all.

That boy in the red sweater is Hugh Elliott. He wrote a blog named Standing Room Only. He doesn’t write there anymore. Now he writes Bible Versus. He was the second blog I found, courtesy of Real Live Preacher.

I have no idea who the girl in the yellow dress is. I kind of feel like she represents the adoration that I want to achieve. She looks like she’s my one fan. Everybody has one fan. When I’m writing, I think about her most of all.

I wouldn’t be blogging if it hadn’t been for Real Live Preacher and Hugh Elliott. Thanks, guys!

The Ancient Ones used to sit on a scale on the the bureau in the foyer of my grandparent’s house. Grandma had it set so the woman outweighed the man. I never thought about that until I just wrote that sentence. Considering how many years she had to fend for herself and the men in her life let her down, it makes sense that she would consider the woman to be more important.

The Ancient Ones were incredibly important to my grandma and because of that, they became important to me as well. I suffer nagging guilt knowing that I am personally responsible for breaking the woman figurine three times. I know Stacey, my sister, broke one as well. I remember Grandma bending over the woman figurine with Superglue many times.

After Grandma died, Grandpa moved the scale to the piano, but it sat there empty and weighing only dust.

I didn’t get a good picture of the last remaining Ancient One. I snapped a photo of needlework that my grandma had created. It hung on the wall in the living room, and to the left of the needlework, there was a wall sconce. On it, sat the last remaining Ancient One. Just like my grandfather left alone after my grandma died, this half of a matched pair sat alone in the house in Billings. I only noticed him in the photo when I was home and transferring the pictures from my camera to the computer. I wish I had realized he was there when I was in Billings. I would have taken a better picture.

It kills me that I have no control over who will get the last Ancient One. It even scares me that he might end up in an estate sale. Since I have absolutely no say in what goes where, I am aching to know that he might be lost forever and I didn’t even get a good picture of him.

While I was writing the eulogy and preparing the photographs for the board at the funeral home, Stacey and my Uncle Danny slaved away cleaning my grandpa’s house. When Stacey cleaned out the basement, she found my grandma’s stash of McCall’s craft magazines and yarn patterns. I rescued them from the garbage bin and took them home to Salt Lake City. I looked through them last month and mixed in with them was this catalog from Home Interiors and Gift. It’s dated 1962, but amazingly, the company is still in business today.

• Home Interiors

On page 12, I sat on my couch amazed. Here is what I saw:

The ceramic pair are labeled “The Ancient Ones.” For less than five dollars a pair, my grandmother, bought The Ancient Ones from an interior decorating company that sold their products like Tupperware to women in the sixties.

It’s so strange to see what I consider a family heirloom in a catalog. It feels so very precious to me, yet back in 1962, you could just order as many of them as you wanted. In fact, my grandma must have ordered several sets because I KNOW I broke one beyond repair. My grandma was an antique collector, so I guess in my childish mind, I assumed EVERYTHING she owned was an antique. I guess not. Some of it was just tchotchke.

This postcard from PostSecret made me really sad and I thought I would write about it a little bit.

The last time we played pinochle, I won. It was the first time in years that I won and should have been an indication to me at how sick you were. I took the deck of cards from your house after you died. It was the only time I remember truly winning on my own.

I didn’t even consider letting you win. I wish I had.

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

I was on a newsfast, but I heard about it before the second plane hit. I was on my way to a work meeting downtown. I turned on the radio and the DJs on X96 said that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. I immediately broke my newsfast and turned the radio to KSL 1160 AM to get the full story. I continued driving to the company meeting.

The news spread fast among us. We all knew. We wondered if our company would go ahead with the company meeting.

They did.

They didn’t even mention what was happening in New York. By then, the second plane had hit and there were rumors of a third plane. I used my cellphone to get headlines from CNN, but it was painfully slow back then. Even now I’m amazed at what that little Motorola StarTac could do back then. I sat in utter awe that our company wasn’t going to say anything. They called up the motivational speaker to the stage. He accepted the lackluster applause and said, “I’m sure a lot of you are worried about what’s going on in New York. I decided that I’m not going to let the terrorists stop me. If I spend time worrying about what just happened, then the terrorists win.”

He went on to give the motivational speech that he was paid to deliver, but I don’t remember one word of it. As soon as he was done and our company leaders took the stage again, I walked out of the auditorium. By then, my phone fed me the rumors that the Pentagon had been hit and there was another plane that might need to be shot down. I wasn’t about to listen to a word more.

I found a television in a back room of Little America. Employees of the hotel and my company were huddled together in that room, watching the first plane hit the building, then the second. They kept showing the footage over and over. The smoke came out of the buildings and I remember hearing an interview with Orrin Hatch accusing Osama Bin Laden of this atrocity. I shook my head. I was sure that it was home-grown terrorists, just like the Oklahoma City Bombing.

I thought foreign terrorists would attack us in our tender spots. They would want to destroy the landmarks that we, as Americans, hold dear and the spots that represent our evil, materialistic ways: Disneyland, the Mall of America, the Statue of Liberty, and The Smithsonian. The WTC and the Pentagon? That sounded like something the ethnocentric militias of the Midwest would attack. Silly me.

I had work that day and my clients called to make sure I was still going to be there for them. I was. They would have been homeless if I had let despair conquer me, so I made sure the terrorists didn’t win in my small part of the world.

I came home to watch the planes hit the towers over and over again on CNN. I told Mike how the company that I worked for didn’t even mention the attack.

I quit working for them before the anniversary of the event.

While we were in Billings, we visited the Rimrock Mall. It looks completely different than it did when I was child trapped in the town. Completely different, except for Herberger’s. Imagine my surprise when I find that Montgomery Ward is gone, replaced with an additional Dillards (does the mall really need TWO Dillards?), but Herberger’s is still there.

The sign looked completely unchanged in the last twenty years.

Herberger’s was one of those stores that I always thought was for grownups. It didn’t have any stickers or candy. It didn’t even have any cool clothes for when I became obsessed with my clothes more than stickers. I always thought it was one of those stores I would like when I got older.

I’m older now and it still looks entirely unremarkable. When will I be old enough to make Herberger’s interesting, and will it still be there when I am?

This is my absolute favorite picture from my Ritz days. The Ritz was an underage dance club and we went there every night it was open from 1987 until I got married in 1990. That’s Steff, me and Dawni the night we all dressed up the same. We did it just for fun and the whole night people kept coming up to us and saying, “Did you know that there are two other girls here dressed up just like you?” It was awesome.

I took this picture with the 110 camera that my grandma gave me for my fifth grade year in school. I thought I took so many pictures with that camera until I got a digital camera and indiscriminately take photos of EVERYTHING now.

Luckily, my nose has grown substantially since then and it balances out my chin nicely now.

I had a lot of fun at The Ritz, but I don’t want to go back. Despite all that fun, I’m having much more fun now.

I love this photo of my mom as a child.

It’s my mom’s birthday today.

She’s a private person. She’s so private that just me saying here that she’s a private person has probably embarrassed her beyond any embarrassment I have ever felt in my life. Because of this, I never talk about my mom on this blog, so you might get the impression that we don’t get along or that maybe my mom doesn’t play a part in my life at all.

That’s not the case.

This is the best photo I have ever taken of my mom. She let me take as many photos as I wanted while she played on the swing. We went to a camping site called Camelot back in August of 2005. I took lots of photos and she followed me around until we walked into a swarm of mosquitoes. She was bit about fifteen times and she let me put Benadryl cream on the red welts. Even though we were itchy it was a good memory.

She married this guy a few years ago.We all just call him Reed. I’m so glad she married him. I didn’t know how much I needed a daddy until the day he showed up at my house with his lawn mower in his pickup. Our lawn mower had broken and the company I had hired to take care of the lawn wasn’t able to come for another week. He mowed my lawn; wouldn’t even let me do it myself. I never had the kind of dad who would do something like that for me before.

Happy birthday, Mom!

I’m sorry I’ve embarrassed you so much, but I couldn’t let another birthday go by without the world knowing how important you are to me.

I was doing a writing exercise and it suggested some possible happy memories that I could write about. “How I Lost My First Tooth” was on the list.

NOT a happy memory, but an interesting story, nonetheless.

We were all in a tree. I have no memory of climbing the tree. Frankly, I’m surprised I was able to get up there, but up there I was and I had no idea how I was going to get down.

The others were swinging down using a cord attached to a branch. One, two, three, they all swung down, finally leaving me alone in the tree.

“Swing down! It’s easy!”

“It will hurt my hands.” The cord was thin and I imagined it cutting into my hands.

“No, it’s easy, I’ll show you.” He quickly climbed back up the tree and swung down again. He was a lot smaller than I was. I was a fat girl, you see. If I held that cord, it would cut my hands.

“Why don’t you put the rope in your mouth?”

That made sense. My teeth wouldn’t get shredded like the skin on my hands. I had seen a lady on Circus of the Stars hang by her teeth and twirl around and around. If she could do that, I could swing down with a rope in my mouth. I put the cord into my mouth and jumped.

When I woke up, all the kids were surrounding me. The dad was there too. Where did he come from? There was the taste of blood in my mouth. My mom never let me play over at their house again.

I never found my tooth.

I was looking at this website and I felt a soft and warm feeling flow over me. Ahh, Rubik’s Cube…

• Beginner Solution to the Rubik’s Cube

In 8th grade, I enjoyed a modicum of junior high fame because I could solve a Rubik’s Cube. My best time was somewhere around three minutes and I was so proud of it. People who wouldn’t deign to talk to me before, would furtively ask me to solve their cube. They would offer me money. They would be nice.

It was the first time in my life that someone was nice to me because I was smart.

I think the Rubik’s Cube was the first in a line of events that showed me that life as a Geek wasn’t so bad. Life as a Geek could alter the typical power structure. I always refused to do someone else’s homework, but I was perfectly willing to solve their Rubik’s Cube.

Via: Drink. Drive. Go To Jail. – Rubik’s Cube Goes Down

I read this article about people partying with Shabu, which is a pure form of methamphetamine. It brought up all my memories of partying during high school.

• Denver – News – 72-Hour Party People – westword.com

Want to know how I survived high school? I was the observer. I attended those parties and didn’t drink or smoke. I pretended to drink and I’m ever so thankful to Calvin for teaching me how, but I was stone cold sober at all of those parties. Reading this article from the point of view of the observer reminded me of how stupid all my friends seemed when they were drunk.

If you ever want to stop drinking or doing drugs, have someone tape you while you’re partying. Have them film EVERYTHING and then have the balls to watch it all: start to finish. Your own stupidity will scare you straight.

Via: Timeline of a 2003 Shabu party in Denver. Shabu is… (kottke.org)

This video shows some people from a television show called The Eagle’s Nest. Based on facial hair and tie width, it looks like it’s from the early ’80’s and they are discussing HeMan and his occultic influence on our youth…

It’s now 2007. My sister and I are the children that they were so worried about. I can safely tell you that I fell away from Jesus because of dorks like the guys in this video and not because of HeMan. In fact, HeMan was awesome. At the end of every episode, they had a moral to the story. I learned more good morals from HeMan than I ever did from the misogynistic writings of the Bible.

HeMan IS the Master of the Universe.

Via: ExtraLife – Scott Johnson’s Comics, Podcasts, Blog, Artwork, Humor and MORE! » Blog Archive » He-Man is a threat to….god?

This is easily my favorite commercial of my teenage years. Hands down, my favorite! I hadn’t seen this commercial for 20 years and I still can sing the song word for word!

Even moms and dads agree
What makes it good is MFP!

I think they were trying to be like Madness, but they ended up creating something completely different!

I don’t care who you are. You owe this guy a thank you. Without him, we would be living in a very different world than we have today. Martin Luther King Jr. represents the friendship of a dear friend of mine. She respected him more than any other man in history. I talked a little about her here:

• Pick Me! » Jackie

This holiday can’t go by without me thinking about Jackie. Somehow the two people have become one in my mind. I miss her and it feels like the entire United States celebrates her favorite hero just so I can remember her.

I found the photographs from the Kearns High 15 Year Reunion for the class of 1987. We had the reunion back in 2002. Dawni, Penny and I organized it and I found a folder full of photos when I looking through my old stuff. I uploaded them to Flicker:

• Kearns High 15 Year Reunion – a photoset on Flickr

I can’t believe we are heading into the twentieth year this summer. I wonder who is going to organize the 20 Year Reunion. It sure isn’t going to be me…

This is a picture of my mom and dad before I existed in 1967. My mom was invited to a “beatnik” party, where everyone was supposed to dress up as beatniks. I asked my mom what a beatnik was when I was a little. She said that beatniks were hippies before hippies were hippies. That made sense to me except I really didn’t know what hippies were. She said beatniks were like The Monkeys. I used to watch The Monkeys on television, so I imagined this party to be filled with fun-loving funny guys. Some of them even might have had English accents like Davy Jones. I used to look at this picture and wish I could have been there.

My dad had told my mom that he wasn’t going to go to the party. Instead, he showed up in full wolfman regalia. She looks so angry here because she didn’t realize it was him. This crazy wolfman showed up at the party and was groping her while people were taking pictures. Who could blame her for looking so bugged? No one recognized him at the party.

This picture is from Halloween 1970. My parents were married and I was already born by then. The dress that my mom is wearing ended up being a “dress up” dress that she would let me try on. Stacey and I played with that dress until it was nothing more than rags, we loved it so much. Here again, my dad is the wolfman.

As a child, I used to look at these pictures. These were pictures of the days before they became Jehovah Witnesses and Halloween was off limits. They had dressed up and gone to parties. How I wished I could be a normal kid who could dress up and go trick-or-treating in the neighborhood. If I wasn’t Jehovah Witness, I could participate in the Halloween Parade at school. I could barely understand why my parents could dress up back then, but I wasn’t allowed to dress up. I couldn’t grasp the concept that these photos were from a time when they weren’t Jehovah Witness.

Later, there was a divorce and the divorce decree stated that at age twelve, Stacey and I could decide which religion we wanted to follow. On my twelfth birthday, I chose “The World” and never set foot into a JW Kingdom Hall again. Of all the holidays that had been denied me, Halloween was the one that I wanted the most. Now, I celebrate the holiday enough to make up for those lost years. It’s my favorite of them all.

I can’t believe it has been five years since that day. I almost forgot about it, actually.

I was on a newsfast five years ago. I wasn’t watching the news or listening to NPR or anything. I had stayed away from the news for a few months. When I turned on the radio to listen to music, they were talking in guarded voices. The usually jovial DJs were serious. They didn’t want to spread rumors, but they had just heard that there had been a plane crash in New York. The plane had accidentally hit one of the World Trade Center buildings.

It didn’t take long for us to learn that it wasn’t an accident.

Even on my newsfast, I heard about 9-11 before the second plane hit. All those people who worry about not being informed if they don’t watch the news can rest easily. People always LOVE to talk about bad news.

I had been heading to a Coldwell Banker conference and meeting at the Little America hotel. All of us stood around the hotel lobby talking about the news. The hotel had set up a couple of televisions in unused conference rooms. Coldwell Banker made the mistake of going ahead with their silly little conference. The speaker made a reference to the event and how if we allow the terrorists to get in the way of our business, then they’ve won. I don’t remember one other word he said.

I snuck out of the conference. I was self-employed. They didn’t pay me to be there, but I still felt like I had to sneak out of the conference. I went to the unused conference room where there was a television. It was full of hotel employees and real estate agents. By then, both buildings had been hit. We watched the smoke coming from the buildings and listened while Orrin Hatch made accusations about Osma Bin Laden. I wasn’t so sure.

I assumed that these were home-grown terrorists.

My first instinct was to blame that neo-Nazi group in Idaho. Even now, I wouldn’t be surprised if that were the case and the whole Al Queda thing was just something the Bush administration made up so they could invade the Middle East.

It has been five years and I have gone from an intense sense of patriotism and outrage to an intense sense of self-loathing and outrage. We let the terrorists get in the way of our business, and no matter how many innocent Middle Eastern countries we bomb, the terrorists have won.

Because we have sunk to their level.

Sixteen years ago, I looked out the window of my mother’s home in West Valley. I peeked at you in your tuxedo. You were painfully thin back then because you spent your days lifting engines off the truck. The tuxedo fit you beautifully, but I could see your hands shaking from all the way up in my mother’s bedroom.

I thought those shaking hands were some sort of disease that would end badly, but a few years later we learned that it was merely a familial tremor and nothing to worry about. I also thought that I was marrying a strict Mormon boy and my life would be filled with church activities and Relief Society. Wrong on two accounts, we live a happy, atheist life here in the land of Zion.

I’m so grateful to you. We have someone crashing on our couch this weekend, so our anniversary will have to wait until we are alone to celebrate it. That doesn’t mean I forgot you, though.

I love you, dear heart, more than that day sixteen years ago when I stole a glance of you from my mother’s window.

The last picture I have from that Lagoon trip. It is of my family in front of the fountains. The fountains are still there and the Sky Ride still passes right over them. Around that fountain and other areas, they have large areas of planted flowers. The scent of tulips and marigolds can snap me back to my memories of Lagoon. Yes, it’s true. Lagoon smells like animal poo and pretty flowers.

We all look so different now. I’m older now than my mom was when this picture was taken, yet I feel so much younger because I’ve never had a child. It’s so strange to look at these pictures and wonder what my parents were thinking. They were probably pretty tired.

These are the paddle boats. That’s Uncle Johnny on the left with Heidi. I didn’t get to go on that ride because I was too little. I did get to go on it years later and it was like torture for me. I was completely unable to keep peddling to keep the boat going. My parents were right, I was too little, but I still felt left out.

Lagoon doesn’t do the paddle boats anymore. They have the Tidal Wave and The Turn of the Century where we used to get on the paddle boats. I never really got to ride the paddle boats as an adult or even a teenager, but I think that it would be a fun, romantic thing for a couple to do. I guess amusement parks aren’t about romance.

That’s me on the left with Heidi on the right. We’re on the cars ride which was like a Merry-Go-Round, but with cars. I really felt like I was driving, so I had to keep my hands on the wheel.

I love how classic these cars are. They look like old Chevys and Fords. They look like they burn more gasoline than an SUV. Check out the white wall tires.

If you look in the background, you can see the Shoe (see previous entry) and a white mushroom with a red polka-dot top. Those were free little things that kids could play on without any tickets. It didn’t take Lagoon long before they had the All-Day Pass where I could ride anything I wanted all day long without having to count out tickets.

This picture is of the shoe. I remember it being Old Mother Hubbard’s Shoe, but she’s the lady who didn’t have any food for her dog, so it can’t be that. I think it was the shoe that the Old Lady In The Shoe lived in. You could go in it and climb on in when I was little.

Now, the shoe is still there, at Lagoon. It’s near the concessions stands, but the entry is boarded up and it has been repainted a bunch of times. Last time I saw it, they had painted it pink.

From left to right: Me, Heidi, my dad, and Uncle Johnny. I don’t think I was picking my nose when this picture was taken. I was probably biting my nails or sucking my thumb.

This is the long forgotten picture of the Hall of Mirrors. I told the whole story about this place here:

• Pick Me! » Lagoon: Hall of Mirrors (Part 1 of 2)

• Pick Me! » Lagoon: Hall of Mirrors (Part 2 of 2)

If you look at this picture, you can see my dad on the left (in the turquoise shirt) and my mom on the far right (with the white bow in her hair). I have no idea who took this photo. It must have been Auntie Doris or Uncle Johnny.

This picture shows us riding the “real” helicopters. I find it interesting that this ride is considered a “real” helicopter in my memory. Even now, I look at this contraption and categorize it as a helicopter, even though it has little relation to what an actual helicopter looks like.

This was a really cool ride. You would push the bar away from you to raise the helicopter and pull it toward you to lower it. Every time I rode this ride, it was a fight with the other kid about how we were going to fly. I would always want to fly high, but half the time, I would get stuck with some kid that was scared and wanted to fly low the whole time. That’s my cousin, Heidi, on the left and I’m distracted on the right.

In July of 1973, my mom’s family came from Wisconsin to visit us in Salt Lake City. We did a lot of the touristy stuff while they were in town, but my favorite was the trip to Lagoon. Lagoon is an amusement park that is about twenty minutes north of Salt Lake City. It’s so close, I consider it in Salt Lake City, but in actuality, it’s in an entirely different county, so I guess I can’t really claim it.

In this picture, we are posing at the “fake” helicopters. My cousin, Heidi, is on the left and I am on the right. If you look closely, you can see that I have my arm on the arm of the placard. I thought I had to put my arm there just like the picture.

In the background, you can see the entrance to the Animal World Train. Lagoon still has that ride, but I don’t know if they still call it the Animal World Train. I haven’t ridden it in a long time. All my memories from the train ride are scent related. I will smell animal pens and it will remind me of Lagoon. Sad, but true. Lagoon smells like animal poo.

I have been struggling with bingeing since I came back from SXSW in March. It’s just a symptom of a bigger issue.

“I want to be the girl with the most cake.”
– Courtney Love

I’m dealing with the green-eyed monster.

SXSW and Vloggercon were incredibly accepting and loving communities. I felt like I was welcomed when I was there. It was a feeling of belonging and community that I haven’t felt since high school. Of course, along came other feelings that used to lurk around during high school.

I’m not the most popular girl.

It’s true. Every community has their celebrities. At SXSW the biggest celebrities were Maggie Mason and Heather Armstrong. I felt like a fan girl actually meeting them and all those feelings of inadequacy of not being the most popular girl came up also.

After SXSW, I remember reading this entry from Maggie and feeling like I was totally out of it again…

We’re at a panel where Jason Fried is talking about “building small.” Nothing too complex. Reduce the feature set as much as possible. Build as little as you can.
I turn around in my seat, and whisper to Amy:
-Behold! I have built nothing.
-Ha! Someone just sent me that exact message over IM.
-Hive mind. (Adopting robot voice.) I-like-your-glass-es.
-I-en-joy-your-graph-ic-tee.
-Where-did-you-find-those-awe-some-Cam-pers?

Suddenly, I felt totally UNcool. I didn’t have any “graphic tees.” My funny little green glasses are rarely worn because contacts work so much better for me and, worst of all, I had NO IDEA what Campers were. I immediately followed the link she provided and found out they were shoes.

It all boils down to shoes with girls…

I didn’t even know what the cool shoes were. That’s how UNcool I was.

(Enter eating disorder, stage left)

Don’t get me wrong. Maggie was so nice when I talked to her at SXSW. She was very friendly and kindly pretended to have read one of my weblogs. She’s not the kind of mega-bitch all of us had to deal with in high school. It really has nothing to do with her, or Heather or even Amanda Congdon. It all has to do with my messed up head. I have some really screwy competition things going on in my head.

The irony is: IT DOESN’T MATTER!!!

Take high school, for example. I was NEVER the girl with the most cake in high school. Every year I ran for office. Every year, I lost. I never once got elected to office. Losing never stopped me, either. I ran for office every time I had a chance. I gave it my all every time and in the end, I never won. That’s my perception of my high school years.

Then I went to my 15 year class reunion and got a different perspective.

I was talking with a table of people that I barely knew, “I ran for office every year and never won.”

The brunette crinkled her brow, “You didn’t? Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure. Failure tends to do that to you.”

“No. You were Treasurer one year, weren’t you?”

“Nope, that year I lost to Araceli Rojas.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

Another person chimed in mentioning class offices that she thought I won. The whole table was convinced that I was among the elite of the school. I was one of the girls who got to wear the special white sweaters with the kelly green highlights. I got to have a “K” on my back and my name embroidered on the pocket. I couldn’t convince them that my experience of high school was anything but privileged.

Who was right? I never won an office, but in the minds of people that I barely knew in high school I was one of the envied ones.

Does it matter that I’m not the girl with the MOST cake? Nope. All that matters is that I bring it, every day.

Time to put down the cake now.

Until age twelve, I was a Jehovah Witness. I was not allowed to say the Pledge of Allegiance. I was not allowed to put my hand over my heart during the National Anthem.

Today is Flag Day and I’m an adult now. I can say the Pledge of Allegiance whenever I want.