I'll be driving up to the Bay Area in about an hour (arriving in El Cerrito at seven or eight, I guess), and I'll be there over the weekend, returning on Monday night in time to do an entry in Pirate-speak only one day late. (There's a chance I'll log in from my mother's computer a time or two, but it may or may not happen.)

In the meantime, check out all the fabulous blogs on my sidebar and don't let Dan Rather get by with any more shit.

Expect another homage to the interstate highway system when I get home.

Posted by: Attila at 12:18 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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. . . on Saturday? Glad you asked. Orange County. My husband and I commemorated 9/11 by driving down to a Red Cross building in Tustin and attending an all-day conference on adoption. We were told it was mandatory for approval, and they don't hold them often. So there we were with 15 other couples who were also trying to go through this same agency. It was one of many classes, but the only all-day one. And as usual we felt that there was a lot of good material, but that the class was a bit long. I almost always feel that way.

Most of the other couples looked funny to me—ill-suited to each other, unattractive. I realized first that we probably look that way as well, and second that the reason was that it was early on in the process, and most couples were about to adopt for the first time. So there was still a bittersweet quality to the experience, as many were probably still mourning their infertility. Add to this the sense of a new, invasive experience, and it was the aura of uncertainty and discomfort I was picking up on more than anything else.

At one point my husband leaned over and whispered, "what if we adopt a monkey by mistake?"

I gave him a little smirk, and didn't roll my eyes, but I raised my eyebrows slightly and the look meant, "you don't get the laugh just because we're married. You'll have to do better than that."

"I mean, it would be cute and all, and we'd be really proud."

I started to smile.

"But what about when it finally became a toddler? It wouldn't really toddle, would it, just kind of shamble from side to side, and—"

I broke then, and started laughing out loud, thankful that we were on a break.

"—and start climbing. Wouldn't we feel like maybe we'd made a horrible mistake?"

"You're so evil," I told him. Which is what I always say. He knows it means I'm glad I married him.

Posted by: Attila at 06:11 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I'm typing this on my husband's desktop computer. Upstairs I have a brand-new Macintosh laptop that I bought yesterday and haven't set up yet. It's beautiful and I love it, but I have a deadline on Friday and I will send this story in on that day if it kills me. I couldn't resist taking the new machine out of the box, but I'm not going to start working on it until I know I have a few hours to devote to being my own techie. ("Plug and play" only means "easier than a non-Mac," not "foolproof.") Likely this will be tomorrow, since I'm within a few hundred words, several phone calls (fact-checking, doncha know), and another several jokes of really being done with this story.

Tomorrow's also a deadline day, since the husband and I start writing workshops then (his in the morning, and mine in the afternoon). Fortunately, I'm only taking a chapter from my long-neglected novel in with me, and merely had to worry about retrieving it from my old hard drive and printing it out. All week, with my computer broken and lots of writing to do, we've been sharing his office. In a way it's been fun, like summer camp for writers.

It's a terrible way to earn a living, though. If only I could do something, like cable installations, that people are willing to pay money for. I've been practicing for having children: "you'll major in English over my dead body!" Hm. Maybe that's wrong: it should be reverse psychology. How about, "your father and I will be very disappointed if you go into a lucrative career."

We'll try that one.

"Goodnight sweet ladies, goodnight."

Posted by: Attila at 01:44 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I'm halfway through my silly non-blogging story, if you count the sidebar, which is all done (unless I think of some more pseudo-witty "tips" to add). I'm perhaps a third of the way through the main text.

I'm trying to remember that they want this light, rather than serious and meditative. They say "funny," but mostly people who claim that only want mildly amusing anecdotes, rather than laugh-out-loud material. If it's the latter they're after, they've got the wrong member of this family on the job.

I did ask my husband if maybe I should just write it, and he should "edit" it after I was done. You know: funny it up. I got a look. All right, all right.

One thing that's easy about working in MS Word is this: to make a word italic, all I have to do is highlight it and hit the "italics" button. Look, Ma!—no html!

My mother suggested that I pretend I'm writing one of those chirpy little holiday letters I send around—60s hausfrau that I am—every Christmas.

And it seems to be working. But ye gads! real writing is hard. I'm a bear of very low attention span.

Posted by: Attila at 01:03 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Yesterday I was so bitchy with my husband that I actually looked at the calendar to see if there was a chemical reason for my hyper-sensitivity on whatever it was that I was sure I was right about.

We Had Words over dinner, and then he finished his work and went off to bed. He's got wall-to-wall deadlines right now, and I'm still waxing dramatic about my interior landscape. I'm not altogether clear on why this man lives with me; it could be that I get 99.9% of his jokes.

Late last night, just as it looked like I might be able to get to sleep, I spilled tonic water on my laptop. At first it appeared that I might have sopped it up in time, and I went about my business—until the keys stopped working. Then I heard a hissing sound.

So today, after church and a quick squabble with my long-suffering spouse, I had to tell him that I suspected I'd hopelessly screwed up my hard drive.

"Well," he replied, "we've been talking about the fact that we need new computers anyway. I guess we'll just get yours sooner. But check and see if we can get a discount for buying two at once."

My marriage is full of these moments, wherein I'm positive I'm right about some small thing and have trouble letting it go. Then my husband commits some extreme act of generosity or love, and I feel like a complete asshole. And of course that isn't the way to look at things either: It's a fatal mistake not to recognize that I bring real assets to this partnership.* But finding the middle ground between extreme egotism on the one hand and a complete lack of assertiveness on the other is an awful lot harder than it looks. It's harder than it should be. (Things should be easy, right? I was born in 1962: does that explain anything?)

I'm a very lucky woman, and it's difficult to remember that fact, particularly through the vaguely depressed fog that goes along with long-term, severe underemployment.

All I can say is, I'm glad I made hamburgers last night (the husband's a fan of All Things Beef). I'm glad I brought breakfast on a tray down to the Attila-Hub's office yesterday (where I'm now typing away on his old desktop machine, as he writes on his laptop). I'm glad I've figured out how to meet my deadlines this week without consistent computer access, or the ability to refer to my files. Glad we have a backup computer, along with all the other material blessings that turn invisible when I start wringing my hands over perceived shortfalls.

The economy is moving up and moving along. So am I. And my little friends at Apple think they can save the data from my old hard drive, though the logic board is toast and the entire machine "not worth fixing." I'll know in a week, and by then I'll have the new computer.

P.S. So what say you guys: should I go for the 15-inch-display laptop, or try to save a few bucks and make it a 12-inch-display model? The smaller one might be more portable.

I'm trying to remember that this will end up being a Good Thing: the old PowerMac was five years old, after all. We needed to do this within 6-12 months, in any event.

* M. Mahatma: Insert joke here? I brought a cooler into this relationship, after all.

Posted by: Attila at 04:57 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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1 Go for the 12 inch, not for the money but for the size. People are always commenting on the size of mine. This is so small it fits sideways in most bags. I don't like the feel of the 12 inch PB vs. the iBook, I really liked the plastic better than this frictionless metal. But the PB has more power and a feature or two the the iBook doesn't, my mind is blank but I was just comparing a few weeks ago. If you're a student you can save bucks on buying an iPod at the same time Gary

Posted by: Gary LaPointe at September 05, 2004 10:59 PM (cO84S)

2 Thank-Q! I'll look into the iBook, then: interesting point about the pastic. My old PowerBook was a bitchin' machine—gorgeous matte black—but it was heavy. And bulkier than most laptops—absolutely a bear to lug around, particularly on airplane trips.

Posted by: Attila Girl at September 05, 2004 11:05 PM (SuJa4)

3 "...absolutely a bear to lug around..." Then you definitely want the twelve-incher. The two larger ones are just overpriced desktops that fold up to keep dust out of the keyboard when not in use. Have you ever seen anyone try to use the seventeen-inch one on a plane? I have. It isn't pretty. Spend the money difference on a bigger hard drive, if it's an available option, and buy a monitor for use at home. Regards, Ric Locke

Posted by: Ric Locke at September 06, 2004 02:18 PM (4a0NX)

4 Actually, I may spend it on memory. That's one of my pet peeves about Apple: very often, their machines are low on memory, and one has to buy extra two months after bringing 'em home. Which is annoying, considering one is paying a premium in the first place.

Posted by: Attila Girl at September 06, 2004 02:40 PM (SuJa4)

5 C'mon, when have I ever disparaged your assets? It's your politics that I disagree with... Regarding new computer, get the biggest, most souped-up SOB machine that Apple puts out, because you'll have peace of mind that you're not hopelessly obsolete for about a month. If you can't afford it ask your Bushie Bloggers for a handout, or petition Bush for another tax cut.

Posted by: littlemrmahatma at September 07, 2004 08:07 AM (BZ0tI)

6 Never. You never have. I just figured "I bring real assets to this partnership" could be a setup, and you might be tempted to say something about my . . . ice chest. I think I'm hoping to pay for the new machine with BlogAds revenue. Possible flaw in this plan: it might take ten years I bought you something for your birthday, BTW. But since I couldn't make an "early"' call (10:30 in Santa Clarita is early for me), I have to figure out how to get it to you. Maybe you should have a party soon, and then I could bring it!

Posted by: Attila Girl at September 07, 2004 01:25 PM (SuJa4)

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