Writing: RAQ's

Rarely Asked Questions that Promote Shameless Self-Plugging-Ques. 1

What was Smudge doing back in 2000-2002?

Once upon a time (i.e. 2000-2002) I wrote...and when I wrote, I was paid for it. Not a lot of money, but I could claim the title I always coveted---Paid Writer.

It was little how-to craft pieces and some deep, inspirational pieces (Shut up, I thought so!). Some were in print (YIPPEEEE!!!!) and some were for websites (yippee!). And then I had Clyde and two years later I had Bonnie (aka "Pebbles," "Bella Boo" and various other nicknames). That's kept me busy. And I started blogging mainly to just start writing again.

However, I decided to take a walk down memory lane and see if I could find some of my online articles in some dusty, forgotten corner of the WWW's attic. And I did! It took me about two or three pages into each respective Google search, but find them I did.

If you're having a boring moment and would love to read my stuff (okay, "barely like" to read my stuff) I invite you to take a gander at the following links:

~ How-To Craft Pieces~
Making Self-Care Boxes
Decoupage Keepsake Box
Flower Power-Pressing Flowers

~One Surviving Article that Isn't About Crafts~
Perfect Mother Syndrome-The Other PMS

Okay...so I'm not sure but I totally think I coined the above title. Doing a Google search for it tells me others have caught on. There's even bumper stickers that say it now. I so could have had some dough from that. Chances are though, that I wasn't the person who coined the term. But from here on out, I'm copyrighting everything because I'm both egocentric and obsessive-compulsive.

I had some other articles that I just purely loved but alas, they are in print and I can't find a link to them, try as I might (and boy I tried, read "egocentric" above).

Ta-ta

Writing: TNT in the Kitchen

Daily, I reported to the kitchen
Sometimes late,
And stressed out

I do not deny this
To you
To him
To the Head Chefs

I never claimed perfection
To you
To him
To the Head Chefs
To anyone
To myself

Each day he threw in more ingredients
The normal ones, I handled
The abnormal ones, I figured out
The flammable ones, though, sent me spinning…

Explosives in the kitchen?
And then he came towards me with a match
He said he would light it,
Getting a kick out of my fear,
This is not right….

And the scents
Were so strong
Of fear
Of hatred
Of anger

I tried to make you understand
But you never
Recognized the scents

I called a Head Chef
What do I do?
How do I sort these?
I just need help.
I just need help.
I just need help.

She did what she thought was right.
She called in an expert.

I do not blame her.

The expert,
Yes, she was eager
She had experience with him, with his explosives and she could help me


I grew uneasy,
Racing thoughts,
“This is going to blow
I know,
I do not want it to blow.”

I was told that blowing it up was the best
Way to dispose of it

Panic and fear
held my hands each day

These hands, they were idle now,
Now that the situation was taken out of them
So panic and fear filled in.

Then this expert,
She brought in more.

So many Chefs in the kitchen,
All handling the TNT
Asking me questions I did not know

They threw some of it back at me
They threw a good portion at him,
Then they threw it at you.

And then lit a match,
And questioned us while we burned.

Yes, you may never believe me,
And I am coming to accept that,
Hour by hour

You asked me if I got what I wanted,
You hoped I was happy now

I wanted help,
I got my soul ripped out.
Does it sound like I got what I wanted?

You trusted me
I trusted them

You said I was oversensitive,
That my TNT was merely
Nutmeg,
Possibly Cinnamon,
Jeez, at the very most red pepper

But you do not know,
You do not know,
Because you only got questioned on the red pepper,
Not the TNT

You told me I was the one who should have left,
And I never wanted any of this
Not his TNT, not his abuse
But again, you only know of red pepper

And when you said that,
I wanted to leave this world.

You trusted me
but
I trusted you
To know who I was,
To know I would not throw a lit bomb,
And stroll away
With a wicked grin upon my face

You may never trust me again,
Don’t worry, I am not there anymore.

It is a day later now,
Since our screaming and sobbing
At each other

And I am still not over it,
But I will be,
You put him on a pedestal.

You blamed me for the TNT.

You insinuated that I was too much,
I expected too much,
I wanted too much.

Yes, well, this is both a curse and a blessing
Of which I do not expect you to understand

But most of all,
You did not stand by me.
You assumed the worse of me
And goddammit you KNOW better
YOU KNOW ME BETTER THAN THAT

You assumed the worse of me,
In a panic to protect yourself.

I told you I was sorry
And I am
I am sorry that I stayed and fought for what was right
I am sorry that you were incapable of believing me
I am sorry that he was Class A Asshole,
To which you had undying loyalty
I am sorry I trusted you to trust me.

So now we are all burnt,
Charred,
I go back to the kitchen day in, day out
On time,
But still stressed out.

He has been kicked out
And you hate me.

And you think this is what I wanted?

You don’t know me at all.

Writing: In order to not go stark raving mad......

I write this open letter to all utility providers, mortgage holders, landlords, and bill collectors:

Dear All,

I speak for thousands upon thousands in this letter. As you are very well aware of, this is the month of December. The month of cold weather (higher electric and gas bills), getting together with family (higher phone bills and gasoline bills) and gift-giving (larger credit card bills).

We know that we have entered into a contract with you to pay you monthly for the service you provide for us day in and day out, i.e. the roof over our heads, the car we drive, the heat we use to warm our homes, the phone service to contact others and the dish or cable tv we use to unwind after a long day.

Unfortunately, many companies don't raise their employee's (your consumers) hourly wage to match this month's expenses. Some give bonuses, other companies do not. Or some companies, like mine, only give bonuses to their full-time employees, of which I am not. And some families, such as our's make it through an ordinary month by the skin of our teeth so saving year-long, a bit of money each month towards our "holiday budget" is a bit of a lofty goal. Therefore December is a trying month for us and many others. One in which we are strapped, stressed and scared. Not to mention worried, fretful and depressed.

Yes, we are late in our payment to you and yes, we are sorry. Although we are grateful for your continued service to us, we couldn't bare to show up to Christmas empty-handed. Because, you see, the very reason we aren't homeless right now is because of family. Family that has buoyed us through the tough times and rejoiced with us during our joyful celebrations. They may say, "No, no you musn't feel you need to give me a present." But how can we not? And those of us with young children, it is too much to even contemplate having an empty Christmas. Many of us aren't big spenders, our children receive moderately priced gifts (nothing of $30 a piece) like many others. But still it's enough to take a bare bones budget and break it's brittle construction.

Please accept our sincere apologies, dear collector, we know your job must suck. The bills will get paid in due time....errr...overdue time, but paid all the same. If you feel the need to revoke whatever service you provide us, we recognize that, that is your option. If such takes place, we'll cope with it and we'll deal with it. Lord, but we have been through worse before.

After all, our true treasures in life: each other, our children, laughter, smiles, hugs and kisses, and many other simple joys aren't on an installment loan or a monthly billing cycle, except that which we call "life."

Writing: Writer's Block

WTF? Seriously, I can't believe I'm having writer's block with blogging. I think (which I try not to do too much) that it is because I share my life on this blog and I have one rule: I won't blog about my marriage unless it is good. And so when things aren't so good (no worries....just another hurtle in the marriage marathon) and it is consuming my life (still no worries...it's all good.....I think), I don't want to blog about it...'cause really who wants to know? And if you do want to know...well that's a bit freaky right?

I read in my most recent US Weekly magazine (to which I'm unreasonably addicted) that Ashley Judd starts each morning writing down all the things that bug her so as to not take it out on others. This makes so much sense to me. When I've read about Morning Pages (ala' Julia Cameron "The Artist's Way") and other similar things I've always worried that venting in the a.m. would color my day all gray and puce and peagreen. And some yucky burnt orange thrown in there too if the vents were serious enough. I am Crayola-oriented.

I'm going to give this a try to see if it does help "cleanse" rather than "dye" and if it improves my ability to get along with idiots...er...other people.

Writing: Motherf--ker Stole My Lunch!

NOTE: Listen, first and foremost I have to give Susie all the credit for introducing the blogging community to the phrase "Motherf--ker stole my lunch!" If you don't understand what it really means, perhaps you haven't read Susie's blog enough. I'd give you the direct link to the exact post but I've got four kids, a job, a husband, a house and all sorts of other fun shit to contend with. But take my word for it, you will be highly rewarded by gobs and gobs of funny stuff that makes you giggle if you take the time to read through her posts to find the meaning of "Motherf--ker stole my lunch!"


Here's my story:

So...what is it now....about four or five months that I've been blogging? So I'm still new and learning and trying to get html, css, meta tags, search engines and all the blogging tools into my brain and in a good order. Little by little, I've made my way. But I've found search engines (especially Google) very discouraging. So as lame as I know it is, I like to double-check every so often and do a "Smudgebaby" search to see if I ever, ever, ever show up.

Recently I bought www.smudgebaby.com Don't go there, it's pathetic right now. Fine go there, but keep your laughter to a dull roar because if you wake up Pebbles it won't be pretty. Basically we've got a strict "You break her, you buy her" policy here.

So after trying to move my blog to my new website (not easy...at least not easy with my limited knowledge) I gave up. And then I felt stupid, because now what am I going to do with this other website? I thought, "Geez, buying the domain name could have waited....because really, how popular is the name 'Smudgebaby' after all?" After a day of bashing myself, I figured, oh what the hell, better safe than sorry and I'm sure I'll learn more someday and be able to post there or do something with it.

And then guess what? A Motherf--ker stole my lunch! Oh yes, he did.

I was doing one of my innocent random searches the other night to see if Google's bot (which seems to operate ALOT like DMV personnel) had finally found me and this comes up:

http://smudgebaby.tripod.com

What? How? Why? When?

Smudgebaby is me and I am Smudgebaby. What. Is. This. Other. Thing. Also. Called. Smudgebaby?!

Did I have a twin at birth and mother only kept me? How can this be....another Smudgebaby?

So as any flabbergasted Smudgebaby would do, I went to visit this site. It turns out to be a website for an actor, writer or something. And it is only one page with links that don't work and is under construction.

But being the fair Smudge that I am, I decided to read the page and see, maybe, by some weird possibility that the word "Smudgebaby" was in there, aside from just being in the web address.

Nope. I am willing to venture that I might have missed it in my identity crisis frenzy but really, I saw no "smudgebaby" around. I was looking for anything, possibly a sentence along the lines of, "The other day I was walking and I saw an peculiar looking bird on the sidewalk. (*Ed. Note: See this could very well have been me!) Once I arrived home and looked it up in my Bird Encyclopedia, I found it's name to be 'Smudgebaby.'" See...I could have handled that.

But no mention of Smudgebaby except in the web address....I don't know Scooby...something seems wrong to me.

So I am left with the feeling of "Motherf--ker stole my lunch." And thank you Susie, because before I read your posts I wouldn't be able to express myself so eloquently. I might have resulted to, "Dirty freakin' assholes, what the f--k?!" "Motherf--ker stole my lunch" is so much more appropriate for this situation.

Writing: Uh...yeah...sure

(I will not blog about work, I will not blog about work, I will not blog about work.)

Which really sucks when such blog-worthy things are happening.

But I'm not going to blog about work. Because I need the paycheck, however piddily it may be.

But if I could blog about work, you would laugh so hard at the actual conversations that take place, and not only take place but are done so seriously. Times like this I really do wish I could earn money taking online surveys or stuffing envelopes.

It sucks when you like your job and you like the people you work with but there is always that ONE challenging person that, because the fates have conspired against you, you have to work closely with. And this person is your button-pusher. The one that says things that are so out there...so completely irrevelant and you, because of some sort of power force, are unable to say anything to defend yourself and/or clear up a situation. You may try to do so, politely, respectfully, hell even lovingly but they just don't get it.

Which is bad and trying to me. I mean if these things were actually happening at my job, which of course, since I don't blog about my job, they are not.

The other website is a slow-go for right now. Apparently, I have to learn some sort of new language, comparative to Latin, to get it to work like a blog, i.e. if I don't want to use someone else's template. Which I don't. There just ain't too many Smudgebaby-esque templates around, know what I mean?

Writing: Haikus for Local Homesellers

Haiku #1
There it stands, your home
Bought for two hundred thousand
Sold for one million

Haiku #2
Quickly sell, fast cash
Gosh, you're so smart and clever
But screwed your neighbor

Haiku #3
Blue collar, too bad
White collar, fast cash for you
Blue collar, pay rent

No hostility here.... :o/

Writing: Write about going away???

Write about going away?! To where? What kind of journaling prompt is that? Just not an option for me. Four kids keeps me firmly planted in either my living room, the minivan or the grocery store. The truth is I'm tiiiii-rrreeedddd. I nap at the drop of a hat. Each moment is evaluated on the sleep spectrum, 1 being a "no way in hell can I sleep without having the apartment coming down around my ears" and a 10 being, "yup, it is midnight and most of the children are finally asleep."
I usually find my napping to happen at a 5 on the spectrum-- "if I sleep real light hubby might not notice and start spouting the inequalities of my napping when he works graveyard and only gets 6 1/2 hours sleep--OR--if I sleep real light I'll notice if Lucas is going to try and make toast again."
Oh, damn, the toast incident. Lucas, just a wee little boy with the capabilities of an ornery tiger cub, decided he was gonna make his mama toast. He told me he was going to do this so I had proper forewarning. He's seen us do this a thousand freakin' times so I figured he could handle it. But I still remained on high alert. He put two pieces of bread into one freakin' slot. Which required squishing. Which prompted burning. And smoke.
Now, even on high alert, I'm distracted because I'm not just on Lucas High Alert but also Medium Alerts for Cassidy, Dylan and Skyler. But the smoke got my attention.
All in all, it just required unplugging the toaster and performing a toast-ectomy to remove the burnt crisp bread. Yum. Boy, he was pissed though. Mama can't even leave his toast alone. I'm so hard to please.
The other thing, along with tiredness is that I have been bored on my ass lately. Bored...boooorrrreeeddd. I have no motivation to create and my writing is still tormenting me. It torments me and I choose not to visit it. I have been reading compulsively and even the authors are starting to bug me. Hmmm...possibly it is all information overload.
However, my neighbors continue to both intrigue and annoy me at the same time. Had a morbid dream last night that Downstairs Neighbor committed homicide and suicide. Nice. I felt so bad for the family yet actually heard myself say in the dream, "Wow, I don't have to worry about the noise anymore." I felt awful as soon as I said it...in my dream. Reminder to self to take meds in a.m. not p.m.
But the vah-tos (listen, I don't know the damn spelling of Vatos which will probably require an accent on a vowel that I can not conjure up without looking at a reference guide and none of that is going to happen while I'm nursing Cassidy at the keyboard) entertained me tonight. Head Shit Homeboy who is sketchy beyond all belief (he interrogated Mike the day he was setting up our phone lines when we moved in--for those who don't know, Mike works for the phone company. For said interrogation, Head Shit Homeboy leaves his property and comes to where Mike is playing with wires at phonebox and says to Mike, "What, are you tappin' my lines or somethin'?" Mike told him he was just setting up the lines for the new occupants.) Do I sense some paranoia?
Anyway, Head Shit Homeboy had his friends all over tonight and I went outside for a smoke. I had Mom-ma on the phone so I wouldn't be lonely. I look up and two cops cars come rolling down the street and pull in beside where his friends parked. Being that we are on a street that is shaped like a court, people sometimes pull in nose first rather than parallel park. So it kinda resembles a parking lot. Anyway, cops pulled in, pulled out their flashlights and even though the gate was visible, they were shining the light on the frontyard grass. I'm sure there was more but I got the shit back in my apartment, because truly the last thing I need is for HSH to see Suspicious White Girl (that would be me) on the PHONE WHEN COPS SUDDENLY SHOW UP. Not good.