Poor little neglected, abandoned blog. It’s like I’ve tossed you on the side of a lonely road to fend for yourself, starving and ill and desperate for care. And then, in the wilderness, while looking for a soft place to fall, you were viciously attacked by a rabid wereraccoon and turned into a slavering beast with unnatural, unquenchable thirsts.

Ok, so maybe not that last part.

For those of you in Bloggoland who don’t know me on Facebook (oh, you unfortunate few), here’s what I’ve been up to. If you care. Which, why would you, since I’ve run off and forgotten about this place and only deign to post occasionally, when the mood strikes. (And, Jesus, how pathetic that I can bring myself to Facebook [oh, and is that a verb now?] but can’t be bothered to blog.)

January 12, 9:55 am: I was gently chastised by a lovely British man over the holiday for using the word “awesome” inappropriately and cheapening its value as a designator for true, gut-punched awe. But, dude, that truffle cheese really WAS awesome. Grand Canyon awesome.

January 14, 10:11 am: I’m disturbed that people I went to school with now hold positions of power. Who the hell are we kidding?

January 14, 11:34 am: I don’t, haven’t, and never will watch American Idol. Even if I wanted to (which I most certainly do not), I couldn’t now. It’s the principle of the thing. I will, however, watch So You Think You Can Dance and make ridiculous shrieking-with-glee sounds.

January 14, 12:51 pm: Is it weird that I’m considering “Rimbaldi fluid green” as a wedding color? I think Arvin Sloane would be pleased. (It’s possible we might be watching too much Alias.)

January 15, 10:50 am: Today I’m running with the philosophy that sleeping is for chumps. Who needs sleep? Not me, man, I’m on fire. I’m raring to go. I’m energized, y’all. See this work on my desk? It’s gonna get done, and I mean D-O-N-E done. I’m awake, let’s go, let’s go, let’s…zzzzz.

January 15, 6:31 pm: Mmmm… bourbon.

January 19, 925 am: You people with your baking and cleaning and working out saving the world status updates aren’t fooling anyone. You’re eating Mallomars and wearing a dingy sweatshirt and watching reruns of Magnum PI, aren’t you? Please say you are.

January 20, 3:17 pm: If I weren’t so sure that being bored makes you boring I’d admit to being bored.

January 21, 3:00 pm: Oh, hello Indian food from lunch. You’re still hanging around? What’s that? You say you’ll be here FOREVER? They should really put a warning on the menu. Not that it would stop me. Mmmmm… naaaaaaan.

January 22, 11:31 am: I’m a little concerned that every time I take the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator I’m “typed” as something different. This means I’m a Sybil, doesn’t it? Damn. (Most recently, ENFP.)

January 25, 1:32 pm: Today I’m glad I don’t live on the set of “You Can’t Do That on Television” because I don’t know anything. Hah! No slime. (Alasdair, I’ll always love you.)

January 25, 3:55 pm: Hey, time? I’ll give you a cookie if you’ll speed up until 5.

January 26, 7:28 am: I woke myself up this morning by biting my own arm. Hard. Musta been some dream.

January 26, 6:12 pm: Pandora just played “Julie” by Merrill Bainbridge. Well, hello moody angst memories from 1995. Have you missed me? Because I sooooo haven’t missed you. Now gimme back my babydoll dresses.

January 27, 9:28 am: Pretty sure the internet hates me today. Or it ate too much and is feeling bloated and sluggish. Stupid gluttonous internet.

January 28, 9:27 am: Hey, People of Facebook: Stop being so dadgum vague with your status updates. If I wanted to read a mystery I’d pick up a Raymond Chandler. Or a Richard Castle. Whichever. Either way my point is spill it!

January 28, 12:24 pm: Oh, Etsy, you vile temptress. How you do entice me.

January 29, 9:21 am: I’d participate in Doppelgänger week, but I’m far too unique, apparently. Pale imitations of my awesomosity abound.

January 31, 11:59 am: Scariest movie I’ve seen in a long, long time: Band of Brothers.

February 1, 8:23 am: Et tu, alarm clock?

February 1, 12: 18 pm: Overheard while thrifting this weekend (three annoyingly loud [and shockingly thin] college girls in preparation for their first Rocky Horror Picture Show): “Well, I don’t know, but there’s, like, a singing alien? And lots of lingerie. And this weird house where everything happens. Just find something hot.”

February 1, 4:57 pm: My stomach needs to stop talking to me in Charlie Brown’s teacher’s voice. I can’t understand a word it’s saying. Except that part where it sounded a bit like, “Curse you and your Mexican food predilection!”

February 2, 12:10 pm: Don’t hate me because I have a new 30″ Cinema HD display monitor. Oh, wait. Yeah. You can go ahead and hate me.

February 2, 2:09 pm: If you and I woke up in jail together, I’d construct a vicious shiv out of a toothbrush to protect us. Then I’d lecture you on the evils of dragging your friends into your fiendish schemes involving forgery, stealing the Winged Victory of Samothrace, and some guy named Knut Biggerstiff.

26 minutes ago: So, wait. Lost is still on TV? But they canceled Deadwood. And Rome. And Pushing Daisies. And The Tick. And freaking Firefly. Curse you, Hollywood. I thought Lost jumped the shark, or the polar bear, or whatever.

So, see? I’m still alive. I still have completely unimportant things to say. I’m just not saying them here.

** Sorry to any who had their comments on this post disappear. There was a database hiccup or something. **

Oh, hi!

I kind of forgot about blogs and blogging there for a while. In fact, I’m forcing this. My desk is clear at work, Twitter and Facebook are updated, I can’t be bothered to do anything useful, like alphabetize something or make important phone calls, so I’m blogging.

That’s just how it is right now. You understand.

But I’ve got free time, and if I’m so damn disappointed in myself for not writing I should just go ahead and write, right? Right.

So. I’m writing.

Did I mention I spent the holidays in Europe? Well, I did. And it was marvelous. Mom and I went over to Dublin to visit my brother. I arrived on Christmas Day and from there it was just a blast for two fun-filled weeks. We drove around Ireland and stayed in cozy inns and got lost and shopped and ate and drank. And then we went to Frankfurt for a few days and had an entirely raucous and faintly debauched New Year’s Eve where I drank something called Red Kisses and watched cabaret performances and danced until my feet hurt and wandered back to the hotel happy and blotto at 5 am.

And now I’m back, and life is fine, but I miss Europe and cobbled streets and foreign languages and worldly expats who spend their Euros like it’s Monopoly money on things like Veuve Clicquot and Italian shoes and train tickets.

I don’t know if I’m done here or not. Probably not quite, but I just don’t know. I feel like maybe it’s time for something else, but what? You don’t see me writing anything else besides this blog, do you? No. Me, neither. But maybe I just need to be inspired. So, inspire me.

Oh, and I have missed you. Honest. All of you.

From the monthly Chicago Manual of Style Q&A:

Q. For Chicago style, is there a mandate on whether a paper clip or staple should be used?

A. In manuscript preparation, paper clips work well; binder clips and rubber bands are ideal. Such WMDs as staples should never be used. Never. If one lands on your desk, it should be dismantled immediately. [SAFETY ALERT: Proceed with caution. May result in torn documents and/or personal injury unless performed by a professional trained in the use of the proper device (and probably even then).]

A-FUCKING-MEN. PREACH IT!

I have a cold sore. It’s terribly glamorous. And it means no kissing, dammit.

Driving around last night running errands, being sweet, and holding hands.

Me: I wish I could kiss you.
Him: Me too, babe. Instead I could just put it in your poop chute.
Me: That’s not the same!
Him: What? It’s romantic.
Me: Nothing says “love” like anal sex.
Him: Honestly.

Things are kinda tight around the old Gypsy-Lancelot household (and I don’t mean in my hoo-ha region, although they are there, too, you dirty-minded freaks — wait, that’s just me, isn’t it?). We’ve been making it, but there’s no cushion to speak of (damn, I really am talking about finances — why is everything sounding dirty?). Lancelot has recently started a new and much better job, but it’s early days yet and we haven’t quite gotten caught up. I know — I just know — things will get better for us financially, but right now we’re struggling like a lot of people.

So I thought, hey, why not try to pick up some part-time freelance editing work? Surely there’s something out there for someone as qualified and capable as I! Well, you’d think that, wouldn’t you? But I haven’t found doodly squat.

Finally I stumbled upon a fairly mediocre online content provider who shall remain nameless. This is a company who squeezes “writers” (I use the term very, very loosely) for $7-15 an article on such illustrious topics as “How to Repair a Window Panel.” I’m only partially ashamed to admit I have written for them in an effort to gain a little extra pocket money. Hey, you do what you gotta do.

But I figured I’m an editor: They hire copyeditors. Problem solved. After some hoop jumping and emailing and test taking, come to find out my test results “don’t meet their standards.”

I don’t meet their standards.

What the hell kind of standards do they have that someone with almost 10 years of editing experience and an MA in publishing is unqualified?

At first I was scornful. I mean, come on. But then it really got to me. What if I really screwed up the test? What if I’m a sucky editor? What if I can’t hack it and I’m doomed to mediocrity and I’m total failure and I’m doing the entirely wrong thing with my life and I suck, I suck, I suck!

All because they don’t think my work meets their standards. Let’s just forget all the kudos and accolades and stuff I get at work day-to-day. Let’s just set aside my passion for the job. I’m just gonna take their grubby little words for it.

No I damn well am not!

Ok, so maybe I’m not Ms. Supergalactic Editrix Exceptionale. Chances are there’s an error or two in this post, for heaven’s sake. But I fucking care about it. I pay attention to words and meaning and context and grammar and punctuation. I read about it, I notice it, and I love it. So they with their big fat “standards” can suck it. Interrobang!

So, my car broke.

I know. Shocker. Wait, what? Something in Gypsy’s life broke? There was an unexpected expense? Surely not.

Yeah. There was this noise, and it wasn’t a good noise. It was an angry, jeering noise. It was a noise that screeches, “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little wallet, too!!” Or something like that. Anyway it was bad.

So I took it home and I described the noise to Lancelot (“Screeeeeeee!! And then grrrrrrroaaaaaaning griiiind.”) and Lancelot was not pleased. Because he had already, in the span of maybe two or three weeks, replaced his water pump, replaced my starter, and replaced his radiator. By himself. In our driveway. Pretty much he never wants to work on a car ever again ever. But he does because, hi, have you seen the economy lately?

When he checked out my car he discovered that, SURPRISE!, it’s my rotor. Oh, and my caliper. And the brake pad. Triple threat! Aren’t we blessed? Remember that whole economy thing I mentioned? Yeah, that meant we couldn’t get it fixed at a shop, and it also meant I had to not drive my car until Lancelot had a day off to be able to fix the beast. So, I didn’t drive for a week. And that is all kinds of upsetting and crippling and I know I’m totally whining here, but it’s really hard to be without a car, I don’t care how lucky we are to live in America and fuel costs and greenhouse emissions and carpooling and blah-dee-blah. Don’t care. Want my car!

Yesterday was Lancelot’s day off, and do you know what he did? What that gorgeous, sexy, talented, wonderful, handy man did? He spent 9 hours working on my car, and y’all he fixed it. And I have it back. And it’s glorious and he totally got a blow job for it.

I am not a literary snob. A reading snob, sure. But literary? Not so much. I’m not all up on the classics and crap, and I avoid reading the next big thing if I can. That may surprise you. Oh, I’ve read a lot of them, but I’m not all that impressed. I know. That’s bullshit, but whatever. I love to read, I read constantly, and I’ve read an awful lot, but I read what I want to read, and what I want to read is all over the place and doesn’t include either (typically) the best sellers list or the syllabus from my AP English course.

If you pay any attention to my “Library” page or the little GoodReads dohickey in my sidebar, you’d know that lately I’ve been reading the heck out of some romance. I love romance novels. Judge me if you want, but I do. Always have. I’ve written about it before.

But something has changed. When I started reading romance novels as a child, I was indiscriminate. What I read depended on what I could snag from my mother’s shelves, and I didn’t care much provided there were heaving bosoms, sparkling eyes, and dashing heroes with broad chests and fierce gazes and stiff members.

As I grew up and into the genre, I tended toward the books about the aristocracy. You know, fancy gowns and powerful titles and royals with rampant sexual peccadilloes. I was all about the castles and tapestries and gems the size of your fist.

Nowhere in my romantic lexicon was there room for the western or Americana romance, unless there was a half-naked half-breed, and even then I didn’t prefer them. They were kind of bland, you know? No glitz, no pageantry, no glam. Just a lot of dust and cowboys.

But things have changed. Recently I’ve delved straight on into the western romance genre, and I couldn’t be happier. I owe it to one author: Maggie Osborne. Her books feature strong, independent women in difficult but realistic circumstances with equally strong but gentle men. Her books generally throw the hero and heroine together when they don’t want to be, and the resultant rubbing the wrong way turns to rubbing the right way, but it happens realistically, over time, where attraction turns into love. And the western locale, with its pioneer spirit and gritty determination and bare knuckle brashness, is now very appealing to me.

Does that mean I’ve grown up? That a love story doesn’t need palace intrigue and courtly manners and the most exquisitely beautiful characters to reach me? Give me hard work, determination, laughter, companionship, struggle, and respect these days.

This is not to say I won’t still read about raven tresses and petulant beauties tamed by hard and powerful and wealthy and cruel men. I will. Oh, yes. I will. Rangoon, anyone? (Almost no one knows that book.) It’s just now I’ve got a soft spot for cowboys.