I stupidly signed up for a short story writing contest, even though I have only written one (1) short story in my LIFE, and it was in 1994. They assign you a genre, a situation, and a character, and you have a week to write it. It is due on Saturday. I have written 341 words and all of them are terrible. However, if I at least finish, I will have written two (2) short stories in my life, and that is a good thing.

I saw The Favourite, and I loved it. Then I saw on Facebook that an older lady I know also saw it, who said, “I don’t know what to say about The Favourite. It was a different kind of movie for me.” #lesbians

The Prime version of Vanity Fair was awesome, and I loved it. It took me a couple of weeks to watch the whole thing because my stress level just can’t take anything these days. Mild stress brought on by an adaptation of a 19th c. novel is just as real as whatever it is you people with real problems get stressed about, ok?

A coworker was talking about her crummy husband and said, “As my mama would’ve said, he done tore his britches with me.” I like that, and while I will not be saying it, probably, I will certainly be thinking it when people cross the line. Do you bite your thumb at me, sir? You’ve torn your britches with me, sir! She also said her mother was fond of saying, “He’s not worth the salt that goes into the bread,” but that’s a little wordy. I didn’t say anything because her mother died recently.

I routinely interact with someone who can’t pronounce words correctly, and you know I find this amusing. A few weeks ago she said, “We’ll have to give them coodles for that,” and it took me a moment, but I eventually got there. I gotta give her coodles for screwing up kudos so charmingly.

My beloved Mary Oliver died last week! She is everyone’s beloved Mary Oliver, or should be. She’s a model for how to appreciate and be astonished by the world. In a weird way her body of work reminds me of the Catherine Wheel song “Here Comes the Fat Controller” (bear with me here) and its instructions for how to be better:

Don’t you think that it’s about now
that you cooled your operations
and be generous somehow?
Don’t you think the sarcasm’s a little hard to stomach?
Your cynicism’s boring!

A search reveals that the last time I referenced this song here, I was full of joy for the world. Oh, baby Sally of 2013. I wish I could bottle that feeling for us both, or at least invent a time machine that sends you back in time via blog post. I’m not regretful, but I am wistful. (Updated to add: apparently they’re synonymous? Ok. So I guess I mean I don’t regret anything that’s happened, but maybe I wish I’d enjoyed it more while it lasted?)