1. I have something. It’s some kind of snotty, nasty, energy-sucking thing that’s also causing panic attacks. I wish I were kidding.

2. I have to teach a class at 5:00 today. It’s technically the 3rd week of class but I’ve only laid eyes on these people once, and I swear to you, for all I know they are Joan Rivers look-a-likes. Yes, people. I am THAT good at education.

3. I have fallen out of favor with the socialites, and I wish I could say that I didn’t care, but I also wish I could say that I did. In reality, most of my frenemies need AA. Just a little message. (Did you like my Danielle Staub reference there? What? You don’t know who she is? Get thee to a television NOW.)

4. My hair is dirty and it’s possible that I also smell, showers notwithstanding. I think when you’re sick AND you’re in a bad mood, stink just seeps out of your pores.

5. I just lost 5 readers and 1 Twitter follower for that graphic and vaguely disgusting imagery.

6. The heat, y’all. The goddamned heat. If Hurricane Earl comes this way, and it’s kind of looking like it, there better be rain and at least 5-degree cooler temperatures. OR ELSE I’M MOVING TO MAINE. Consider yourself warned, Maine.

7. On a good note, the friends loyal and true to me are ones who warm the cockles of my heart. I have this one lovely friend who flew to NC this weekend just so she could host some friends for dinner at her mother’s house. She had me print up menu cards and she cooked a three-course meal, in the grand tradition of Southern hostesses. I swear, Yankees, I’m just not sure you know what you’re missing.

8. Hey, did you watch the Emmys? The dresses were ridiculously ridiculous this year. Actually I’m just talking about January Jones. The rest of them were kind of boring. Woo, but do you know who’s NOT boring? Tom and Lorenzo. The love I have for those boys is just ginormous and I think I need to up the gay quotient in my life. I really think that’s what might be missing, y’all.

January Jones, looking ridiculous at the 2010 Emmys in Atelier Versace.

9. I’m all done with the listing for today, mostly because the Diet Coke has kicked in and I’m a twirling, nervous wreck. What is it about illness that brings on the panic attacks? I’ll never know.

Have a great Tuesday, dolls. In the words of the ever-profound New Jersey housewives, I am not garbage.

I saw a face in PEOPLE magazine last week that also told a story. This face is one I know well, and belongs to a woman who has been my friend for almost 15 years. She is a mother, a wife and a lawyer. Before Katrina she had no real ties to New Orleans. After Katrina, she committed her life’s work to representing the underrepresented and in doing so she met her husband, adopted the Crescent City as her home and married there under the lights of the French Quarter. I was there to see her and her fair city three years after the hurricane. I visited Lakefront, a community flooded by the breached levees. I took photographs of water lines above overpasses and houses that probably still haven’t been rebuilt. My friend had her daughter in Louisiana and, with her family, lives near a military base there.

I saw a face sitting next to me in a taxi last week, and this face told a story I’d never heard. As he drove me up Canal Street, from the French Quarter and around to Jackson Square, I listened to his Louisiana accent and saw the lines on his face. I never learned his name, but this man – in his late 60s – was born and raised in New Orleans. He remembered Hurricane Betsy and so he evacuated the day before the storm, per the orders given by the city and state. He left with his family and returned not long after Katrina, coming home only to a little wind damage, but luckily no flood waters. He couldn’t understand why so many people stayed, and further, he couldn’t fathom the “lack of self control” his fellow New Orleans residents exhibited in the days after. This man was ashamed of the fighting, the looting, the reaction of his people, but he never said a word about the action – or lack thereof – of the government. He was proud to be back in his city driving tourists around to see the sights that are still standing, that seemed never to be touched.

When I was in New Orleans last week, I watched the local news in the morning and again at night. There were stories after stories after stories featured on each channel about rebuilding. There were families with new Habitat homes. There were children preparing for a new school year in new schools. There were local politicians cutting ribbons on new businesses in different neighborhoods. There were very few pictures of flood waters, and even fewer pictures of the Superdome and the Convention Center.

My friends and I did the usual touristy stuff. We walked to the French Quarter and ate dinner. We rode the street car up St. Charles, saw Loyola and Tulane, and pointed out The Real World house. We lost money at Harrah’s, took pictures of the Mississippi from the Riverwalk and ate beignets under the shade at Café du Monde. We bought pralines and jewelry, took pictures of the mimes and the jazz musicians and brought home t-shirts to children. I met a friend for drinks in an up-and-coming section of town, and marveled at her historic Garden District home. All of us spent money. We met natives and transplants, asking them questions along the way. Some of them were tired of the questions – the same ones – about Katrina and whether or not they stayed. Had their houses suffered damage? Did they live in the Ninth Ward? Did they know anyone who did? Or who had died? Some of them wanted to talk, and some of them just wanted to show off their town.

I have watched the documentaries, listened to the stories, seen my dear friend fight for the rights of the underprivileged and I am still shocked that a natural disaster could tear our country apart and expose it for what it really is. Five years later, 25 years later, doesn’t matter. I live in a small Southern town, I know what goes on here. You know it, too. As a really ignorant woman once said to me, there are the haves and the have-nots. She was a have, she told me. But she did pity those poor other people. Most of them.

It’s hard to say why, in the last ten years, these horrific things keep happening to us. Yes, to us, I believe. In the South, there are evangelical Christians who are recruiting young people in droves to their mega-churches with coffee shops and rock bands. It gives them comfort to know that their religion and faith in their God will carry them through whatever else is coming. Some people my age, myself included, find themselves past the quarter-life crisis and in the middle of their anxiety-fueled 30s, ever upwardly mobile. We compare ourselves to each other, watching as our neighbors’ houses get bigger, our friends’ cars get more expensive and our own credit card debt gets higher.

Somewhere along the way we have continued to miss the big picture. It isn’t necessarily about the power of religious belief. It definitely isn’t about our own small corners of our own small worlds. It’s about the faces we see every day, that could tell us a story if we listened. How very many of us have forgotten about Katrina victims until we were reminded on television? How many of us take our girls’ weekends to the beach and whine to our friends that our kitchen counters need replacing and that our waists just aren’t as small as they used to be?

I do it and you do it. We forget to look at the lines on the faces of our fellow human beings and think about how those lines got there. From laughing? From crying? From worrying? From mourning? From rejoicing? We don’t stop to think that there is a bigger world outside of our own, and that bigger world has a much bigger story to tell.

My own story is small and forgettable, because I am only one of millions who have traveled to Louisiana in the last five years. I am one of an unfortunately large group of people who didn’t travel to New Orleans to help. I went on business, spent some money and patted myself on the shoulder for shopping because I thought it would help the economy. Perhaps it did. But probably it didn’t, because probably my money would have been much better spent buying a hammer and some nails and helping someone rebuild…something. Anything.

No one likes to be preached to, least of all me. But I found myself in the middle of one of the most open wounds in our country, in the middle of the anniversary of its injury, and I couldn’t come home and blog about the wonderful restaurants I tried or the funny stories of the shit that happened while I was there. It’s not funny and it’s not relevant unless we’re talking about HELPING PEOPLE.

I haven’t done that in a while. It’s time I did.

There is a Julia Roberts marathon on USA.

I’m reading the BlogHer ’10 tweets and wondering about these girls.

A pile of bank papers on my coffee table is staring at me.

My cat is desperately trying to meld her body with mine.

I can’t organize my thoughts well enough to write more than a list.

But I’m trying.

Last summer I wrote a post about Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love, a book that has stuck with me ever since. The eating part I’ve got down pat; it’s the other stuff I – and undoubtedly every other woman who’s read that book – am working on. I forget though. Do you ever find yourself starting those good habits like exercising and eating right and calling your mother every Sunday and then find that two weeks have passed and you missed that one day and then that other day and then all good intentions are no more? You’re not alone. Or maybe I’m the only one. Who gives a shit, really…the important thing is that the praying and the loving are far more essential to getting down to the root of what ails me.

I am failing at my business. Oh, I have customers, and I have people who buy things from me and who plan to get gifts for birthdays and graduations and so forth. But in the grand scheme of things, like THE BUDGET, I’m failing. I am not a good record-keeper, I am a terrible mathematician and I have no head for business. I love the work itself, but I hate the business and the voices in my head were right: this probably wasn’t a good idea. There’s no one to rely on – or blame – but me, and it’s far easier to give up than try to fix a mess. It makes me feel awful though, and I fear that the awfulness will get the better of me.

Additionally, that gentle, relaxed feeling I had leftover from vacation is gone and the tension of real life has crept back into my shoulders like stubborn ivy, winding its way up my neck and down my spine and choking the life out of my head. There is intense fear and anxiety about the expectations I have for myself. I did not register for school. I am terrified to teach this semester. I am ashamed that I am not a better housekeeper or wife and that I have failed at my business venture.

I have educated myself enough about my anxiety to know that there are definable triggers and that there are steps I can take to head off the avalanche that comes so easily. I can meditate, I can reduce distractions, I can focus myself and my thoughts, BLAH BLAH BLAH. Just like the business, it’s easier to give up than to fix a mess. I take my medication, most of the time, but there is work I know I should do right along with that. Is it that I’m lazy? Is it too much to tackle at once? Do I forget? I don’t have the answers.

Praying and loving are these two huge words – these touchy feely warm fuzzy words that are repulsive and comforting at the same time. Praying for some people involves a church or mosque or synagogue; for other people, it’s just a quiet moment that is private and personal. I don’t know what it is for me. I forget how to do it, mostly because I think I’m doing it wrong or that God is sitting there (up there? out there?) shaking his head at me and adding my name to that list of people who got left in the oven too long. So I just skip right over it because really, what would I pray about anyway?

Loving, for me, comes back to that whole thing about being an asshole. I know that I shouldn’t be an asshole and that I should love other people, but I don’t know that I’m aware of how to do that. I could write a whole other list of shortcomings right here that would take up 14 hours of my time, and all of it involves being self-centered and too afraid to tell people I love them because they might not say it back. How do you know you love someone or something to begin with? I don’t mean romantic love – I have BB and I put a ring on his finger and so he’s contractually required to love me until I do something to piss him off. And vice versa. I’m talking about the other kind of love – the kind that (I think) is what you reserve for friends and ideas and yourself.

I really don’t know what I’m talking about here other than to say that life has confounded me in such a way that I feel as though I’m at a 4-way stop sign with no directions. It does that to everyone, I totally know that, but what happens to you isn’t nearly as important as what happens to me. See? I’m an asshole.

Finally, before Pretty Woman ends and I strangle the fur off my cat, I should say that two weeks ago I had a conversation with one of my best friends about traveling abroad for a period of time. Neither one of us knows how we will finance it or where exactly we’ll go, or what we’ll do when we get there, but we have good intentions. If it happens, it will be a lesson in selflessness and compassion, both of which I desperately need. If you’re the praying sort, send us your good wishes so that we might focus and develop this. If you’re the loving sort, send us your love because we probably need that too.

We returned from our week-long family beach trip yesterday and we are happy, slightly tan and rested but exhausted, if that makes sense. We’re exhausted from visiting, from finding things to talk about with people who can’t count conversation as their strong suit, and from filling our bellies with shrimp, crab and fish. (And maybe some cheese dip and margaritas and cookies and lemon meringue pie and tomato sandwiches with real mayonnaise and ice cream…)

We are rested though, because we basically did nothing. The most exercise we got was from hauling our crap down to the beach and back up to the house, and really BB did that. We swam – a lot – and we lolled about in the sand until we got rashy and bumpy, which is an okay trade off. We played shark and pulled our nieces around in innertubes. We people-watched and criticized bathing suits and tattoos (we already know we’re hypocrites, don’t worry). We read books, had deep discussions and tried to avoid olive appetizers and bourbon slushies. (Eww and eww.)

In short, we had a really good time.

Now, though, the real world faces us, as it does everyone who returns from vacation, and for me, school will begin in a week. I will be teaching a class of 75 students (in an auditorium!) once a week, after my regular job. We will register new students, encourage the old ones and smile the smile of this-summer-wasn’t-nearly-long-enough.

I’m kind of with the kindergarten mothers: I’m not ready to let go, even though it’s time this weather cooled the hell off already. I’m also ready for football and for daylight to go away before bedtime. When you live here though, the seasons don’t change quickly, or on time.

Some days I’m really surprised that I’m not in charge of the world. I really am.

Before. WAY before.

BB said he might kill me if I posted this picture because it’s embarrassingly awful and he thinks it qualifies us for Hoarders. I said it was just a “work room” that we used for storage sometimes and that the Internet would understand and not judge us. Please note the wall color (ass), and the electronics tower that could topple if you look at it wrong.

So then we cleaned out all the junk, taped off the walls and really took a good, long look at this ugly room and bid it farewell.

The quality of this picture is quite terrible, but it’s the first wall of navy blue and we squealed because we loved it so. We hated the color of the hardwood floor before, and we still kind of do, but it looks so much better now and the trim really pops against the blue.

It made a huge difference really quickly.

Finished! Kind of.

This is the after, and again, the quality of the photo really is bad and doesn’t do the room justice. The sofa is a blue-gray leather and actually looks great against the blue walls. We haven’t hung pictures yet, but I did pick out some pillows that are kind of office-y but cute.

A family of 5 could live on these shelves.

Man these pictures are fuzzy. So this is one of the two shelving units we bought to store all our junk on. They’re giant. But they’re kind of industrial and they hold EVERYTHING. We swapped the rug for a faux sisal and the shelves now have matching seagrass lamps on them. It’s coming along, but it’s a vast improvement.

Trust me.

Those weather people. So creative.

I’ll go ahead and warn you up front: this entire post is a long, drawn out complaint about the heat. Ready? Here goes:

1. It’s so hot that my ass sticks to everything.

2. It’s so hot that pipes can’t produce cold water.

3. It’s so hot that birds don’t have the energy to shit on my car.

4. It’s so hot that my deodorant doesn’t work anymore; I stink by 9am.

5. It’s so hot here that no one is at the pool.

6. It’s so hot that being naked won’t even cool you off.

7. It’s too hot to eat.

8. It’s too hot to sleep.

9. It’s almost too hot to type.

10. It’s so hot my cactus plants are dying.

11. It’s hot enough to melt my jewelry.

12. It’s so hot my coworker’s windshield exploded. True story.

I would write more, but frankly, it’s just too hot. And this is enough complaining for one afternoon. I wish you all a wonderful, cool weekend. I will be packing for my beach trip, going to see my shrink, having lunch with a friend, and sleeping in the freezer.

Anyway, our annual Beachsplosion adventure starts next week and as you may recall from last year, I expected it to be a nightmare of epic proportions and it really turned out not so bad. Granted, there were a lot of people, and granted, there were some meltdowns but all in all it was tolerable and at some points, enjoyable!

We're staying here. How bad could it be?

We leave next Tuesday, but this time there are a few twists and turns. One, part of BB’s family we will miss altogether, as they will have come and gone before we ever get there. Two, my MIL’s boyfriend is coming – not new – and bringing one of his children. TOTALLY NEW. There’s a little bit of a stink about this. I’m waiting to see what happens, because at the least, it should be entertaining.

So here’s my packing list from last year, compared to this year:

1. 5 lbs. of homemade chicken salad Pick up a half gallon from the bbq place.

2. 4 cases of Pepsi products A couple bottles of water.

3. 7 pairs of shoes Beach flip flops and dressier flip flops.

4. Laptop, iPod speakers, chargers, portable DVD player, DVDs Two Droids and some headphones.

5. 20 lbs. worth of hardback bestsellers Couple of paperbacks, Kindle for Droid app.

6. Enough clothes to outfit Paris Hilton Bathing suit, perhaps some pajamas.

7. Snacks. A lot of snacks. Tequila.

8. Pasta, cereal, bread, farm veggies, casseroles Debit card for the grocery store and takeout.

9. Effort, energy and pleasantness Apathy, appetite, lazy bone.

I’m sure BB will have a great time being around his family, away from Pepsi and reading the fat Stephen King novel I bought him. And I’m sure I’ll just be drunk.

You know, typical family vacation.

BB: Hey, I’m washing the cars today. Going to get some Armor All.

Me: Uh, okay.

BB: I need you to come home right now because I accidentally set off the car alarm when I was cleaning the locks on the door handles and the alarm drained the battery and now my car is dead and the neighbors are looking and I had to disconnect the horn fuse and ALL I WAS TRYING TO DO WAS WASH THE CAR.

Me: Uh, okay.

BB: I don’t understand it. All I was trying to do was wash the car. That’s it. WASH THE CAR. But the alarm wouldn’t turn off and I tried to put the key in the ignition and it wouldn’t work and my keyless entry is broken and you have to come home right now.

Me: *Sigh.*

Charlie the Cat: I don’t know what’s wrong with you people, but you disturbed the neighbors and now their dog got out and I’m over here howling and no one is paying attention. You’re all a bunch of assholes.

Me: This is going to be a shitty day.

BB: I’m taking you to get lunch at the drive-thru because I have to drive your car to BFE to get Nissan to replace this dead battery and oh yeah, they should probably replace and reset my keyless entry that hasn’t worked in 5 years.

Me: Could this day get any more annoying?

Me: Never ask that question.

BB: I’m back and now the battery doesn’t work because it’s the wrong kind because those people are stupid and don’t know what a NISSAN IS!

Me: …

BB: I’m taking it back. To BFE. Find a ride home from work.

Customer: I’ll be there at 5:30 when you get home from work!

Dad: What’s wrong now? Why are you calling me?

BB: I can’t help it that the alarm is going off again! I can’t! I hate this fucking car!

Me: …

Customer: Is your car alarm going off? Should you check on that?

BB: Screw it. I don’t need a car. I’ll take you to work and you can get your mom to drive you around forever and ever.

Me: I really have nothing to say.

Me: Oooh, except yes I do. Here on the Internet it says to lock and unlock the car door three times and that should reset…well, everything.

BB: Huh.  Would you look at that.

Me: I guess now is not the time to tell you that you can get those keyless entry batteries at Wal-Mart. And also, they sell car batteries there.

BB: This is the worst day ever.

Lucy the Cat: I agree. You’re all assholes.

I’m the kind of person that will lay on the couch all day and then bitch and moan because the dishes aren’t done.

I’m the kind of person that will yell at you for yelling at me because your day sucked.

I’m the kind of person that will rain on your parade, shit on your daisies, and tell that Double Rainbow fellow to go fuck himself.

I’m the kind of person that only sees your shortcomings and will never praise what you do right.

I’m the kind of person that begrudges other people’s success. I’m also the kind of person that will complain because I’m not successful, yet I will continue to sit around and do nothing. (See: Everyone Else’s Blogs. Also: People Who Get Jobs For Which They Applied.)

I’m the kind of person who wrinkles her nose at your outfit or your hairstyle or your makeup or your kid, all the while knowing that I couldn’t fit in that outfit, my hair would never do that, my makeup is all gone and I don’t have kids.

I’m the kind of person who probably talks about you behind your back.

I’m the kind of person who never asks how you are, but spends 45 of your 200 cell phone minutes talking about why my life is terrible.

I’m the kind of person who doesn’t return books, clothes or wine glasses.

I’m the kind of person that never keeps promises.

I’m the kind of person who couldn’t finish a task or follow through on, well, anything if life depended on it.

I’m the kind of person who pretends to do work all day but instead dicks around on the Internet.

I’m the kind of person who feels entitled. To everything.

I’m the kind of person who doesn’t feel bad because you worked all day in 95 degree heat. Actually, I’d rather know why you haven’t cooked my dinner yet.

I’m the kind of person who never chips in enough money for the group gift.

I’m the kind of person who would rather email you, tweet you or Facebook-message you than pick up the phone to call you.

I’m the kind of person who writes “you’re in my prayers” on sympathy cards but never really prays.

I’m the kind of person who will give you the smaller half of the cookie.

I’m the kind of person who fakes phone calls when you show up in my office door.

I’m the kind of person who will tell you that I hate that shirt/purse/pair of shoes or sunglasses because really I want them for myself.

I’m the kind of person who is taking up space that could be used by someone with a heart.

But.

I am the kind of person who will admit it.

…painting. Redecorating. Organizing. Spending money I don’t need to spend.

So – and I’ll post some pictures to really illustrate my point – our third bedroom, which we’ve been using as an office, has become a dumping ground for junk. Like, real live junk. Amongst other things, there are plastic bins full of photographs, baskets, old bank statements, Christmas ornaments and random paper. There are stacks of things to be recycled; DVDs that actually get watched on a regular basis and remote controls that don’t work or need batteries. There are shoes, an old rug, two suitcases and a computer monitor. I swear we’re not hoarders, though that’s what this is starting to sound like. We’re just two people with stuff we’re not sure what to do with that live in a house with three closets and virtually no attic space. Who can blame us?

To boot, this room is painted army green. No, seriously. Like, look at a tank, lighten up that green a notch or two, and that’s our room. It’s hideous and I can’t believe I ever agreed to paint it that color. It’s beyond awful. This green looks like moldy mud and it makes the room even more drab and miserable than it was to begin with.

Solution? Paint it darker! Bear with me here, because I know this sounds a little unconventional. We’ve decided to go with a dark navy blue for the walls (we already have off-white trim and molding) and a pale robin’s egg blue for the desk and maybe a side table. I want something rich and bold, but also something that will stand out behind the stacks and stacks of paper I’m accumulating from my business. (And before you complain, the paper is NECESSARY. This is a stationery business. It’s mostly envelopes and miscellaneous sizes of stationery.)

The plan is to get steel shelves from the home improvement store for either side of the window. I think the chrome color will look good against the blue and will give it kind of a modern edge that the rest of the house really doesn’t have. The baskets and bins will go up on the shelves – which means off the floor! – and I will become at least somewhat more organized.

All of this is just a picture in my mind; I haven’t drawn anything out or done anything except get paint chips. BB isn’t so much on board with painting it ourselves because he finds painting to be mundane and peasant and he’d rather spend his day off watching All in the Family. He’s such a party pooper.

So here’s to the 4th of July: the perfect time to work on house projects, grill something delicious, and watch Real Housewives reruns. Hope yours is just as fun.