The following section is for people who watch The Practice. If you don't watch the show or have it Tivoed and plan to watch it at your leisure because you can, skip this.

So Lindsey wants to plead. Can you imagine how depressing it must have been for the actress to open her script and find she's going to jail? It certainly limits her character directions. She can either :

(A) "somehow" get claimed innocent and we never hear about it again,

(B) get sent to jail and we never hear from her again or

(C) initiate a jail sub-plot where she realizes her inner "Mother Jones Reader" and gets all "real" with the ladies and is released to start working for the "truth". Like Ashley Judd.

She does have this Traci Lords, "Girls of Cellblock C" aesthetic that works in her favor should she go to the Big House. She certainly manages to make all the Jailhouse Duds look like low-key Calvin Klein. I wanna see her bring that talent home and make Bobby her Cellblock Bitch.

Or at least let FatGirl do it, they've imbued her with so many Super Powers to make up for how uncomfortable they are with her weight. She's always worked a big ol' Bull Look with the row of earrings. I wouldn't blink twice if her character rode a Harley and went to lawschool after she beat the shit out of some Redneck in a Seven-Eleven Parking Lot. They've knighted her the Mama Cass of Network Drama and we know how that story ends.

This being TV, the only real choice for Lindsey was (A). Not only was she set free, the whole episode was erased from everyone's memory by group amnesia.

Ok, that didn't happen. But it was close. The Evil Darth Vadar District Attorney cracked after the dismissal and got all freaky and biblical in front of the press. Even LFBoyle forgot the trial at the sight of this PR melt-down, her Barbie Gaze luring us out of the show and on to the rest of the Season. We're spared any Big Linda Blair Drama in jail but if I'd had a choice, it would have been a real tough one.

11:36:13 PM    sro home /

Check out Radio Free Blogistan (Sunday, 10/13). There are a number of sketches Christian drew at a Bob Dylan Concert along with the scanned notes he managed to scrawl down.

I love the drawings. They remind me of black wrought iron sculptures from the 50s. My mother had a pair that were African Bongo Players. They visually convey a mood you want to be a part of.

The notes are interesting as well, more for their presentation than their content. Their legibility ebbs and flows, much like music, and the writings and the drawings combined - and this is saying alot - made me want to listen to Dylan.

Thanks for the rush and a job well done.

8:33:35 PM    sro home /

I just saw a trailer for the new Enterprise Wednesday Night. Apparently the Hunky Leader has sex with the Super-model Alien on a tanning bed.

I'm a little curious, natch. Specificly:

A) Do Aliens have to wear the little sunglasses?

B) Are Enterprise tanning beds free or do you have to buy group sessions?

C) Do the Starfleet Members who work in the Tanning Department look like Orange-cicles?

As obsessive as that World is, I'm sure we'll find out. It sounds Ultra-L.A. to me but I'm willing to think I live on another planet.

8:01:20 PM    sro home /

E-mail from my sister after she read my earlier post "The Facts of Life":

First, thank you for what you said. I don't think I ever knew really how you viewed my relationship with B.

It's actually funny you said that today. Last night we went to a football party, not much fun for me or B., and they were playing music over the game in the last half. The first song was "I'm Coming Out" and suddenly B. takes center stage and starts performing his new dance moves. (some were very provocative, Britney moves no doubt) and then "I Will Survive" and he was only getting started! The whole party was laughing so hysterically they could barely breathe! Then Abba, then Le Freak! OMG!! He was actually GOOD! I leaned over to my friend M. and began to explain how B. just loves to dance. It was something we've always done together, since he was a baby, and it makes him happy. Maybe I was afraid, just a little, that they were laughing AT him. M. just said "He is great!! He's actually got rhythm!" His wife agreed and they both said maybe he should take dance lessons. I love that B. doesn't have to suffer some of the social stigmas like you did, or I did. Maybe he's the next Billy Elliott..:) I'm so proud of him.

Funny how Dexter is imitating Peggy. I hear most younger siblings learn to use the bathroom by watching their older siblings. But even more, as irritating as it may be to Peggy having Dexter one step behind her he's learning alot.

Did you ever think, that even with our 12 year age difference and you off to college when I was only 4, that I would have really gotten much from what little relationship we had at the time? EVERYTHING that became who I was growing up, was patterned after you. I saw your art and it amazed me, I had to become an artist. Your poetry I found in dusty boxes in the garage, became another way for me to be able to deal with adolescence, letting out all the agressions and heartache that come nicely packaged with the new hormones, and I became a poet too. Even the acting! Mama had all your yearbooks still on shelves at home and there you were, an actor too! All I got from you made me who I am today. I know that doesn't seem much. The art is gone. The poetry exists, but sometimes doesn't find paper and the acting only happens to an unsuspecting audience. But, I'm a mom. And without you, I can't even imagine how B. would be for all that I did learn from you. THANK YOU!

I love you :) -c.

Just for the record, I edited (slightly) to protect the indignant. Also, though all the talk about art and poetry makes it sound like we were raised in a Commune, we weren't. Although I wrote poetry through college and even won some awards, it's not something I pursue on a regular basis.

7:07:46 PM    sro home /

A year and a half-ago I had a heart attack. It was late at night and I got a pain in my chest that wouldn't go away and kept me from falling asleep. Eventually I arose and told Joe, my ex, I was going to the hospital. I truthfully thought it was nothing serious and made him stay, thinking I would be back in a couple of hours. I got in our car and drove myself to Ceder-Sinai and was promptly admitted.

Around six, Joe showed up with a friend and Peggy, who they amazingly let in the Emergency Room to see me. I was still waiting for a room upstairs and was going through all the standard tests. Eventually, a space became available and I was moved to ICU. All of the rooms at Ceder-Sinai are private but that weekend was unusually crowded and they temporarily placed me in a room with an older man.

Apparently one of the IVs they give you when you have a Heart Attack causes headaches and to counter the pain, you're given Vicodin. Extensive as my Drug Career had been, I'd never been in a position to have such free reign with a painkiller. The closest I can remember was being good friends with a drug dealer in the late seventies who allowed me carte blanche with his Quaaludes. Of course I also had a Backstage Pass for the coke, so the effects are questionable at best.

It wasn't until later I learned Vicodin was the drug du jour, causing headlines because of it's High Celebrity Factor. I obviously wasn't a Celebrity but I was probably one of the youngest patients ever in Cardio ICU (I was 39 at the time) and promptly became RN's Pet. Therefore, as with my friend years before, I kept the ball rolling on the Vickies, getting 2 every four hours and more if I asked. Who wouldn't?

Blitzed on painkillers, I quickly took full advantage of the situation. The nurses began bringing me food and I became dependent on "Mrs. Dash", the only seasoner I was allowed, which I liberally scattered over everything. I had my iBook and unplugged my room phone and surfed the internet. Joe smuggled Peggy in to see me and when we were discovered my room was crowded with young nurses wanting to pet her.

One night while I was in ICU, Joe went to a Benefit Showing of the movie Valley Of The Dolls which I had planned to attend with him. Before he and a friend went, they came for a visit and I was more than happy to entertain. Joe brought his Polaroid and a bag of costumes and I posed as the Crazy Neely O'Hara, the one in the hospital surrounded by tubes and screaming to the cold attendants, "I NEED A DOLL!" We took an extra pic for the nurses, certainly a first in the ward, and they proudly thumbtacked it on the bulletin board.

Eventually I went to surgery and had an angiogram performed. My cardiologist discovered I had two blocked arteries though one of them was somehow still letting blood through. The reasons for my heart disease were three-fold. One, I am genetically disposed. Two, the meds I take for HIV increase blood pressure and cholestorol levels. Three, I smoked although only for the past ten years. I was advised against a bypass and began an additional daily regimen of heart meds.

The Unpleasant Truth about Vicodin is it's highly addictive and I found this out when I left the hospital and went cold turkey. I also went on the Internet and learned post-Heart Attack-depression is common and the feelings I felt weren't just from withdrawal.

I look at the pictures of me in bed, high and laughing and the tubes around me all the Real Thing, and think how lucky I am. Lucky that, despite the lack of a Cheesy Theme Song, the experience can bring a smile to my face.

4:12:09 PM    sro home /

I don't have children and if it's anything like having dogs, Thank God I never had a paternal urge. I have a three year old Jack Russell named Peggy that my ex and I got during our relationship. Now that we've seperated he's gotten his own puppy, another Jack Russell named Dexter, and I'm often in the position of having both dogs around.

Peggy gets terribly jealous. Especially since Dexter is teething and wants nothing more than to chew on my arm all day. She will tolerate his antics to a certain degree but eventually snaps, both metaphorically and literally, and turns Cujo on him. Dexter is no dummy and while he becomes submissive against her aggression, he continues to yap, either at her or me or the general unfairness of being small in a Bigger Dog World.

Sometimes the two of them fighting is the only respite I get and I find myself pushing Dexter her way, hoping she'll react and the two of them can snarl it out. Instigating fights between your "kids" is not a parental tactic I've heard of before and I shudder to think what Dr. Phil would say. It works though, and since my communication skills with both of them are limited, is often the easiest route.

My own sister was born when I was twelve and whatever sibling rivalry we had was certainly not on an even playing field. I was beginning High School and too busy formulating my own psyche to pay much attention to hers. I remember rocking her to sleep when she was a baby, she remembers me telling her she was adopted. The truth, as much as there can be one, is more likely somewhere in between.

Now, of course, she's much older and has become a beautiful woman and six years ago became a mother. I'm impressed by her skill in the area and wonder what it would be like to have a mother like her, one who's threshhold for angst is relatively high. My nephew is very smart, curious and seemingly unconcerned with the stigmas and stereotypes prevelant in the 60s and 70s of my upbringing. He loves Beauty and the Beast and prefers to play the lead, Beauty, using a towel to represent his long luxurious hair. My sister finds it amusing while my mother acts appalled and hesitant, afraid, no doubt, that he might turn out like Me.

I can relate. When I was ten my best friend, another boy, and I went to a David Cassidy concert, the first concert I ever attended. He sang Partridge Family songs and we, the audience, appropriately screamed and rushed the stage. Near the end, a girl - an obviously older Teen Ager - turned to us and said "What are you doing here? You're boys."

Oops. It never occured to me that going to see David Cassidy in concert was a "girl thing", anymore than buying Tigerbeat and putting up pictures of him and Bobby Sherman on my bulletin board was a Gender Issue. I don't think it's when I thought of myself as being Gay, but it certainly was a huge Buzz Kill for the event.

Dexter adores Peggy, watching her every move. When I take them for walks, he squats like she does to pee, lifting his leg only slightly as a gesture. As a parent, I wonder if I should worry. Other dogs may see him and point and laugh, turning what he does naturally into a Gender Issue and taking out all the fun.

The second Big Tip I've learned about parenting is All Things Pass and even as I write, the two of them are sleeping soundly, their white furry bodies nestled together as if they were one.

2:27:14 PM    sro home /