Julia Barrett's World

Disclaimer - this is not my bird, however my bird looks just like this and she does goofy things just like this. Every morning, in her little birdie voice, she says, “Wake up.” And every night, without fail, in her little birdie voice, she says, “Nite, Tib.” (Her name is Tibby.) It’s so sweet!

Tibby has quite the vocabulary. She asks, “So?” She repeats various versions of “Step up,” as in, “Wanna step up,” and “Please step up,” and “Tib step up.”

She can say, “Wait!” “C’mere.” “Okay.” “What?” “What’s up?”

Of course, cute and funny as she is, she can bite like a demon, or a dinosaur from which she’s descended - I tell you, it’s a good thing dinosaurs shrank into birds because otherwise they’d make very bad pets.

All of which is way off topic! It’s been one of those weeks where I’ve accomplished next to nothing writing-wise. The website’s about all I’ve looked at. Three days of work IRL entails at least two days of mental and emotional recovery. Then I got a nasty migraine. Still have it. I did however, get a contract offer from Siren - which is very exciting - and I managed to fill out my forms. That’s something. And I found this great coffee - just the smell draws me out of bed. Starbuck’s Gold Coast Blend - it’s like heaven.

I have watched some basketball - I’m second in my pool because I picked some early upsets but there’s no way I can win the whole thing. Enjoy some B-ball this weekend! Fist bump for March Madness!

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Today was Awful…after the bird situation.

Hubby had to work at home today, so after our early morning hike, I took the dog and headed over to a coffee house to drink a double-tall-nonfact-peppermint mocha, no whip, extra foam. The dog ordered a mini-vanilla scone.

Anyway, I’m sitting there near a guy who looked neat enough. He wore faded blue jeans, a nice dark green sweater and running shoes. He was well-built, attractive, around my husband’s age and he asked me about my little laptop. Then ensued a long discussion about how I can repair my old laptop with the fried hard-drive, a computer which I much preferred. I figured he was somebody who’d made a killing in the tech industry back in the day and now he had retired early and he could sit, drinking coffee and reading library books to his heart’s content. But no…

He was in the tech industry and he was hired by a New York company two and a half years ago. He and his wife moved out East, bought a home, and all was hunky dory. Six months later, he was laid off. They managed to sell their house, but he couldn’t find another job. They moved back here, to California, moved in with his mother-in-law, and then his wife got sick with a chronic illness that is going to kill her pretty soon and they don’t have health insurance. He voted for Obama and now he’s scared to death that between looming deficits, the unemployment figures, the decrease in consumer confidence and the outsourcing of manufacturing, this country is headed to hell in a handbasket.

Yeah, no fuckin’ shit. After reading Sunday’s New York Times, I’m just as scared. I tossed and turned all night, wondering what the hell we are going to do - as a nation - and I don’t think Democrats and Republicans screaming at each other and pointing fingers is any solution. I made the mistake of listening to Tim Pawlenty on Meet the Press, a show I never watch, and all I could think was - because basically he said nothing of substance - if this guy becomes president, he’s going to make me go to church - I’m Jewish - and ask me whether I believe in God or not - and that’s none of his damn business! And didn’t that bridge fall down because his tax cuts gutted Minnesota’s infrastructure??? What is going to happen to my children and their children? Guess we’ll be moving to Costa Rica, Canada or Scotland because the tolerance factor in America is dropping precipitously.

I listen to the political pundits and instead of offering solutions to the myriad problems facing us, they dish out hatred and blame and name-calling. Gee, how constructive. While the politicos are busy insulting each other, this guy’s wife is dying because they don’t have any health insurance, two of my three kids can’t find jobs, my divorced sister and my divorced cousin - both dedicated teachers, are out of work and will probably have to move in with me, half the people living on my court are unemployed or under-employed, houses are in foreclosure - including my cousin’s. Really, America, this sucks. This fuckin’ sucks. Maybe we should just outsource our government.

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