Zengrrl dot com :|: The Personal Website of Writer Michelle Snow

some random late night queries…

Apr 27, 2008 Uncategorized

1] Why is it the cable always goes out five minutes before the movie I’ve waited for all week starts?

2] Why do the cats always wait until 5 or 6 am to play tag?

3] And why am I always home base?

4] When accepting Facebook requests for things like stickers and hugs, do they multiply like amoeba when you accept them? I started with 125, got down to 98 and now I’m at 137. All in the space of four hours. WTF?

5] Why do people assume that those of us who earn a living with the computer are just wasting time goofing off on it?

6] Had a guy complain to me that he thought the full frontal male nudity in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” shouldn’t have been allowed in a R-rated film — but full frontal female is always ok. Is a nude penis somehow more “R”-rated than a nude vagina? Or does it just make him uncomfortable to have to look at another man’s penis?

7] Can you imagine if we had to greet each other like dogs do…by sniffing each other’s butts?

8] Why do people care who Tila Tequila dates?

9] Speaking of R-rated movies, why do parents think it’s ok to bring their young and pre-teen kids to see them? Does any 8 year old need to see Hostel or Knocked Up?

Feel free to answer any of those or post some random queries of your own…

it’s been three long years…

Apr 23, 2008 Uncategorized

It was early this morning when the song popped in my head…

“Tie a yellow ribbon ’round the old oak tree. It’s been three long years. Do you still miss me?”

And not just the normal chorus version, but the jazzy ad lib outro of the song. At first, my musicology background corrected the lyrics to “Do you still want me?” but then I remembered that my mom always told me when a song pops into your head like that, there’s usually a meaning for it. It wasn’t hard to figure it out.

Today was my mom’s birthday and it’s been three years since I lost her to cancer. She would have been 56 today.

Now a lot of people think I didn’t love her because we fought all the time. But it wasn’t that I didn’t love her – I have always loved her deeply. I just hated the drug-dependent person she became later in life and that’s what we fought about.

To me, my mom will always be the deeply passionate, insanely talented artist who taught me it was ok to be smart and strong and most importantly, myself, no matter what other people said.

But it still frustrates me that she constantly surrounded herself with people who enabled her to do her drugs and who encouraged her alcoholism. Pisses me off that she always chose relationships with men who beat her and cut her down and told her she was good for nothing. She could have been a world famous artist or anything she wanted, but she chose to do the drugs and numb herself with them.

Now I know I’m no saint. I’ve had my issues with alcohol when I’ve been super depressed, but I’ve never been completely dependent on it and I’ve never thrown my life away in search of the next fix. But to watch this amazingly intelligent and talented woman just waste her life away on this shit was more than I could handle. Even towards the end, she still wouldn’t give up her cigarettes and pot and alcohol and god knows what else. And it’s hard to watch your own mother self-destruct and know that no matter what you said to her, it would just end up in a big argument where she would deny she had any problem at all and that is was me that had the problem because I wouldn’t do that stuff.

But of course, to everyone else, it was all my fault because I didn’t love her enough.

It’s been three long years since she passed away and I still miss her to no end. Even with the anger and the frustration, she has always and will always have a big chunk of my heart. And nothing anybody says can take away how I truly felt about her.

Mom, wherever you are, I hope you are in a good place with gramma and Michael. And today I celebrate your life, for the short time I had to share it with you. You are a big reason I am the person I am today and I will always love you.

PS: Here’s a few of my favorite pieces of art that mom did that I could find photos for. You can view the rest of it at Webshots. The image above is also a self-portrait my mom did before she got sick.

give until your fingers hurt..

Apr 18, 2008 Uncategorized

One nice thing about the internet is it offers opportunities to help others, even if you don’t have the money to donate. One of my new favorite sites is called “Free Rice” and it not only enables you to donate free food (the rice) but it lets you build your vocabulary at the same time.

The basic idea is you are presented with a word and four possible meanings. When you pick the correct meaning, the site donates 20 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program. Now, by itself 20 grains of rice isn’t a lot. But the idea is the more you play and the more other people play, the bigger the donation. So when you have a few free minutes during the day, such as when you’re on IM or Twitter or something like that, pull up the site and play a few rounds. You learn and people get to eat.

To quote Martha Stewart…”It’s a good thing.”

While you’re at it, here are some of my other favorite daily visits where all you have to do is click a button and the advertisers sponsor the donations:

Are there any I’m missing that are faves of yours? Let me know in the comments. Otherwise, get to clicking already… LOL

returning to normal…somewhat

Apr 15, 2008 Uncategorized

Well, I finally fixed the old layout to bring it back online. I just wasn’t digging all the orange on the other layout – esp. not with the blue. I guess I’ve never been much of a fan of the color orange anyways.

I’m hoping to finish up gramma’s garage this week since temps will actually be higher than the 30s the next few days. The only bad part is my friend Kurt had to have surgery to fix a torn rotator cuff, so I’m down my muscle. I can get the smaller stuff, but I pulled some shoulder muscles during the apt move and with sleeping on a couch they haven’t healed fully. Without someone with some arm muscles to lift the heavy stuff, I may get a bit stuck. Oh well, guess I’ll have to figure out a way around it.

In addition to reworking this layout (it’s still not completely done), I uploaded a bunch of old photos I found on my hard drive from 2003-2004 to Flickr. There were pix from road trips Rhon and I took to the Jack Daniels distillery in Lynchburg, TN and some trips to the Gulf coast of Florida. A few of my faves:

I also have some new articles posted at lasvegaslogue.com and budget travel @ suite101.

Other than dealing with the garage, I might go with my friend Mary down to Devil’s Lake for a photo walk this week. I’ll try not to wait 3-4 years to post those if we do. LOL I also want to see “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” this coming weekend. Besides starring one of my fave actresses (Kristen Bell), the previews I’ve seen look really funny.

I hope to be finished with the garage in the next week and then I’ll hit the road back to Orlando. I’ve never done a 1400 mile road trip by myself, so I am a bit nervous. But I’m going to use the opportunity to check out some areas and get some story material and photos. So if anyone has any tips of things to check out in Southern Illinois, Nashville or Birmingham, Alabama, feel free to leave me a note in comments or send me an email via the site.

Ok, I’m off to bed. If you spot anything wonky with the layout, let me know. Otherwise, I’ll catch y’all later.

damn paparazzi…

Apr 13, 2008 Uncategorized

I knew sooner or later they’d get me:

If you want your own cover, visit TVGuide.com. Beware, most of the options are even cheesier than this one, but it’s still kinda fun.

things I’ve learned in the recent move

Apr 1, 2008 Uncategorized

Well, all of gram’s stuff is now out of the apt. Still need to deal with the black hole of a garage, but I needed a day to rest. I was awake from Wednesday through last night at 9pm, living off of Mountain Dew and Full Throttle. And while it is possible to exist for six days with only 10 min sleep here and there, it’s not really recommended.

But I have learned a few things…

1. Gramma could pack like it was a black hole. One closet yielded seven big plastic tubs and nine bags of clothes. Don’t even talk to me about the china cabinet which took eleven boxes and six hours to pack.
2. I never ever want to see a Jesus statue or a crock pot ever again in my life. How many do you really need anyways?
3. Said Mountain Dew/Full Throttle diet is not very digestive system friendly. But it will keep you very regular.
4. It is possible to live off one slice of pizza a day.
5. Going offline for four days yields me over 9000 emails, not counting spam. Must stop signing up for mailing lists and discussion forums.
6. When installing a new layout, it is a good idea to test the comments. So yes, if you comment, I do see them in my WP admin area but they just don’t show up on the site. Will fix soon.
7. My cellphone will survive numerous box hits, drops and even a swim in mud.
8. My laptop, however, will retaliate against a move by shortening the battery life, forcing me to do a panicked search for the power cord amongst four boxes all labeled “Michelle – Office”.
9. When one reaches the breaking point, humor can pull you back from the edge. Barely.
10. That I really need to get some more sleep as I still have plenty of work to do and it’s easier when I’m not operating at “zombie” level.

Thanks to all who are clicking my article links to the right. I have a feeling taking care of the garage is going to take hiring a dumpster, which is pretty pricey around here.

Thanks for all of your emails, comments and calls of support, too.