Kay Hanley

Last night we had a lovely party to celebrate the 9th anniversary of the birth of our best gal, Zoe Mabel. Her birthday isn’t actually until next week but this was the last chance to get all of her homies together before she leaves for Cape Cod for the summer. She is such a good kid, I have to *squink squink* my eyeballs in amazement sometimes.

 they all look like teenagers now.  go easy on me, please.

The night before, USA returned from 2 weeks on the road with Rob Dickinson.  For the first week that he was away I held down the fort like a champ but after several Celtics games and pool parties where everyone converged on the home of the rockers, my well oiled machine quickly began coming off the rails.  Here’s a roundup of the 2 weeks that USA was away and all the hooligans that forced me to rock out while the laundry and dishes piled up.

 bill likes to tickle. carol is supportive. stacy gets cozy in front of the tv.

jamie & joey seem nice enough but that kaylyn has always been a troublemaker.

  carol & courtney reprazent tha LMV

At one point during game 5 of the Celtics/Lakers series, my neighbor Ami (a lakers fan) snuck away from the game action in the living room briefly enough to a) not be missed and b) do this to my son.

 this is so wrong. put a yankees cap on him while you’re at it.

Not for nothing, but Carol took this picture and several others.  Thanks a lot, MILFA, I see how it is now.  When I found the pictures on my camera I jumped up and down, threw a fit and proclaimed righteous indignation to all those involved (including ami’s wife and kid) but between me and you, I thought it was pretty funny.  Look at poor Henry with his Rondo shirt underneath the Kobe one, knowing that he was doing something he shouldn’t.  Also, as a lifelong Boston sports fan, I had to respect the cojones.  Don’t tell Ami that though, because he and Jackie owe us dinner because the stupid LAKERS LOST.  HAHA!!!  The more guilt I pour on, the more impressive the dinner will be, is how I figure it.

Other things that have happened over the last few weeks:

The members of one of the bands I’m in went down to Nashville for a week to shoot scenes for a movie.  I think I signed some sort of confidentiality agreement, so I can’t reveal what the movie was or any details, but I think it’s fair to post some pix.  

 me standing in for the star

  stacy and schmidley with some girl.

 One of my closest girlfriends, Melissa Eltringham, moved to Nashville last year.  I cannot express how happy I was to see her and catch up.  When she showed up at my hotel to pick me up for dinner, Hillary Clinton was on CNN giving what we thought was going to be a concession speech (’twas not to be).  We spent the first 15 minutes of our long awaited reunion glued to the TV watching an historic moment in American politics.  How fitting.  It’s a gift to have women like her in my life.  

  love ya, melisse. whoreanous mani/pedi and all…

Henry graduated from pre-school so naturally he and his friends wanted to celebrate at McDonald’s.  He and the guys are all big kindergarteners now.  Gah!  How did that happen?

hank, ryan, aidan & caleb moving up in style.

 On deck:  a whole lot of nothing, I hope.  And then I have to learn the new Miley record for our dates this month.  More to come….

xok 

Conroy called me this afternoon.  Like most of my non - face to face interaction with close personal friends, Conroy and I keep our daily chit chat as efficient as possible. We text (i.e. omg!!! andre 3000 at studio city trader joes! wearing suspenders and a straw hat!!!!!).  If I get a call from him during the day, which I hardly ever do, it usually has to do with CNN alerts (that go straight to his phone because he is a dork and i mean that as a compliment), usually of a wonky, political nature.  American politics is pretty much my favorite topic of conversation no matter how arcane, so I always pick up.  When I answered the phone today I was expecting an outraged kerfuffle about the dissenting opinions on the Supreme Court decision regarding Gitmo.  Or something like that.  Right now, I wish that I had been right.

conroy:  ”i just got a cnn alert.  i think tim russert is dead.  he collapsed at nbc’s washington bureau” 

me: “what???!!!”

conroy: “…………”

me: “…………”

Frankly,  I was surprised by how hard it was for me to hear this news.  The first thing I thought about was Mr. Russert’s sign off on Meet The Press last weekend when he gave a proud shout out to his son Luke to congratulate the boy on his graduation from Boston College.  In true Russert style, the moment was brief, to the point and with no self aggrandizement.   I then began to think about the amazing interviews that he was on the receiving end of as he promoted the book that he wrote about his dad, Big Russ, who has now outlived him.  I have no idea where the feeling came from, but I started crying.

What a terrible loss.  On so many levels.  Tim Russert was one of the best that American journalism had to offer.  His interviews with political figures could always be counted on for unparalleled substance and depth.  His unabashed adoration and respect for his family gave him a humanity that engendered trust from his audience and admiration from his peers.  Like most grown ups, he approached our rapidly changing society and world with common sense so rarely reflected in today’s political coverage.  His journalistic ethos transcended the mindless chest thumping that has turned most political debate into shrill, partisan ghettos.  

My only hope is that the loss of Tim Russert will be instructive.  I hope that American journalists will take this opportunity to look at how they have failed us in recent history.  It is now time to reinvigorate the standards that our journalists were once known for and to uphold the uncompromising character that seemed so effortless in the hands of a guy who passionately loved to find truth in an arena that hates to reveal it.

-xok 

Is it possible for one to more absolutely prove their relentless self absorption than by having one of these??  I say this because I do have one and I feel very up my own ass as a result.

 

Twitter.  As a noun it seems cute as in “I just joined Twitter”.  But when you use it as a verb as in “I am twittering more often than Mike Schmid these days” it sounds kind of dirty.  Maybe that won’t be such a problem as I have just discovered that the correct usage of Twitter as a verb is “Tweeting”.   If you go back to your original Latin text of Virgil’s “Aeneid”, I believe you will find that tweeting is derived from the first person singular of the indicative active present.  Oh, first conjugation, of course - LOL!  But I didn’t need to tell YOU that… 

Want to see my Twitter?  Shit, I just disproved my initial point.  Oh, well.

- xok