My Favorite Blonde Martian

I should begin this week as I probably should every week- with an apology. I apologize to Al, Carl, Ty, and anyone else who works at the warehouse. Last Sunday as I got in my car heading off to complete production of this publication I noticed a god awful stench in my car. I sez to myself, I sez, "What the hell died?" The odor was so pungent I actually had to drive with my windows open days before it was fifty degrees in January. Brrrr, my high school friend voted class airhead Chris Jones, would have said.

I entered the warehouse dripping with more than the usual leeriness knowing when I was done I would have to open up the trunk of my scratched car and look for something in a state of decay. But lo and behold (and a bottle of bread!) as I was running off copies I noticed that the smell was in the warehouse as well. Hmmm, my post-college friend, Stephanie Jane, would have said.

I got home in a car not only still smelling but also downright chilly. As I was getting my lunch prepared I looked over and noticed that Mr. Max who now spends almost every minute of every day lying in his lil kitty hammock, up and sniffing curiously at my shoes. It then dawned on me that the unlikely coincidence of the same awful smell somehow having found its way in both my car and the warehouse might instead have something to do with me personally. Yup I sure stepped in something.

So if you guys arrived at the warehouse Monday morning and it was smelling of something terribly ripe, I am truly truly sorry. I would have gone back and cleaned anything I might have tracked around up, but darn it I was too busy trying to get the smell out of my car's floor mats.

But enough (or way too much) about stinkyness. How about something pleasant? I don't know if I've ever mentioned it but I have a certain fondness for Sandra Bullock. This fondness has more to do with how she reminds me of a "friend" from the past, a friend that remains with me more than a decade since I've last seen her than it does with me thinking Sandra is an extraordinary fabulous babe. I'll admit she isn't exactly hard to look at but I think she'd be my favorite actress even if she looked like Bela Lugosi.

That said have y'all picked up your copy of this month's Vogue? Oh my God. A now former workmate gave me the magazine as a going away gift. And what a gift it is. The cover shot of Sandra actually made me gasp. And the inside photos are among the best I've ever seen of her.

The cover pic alone almost is enough to convince me that there is indeed the existence of a higher being. Such beauty isn't normally found in fashion magazines after all. Yes the picture reveals a lovely shot of Sandra's bosom pushed up by a red and white dressy tank top (and a strategically placed black strap around the ribs) and yes that is what may catch the eye of most readers. But for me it's the eyes, it's the hair, it's the look on her face. This is the face of a gal that a fellow stuck in a decade long stupor would actually finally get off his arse for and maybe go out and do something eccentric like buy a white parakeet to give to her.

It's a picture I can't stop looking at yet still sheepishly don't want to let anyone see me looking at. The past is gone and you gotta keep moving forward. I've never been a great believer in one dimensional images but this one, dare I say, does something other than rob one of one's precious little soul.

Indeed I feel so inspired I think next week I'll go out and try and survive in an entirely different setting, an entirely different state of mind. Every three years I seem to jump out of the current and make a job switch and 2003 is no exception. I look into the picture of Sandra's eyes and I see 1988 all over and my first government job that included flinging voter registration cards into a bin and now years later there is so much more I'm going to be counted on doing. I stopped caring but things have changed.