In response to his little girl's asking about white Santas, a friend of mine used to tell her,

"Don't worry, Santa's really black. He's just passing."

That's a phrase I've borrowed a few times myself to shut up particularly virulent racist diatribes in my presence: "How do you know I'm not passing?" Guaranteed to stop 'em in their tracks, because it's an unfamiliar challenge and they don't know quite what's about to happen, though they're pretty sure they might not enjoy it. People who don't know me yet take one look and make all sorts of erroneous assumptions; the racists think they've got carte blanche.

God bless them, more and more of the younger generation are just plain puzzled over the hangups of ours.

You do realize that even with a big old barn of a house, I'm going to run out of wall space,

don't you?

That has to be one of the best pictures ever. Sweet story to go with it. I don't exactly favor People magazine, but that's one issue I'll have to buy. If I can find one in this tiny town. (The only folks who call us the 'big town' are those from places that have a maximum population down to 6 or 7. A more typical count hovers around 200/300, and those are few and far between.)

edit: Sorry I forgot to mention earlier: Some men would be whining when they said they had 3 opinionated, strong, tall women. But it takes a real man to say that with sincere admiration.

How sweet! My dogs refuse to wear sweaters. Every time I put one on them, they tear it off.

Same with collars so I had to have them microchipped.

I love soccer!

Too many headers, that's probably what's wrong with me now.

JD studied classical guitar for many years. He debuted professionally with the blues at around age

11 and took off from there. I was surprised when he threw in with the Kelly band for awhile, but he's gone back to his own band now, SIMO. Check them out. Glad you like him. He's also a tremendously sweet and well-reared young man. When he threw guitar picks to the crowd, he'd step over and hand mine to me. Even stopped playing one time just to announce from the stage that he appreciated 'this good woman's support.'

Maybe I looked a little out of place at his shows even though I appear only about half my real age. But anyone who loved Stevie Ray couldn't help adore this kid. And yes, barring accident, we should have him with us for a good long time. One of my favorite moments happened at the Pines (Prescott AZ) when another professional guitarist stood entranced at stage side, and JD moved over closer so he could study his fingering more closely. The guy just stood there with his jaw dropped almost to his knees!

Stevie Ray was the absolute best.

At least until JD Simo came along. I'd be hard put to choose between them, and there's no real reason to need to do so. I'm a most fortunate person to have seen both perform live many times. Small venues were always my favorite because I could arrive when the doors opened and stake out a place right next to the stage. Those were very happy times for me. By the time JD came along, I had a Sony minicam and took some great videos of performances no one else taped, so they're unique. Someday I'll get around to posting stuff on YouTube.

JD did the best cover of 'Hurt' imaginable.

Doctors Oz and Weill both stress that viewers should listen to their bodies, be aware of symptoms,

You would be the local authority on that, I suppose?

I guess you don't appreciate the health indicator value of poop? Ignorance is NOT bliss.

Is it above your level of comprehension and retention, then? It's really just little tidbits of

critical information with a lot of sugar (fun) to make the medicine go down. Succinct explanations and reasons included. I suppose you also discount the value of yoga? tsk tsk tsk.... I once meditated my way through a 4.6 quake in L.A. w/o even being fully aware of it. I saw people get up and move around in slow motion, but I thought they were taking a break from a very long ceremony at the Buddhist temple where we were gathered. You have no idea the cred that gave me, even though I certainly didn't feel the need to seek attention.