Slices of Life - Company dinner

Thursday evening:

My husband and I (I have to come up with some clever nickname or initials for him) attended a business-related dinner.  One of those where you sit at a big round table with 9 other people, and there are 9 or 10 of those tables in the room and all those voices create a cacophony that would make a bat's ears bleed.  So you can really only hear the people right next to you talking.  If you want to hear the people across the table, you have to lean forward and cup your ear like Beverly Hillbillies Granny.  And sometimes, the people on either side of you are facing away, talking to the people that aren't you. (For the purposes of this little story, I'll use "bh" for "beloved husband") (At times, that would need to be spoken with tongue firmly planted in cheek).

Me: (The people on my right are having a conversation that I can't hear completely, but I try to look keenly interested)

BH: (The people on his left are having a conversation that is engrossing to the two of them)

Me: So, how ya doin'?

BH: Pretty good.  You?

Me: Not bad.  This food is really good.

BH: I don't like it (he pushes it around his plate)*.

Me:  You seemed to like those morel mushrooms (I'd given him one of mine and the man sitting next to me gave both of his to bh)

BH: (Shrugs) Only the first two were really good.

Me: What are they talking about on your side?

BH:  Haiti, I think.  Earthquake fall-out.  What about your side?

Me: Finances.

BH: Oh.  (We should've switched seats at this point.  Finance is like the adult-speak in the Peanuts comics to me: waaah-waah-waaah.  Bh is all about the finance.  I might've been able to hold up a bit of conversation about Haiti, though).

BH: Why don't you ask Jean about scuba diving?

Me: Huh?  (Jean is sitting two people away and is involved in the finance talk)

BH: You know, make conversation, have something to talk about.

Me: (Blinking.  Trying to understand what the HELL he is talking about because Jean obviously needs no encouragement to talk and I'd have to lean over the man between us and say: "Hey, Jean, I hear you like to scuba dive!")  (Also, I realize that he'd like to learn to scuba dive someday and wants me to want that, too.)  (Fat chance of that ever happening).  We've already had a nice conversation.  I talked.

BH:  What did you talk about?  (His eyes sort of glaze over and I think it's because his phone buzzed, meaning he got an email and now he's itching to see what it's about)

Me: (making shit up) Whether roadkill squirrels are tastier than roadkill possums.

BH: (doesn't hear me)

Me: (goes back to the finance talk)

*THIS sort of thing is why together we look like a golf club and a bowling ball.  He's a foot taller than me and weighs less. 

Slices of Life - weekend activities

We've had a busy few days.  I'm jotting down a few of the stand-out moments...

Friday evening - Husb and I attended a fundraiser dinner for a local charity.  The big event was a dance contest of sorts, where local 'celebrities' danced with pro dance instructors.  The celebs were to drum up votes at $40 each, all to go to the charity.  It was fun.  They'd been practicing for weeks on their dance number.  Some did salsa, some foxtrot, some swing.  A la Dancing with the Stars.  Anyway, we're sitting at our table, watching, and Husb leans over to me.
Husb: Give you any ideas?
Me: (Of course it did, but I wanted to hear what he was thinking) Like what?
Husb: You know. 
Me: Yeah?
Husb: For a story (waggles eyebrows).  One could be in drag.
Me: (Having already generated plot bunny) That's brilliant!



Saturday - Husb and I discussed summer vacation plans.  Our son is going to join us, and so we're giving him a choice.  One - United Kingdom, some sort of land tour, or two - Mediterranean Cruise.  If you were at DIK Blog a while back, you saw Jenre's Post about romance novel tropes and a little discussion about researching Greek Billionaires.  Such irony that now we were seriously talking about a cruise that will take us to a few of those Greek Isles! But today, Boy informed us that if he gets to choose, he'd rather go to England and/or Ireland.

Saturday evening - We went to see a production of Avenue Q, which is an adult muppet musical.  There's a gay muppet - Rod (holding book in picture) and his not-gay roommate Nicky.  Rod denies that he's gay until near the end of the show and after intensive therapy.  And Nicky finds him a boyfriend, Ricky, who happens to look just like Nicky, because Nicky knows Rod's type.


Beyond that, though, there was muppet sex.  I kid you not.  Princeton and Kate Monster (see photo below) went out on a sweet date.  The Bad Idea Bears showed up with Long Island Iced Teas and our protagonists got drunk, went home and had sex.  Accompanied by the song "You Can Be As Loud as the Hell You Want (When You're Makin' Love)".  I thought it was hysterical.  My dear husb, however, was, well, shocked.  I think it was a "Please bleach my eyeballs" moment for him.  We discussed it at intermission: 

Husb: That's just not right.
Me: I thought it was hysterical.
Husb: Muppets are supposed to be cute.  They're for kids. 
Me: Do you need to go home?
Husb: No.  Just...I can't think about muppets that way.
Me: Well, these are grown up muppets.  




Wishing you all a wonderful week!

National Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month. Erotic Horizon has suggested for bloggers to do something poetic. So here are a couple of my favorites.

 

 

[in Just-]

by e. e. cummings 

in Just-

spring          when the world is mud-

luscious the little

lame balloonman

whistles          far          and wee

and eddieandbill come

running from marbles and

piracies and it's

spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer

old balloonman whistles

far          and             wee

and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's

spring

and

         the

                  goat-footed

balloonMan          whistles

far

and

wee

 

FOG 

by Carl Sandberg
 

   The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

 

 

 

 

 

 

How Much Is Too Much?

I'm reading a book (well, duh).  It's m/m romance.  The writing is good - clever, correct grammar, plot builds well, etc.  But it has a lot of detail (to me anyway).  The step-by-step kind while one guy teaches the other a new skill.  No, it's not a sexual skill.  I find the details mildly interesting but not enough to pay complete attention to them, so I sort of skim.  This happens from time to time in my reading. Recently it was a little too much military life.

I'm also writing a book.  (Not the paranormal I've mentioned).  And now I'm paranoid.  Am I writing too much detail, too much about getting from here to there, etc?

Val recently (okay, like ten days ago) posted about what unkowns you like in your fiction, and it's possible that someone else followed that up with more deep thoughts, so that's what got me started on this path.

So how much is too much detail in a book?  Are there limits to what you want to know?

Just Askin' - Has M/M Skewed Your Thinking?

First: A word from our sponsor.  Ice Cream on the Side got a lovely little review from Sensual Reads! Now on to our regularly scheduled program...

I saw "Clash of the Titans" this weekend.  You know - the remake with Sam Worthington as Perseus.  As soon as I saw those pretty boy soldiers who went with him on his quest, I wanted to see them.  Together.  En deshabille. 

Alas!  It wasn't meant to be.  But thinking about it got me through the over-long battle with the giant scorpion thingies.

(Sorry I could only find a decent pic of one of the boys.)

A few years ago, this thought wouldn't have crossed my mind.  At least, I'm pretty sure it wouldn't.

But my point (yes, I have one) is my mind seems to be permanently skewed toward the m/m-ness of...whatever...

On a recent vacation in Jamaica, at a lovely all-inclusive beach resort, I snickered (mentally) every time I caught sight of the Activities sign advertising "watersports."  I definitely wouldn't have given that a second glance a few years ago.  I wondered if anyone else at the hotel got a kick out of it. Then I wondered if I'm just a big ol' perv.

Today my suspicions about myself were confirmed when I came across this clue in my crossword: Type of plug.  Four letters.  All that came to my mind was "butt".  I tried to scrape up my knowledge of butt plugs to figure out a type of butt plug that has four letters, even though I was sure that wasn't what they were looking for.  Couldn't get past that. Until I got m_le in the puzzle.  Oh.  Male.  Like electrical plugs.

Please tell me I am not the only one who suffers this condition.  Finding m/m goodness in ordinary, everyday things.