Jill Rants and Raves

Survivalist fantasy

At the traffic light heading off the freeway this morning I found myself behind a older model Ford pickup with a beaten up camper shell. No designer truck this. On the back is a hand painted slogan - 'Rule Number #1 - don't mess with a grizzly bear' and next to that a painting of a grizzly and some bullet holes. Whoa. As we pull up to the next light, I'm neck and neck with Mr Hunter Man and I look over  at him. I can see the camouflage jacket, the grizzled grey moustache drooping over his top lip, and the look of steely determination in his eye. He's heading to the same dog park as I am. We pull in to the parking spaces next to one another. I'm half expecting survivalist Bo Gritz to climb out of the cab with a rifle. I can hear what I fantasise to be major hunting dogs in the back of the truck.
I climb out of my piddling little station wagon, carrying my 17 year old dachshund in my arms. This giant of a man, with a baseball cap imprinted with 'Vietnam Veteran' emerges from the truck and gives me the hugest grin. From the seat next to him he gingerly retrieves his pride and joy - a three month old mini dachshund, and on it's diamond encrusted collar a little tag with the name 'Princess'.

Even the hunting dogs I've imagined turn out to be some overweight retriever mixes. I'm a little disappointed but perhaps it's better that Bo Gritz doesn't hang at the same parks I do.

Trabants, Die Mauer and a Pink Honda

I was driving to my favorite coffee spot in Berkeley when I saw it. From the back it looked like a Trabant, the car that almost everyone drove in communist controlled East Germany. The Trabant was a toxic disaster all on it's own, made out of papier mache it seemed and which became a collectors item after the collapse of the Wall. Much like Die Mauer itself, which was packaged in small plastic containers imprinted on the outside with the date on which the Wall was scaled. The streetwise vendors made sure to include a bit of colored paint on each chunk so that American suckers would carry home a genuine (you have to say genuine the way some beef obsessed Texan would drawl it -  gen - you - wine ) piece of graffiti'd history.

But to get back to my story. The little Honda (I think it was a 1970's N600 - that almost counts as a classic if only it weren't so unbelievably ugly) pulled in front of me as if it meant business. It was pink, a sort of nail polish pink, and it belched an ugly green grey smoke which reeked of last month's garbage from it's skinny tailpipe. It caught my eye that's for sure, because one turn signal was on regardless of the fact that it was turning the opposite way. The woman driving was possessed - obviously an important person in a hurry, I watched as she almost got creamed by the driver of a Dodge van who, like me, thought the turn signal was an indicator of sorts....

But what really got my attention was - you guessed it - the reading material Berkeleyans insist on turning their vehicles into. They are taking the collapse of the independent bookseller very  personally. 

I have to hand it to this woman - her bumper stickers were limited to banning and boycotting and losers - no positive reinforcement on this car. Dennis Kucinich and Jesse Jackson For President...ho hum... 'Ban Voting Machines' and 'Boycott Berkeley Honda' - that's it..a no frills  punch 'em up type of politcal statement. Berkeley does love it's labor disputes.

I'm taking a while getting to the point here - the point was the license plate. In California people just love to personalize their number plates. And you can while away the traffic time, trying to figure out what they are spelling out in the 7 spaces without vowels...SGR DDY is prett clear as is DGLUVR...and this one left no room for error....USA USSR it proclaimed.

I take comfort though - she has to pay a license plate renewal fee every year to make her political statement. I'm relieved that the fee she has to pay will go to programs to protect the environment. With the grey guck from the back of her Honda Trabant still sticking to my front fender, I'm glad to know she's doing her bit for Mother Earth.....if only because she's forced to by a government agency.

Twisted Sister - Dont' Read On

The photos of me on this site are getting younger. I should be worried about this. But curiously I'm not. I'm going through a midlife crisis. At least, I hope it's a midlife crisis, and not a late life crisis. And running photos on my own blog which remind me of the days when women were falling for me in droves, is good for my battered ego. Thing is - women do still fall for me occasionally but for some reason I'm never quite right. What is that????? As Hank Williams says: My hair is still curly, my eyes are still blue, so why don't you love me like you used to do?'

It definitely is the blue eyes. Oh, and the British accent. And the 'you're so smart, artistic, a genius, fucking rockin' in bed, sweet, an animal lover, intense, charming...etc" that all works too. But I'm never the one they want to marry. The one who did 'marry' me told me 12 years later she'd never had that 'falling in love' experience with me. Loved me...sure. In love? No. oops....sorry 'bout that.

But before you think I'm feeling sorry for myself. I am. Totally, absolutely. I'm in therapy for the first time in my life. That is absolutely weird. What do I think I will discover? I'm one of the most self aware people I know. Problem is, I'm also one of the most intuitive people I know. Often, I know what my girlfriend is doing before she does. Does this sound like self-fulfilling prohecy? Nonsense.

I'm going to change the subject. Back to.... I am so sick to death of Berkeley bumperstickers. People ruin a perfectly decent car with hundreds of competing stickers. And in Berkeley they usually involve word play with the word 'bush', refer to villages in Texas and idiots, more often than not talk about stealing elections (had Gore or Clinton just won their own home states we wouldn't be having this conversation), evoke some liberal radio station, bake sales and fighter jets, education and ignorance, earth and mothers, midwives, something about not eating your pet so don't eat your cow, Peace, Iraq, War,Troops and not letting friends drink a particular brand of coffee...and I'm sick of the lot of them. The worst one is the 'Animals Are Little People With Fur. Give me a break. What a bunch of self righteous ninnies. Never mind the fact that most of these cars have bald tires, or huge dents in them, are way overdue for a new muffler and are driven by cell phone using, soy chai chugging, muffin chewing, Patagonia wearing Berkeley liberals. It isn't that I'm not a liberal. I know which side of the barricades I belong. I'm just tired of Berkeley, and wish I could live anywhere but here right now. Preferably on a hill.

A dear friend of mine says "Jill, if you're going to be so bitter and twisted in your blog, you should start another one, under a pseudonym. Then you can really cut loose'. Wish I could, but I'm incapable of being bitter and twisted anonymously. I'd have to tell, I can't keep a secret.