Viva

St. Anthony's always marks the end of the summer for me. Since I was a little girl spending the feast weekends at my Dad's house in the North End, all summer breaks led up to the last one in August. Friends would come in to experience to exotic world of fried dough and rice balls, totally falling in love with the boys selling slush, and sticky sweaty nights getting lost in crowds.

This was a great summer. It might be one of the best I've ever had. Countless weekends away with friends and family with no stressful time restrictions. I wasn't able to perform with NXT due to scheduling conflicts (among other things) and with that boost I choose to take the summer off from Improv with the exception of the occasional FNFO show. The decision resulted in time - quality time - spent with friends that I've some how neglected. I had more time with Ted, renewing lost parts of our relationship; I mean let's face it - improv leads to neglecting him too. By doing all this, my improv has actually improved. Decisions and risks have been stronger. Group bonds have been renewed. A lot of goals have been put into perspective.

Last night slow dancing with Ted for just a few minutes while the band played and friends watched on marked a highlight for me. Lights and garlands were shining over head, people were laughing and singing. Confetti covered the ground, folding chairs with older ladies occupying the street where cars would normally be parked bumper to bumper. A small moment of perspective looking up at Ted, and a little bit of bitter sadness that This is it folks. Until next year.

"Hey, Do me a solid-"

The phrase makes me think of pooping. I don't like it. Never use it.

A view from our seats.

Dad and I scored amazing Red Sox tickets for Saturdays game. The photo is blurry cause it was taken from my phone, but we were third row behind the Red Sox Dugout. I made eye contact with Ortiz. It was sopping hot outside, the park was packed, and I had the best time. We slammed the Yankees (well, that day) and made friends with the people around us. Success!

"You get the hot dogs, I'll get the beer. We'll meet right by the condiments."

"Got it."

Okay Shannon. Get the hot dogs, Dad gets beer. Hot dogs, beer. Hot dogs, beer. Beer. Beer. Get the beer and meet by the condiments.

We ended up with 4 beers. I have a one track mind on hot days at the ball park.

The three men I want to spritz with a water bottle while they say my name and make eye contact with me:

Jason Segel

I want to smooch him. No, I want to smooch him and go on silly adventures. I want to go ghost hunting with him at night and come home to build pillow forts. I want to take long car rides and make up songs about alligators and the moon. I want to go the the Garment District with him and make silly outfits and go out to a fancy restaurant wearing them. I want to be his best friend... and I want to smooch him.

Naveen William Sidney Andrews

I want to go to go to the most expensive restaurant I can find wearing a dress that cost me $5,000. I want Naveen to pull out my chair, lean down, push my hair aside and whisper something in my ear. Halfway through dinner I want international terrorists to invade the building so Naveen and I can kick their ass. When they are all dead, and the place is cleared out we'll sit back down and finish our champagne.

Alexander Skarsgard

I want to get naked and tickle fight with him.

Silly Amercans, health care bills are for socialists!

I was walking into work last October and Mr. __ stopped me in the parking lot to give me an article and speech about how Obama was a terrorist and was going to destroy our country. He was angry, and the facts he gave were-well silly. Just like the birth certificate drama (you know, because if I were a 19 year old pregnant white woman in college I would want to go to Kenya to have my baby), and the death panels, and the countless other silly accusations that are still blowing around. I swear I wasn't trying to be rude but all I could do was laugh.

This respectable 70-something year old man made me laugh, and he didn't mean to so it was at his expense and I feel sorry for that.

However, he gave me the best advice - maybe somewhat tongue in cheek, but good advise: Educate yourself.

See- it's so easy to get angry. It's even easier to remain ignorant. I won't take you seriously unless you actually know what you are talking about.

So, I ask of you:

Read the actual health care bill.

Educate yourself, and then form your opinions.

Then when you talk to me, we can have an actual conversation. Not what you heard on O'Reilly and what I learned from The Daily Show.

Cause we're better than that.

(Though both shows are the same amount of funny.)

Bridge memories all in one bag.

I was four - maybe five, and my mom and Auntie Mac were in the front seat. I can't remember what car we were in - maybe a red two door? Or was it the blue K Car? We had been waiting in bridge traffic and the air was stagnant. My butt was itchy on the polyester seats and I had to pee. An Army bus pulled up on our right and Mom and Auntie whipped off their bras and flashed them.

I lifted my shirt to inspect my mosquito bite boobies.

"Can I moon them?" I loved to moon people back then. Maybe it explains my tattoo.

"Go for it Shanny!" Auntie Mac yelled. Auntie Mac's voice sounded like she's smoked a million cigarettes, and she was so tan she was black. I'd asked my mom about the black thing in private once. She explained that auntie was just Italian and her skin gets dark in the summer.

I unbuckled my seat belt and pulled down my elastic waist band shorts, pressing my bum up to the half rolled down window. There were cheers and honking horns. I felt proud. There was a sweat mark of my bum, proof of my rebellion. I don't know if it's rebellion if your mom is telling you it's okay.

Sunny Cape Cod was on the seat next to me. The legend is we found the stuffed little guy on a beach when he washed up on the shore when I was a baby. I'm pretty sure he was bought at the Christmas tree shop. He was a little bit shorter than me, and clearly a German Shepard. His tongue was brown and hard from when I had tried to feed him a fudgscicle the previous year. I wrapped my arms around him, both of us in matching kids "Gull Cottages" t-shirts in baby blue.

"Mumma, I have to pee."

"Honey we won't be able to stop for a while, the traffic is all backed up."

"But I have to go!"

"Go in Mickey Mouse."

The red Mickey Mouse lunch box was next to Sunny. I let go of him and opened it up. Tossing the warm grapes and removing the thermos, I braced the two seats in front for leverage and let her go.

"How can I wipe?"

"Just shake it clean." I felt much better. Poor Mickey. He deserved a better fate.

We were close the the bridge by now. and the traffic was moving better. Not by much, but at least there was a breeze.

As we got onto the bridge and approached the middle Mom and Auntie tossed their cigarettes and grabbed their discarded bras from the floor. They counted to three and tossed them out the window over the side of the bridge. I tried to follow them as the fluttered down eventually hitting the water.

"Welcome to Sunny Cape Cod!" they yelled and laughed. I grabbed Sunny in the back and gave him a smooch. We were here. Well, still an hour to go- but the two week tradition had started. Nana was on her way up not too far behind us, and Auntie Jane would be there waiting with her daughter Vanessa. Auntie Silly would come up later in the week. It took be a long time to realize what the traditional word for Aunt was. These were my mom's best friends. No blood. Just loyalty.

I'm trying to avoid getting all Ya-Ya siterhood on you all. Cause it wasn't like that. I'm just as messed up from my mom and all of her escapades as I am better off by it. I certainly have a strange relationship with alcohol. I've written about these annual two weeks so many times and I can't figure it out.

It's the stories I love most of all.

The time Nana and Auntie Mac swear to God (and they still do to this day)that they met two handsome men with guitars on the beach one night who were really aliens. "They made the rocks glow! They were moon rocks!" I would collect them on the beach and try to make them glow in my room at night.

We went to P-Town and there was all this talk about "The Lesbians" and I asked my mom what they were. I was so worried for a few days after that talk. My mom eventually asked what was wrong and I told her I was scared that I was a lesbian, I loved her and the aunties. She laughed and told me it's okay if I was a lesbian, but that's not what it means.

Bringing Susie along when I was older, telling secrets by the fireflies and the fence at night.

Hot stagnant days like the one's we've had up here make me remember all of this.

All these memories are squished together. I can't tell one year from the other. I wish I had a time line.

I wish I could go back.

Last night on the Mass Pike-I fell in love with you.

As Susie and I crossed the street to grab a cab, we looked up and the sky was full for soap bubbles. Across Boylston the fountain was brimming over with soap suds. Everyone was laughing and playing like they were six and were just given the world's biggest bubble bath.

It turned out to be one of those reassuring moments that made me realize that I'm a Boston gal.

With so many friends moving out of town (and even myself giving it the occasional thought) it's nice to be reminded that I love it here. I love the neighborhoods, the ass-hole drivers, the B line with it's stops every two minutes, Cambridge, Somerville, Charlestown. Give me a slice of Regina's pizza over another cities any day. There is nothing better than being a die hard Red Sox fan simply because your city expects it. I watch maybe five games a season but you're a loser in my book if you don't think they are awesome (until they switch to another team and then we hate them). I love our streets that have no logical system until you know them and then it's perfectly obvious how to get around. Chairs holding parking spots. For such a gruff outer exterior we love our Gays. And our Kennedys. Our Mayor is an idiot who has chewed his own tongue and you can't understand a damn word he says. We scandalize everything - well the Herald scandalizes everything. We know all the words to Sweet Caroline. We dig big. We curse, we sear, we drop our R's. Eff you New York, you may have a big apple but we have a bigger heart.

Sure, some days I play the scenario of moving to Seattle/Chicago/LA. Getting a studio apartment and starting a new life. Then it's the funny simple things, like bubbles in a fountain bringing mass-holes together that make me realize I'm happy here.

Night time whispers.

"Ted?"

"Yeah?"

"You're awake?"

"Yeah."

"Can we name our little girl Door?"

"We're having a little girl?"

"Well, someday."

"Why Door?"

"Cause of the Neil Gaiman character."

"It doesn't sound girly enough."

"Okay, Doordinia."

Long Car Rides

With the Wedding Tour 2009: The Curse of the Twenty-Something, Ted and I have had to spend a lot of time in the car together. On such occasions when we've run out of discussion topics (Vampires vs. Werewolves, Can we walk our cat on a leash?, What will we do with a Pirate Ship when we steal one?) we play a game called "I'm Thinking of an Animal."

The game isn't as simple as it sounds. Yes, one person thinks of an animal while the other tries to guess, but it's the questions that are key. You may ask standard questions about it's grouping like "is it a mammal?" or "does it fly?" but the key is to ask the right questions, for example "If it were to host a tea party, what would it serve for a snack?" or, "What kind of shoes would this animal have?"

I'm telling you, the game is most fun and passes the time between rest stops and exits for Hicksville Long Island (where one of our June weddings were held).

So who wants to go on a road trip?

The Bitch is Back

Chill out guys, I'm right here.

After a two month hiatus I'm back with new undies and a fresh outlook.

Right now I'm writing while Mr. Mooney cleans up the apartment in preparation for the In-Laws. Don't worry-they aren't my actual in-laws yet, but they might as well be. I spent the past weekend at their house flopping around with no bra, drinking wine, and pooping in their toilets like they were family. 2 1/2 years into the relationship and I feel fine.

The past two months have been a whirlwind of weddings, improv, dentist appointments and Kittens.

Now for excuses:

Cranky Face
So, one of the reasons that I stopped writing for a while was the passing of Gus. Guscat was with me for a long time and we had to suddenly put him down at the end of May. Needless to say I was a mess. He was a best friend. Smooching me when I got home, curling up between Ted and I while we slept, and generally a good old fashioned crankyface. Ted and I had a hard time with the sudden death of our old buddy and every time I sat down to write something for the weeks after I started to cry. I've got it down to that bubble in the back of my throat that makes me feel like I've got a sad donut caught in my esphogus. The hardest part? Two days later the Doc. sent us a paw print. Now we are a one Gus* house hold.

Michael Jackson
One entry I sat down to write, and still currently have in my drafts was about crazy people. On my list were the crazies on Whale Wars, the man that walks around central square with the potted plant, and MJ. Well, don't you know it two days later MJ dies and I secretly think that I did it by writing about how crazy he was.

Weddings
Mooney and I have a wedding just about every other week this summer. In fact, until October we DO have one every other weekend.

Miles
We adopted Miles: The Dragon Slayer last month. He's an all black crazy kitten. No Gus, but good company for the other kitty. And he's pretty damn cute.


So that's it folks. I'm back, I promise this time.

Smoochers.


*For those of you who don't know, Mr. Mooney and I each had a cat named Gus before we started dating. His is a girl, mine was a boy.