Hello, I have a blog.

Bargain-hunting is a great talent of mine, inherited from my mother and Yankee Irish grandmother who to this day buys Christmas presents for the entire family at the local 99 cent store in Boynton Beach Florida. She does not try to pass the gifts off in Sak's boxes as my Jewish grandmother may have done, but instead brags about how little the gifts cost.
I do not necessarily do all my gift shopping at my favorite Fort Greene Brooklyn store Dollar Dreams (otherwise referred to as Do Reams due to the signage on the front of the store whose light bulbs have only illuminated the D-O R-E-A-M and S for the past six years) but I do like to brag each week about the booty I acquire at good old Do Reams. The chicken pillow pictured above is my latest score. I found it while purchasing a brand new giant laundry bag since ours had finally disintegrated and the local Laundromat charges $6 for new bags. Did I mention that everything at Do Reams is $1 or less? I felt a twinge of guilt for not patronizing the wonderful family who run the Laundromat but let's be honest, a family of three living in NYC on a public school teacher's salary does not leave much room for philanthropy.

So, get to the point of this blog
Yes, I have waited until 2006 to jump on the blog bandwagon, despite having been a fan of reading other blogs for almost a decade. Why now? I have no free time to spare, so what better way to overwhelm myself than by creating a new, technologically intricate, and of course very fashionable way to keep track of everything I have to do and to write snarky comments about the neighborhood. Also I am a bonafied freak-magnet, as is my husband, so there are often pretty juicy tales to regale you with, just from a simple walk to the corner store.

Is this going to be some kind of cyber to-do list?
My lists of books I've read and movies I had seen evolved into "to-do" lists around age ten or so. I recall the summer of 1981 when my friend Kim S. came to visit at my parents’ summerhouse as she did almost each summer. We woke up and planned our days with very important lists of what we needed to do. We called it the daily schedule, and from what I can remember the days began by sweatin' to the oldies with Richard Simmons in front of the 13" television in the living room before we headed down to the beach to spend the rest of the day in the ocean. It was obviously very important to us to work out before swimming for eight hours. We slipped our braided cotton sweatbands under our bangs and went to work, determined not to get fat with Richard's help (anyone remember the vanity plate that inspired Richard to diet? If so, post answer below and you may win something from Do Reams). I have no recall of anything else on the list. Perhaps a bike ride into town and buying some ice cream and looking in the record store for a new J. Giels Band or Ramones album.

Don't worry, I won't bore everyone by literally using this blog to keep "to-do" lists, but I will use it primarily as a way to track my creative projects. I also will ramble about the important minutia that makes each day so special.