Okay all you mothers and others, young and not so, clucking about the twenty-something mother of two, whose every seemingly bizarre impulsive moment is recorded, if not aided and abetted by paparazzi, for entertaining regurgitation across the world--I invite you to so judge your own lives. Has it always been squeaky perfect? If you find one of those ooooo yeah, there was that time when, perhaps you can also find some compassion for this young, rudderless woman who seems to have all the talent and money in the world, but little else?

What set Mmmmmmmm off on this "Leave Britney Alone!" tangent? I saw a very sad photo of her weeping on the Comcast homepage this morning with the caption: Britney Breaks Down--in front of scores of cameras, of course. Gotta say I was feeling it for her as I've felt as bad as she looked. Of course, I haven't shaved my head, yet, or forgotten to wear underpants to dance, again yet. Though we've all had those no underpants dreams, haven't we? Seems Britney may be living our worst nightmares, those in which the ones we love and trust betray us, usually with the help of our own subconscious fears, addictions and compulsions, unfortunately.

Poor Britney is the poster child for "Life goes as thinking flows." Everyday the media gleefully posts some new Britdisaster. She can't even have a fender bender, which most of us have had, without the cameras. The world voyeurs and condemns courtesy of pernicious media that encourages the Britrageous without offering her a bit of help or positive guidance. When she pulled into that parking place and scraped up the car next to her, did anyone offer her help? Nope. They got it all on tape, though, with the comment that she didn't even bother to leave her name and address on the car she bumped. Perhaps she knew if she had, that note wouldn't have been there because some paparazzi would have taken it? Or she may have thought the paparazzi were going to take care of it somehow, let the owner know who did it, for all was recorded, right? And aren't most of her overt life bumps and scrapes as well as her wants and needs "taken care of" by someone else? Like that bodyguard who got himself fired after just two months. He must have been unusually unguardish for Britney to fire him, as she does seem to hang onto should-be protectors way past their expiration dates.

I wonder how most of us would mishandle things or overreact if the world was constantly judging our every move as unfit and howling that our careers/lives were over? I know that when some critic questions or gently criticizes (I haven't had the hardcore bad reviews) something in my books, it can hurt. Even though I've had great training, education, guidance and love throughout my life, I sometimes can focus painfully on a perceived negative before my regaining my equilibrium and confidence. It may take five minutes or five hours, but I get over it because I've learned how. My wish for that young woman would be that she also learns how--to love herself.

Yeah, before you flame my use of "pluming", which even MSWord never heard of, forget it. I made it up, okay?!

My weekend was plum delicious, in case you're wondering what inspired the title of this post. On the south side of the house, we planted an Italian plum four years ago. The first year it mostly grew a huge crop of aphids sucking the sweet life out of the tree, I feared. Each year after that the tree has expanded its delicious plum output exponentially. Last year we went Med cruising as they came ripe and were completely prunishly shriveled when we returned in mid October. This year, I was determined to use every last plum and so began harvesting them this last week. Oh my. And just how many plums can one tree generate, you might ask. Way too many, I say. I've never done any canning, but the DH and I declared, "How hard can it be?" and bought all the equipment--jars, lids, sugar, etc. And set to work.

The DH's mother, LL, came over on Saturday to help me pit the plums that the DH pulled off the tree--all flipping day long. And there were still a huge amount left on for his Sunday pluming, while I made plum jam, plum conserve, and put up plum halves in medium syrup. I followed recipes in my ancient Better Homes and Garden cookbook and "double" or perhaps over-processed the first jars of jam. The recipe ordered me to cook the plum and sugar mixture until thickened then put in hot jars and seal, which I did. Then the DH and I figured that if you "can" stuff you have to put the jars in boiling water, which we did. Then my sissy-in-law of the thousand cookbooks called to get a report on the great pluming. We told her what we'd done and she said that we didn't have to water bath the jam as it was already cooked. Ah well, we cooked the crap out of the stuff, I guess.

Cautionary Note: Watch out everyone, really done plum jam incoming to your home this holiday season.

I have jars of plumy goodness sitting all over the place and still another bushel of plums to process. Oh my. Did you know that fresh plums turn your fingers brown and the nails, too? Oh yeah, I'm looking good and for plum recipes. I think we're going to get really, really tired of plums in whatever form. So help us out and email your recipes, preferably the tried and tasty ones, and I'll share with you the plumy fruits of September.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmelinda

I was sharing, whining actually, with my DH that I really needed a creative push to get my present book done by deadline. Ever the fixer, he suggested that since the story is about a Seattle barista that I take my laptop into Starbucks and soak up the caffeine saturated atmosphere. Though I prefer my neighborhood Tully's Coffee Shop over the packed Starbucks on the opposite corner, I sallied forth to Starbucks because I now possess a gift card courtesy of my sister.

Yesterday I parked QuickSiver on the end spot at 7:00 a.m. on a November-like dark and rainy morning. Toted my son's hard used old e-Machine laptop into the surprisingly empty shop and ordered a tall mocha, my favorite. Actually, my favorite is how Mary at Tully's makes it--extra hot with a drizzle of caramel on the heap of whip. Yum. I asked where the power points were in the room and the barista pointed to a tiny round table in the corner by the windows at the end of the counter. It has a half wall between it and the rest of the room and is open to the row by the windows. I set up there and began to work, but it wasn't long before some wretch ordered a breakfast ugh with Parmesan cheese that smells like puke when overheated at that time of the morning. I wished for a gas mask but stuck my nose in the coffee cup and inhaled.

And was I getting pages! Oh my yes. My brave barista was having a hard of time of it and that meant I was having a great time putting him in the soup. Wheeeee. Then the shop began to fill up with folks. There were three tiny table lined up with six chairs about ten o'clock from my position that had remained empty until an older, than me I so hope, fellow set his paper down on the middle one and went to get his coffee. When he returned he picked up the paper, walked around to the other side of the table, and staked out the end chair facing me! And proceeded to stare at me for the next forty-five minutes. Instead of handling his most perilous situation, my story barista wanted to talk about that old guy trying to get eye contact and establish an opener with me. Have you ever kept your eyes on one thing for four minutes, not to mention forty-five? Well, yesterday I set a record. Can't say it did much for the page count, but I proved I can focus--my eyes, at least. Finally, the guy picked up his unread paper and ambled out of the place. I breathed and got control of my story barista, damn his hide.

I was flying along, making things oh so difficult for my barista when a gaggle of young mothers settled on the six chairs at those horribly too close little tables. They all had grande cups so I knew they'd be there too long for my taste, and my barista agreed. Five of them were rather sullen and silent. That's probably because the extremely vocal woman nearest me, oh God, shout-lectured one and all about the exciting to her only essential details of her life. I believe I can safely project that all of Starbucks was as bored spitless, if very, very cranky, as I was by the time she finished her freaking grande and lecture series to drag those poor ladies to the outlet shopping center fifteen miles south of there. I think I heard something about scrapbooking or stamping in her endless soliloquy. No one looked happy at that prospect except for those of us remaining in the shop.

Again, I get my barista back into the story and smartassing his way through the next mess. Then the children arrived. One little three or four year old who was clearly raising himself was unleashed on the place. The dear one didn't see me cringing in the corner and so applied his annoying talents to harassing the young couple on the sofa in front of the fireplace and all who unwisely gave him eye contact or a smile. My barista wanted to toss the hellion in the microwave on reheat, but I convinced him that would be counter-productive. The young mother of that thing--or at least I think she might have been a careless giver--would occasionally break off from her conversation with a guy and another young woman to chase the kid down. She was well turned out, very thin and obviously way out of her league trying to discipline that one. She'd given up long ago and was just going through the motions for appearances sake. When she grabbed up the child to hopefully leave, no, to take it to the bathroom, her table mates controlled themselves very well. I expected them to mirror the great disgust building in the room, but they just exchanged meaningful looks and sat stone-faced with little Mona Lisa smiles when the woman and devil's spawn inevitably returned to torture us further.

I packed it in. After three hours, a mediocre mocha, more distraction and noise than I could handle with only caffeine and fat for breakfast, and having written only seven pages of the intended thirteen, I was outta there. I drove home in the rain, remembering that a former critique mate of mine wrote several books in her neighborhood Starbucks. Her best writing advice for beginning writers was to find a coffee shop they liked and bring forth the magic. Wheeeeeeeeeee.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmelinda