first-degree murder

i've been meaning to post the latest on the linda woo trial. i wrote about her in an earlier post -- she's that mother-of-the-year from my daughter parker's preschool who told her kids she was taking them camping, packed 'em into a borrowed subaru with some blankets, lit the grill, and asphyxiated her three-year-old while leaving the four-year-old brain damaged. that's some good parenting.

well, last monday she was found guilty of first-degree murder.

it's emotional for me because of how closely it touches my life. just the other day, i was chatting with two moms at laurel hill when my eyes focused on a hand-painted planter next to blue room.

Olive Woo Murphy
2003 - 2006

i never met that little girl but she fits the description of so many at our preschool, an adorable mixed race three-year-old. i can imagine her painting in red room, climbing the dome, sitting in a circle at group meeting, riding tricycles on bike deck. it breaks my heart. nobody talks about her at school. it's too painful, i guess.

she's just a sad footnote and a name on a planter.

sushi lunch

it's freakishly hot here.

in a city that tends to hover in the 60 to 70 degree range, it throws everyone for a loop when the it's actually hot out. the cats are more languid than usual -- bordering on dead, nobody knows what to wear -- "really, i can go out for the night without a jacket?" -- the kids are pink and cranky, and i turn to eating sushi for lunch and serving frozen yogurt for dinner. good parenting.

i have an organic free range chicken in the fridge, begging to be roasted, but ain't happnin' till the temperature drops.

over the weekend, the pinoy and i went to see tea leaf green (her housemates) play at the fillmore (my old stomping ground). i bartended there for ten years in what seems like another lifetime. i met my husband dan there. saw tons of great music and made lots of strong drinks and good friends along the way.

and, it seems, i still have some juice. i got a free ticket at the box office, free drink at the main bar, and was let into backstage (ok, that was the pinoy's juice, but i did know the aging hippie chick who was working the door and she just let us right in).

tea leaf green rocked the house! ok, so it's a hippie jam band, not exactly my genre, but they are really talented. and they had these badass back-up singers -- macy gray and joan armatrading look-alikes. we drank veuve backstage and danced in the upstairs balcony with the other hangers on.

it's good to be a rock star.

farewell chronicle friends

i angsted and angsted up until the deadline last tuesday at 5 p.m., but ultimately decided that the best decision for me was not to volunteer for the buyout, but rather to stay put at the chronicle. who knows, i might be laid off next week, but i will have collected one more paycheck...

it's really hard to watch people go. tomorrow is gabs's last day, michael and i went out to lunch with her at anabelle's. jessica left today and i went by her desk to wish her well, but she'd already left. i walked through the newsroom and they were having a farewell party for all of the journalists and editors who were leaving.

it's windy and rainy here today, but tomorrow we leave for warmer climes in sonoma. i shopped for little easter outfits for the kids -- a little white eyelet dress for parker with a yellow shrug pink, sparkly flip-flops, and a rainbow-hued straw hat from h&m. the professor, also known as winston churchill, got a pair of old-man madras plaid shorts to be worn with his stride rite sandals and white collar shirt. so damn cutey!

off to hunt some easter eggs...