As I said in my earlier blog, I haven't had much time to indulge in writing. I told you I had medical and financial diffculties. That's nice and vague. I didn't have time to explain.

 The medical difficulties are fixed. My immune system after a couple of rounds of chemo… Read full post »

I haven't updated my blog in months. Not because I didn't want to. Because I had a health crisis that was chased like a cat by a terrier by a financial crisis. I had neither the time nor the energy to write. Not for no money.

 But I just ran… Read full post »

Dear Arlene,

Last night, my son told me that his best friend had gotten arrested yesterday, for shoplifting when my son was with him. My son is under 18, however his friend just turned 18 in June. My son says he had not shoplifted yesterday, however he admitted to me… Read full post »

Dear Arlene,

My mom, who is 71 and a widow, seems to be going crazy. She moved here near me when her husband died almost 3 years ago. Up until then I didn't have a lot of contact with her for about 17 years. Her husband liked her to… Read full post »

Dear Arlene,

Recently I've been dreaming about an old boyfriend. Not just dreaming, having full on passionate sex with him in my dreams. Which isn't so bad I guess. I don't have any control over my dreams. I'm worried because I've also started fantasizing about him while having sex with my… Read full post »

About every other week I read something that suggests that video games are a bad, bad thing. That too much exposure to them will rot childish brains. Parents and the people that like to tell parents what they should be doing seem to consider video games the crack cocaine of recreational… Read full post »

Jeff Schult asked me an interesting question on a comment on one my posts the other day and I've found myself musing about it while I washed my hair, went to war with the gophers eating my cucumber vines and otherwise went about my daily life. I figure the best… Read full post »

When I was a very young mother I used to encounter what Ayun Halliday has dubbed The Old Lady Brigade. They were rude, opinionated and more than a bit bullying. They wore polyester and had blue rinses. When they weren't telling me how under dressed or overdressed my kids… Read full post »

Dear Arlene,

I have been dating the same woman for 8 years and I want to ask her to marry me but we have a problem. When we first got together neither one of us wanted children but as I've gotten older I've changed my mind. I want a child now… Read full post »

Dear Arlene,

I've been married for a year and my husband has just confessed to me that he is bi-sexual. I'm very confused about what I should do now. My best friend says that I should leave him because he going to put me in danger of contracting HIV. I love him… Read full post »

Dear Arlene,

I think my boyfriend is lying to me. He told me that he was going to help his friend fix his porch but when I drove by they weren't on the porch and nothing on the porch that is normally there had been moved. I waited an hour… Read full post »

I discovered orgasms at a very young age. I never realized how fortunate I was in that. By the time I was 8 or 9 I rode the white pony with regularity. And when we moved into the new house when I was in the 5th grade and I found, hidden… Read full post »

Since I didn't want to leave everyone I've met and interacted with here wondering who the hell all these people were and when did I become an advice columnist...

I joined Open Salon with a particular purpose in mind. I had a thread on Salon's TT called Arlene Explains It All… Read full post »

One of the most important jobs of a parent is to teach their children to think. Many  parents are confused about this and believe this means you are to teach them to think just like you do. They are wrong.  You find this mindset amongst people who send their… Read full post »

This is a picture of 3 of the boys on vacation 7 or 8 years ago. I used a colored pencil effect. Read full post »

  About 10 years ago I lost my mind and decided to go blond. I ended up looking like a calico cat because it didn't quite work out and had to get it professionally fixed When a friend of mine laughed his ass off at… Read full post »

This is a picture that Bill drew on my back that I had him photograph and then one night in boredom decided to play around with in PSP.  Art? Don't know. But I think it turned out kind of cool, all the same. Read full post »

What with the Rachel Ray smackdown, I started thinking, what is it about her that sets me off, really? It is true she's perky and I hate perky. Perky, even when it isn't, always seems fake to me. And no one is perky all the time so people who/… Read full post »

I actually started this post about a week ago and then never got around to finishing it. I'm finishing it tonight. Things have come to a head. Changes are going to be made. Even if I have to drag my husband kicking and screaming into the Century of the… Read full post »

I should know better than to give my family tech advice. I really should. It all starts way back when I was the only person in the family that even had a computer and my dad asked me if he should get a Mac or a PC and I… Read full post »

My husband found this on Break.com and insisted I look at it and asked me if it reminded me of anyone. I think he is trying to tell me something. He could be right.

A comment by Neil Paul on the piece Make Love, Not Measles, Jenny Mcarthy by Dr. Rahul Parikh struck me last night. It stuck with me all night and kept popping into my head uninvited today. It isn't a particularly controversial observation. Just a/… Read full post »

Alaska's Copper River Basin where the O'Brien creek feeds into the Copper River is some of the most treacherous, wild, beautiful country in the world. You can take a picture of it like this one:

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Chitina_dipnet.jpg)

But it only tells half the story. It… Read full post »

I remember my childhood 4th of July celebrations fondly. Mostly because my father turned into a kid himself for that one day when he was able to blow things up.

Dad is a bit of a pyro. Case in point, last summer when my older boys went to… Read full post »

I'm not sure how it came to be that I became Clearlake's unofficial birth coach for young mothers. I didn't exactly apply for the position. It just kind of happened. It might have started with my young friend Desiree. Desiree knows everyone in this town and she was so… Read full post »