Tea and Honey Bread

It's another gorgeous sun-filled morning in the Sonoran desert. (That line just reminded me of a Police/Sting song...which one though...hmmm...hums unintelligibly sings hesitantly, "on a dark Scottish lake..." that's all I can recollect. I'm sure it'll come to me at some arbitrary moment and I'll blurt it out excitedly in a room full of onlookers who are clueless as to why I've suddenly come undone.)

The week is moving along nicely in the Moonmaiden home, no big plans for the weekend. I need to get this house in order. When your home is an indie record label, jewelry shop, arts and crafts bazaar and both grammar and high schools things- tend to get a bit uh...nuts. There is laundry on the sofa (clean, of course) Beau needs a bath and some cage cleaning, I've got to sell some paper scraps and excess unused supplies, bag clothes for donation and still find time for a pedicure, a foreign film and some Law & Order. What?! I can too do it, trust me.

Oh, one odd happening. I signed Yael up for this international pen-pal thing and she got a few replies but the ones that have been most consistent are an 8 years old boy in Australia, an 8 years old girl in Ireland and a 12 years old West African boy who is bordering on harassing with his insistence that we adopt him! Is this for real? Of course my kids are haranguing me like I'm an ogre or something and perhaps I am mistaken, but it seems suspicious. Is he the heir to the large sum of money that Bitu Okepopo left his wife who e-mails me several times a week requesting that I deposit her check in to my already overdrawn checking account? I'm not buying it. Ever since I saw the Dateline NBC special I've been way paranoid. I tell you if I had any money I might not even open the e-mails for fear that there was some heightened phishing scam that would grant access to my millions.

Now, clearly I am venting to you all, but I've been as courteous and kind as possible with the child, despite my suspicions that he is a 47 years old scam artist. Somehow, when I signed up for a pen pal in or about the 5th grade it was a safe seamless, sincere means of making a new friend and enlightening oneself to the cultures and customs of others. What happened? I love this advanced technological society we live in but is anything safe, simple or sacred anymore?

Looks up and to the right singing, "... tiny yellow boxes...nananana" hums "dark Scottish Lake" What the hell song is that? I think it's one of the Synchronicity releases...