Hi. This is my blog and I can put whatever I want on it – as long as it’s not filthy or abusive, which really cuts down on a lot of the things I was planning to say.
Check my menu bar – you can see my cats, my garden, my friends. Send a card with a quote from my stand up act if you want. Say hi on my message board.
I’ll be updating regularly so please keep coming back!
Janette Goes Fishing.
Does she catch? Does she release? How is her cast?
Watch and see.
Barry's New Car
Janette and Barry help the Easter Bunny with Fiona's Easter Basket
I'm back from Rwanda and it was amazing! My best trip yet. This video clip was taken at the hospital on our last day there. They were having a celebration and this was my favorite dancer.
Rwanda is one of the poorest countries in the world with electricity in only 6% of the country. In Gitwe, where two dirt roads intersect, they put a hospital and that's where I was for 2 weeks. The doctors and nurses were inspiring - doing 5 - 6 surgeries a day. All cleft lips. The surgery takes an hour to an hour and a half and then the patients walk home the next day - sometimes 4 and 5 hour walks. The people are so immediately and completely transformed that the nurses take a picture of the kids before and after with the same toy - otherwise they can't recognize them. We had a 50 yr old woman and quite a few in their late teens and 20's. Cleft lip happens at about the same rate in Africa as it does in the US -- but here all babies get fixed by the time they are 3 months old. It is heart wrenching to think of someone living for 50 years like that. To find patients, somebody just goes out driving around looking for lips because there is no newspaper to let people know Medical Missions for Children is there. There is radio but most people have no power so can't hear it. They found one guy under a tree. His name was Emmanuel. He came for the surgery without telling his wife so he could surprise her. In his village when he was growing up there was another boy with a lip, but that boy's family had cattle and could sell some cows and get the surgery. Emmanuel’s parents had no cows. So all his life (he was 27) he’d had a dream that someday, somehow he could get his lip fixed. And, thanks to Medical Missions for Children (www.mmfc.org) he did. This was one of everybody's favorite stories. But all of it was amazing. The minute the patients come out of general anesthesia - literally the first words are “thank you.” It was great. One day we drove out to see where one of the patients was returning to. We drove as far as we could but then had to walk since you can't get to her house any other way. (Our driver did offer me a cow so I think he was flirting.) The woman's name was Rosa and she had literally nothing. Two cows that she cares for that are not hers. She does all that work – which is a lot because no power means no plumbing so the water has to be lugged…and it’s all farm land, not grazing so the cow’s feed is also gathered and carried back. She does all this and, in exchange, she can keep the manure for compost. I couldn’t believe it. All she gets is the shit. So I already have a new dream to go back next year and get Rosa some cows of her own.I am so impressed with Medical Missions for Children (www.mmfc.org). The organization runs on a 3% overhead. ALL the money goes into missions. The doctors not only contribute their time, they also contribute financially. There are absolutely no frills. One day we cut off early (4pm) for a break. One of the nurses said to me that she was kind of sorry we had to have a night off because they could have fit in one more kid. The dedication is inspiring.I have lots of stories and will be posting as soon as I can. I’m also creating a series for a new web platform called MaxMouth and will let you all know when you can see it. I have Sharon Kelly – the best field producer I’ve ever worked with producing the video. Expect it to take a few months before it’s up and ready….but, with Sharon on board, it will be really, really great.You have probably figured out from my long silences that I’m kind of swamped lately. I’m working on a bunch of projects…details on all to follow. Thanks all for coming to the blog and putting up with me when I get too busy!
:) jb
Janette at the 21 Club New York City
Janette Goes Sledding
Janette and Barry go to AC/DC
New Glasses
My friend Fran Capo (www.francapo.com or email at: FranCNY@aol.com) is one of the most amazing people I know. She’s a stand up comic, an AMAZING motivational speaker, an actress and she’s in the Guinness Book of World Records as the fasting talking female. You can find out more about her and see her fast talking on her website at www.francapo.com
Fran is one of my best friends in the world. I met her in the fall of 1983 – which was the year I started doing stand up comedy. We were at an acting audition that we had read about in Backstage. We discovered we were both comics – we started talking a mile a minute and have been best friends every since. We used to work together all the time and one of our favorite stories was the time we drove all night to get to a gig in Pittsburgh.
Fran was seven months pregnant we had to get to Pittsburgh from New York City by 7AM on a Friday to do morning radio, but we also had to be in downtown Manhattan at a club on Varrick Street until 10:30 PM on Thursday night. We figured we could make it. When Fran and I decided to take both jobs, she asked if I had a drivers’ license. Well I did have a license so I said yes but really I had no idea how to drive. I’d tried it one summer in college with disastrous results so I just stopped doing it. That doesn’t mean I didn’t keep my license. You never know when you might want to cash a check. Fran asked me if I could, in an emergency, drive. Well, I thought that if it were actually an emergency, I could probably do it. As long as someone could just tell me how to get the car started I figured I’d be okay, never thinking for a minute anyone would ever really want me to drive.
What I hadn’t yet discovered about Fran was that she can have (and if fact almost always does have) more energy than most hydroelectric plants, but when she gets tired she simply drops off. It doesn’t matter if she’s busy. I hadn’t anticipated this when I’d said I could drive.It was about 2AM and Fran couldn’t keep her eyes open. So she asked me to drive. I cannot think what possessed me to risk all of our lives by agreeing but I did. Luckily the car was still running which was great since I had no idea how to start it – so I didn’t have to face that Rubicon. Somehow I got the thing moving and there we were hurtling down the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
Fran fell asleep immediately and I have never been so terrified in my life. I was crouched over the wheel with my face pressed toward the glass - all that was missing was the blue hair. I clutched the steering wheel like the last life raft off the Titanic. Sweat ran down the center of my back. The later it got the more it was just me and the trucks. Monster trucks. Trucks in front of me, trucks in back of me, trucks passing me. I thought I was going to faint.Then it got worse. Tunnels. The road was littered with tunnels. Driving through a tunnel terrifies me because I’m afraid I might accidentally suddenly wrench the steering wheel to the right and crash the car into the wall. This may not seem like a reasonable fear to you but try having it while sitting next to your best friend who is seven months pregnant so you know you absolutely CANNOT kill her. It was a lot of pressure.
I did it. We survived. After about six years or two hours depending on who you’re listening to me or Fran, she woke up. Fran always says that she went to sleep for two hours, woke up and we were still on the same exit. I always reply that anywhere that you can’t get to at 40 mph isn’t worth going to. She took over the driving and we made it only a half hour late. Oddly, Fran has never asked me to drive again.
Just Checking In
Whitey Brown Speaks English
So here's the thing - Whitey Brown speaks English! This isn't the first time but I never got it on camera before. Frequently he enjoy's shrieking hello - pronounced Herrow - at around 3AM. Not a good time for blogging. But when he was getting his bath he just let loose. We figure it was because he had dandruff and was so happy to be getting a shampoo that he just couldn't stop repeating himself.
I had a sinus infection and then a cold and I'm working on 45 different projects (okay I'm exaggerating but not much!) so I'm slightly behind on everything. I've read most of the emails but haven't had time to answer so if you've written in you'll be hearing from me eventually!
Also can't stop thinking about all our B-FABs in Texas and in the path of the storm. It made me realize how happy I am that Anna May is writing about emergency preparedness here on the blog (check her out under "meet Anna May" on the menu bar). Emergencies happen all too often and when it's happening is the hardest time to prepare. Anna May is giving us all kinds of great information on how to be prepared to survive any catastrophe so be sure to check it out.
Janette and the Woodchuck
Woodchuck Release
Janette and the Backyard Bat
Walking the Driveway
Toad Redemption
Janette in the Rain
Janette Rides Her Bike
The Screaming Toad Incident
Okay, so I know it was just a toad and I over-reacted, but here’s the thing. I was expecting to make up a joke about being in the Amazon and reducing my right thigh flab by dragging it in the water with the piranha when I turned and, suddenly, a mere two inches from my face, was … um. A toad. Near my face. A surprise toad /face near collision to be more accurate. And OF COURSE I’m not afraid of toads. But, as the circumstances are, I haven’t actually touched a toad in a number of years at this point and I think it would require just a little prep time. Like I would need to have made the decision to touch the toad and I would have to be prepared for the feeling of that cold, mottled skin.
I’m not that fond of touching toads.
But I love them. If I ever see one hopping through the garden or whatever I bend double and follow it and watch it. I like to look at them. I would never hurt a toad. I just don’t want to cuddle.
And, since toads are rarely known to attack people in the face, you know that there was somebody behind it all. It was Barry. He found the toad and seemed to be absolutely certain that he was funny. Isn’t it funny about certainty?
I don’t feel that I should have to work on my I-don’t-want-to-touch-a-toad phobia because, realistically, when am I ever going to have to touch a toad? It’s just not a skill set I see the need to build. I never see “toad-toucher” in the want ads. It’s never on the home page of aol under the heading: Hot Paying New Trends. And as for the toads…well…they don’t really want to be touched. They like to hop. Hop and eat bugs. Not hop, be held, and eat bugs. To them we are King Kong in a naked suit and they would just as soon be left alone.
Janette and Marie in Barnes & Noble Meet Marie
7-28-08
Janette and Marie at Barnes & Noble
Marie is sort of a fan who became a friend. She wasn’t my fan. She was John McDaniel’s, friend and fan. You remember John McD, the genius band leader from the old Rosie show. He was at Joe’s Pub in Manhattan one night playing the piano with a few invited friends to sing. I was there in the audience with Barry, my perfect boyfriend, and on our way out we ran into this woman, Marie. Maybe she had recognized me from the show or maybe we just started talking. I don’t know. I’m 54. Where do I live?
Point is we stayed another hour just talking to this woman we’d never met before. Then we left. Then years passed. Then I was on the View with Rosie and Marie and her mother were going to be in the audience. She wrote to me and sent her picture because she wasn’t sure if I’d remember her name. (Great idea since as you know I can’t quite remember my own. I think it starts with a J. Unless it’s a K. Or it could be a G. It will come to me.) When Laura and I were writing EBFA (Embracing Your Big Fat Ass) and decided to ask other B-FABs (Beautiful Fat Ass Babes) to give us some of their stories, I thought of Marie. She immediately said yes and even introduced me to B-FAB Dana – also in our book. I LOVED Marie’s story. I think there are two. (I know it’s our book….haven’t I explained about this short term memory thing?! Jeesh.) Anyway…Marie is the one whose underwear fall off in the department store.
So…Marie’s daughter lives in NYC which means Marie comes up to the city periodically which made it very clear that one of these days we would meet for coffee. She did. We did. We met at 11:30…figured, lunch. Nice long lunch. And I’d still get home in time to ride my bike and get a little writing done. The first time we noticed the time it was 5:20! And we were just talking about stuff. Nothing intense or stressful. Just one thread led to another and time disappeared. Then we went to B&N. Then we had a snack. Then we met friends of Marie’s who, although we hadn’t met, knew who I was…so we ended up having a fabulous time talking non-stop in the lobby of a lovely theatre district hotel until 1:00 in the morning. And it’s a J. My name starts with a J. I knew it would come to me.
7-25-08
Beastly, My Mean Cat
Beastly is my first cat, my favorite cat and I’m scarily attached to him (in that I can’t imagine EVER not having him but, what with him being a cat and me being a human and life spans being what they are…doesn’t look good.) Beastly is feisty…which is an understatement.
I never planned on getting a cat. (FYI – They crap in a box.) I told Barry, who was aggressively pro-cat, that I did not plan to have livestock in my apartment. I wrote an essay about it in Rosie Magazine years ago where I quoted myself as having said “As soon as they make a cat you can cork, I’ll get one.” Or something like that. The cork part is right but I’m not going to go look it up which I would have to do. I think it’s so odd that you can COMPLETELY forget what you write.
For years, Beastly would wake me up between 2 and 3AM and often bite me. Once he gave me a black eye. I’m pretty sure it was a head butt. I was in bed with the pillow over my face (because I can’t have any light at all or I can’t sleep) so I couldn’t see Beastly but all of a suddenly I felt him leap on the bed. My head probably started to come up and pow - right on the angle on the bridge of my nose. Then he ran away. He always attacks like that. I can be dead asleep and all of a sudden he’ll leap, like a wolverine out of the night, and really bite me. He’ll hold me with his paws to try to keep me from getting away and bite hard so the entire length of his incisor goes in. My arms are polka dotted with little tiny, white scars that, if you look close, are the shape of the top of his tooth.
When he does this I snarl and growl and bark. Just feels right.
Then I grab the water spray bottle and spray him. He HATES that so runs away. If I’m really mad I’ll get up and follow him spraying him repeatedly as he runs around trying to hide. Sometimes if he’s really mad he’ll hold his ground even if I’m spraying him and swat back at me with his paw.
We get over it pretty quickly. A few minutes. Neither of us holds a grudge.
He’s the smartest of my cats and he’s the one that cares the most if I’m not around.
I love my cat, Beastly.
Biking at Walmart
So I did buy it. And I spent the rest of the day and weekend just thrilled with the idea of my new grape colored bike. I envision myself riding along wearing slim Capri pants and a buttoned acrylic cardigan with a soft scarf at my neck – sort of like Audrey Hepburn riding a bike. Or I could see myself as a young Leslie Caron wearing some sort of leggings underneath a full skirt with crinolines. I could see me riding a bike down tree shaded country roads in rural Italy in 1941 working for the underground…I can imagine riding it from the mission school back into the village during Flame Trees of Thika. I can imagine many circumstances where I would be flying along on my two-wheeler, cool as a cucumber and very sophisticated, but, in fact, the most likely scenario is that I will wheel it to the park since…you saw my steering; I’m not that good yet. Once I get there I feel that I’ll be safe since there’s no traffic. Other people and their children…well I can make no promises. I suggest that if you think you live anywhere near me…stay in your house.
Then I’ll huff and puff with my face as red as a tomato as I sweat like a science experiment. But I’m hoping I’ll enjoy it. I used to ride a bike all the time. I stopped in 1996 (which I could swear was just last week) when I started working on the Rosie Show. That was because before that I was a stand up comic and worked for 45 minutes a night. I had time. TV is sort of the opposite. You have 45 minutes a day when you’re not working.
But I bought the bike because I’m reading this book called The Art of Aging. I’m about a third of the way through and already I have the shakes and am considering re-doing my will. It’s written by a doctor and he says that by our mid-sixties we will all lose about 30% of our muscle. If I lose 30% of my muscle I will be a puddle.
I have to start exercising even though I’d rather be hung by my toes over an open fire. So I guess I’m also going to have to start lifting heavy things. But muscle mass is not all this dastardly nemesis in this book talks about. He says that aerobic exercise is more important for your brain than your body. Normally I walk for exercise. I think that’s good but it’s not all that aerobic. Yes I know it could be and no I’m not going to pump my arms and walk in that funny way. Good for all of you who do - I respect and applaud you, but I hate that and I’m not doing it. That’s why I got the bike. Like I said, I used to really like it. Maybe I will again.
My only real concern is that I was really sore after riding the bike around the aisles in Walmart. I wonder: Will I survive a ride in the park?
B-FAB Lifter
So I was on my way to an in-studio radio interview when I encountered what I could only assume must have been an escaped figment of my imagination. I was so surprised I whipped out my Flip and walked behind him narrating as if I were Otto Preminger. But I think it was worth the effort. Did you see him? What could cause that?
There are a few obvious possibilities. He could be an out of work superhero. Pixar may be experiencing un-reported layoffs. Maybe he sleeps in a lead mold. He must be some kind of experiment.
Not that I’m being judgmental because I’m not. I’m NEVER judgmental. Other people are.
Did you see how narrow his hips were? If life were a Pearl Buck novel, I’d suspect that they bound his hips as a toddler – the way they did the women’s feet. But, regardless of how many times I’ve read The Good Earth, life is not a Pearl Buck novel and maybe this guy was born like that? But how could he have those shoulders? Did he or did he not look EXACTLY like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast?
I thought he might a cartoon actor. Part cartoon, part actor, out having a day off trying to fit in walking around New York City. Then it hit me. He’s a B-FAB Lifter. This should be a lesson to men everywhere about how valuable we B-FABs are. Not only are we smart, funny, sensitive and gorgeous. We can help them body build.
Skinny Bitch in South Beach Part 1
Skinny Bitch in South Beach Part 2
Skinny Bitch in South Beach Part 3
Skinny Bitch in South Beach Part 4
Live, from the Caspian Sea
Janette, Andrew and Christian win the Emmy for The View (Thanks Rosie!)
Meet Little Girl Michelle
Mathew, Cutest Boy in the World
Mathew says Embracing Your Big Fat Ass!
Mathew Succeeds:
Panty Hose Falling
Live from Borneo
Hi. This is my blog and I can put whatever I want on it – as long as it’s not filthy or abusive, which really cuts down on a lot of the things I was planning to say.
Check my menu bar – you can see my cats, my garden, my friends. Send a card with a quote from my stand up act if you want. Say hi on my message board.
I’ll be updating regularly so please keep coming back!