Pooped.

My sister came in on Thursday night for the National Hispanic Bar Association conference in San Francisco.

She met my car with an eye-growl of disapproval and I've been tense ever since.

This is a woman who slapped me when I first held her as an infant. Our relationship has been a tenuous tolerance of one another ever since. At best we allow each other our space. At our worst we've antagnonized each other with our specialties. She's been more physical with her disapproval of me. I've taken a more psychological approach, for the most part. The worst thing I did to show my frustration with being terrorized was hang her prized Cabbage Patch Doll and attach a suicide note to it that read, "Good-bye, Mommy."

She stopped messing with me for a little bit after that. I was in high school. We had moved to Boca Raton, FL and our parents had separated for the first time not too long beforehand.

It was a tense time to be had by all.

I've also had my only two fist fights because of my sister. One in defense of her because a cousin called her fat and the other in defense of myself because she lied about hocking my high school class ring. I went off on her like Ralphie goes off on the bully in A Christmas Story. She went after me with hangers and threw things at me. I kept marching forward, like Carrie through the Prom and I didn't stop until a piece of furniture fell on top of her. I snapped out of my rage and since then she's kept it cool.

That was like 14 years ago now.

I'm a very mild David Banner, but please don't make me become The Hulk. I've done it once and I've sworn never to do it again.

Anyway, my sister doesn't approve of how I dress or not clean my car, and she has disdain for my "environmental" ways. She's getting married in a couple of years and I asked if she was going to get a "Cruelty-free" diamond for the engagement ring. She said, "No. I want a nice ring...we're all a slave to something."

True. But if you can get a beautiful ring that people didn't have to mine in ridiculous conditions, wouldn't it be all the greater symbol of love?

That's just my take on it. When I meet my partner and we've made the decision to formalize our relationship through engagement, he sure as hell better NOT present the symbol of our love as a diamond. I'll drop him then and there. I may punch him. I may drop him down a mine shaft and suggest he crawl out on his own.

Such is my disdain of a diamond industry where the people who mine these precious things live in tatters and those who sell these precious things after they've been polished and cut can choose their comforts.

I'm hoping he and I invest in land instead where we might build a house or something. Heck, plant trees in each other's honor. An engagement tree actually sounds pretty cool.

Hrm.

To treat myself after dinner with my sister and her friend who giggled at our typical sister antagonism of each other, I went to see David Alan Grier last night at Cobb's Comedy Club. It was pretty cheap and he was awesome. On the night before the Bay Bridge closed, it was so great to laugh so hard.