It'll cost you

The other day, I went to the store to get a 2010 daily planner (yes, I still use a paper daily planner and I am aware that it is not still 1982) and a small calendar for the fridge. For some reason, I picked out both of these items without looking at the price. I figured the big calendar to be about $15 and the small one to be about $5. Based on what, you ask? My many years of practice watching the Price is Right, of course. Der.

The nice saleslady rung up my items, and this is how it went.
Her: That will be $42, please.
Me: WHAT?
Her: $42.
Me: DID YOU JUST SAY FORTEE TOO DOLLARZ?
Her: (stepping back from the screaming customer) Yes. Um, each of these is about $20 each.
Me: THEY WERE? WOW, THAT IS A LOT FOR A COUPLA CALENDARS.

Nordic Boy stood there, shocked. And then I collected myself and bought the damn calendars anyway and we ducked our heads and walked out. Because really, people. Who does that? Maybe that was too much for some calendars, yes, but did I need to bring the drama like that? And yell so that the whole store could hear me? Was I raised in a barn?

Later that day we stopped at Office Depot. And you know what happened? This.

Cashier: That comes to 21 dollars.
Me: (in a complete panic) TWO TWENTY ONE? IT COSTS TWO TWENTY ONE?
Cashier: No. I said it comes to twenty one. It costs 21 dollars.
Me: Oh. Sorry. Ha ha.
Cashier: (not laughing).

The moral of this story for me. Me = classy.
Moral of this story for you. Don't try and tell me how much things cost. It causes a Pavlovian effect whereby I will most assuredly scream at you.

If we took a holiday, took some time to celebrate

I've just had five whole days off of work! And here's what I did with it.

1. Became much more well-acquainted with my jimjams than I had been heretofore. We got along famously.

2. Got a gorgeous new necklace from my sweet Nordic Boy, among other sundries. That dude has good taste.

3. Gave Nordic Boy his presents, among them a food scale, which was the surprise hit of the day. Nordic Boy could not WAIT to start weighing shit. Listen, everyone needs a hobby, right?

4. Got a sweet ass lamp from my parents. I LOVE IT. Plus, now I can actually sit on my couch at night and read, which is sort of essential.


(Please do not hold my crappy iPhone photography against my new lamp. Trust me, it is pretty in person).

5. Went to see a nutty, over-the-top light display at the Bellevue Botanical Gardens. That place was GAUDY. In the best way.


6. Finally sent out my holiday cards. Yesterday. The upside of being a heathen with no investment in the holidays is that I can send out my cards any damn time I please.

7. Spent a day with my brother, sister-in-law, and super awesome nephew, who is scientifically proven to be the funniest, smartest, cutest, most adorable kid ever made. Four out of five dentists agree.

8. Also got some quality dog time with my nephew's lab, Mokee, who is also scientifically proven to be the best dog ever constructed. By the time I was done playing with him my sinuses were so clogged I wanted to pop my eyeballs out, but it was so totally worth it.

9. Learned from my nephew all about legos, and Star Wars, and Bionicles. These three things are, according to my nephew, the only things that ever need to be discussed, ever, at any time.

10. Saw "Sherlock Holmes." I think Robert Downey Jr. needs to make a movie wherein he just reads the phone book for three hours. I am convinced I would find this riveting, just because of his Robert Downey Jr.-ness.

11. Saw "The Road," on Christmas Eve. There were three other people in the theater. What, people don't want to see post-apocalyptic people-eating bands of nomads on the eve of the birth of the lord?

12. Watched "The Great Escape" on dvd. I forgot that that movie is like eight hours long. Nordic Boy and I started to yell "ESCAPE, ALREADY!" about half way through.

13. Played Wii until it kind of got ridiculous. Our current favorite activities? Samurai sword fighting and the bowling game where you have to knock down 100 pins each frame. Both are really dumb games. I don't know if you can even call them games. And yet, we can't stop, to the piont where my arms are completely sore.

14. Got turned away from seeing "Avatar." Twice! Stupid sold-out movie.

15. Had dinner with our friend Delium, who never fails to make me laugh in a milk-out-of-the-nose sort of way.

16. Wrapped the whole thing up by waking up at 6am this morning to see Nordic Boy off to Portland, where he is working for the next two nights. I managed to restrain myself from grabbing him around the leg and trying to prevent his departure and making a spectacle of myself in front of the neighbors. But just barely.

Hope you all had a restful, fun week full of just as much love as I did. Also, that you talked to someone about legos at some point. If you haven't, you really must get on that.

Tossing Those (Christmas) Cookies

Jeezy Creezy, you guys, where the hell have I been?

I've been in Crazytown, that's where.

Work is an absolute nuthouse right now, and so was home too- Nordic Boy went and got an effed up sickness that scared the holy hell out of me (he's fine now), and so what I have concluded is that for the holiday spirit I was not having, December decided to give me a nice firm kick in the crotch just to seal the deal between us. Message received, December. This does not make me like you more.

So yeah. I don't have a lot of mirth and cheer to tell you about, because I have been too busy working like a dog and then cleaning up lots of the puke of my beloved. We never did the whole "in sickness and in health" vow, not that we wouldn't, but we have just always walked the walk with each other without having the need to talk that talk. Anyhow, that whole in sickness and in health thing? That shit is the real deal when it comes to love. When you don't find another human being's puke any more disgusting than you would find your own, that is saying something. And I am queasy about other people's germs and bodily fluids and stuff. But Nordic Boy's? Doesn't even phase me at all. So although "in sickness and in health" sounds pretty sanitized, in terms of verbage, it really means something. They really should change that line though, to make it more real. Something like "if you puke on me I won't be mad." Something along those lines.

Ha ha ha. I cracked myself up. "If you puke on me I won't be mad." I am totally saying that if I ever want to do vows. And if I don't, I think I should send that one in to Hallmark to be made into a valentine.

Sorry, everyone. You probably didn't want to hear this much about puking, did you?

Subject change!

I have no idea why this clip makes me so happy, but it does. I think this sort of epitomizes how I feel about Christmas, in that I don't know how to do it, but I'm trying to follow along and do my best.



Hope your holiday is puke-free, all!

Awww, SNAPPED!

Do you know that there is a show on Lifetime called "SNAPPED!"? And although I have never seen it, from the commercials I gather that it is an entire show where they reenact the moment in some poor woman's life when she, well, snaps. I assume, because this is a Lifetime show, that the snapping involves her going crazy in some way after being pushed too far.

I scoff at the concept of Snapped! but you know what? Everyone has their line. And for me, it was this weekend.

Me: I am excited to go to the play tomorrow night!
BioGirl: Me too. It'll be the official start to the holiday season!
Me: Um, what? You have been talking about nothing other than Christmas since Thanksgiving! How can this be the start? I will tell you how. It CAN'T.
BioGirl: (giggling) Well, it sort of is.
Me: No, it's not. You put up your tree. And your decorations. We went shopping for holiday sweaters. You have done Christmas shopping. You are doing Christmas crafts. You have designed your Christmas cards and started making them. You have been playing Christmas music. You have put up Christmas decorations in your office. Those are all seasonal things. You can only have one kick off for Christmas. Maybe two. But I think you have had about ten now. And that's not fair. That's too many kick-offs. You can only have a limited amount of kick-offs!
BioGirl: Until next year?
Me: Until next year.

I want you to note that during this entire conversation, she was laughing. And I was laughing. Only hers was in a normal person way and mine was in an I have lost it in a Lifetime SNAPPED sort of way. And all because, apparently, I have a pre-set number of Christmas Kick-offs that I am allowing people. Because that's not weird.

In other BioGirl news, guess what, ya'll? She has a blog! She's had it for a while, but only recently has she wanted to keep up with it more often. You should totes go read it. In fact, do me a solid and go over there right now and leave her a comment and say howdy. Let's freak her freak with a blogland welcome wagon hello. A blog-commenting kick-off, if you will.

Berried Alive, by the incomparable BioGirl

While you are at it, go over and check out Neighbor J's etsy shop. If you are stumped for holiday presents, it's the place to shop. If you go there, I will let you count it as an extra holiday kick-off. But just this once.

TraditiSHON! Tradishon!

I love weekends so much, it's sickening. Me and weekends are like those couples that make out in public, with full tongue and gropage. I know this. But, like those couples, I don't stop. I must grope my weekends no matter who is there! I can't help it! GET A ROOM, ME AND WEEKENDS!

I know that metaphor really doesn't make sense. I am too swept away by my weekend to care, however.

I was still feeling under the weather on Friday night, just a smidge, so I opted out of going to a dance party at my friend A's house. This was painful to me as there is nothing I love more than cutting a rug with wild abandon, but I did the responsible thing and stayed at home so as not to cough my germy cough all over the dance floor. Nordic Boy, after working another 14-hour day (that dude works so much more than I do and complains so much less, which is something I am working on, the complaining less, not the working more) came home and we watched a bunch of bad tv and fell asleep by ten. This makes me sound old and moldy, but I LOVED IT.

On Saturday my friend Sarah came over and she brought me homemade chocolate brittle, which, come on, you gotta love a girl like that. We drank tea and talked the day away until the sun went down (which ok fine is only until 4pm these days) and can I just tell you if you don't know Sarah, you totally should? She is just the cat's knees or the bee's pajamas or whatever the saying is.

That night BioGirl, Nordic Boy, and I put on our fancy knickers and went out to eat at Cafe Lago, which has the lightest lasagna you have ever had in your life. It's like lasagna-flavored air, which maybe doesn't sound like a good thing, but it is.

Then we went to see a live production of White Christmas. The show was good, although the cast members were clearly singers and actors (excellent ones) but not dancers. The dancing was fine for what it was, don't get me wrong. I just have a case of hyper-picky-itis when it comes to dance sometimes. What warms my heart is that after all these years with me, Nordic Boy is as perceptive a dance watcher as I could ever hope for. After the show was over, he noted "did you notice that the lead dude only turned to the right, never to the left?" And I said "OMG YES I DID NOTICE," while thinking in my head goddamit I love this man.

The other thing about the show was that although it wasn't as bad as the last time I went to this particular theater, there were still a few people that did not clap at the end of the show but just up and left during the curtain call as if they were at a movie during the credits and not watching real live performers who can see your indifference to their dedication. I don't usually have much of a temper about things, but this makes me so mad I want to Chuck Norris someone. FIFTH AVENUE THEATER PATRONS YOU ARE REQUIRED TO CLAP OR AT THE VERY LEAST SIT DOWN UNTIL THEY HAVE DONE THEIR CURTAIN CALL NO ARGUMENTS THE END. Don't make me come over there, effers.

Sunday was a day for the history books. I love days like I had on Sunday. I slept well, and woke up when my body said so instead of my mothersucking alarm clock, and then Nordic Boy and I just hung out for the whole day. The day seemed like it went on for eleventy jilliion hours and I never wanted it to end. We watched movies, we baked peanut butter brownies (and we ate apple pie while making the peanut butter brownies which is a style of multi-taking that I can really get behind), we talked a blue streak, we laughed at stuff that probably wasn't even that funny, we ventured out to the grocery store and hardware store, we played a heated game on the Wii with trash talk that would scandalize your momma, and we just soaked it all up.

This made me realize that for all my non-traditional holidayness, and the fact that we don't put up a tree or lights, and that some years we exchange a little gift but others we don't, that we actually have managed to come up with a holiday tradition that is all our own and that we do without fail each and every year, right around Christmas/Hannukah/etc time. We set aside entire days where we do nothing but look at each others' ugly mugs for the whole entire day. We don't talk to anyone else on the phone, we don't go to anyone's house, we don't check any email. We just act all together-ish, just like this Sunday. We have already planned at least one more day like this before the end of the year.

Look at that. I do have a holiday tradition that is meaningful to me after all and I never even realized it. Who knew?

Sicko

I'm sick, people. WAAAHHHHH.

I am usually a pretty good sickie, if I do say so myself. But this time is frustrating. Because I sort of feel ok as I sit and watch Hallmark Original Movies in a long, unending loop. Just a sore throat, really. But then I get up to put in a load of laundry or try and vacuum and I feel like I have just run a few miles and I either need to take a nap or faint or something. So, I just have to sit. And sit. And sit some more. It's now Day Two and I am bored out of my everloving gourd.

Did you guys hear that Kirkus Reviews is closing down? My library colleagues and I are all abuzz about it, because even though Kirkus reviewers are haughty and crotchety and scary to authors, we use them a lot. I wrote a short story in an anthology once, and the crowning achievement of the whole experience was that the Kirkus review for the book called the entire book the equivalent of maggoty goat turds, but singled my story out as being less maggot-filled than the rest. From Kirkus, that was like a four-star review.

Does anyone think it's kind of cheating when mascara commercials show models who are obviously wearing fake eyelashes? Are fake eyelashes so ubiquitous that they are just a given? I think it's cheaty advertising.

One thing that I can get going on today is my holiday cards. I always feel a little chagrined about my holiday cards, to tell the truth, and I have decided to stop that shit this year. The story is that I really do cards mainly for my relatives overseas, who have not seen me for years (and some of whom have not seen Nordic Boy ever). Because of this, my cards are always photo cards. I choose a photo or set of photos of us from throughout the year and make a card out of them and that way my family can see how we grow and change each year. For instance, this year, my cards have a photo from each season, so I can tell my relatives about the snowstorm in January and the Chicago trip in July, etc. Most of my relatives do not have computers, let alone Facebook or email addresses for me to send photos of us, so the holiday card is kind of important to me for that reason. So in past years, I used to order up those holiday cards for family, and then get another non-photo set for friends and family in the States. That got to be too much of a hassle and so for the past few years I have done just the photo cards.

Here's the thing. I don't know if you are aware, but there are some people who think it's weird that people such as us send out photo cards. It's like, looked upon as megalomanical in a Tyra Banks self-referential sort of way, or something. The first year I did this, someone said thanks for the card, and that they found it interesting that we sent out photos of ourselves. They said it in a non-assholey way, but it made me think. And when some other people said similar things, it made me think some more. And you know what I think it is? I think that the only way that (some, not all) people really want to see photos of you in that context is (a) if you have children and the photos are of them, or you with them, or (b) if you just got married and your photo is of you at your wedding or honeymoon or something, or (c) if you have done something worthy of photo-documentation, such as finishing a marathon, or buying a house, or graduating from grad school or something, or (d) if it's of you doing a brag-worthy hobby, like you traveling to Paris or you climbing a mountain or you underwater basketweaving. But you, just living your regular life, with regular happiness and contentedness? BORING. And also borderline Tyra narcissism.

So in the past couple of years, I have found myself making an excuse for the card, whenever anyone received one and thanked me for it, even to those people who weren't even making the "that's so interesting that you did that" sort of comments. "Oh, yeah, you're welcome. I only get those photocards for my overseas relatives, you see, and I know you probably don't need photos of us since you see us every week and everything, but you know, it's just that, um, it's for my relatives, and so, you know..." Which makes me look like a weirdo to the majority of people who weren't even thinking anything bad about the cards, which is a bonus.

Anyhow, this year, I have decided to officially stop feeling weird about the cards. I don't have kids, I don't do underwater basketweaving, I don't run marathons, and I didn't go on a honeymoon. What I did do this year was spend a lot of time with Nordic Boy, and we clocked in another year of being happy, and smiling a lot, and probably looking a bit older than the year before, and that's all the pictures show us doing. If that is boring, then people can be bored. If that makes us Tyra, then oh well. I'm good with that.

Well, maybe not good with being Tyra, exactly. But you know what I mean.

"And so I'm offering this simple phrase..."

Nordic Boy: Brrr. It sure is nippley out there today.
Me: Nippy.
Nordic Boy: What?
Me: It's nippy out there, not nippley.
Nordic Boy: Same thing.
Me: No, it's not. Nippy does not refer to nipples. It refers to nipping. Which is like biting.
Nordic Boy: I thought it was nipping. Like, you know, nipping.
Me: No, it's nipping, like a dog nips at your ankles. Or Jack Frost nipping at your nose.
Nordic Boy: Oh. So Jack Frost is not nippling at your nose?
Me: What, like nipple on nose action?
Nordic Boy: It would be such a better song if that were the case.
Me: (groucho impersonation) And don't even get me started on the chestnuts. Is it hot in here or are my chestnuts roasting?
Nordic Boy: Ew.
Me: Listen, you started this whole thing. Don't complain now.

What if I have to talk about the Buttock Zeitgeist?

Words and phrases that I just can't use, either at all or at the very least without rolling my eyes, giggling, or being loaded with sarcasm:

TIA (for "thanks in advance")
return on investment (or even worse, just saying "R.O.I.")
just a heads up
bailiwick
poo-poo (as in, "he poo-poo'ed that idea")
outside the box
win-win
kudos
massaging the data
staycation
webinar
vista
Twihard
buttock (weirdly, this is only true of the singular. I can say "buttocks" just fine).
zeitgeist
panties

What words bug you?

My Professional Opinion

Are you shocked at how little I talk about books? I am the Pop Culture Librarian, after all. LIBRARIAN. It's right in the title!

Come to think of it, are you shocked that I don't talk about Pop Culture either?

It's like this whole blog is a LIE. A LIE, I tell you!

I don't know why I am trying to whip you all into a mob-style fury directed at me. I just felt enraged, on your behalf, as readers. And also? I realize that using the terms "shocked" and "enraged" is so completely out of proportion to the importance of anything related to this blog, but you know me. I like to ham it up.

Anyway, a couple of people asked me about my mention of A Prairie Tale, by Melissa Gilbert. In response, I give you my goodreads review of it. That's right, I am recycling content from goodreads to blogland. Once again, I am setting the bar as low as low can go.



If you're going to write a celebrity tell-all, this is how it's done, people. The ingredients: a starlet who is born into a show business family and can tell anecdotes about meeting the likes of Groucho Marx and Ann-Margret before turning 10. Also, anecdotes about an affair with Danny Sugerman and Billy Idol doesn't hurt. Throw in a long-term tumultuous relationship with Rob Lowe? Yes, please. Sprinkle with vignettes where one of the guys from the John Hughes Brat Pack makes out with Liza Minnelli (I won't spoil it by telling you who) and a tryst between John Cusack and another 80s star is revealed, and then top it off by a description of a post-9/11 visit from Karl Rove to talk about how the entertainment industry can fight terrorism, and you have WON ME OVER. Nice one, Half Pint.

Thanks, Thanksgiving

As I have noted, I am not a holiday person overall. But a days-off person? I am most definitely a days-off person. Give me a day off and I will celebrate just about anything. Let's make next Monday National Pablo Cruise Day and stay home in honor of it. Who's with me?

You don't know who Pablo Cruise is, do you? Sigh. Youth today. Luckily, you have me here to educate you on these most important matters of state.



On the first day of day-off-ness, Nordic Boy and I did a very strenuous day of sitting on our keisters. It went for hours and hours and it was only interrupted by Nordic Boy making us a bruncheon of grilled cheese and tator tots. Have I ever told you about Nordic Boy's god-given talent for making grilled cheese sandwiches? They are the absolute best thing ever. If he didn't have all of his other fine qualities, I think I might still be with him just based on the cheese grilling prowess. It's that good.

Anyhoo, in the evening we got ourselves together and went over to Delium's house for a proper Thanksgiving dinner with a bunch of friends. We contributed a mushroom stuffing type deal to the mix, which we were worried might not turn out ok since it was the first time we tried making it and it was from Martha Stewart and had some crazy mushroom varieties that are not carried at our local co-op from which we shop so we just mixed up some regular old mushrooms and Martha does not take kindly to doing things in a regular old way sometimes. We decided going in that if it sucked, we were going to blame Martha, whereas if it was awesome, we were going to take full credit. Unfair to Martha? Perhaps. But that's ok since she has her humptillion dollars to console herself with.

For the rest of the weekend, I did the following:
1. I went into work for a half day or so which was TORTURE because Nordic Boy was off and I am so not used to leaving the house when he is still there, all pajamafied and cozy. Dang him.

2. Had a whole Thanksgiving dinner gorge-fest all over again with BioGirl and her mom, who is visiting from San Diego and who was all excited that she actually got some use out of her winter coat. Weird Californians.

3. Watched a bunch of movies including Tyson (so not worth the hype), and Volume 1 of the 1960s version of Zatoichi films (nice) and The Great Escape (even better) and Gladiator (eh, it was on tv and we got sucked in) and about 20 minutes of Batman Returns on tv (ouch, Tim Burton, what the heck were you doing?), and The Wrestler (yo, Mickey Rourke is BUSTED UP, you guys), among others.

4. Replaced a bunch of pipes in our laundry room and under our kitchen sink. Now, instead of old decrepit pipes, we have new shiny ones. Hey, it's exciting to us.

5. Read, in its entirety, Prairie Tale by Melissa Gilbert, for which I was truly thankful. I'm not kidding.

Best Thanksgiving Prayer Ever

Happy T-Day, all!

I Want To Go To There

This is the world I want to live in. For real.

Drawn to Each Other

A little while ago, Josh said that he discovered that his lovely bride makes sketches of her outfits on her desk calendar at work and asked if anyone else does that.

It freaked my freak, because dudes! I DO THAT.

Not all the time, not consistently, and it's in my day planner as opposed to my desk calendar. But still. I have an OUTFIT SKETCHING DOPPLEGANGER!

How weirdo is that????



(I have blocked out my day planner meetings and such to protect the names of the persons I work with and the shit I may or may not write about my workplace therein).

Admittedly, her sketches are cuter than mine. Now that I really look at these sketches I see that I have made myself into some sort of faceless rastafarian with no hands. Which is weird.

"If You Want to Destroy My Sweater"*

Lots of things happened over the weekend, some of it good, some of it bad, and some of it ugly.

The Good
Friday night, some of my ladies came over for crafting night. Hopscotch, Biogirl, and other fine and dandy girlfriends came over with knitting, crochet, and embroidery needles aplenty and we got our old lady sewing circle on and shot the shit with wine and brownies and cookies galore. Some of us actually made progress on our crafting projects, while others of us (me and Biogirl) made progress on the food and drinks. So there was something for everyone.


The Bad
Saturday was all shot to hell with illness-related events which no one wants to hear about as it is quite gross so I shall skip right over that except to say that someone near and dear to me spent most of the day near the terlet and I had to be there to care for that person who shall remain nameless but come on, I think you know who I'm talking about. Nordic Boy renamed Saturday our Inconvenient Truth. And yes, our personal truth was very, very inconvenient.

The Ugly
As you might recall, I don't usually get it up for the holidays. Holidays are fine with me in that I love days off from work and spending time with my loved ones, but in terms of decorating and doing traditional things, I just don't feel the need to go there. Biogirl is a staunch celebrater of the holidays, and I have told her that I would be more than happy to de-Grinch-ify myself to the best of my ability so that we can celebrate these things together. On Sunday? Not only did I feel Christmas in my heart, I grabbed it by the balls.

First, we drove out out to the burbs and went to the mall. The crazy, crowded, Christmas-themed mall. Dudes, I don't know what it is since I haven't been in a mall during holiday shopping frenzy season (and yes I know it's early so I probably didn't even experience the half of it) for many years, but that atmosphere can put me in a deep, deep glaze. The music, the decor, the crowds, the hundreds of unhappy people. OY. It's NUTS. However! I was there to get into The Holidays. And get into them I did. How? By finding the brightest, the bedazzledest, the boxiest, most unflattering holiday novelty sweater that I could find.

WHICH I DID.

And Biogirl went there with me. And we bought them, and we love them. Christmas spirit I still might not have, but with this purchase, I think I deserve an A for effort. Right?

Come on, right???


*See what I did there? It's that Weezer song! I am so clever, you really should be in awe of it.

If You Like It Then You Shoulda Put A Frame On It

First of all, I have to clear something up. That icky "she's just 16 years old" song that I was singing yesterday? That is not, apparently, an Eddie Money song. It's some one-hit wonder dude named Benny Mardones. Look at me, besmirching Eddie Money's name like that. I take it back, Eddie!

Ok, now that I have cleansed myself of soiling the good name of a man who only wants us to have Two Tickets to Paradise, I can move on.

Last night, I spent two hours in my car. I know there are many who commute this every day but most of my car rides are 10 minutes or less, or else I am riding the bus or walking or what have you. So after two hours in my car last night, I wanted to cut someone, for real.

First of all, I had to go to this art store to get something framed. Can someone please explain to me why getting something framed is so bleeding expensive? I am willing to be schooled on this. In fact, I really want to be schooled on it, because I need it to make some sense to me. Four pieces of wood around a picture plus a clear covering over the top and this is many many dollars? Really? So far in my life I have actually avoided ever getting anything framed, because Nordic Boy usually will just get the glass cut at the hardward store hisself and make a frame easy peasy for me. But lately he is super busy what with re-plumbing our laundry room and hightailing it to Portland every week so I thought I would go ahead and just go to a frame store. I did my homework by asking around and looking on Yelp! and so forth, so I am confident I did not go to a place that was outrageous (and although it was not exactly near my house-hence part 1 of the Driving Extravaganza- I went to a place that was highly recommended everywhere I looked just in the hopes that I would not be punctured with a new a-hole along with my frame job). But still. Three prints of less than one-square-foot each and it cost me one whole Benjamin. A WHOLE BENJAMIN. A Benjamin and a Jackson, actually. Plus they told me it was going to take them until after Thanksgiving to have it ready. What the WHAT??? Is there some sort of framing craftsmanship that I don't understand? Because I just can't accept this. Well, I can't accept it in theory, because I forked the money over. Which made me feel like a royal chump. With crown and scepter.

Phooey.

At any rate, I got back in my car and started the drive back to my neighborhood to go to the grocery store to get some dinner. While in the car, Nordic Boy called from Portlandia and me being the hands-free cell-phone user that I am, talked to him on speaker while my phone sat snugly on my lap. Then I forgot all about it being there, and when I got to the grocery store I got out of the car and heard a sickening thud. OH MY DEAR IPHONE I HAVE GONE AND KILLED YOU.

Normally, I might have waited to fix my phone, but the thing is, when Nordic Boy is in Portland he calls me, like, a lot. A lot a lot. And if he can't get a hold of me, he pretty much thinks I am dead. The reason for this is not because he is maudlin, but because I have drilled into him after many years together that one of us could die at any moment, especially when we are apart. It's a cheery thing to be around, I assure you, and I know you are so jealous of Nordic Boy right now to have landed a catch such as yours truly. So after the grocery store I drove my phone to the Apple Store (drive drive drive) as if I was on fire and because everyone else in Seattle lives at the Apple Store too they told me that they could not fit me in to see a Genius (and can I just ask you what kind of an establishment is that that deems themselves, individually and collectively, GENIUS? Who are they, Wile E. Coyote or something?) that night. It was then about 7pm, and to think that Nordic Boy would be trying to call me from 7pm until the next day? Not acceptable. So I might have prostrated myself at the feet of the goddamn Geniuses and begged them to help me. Just a little. And they did. So ok, they can be Geniuses, fine.

Then I had to drive to the dry cleaners to pick something up, and then had to go to the co-op. And then my butt grew right into my car seat and I became a Transformer and rampaged through my fair city. BLAH.

In non-grumpy news, my friend Hopscotch is having a baby boy who we have fortunately/unfortunately started to call TimJim. Also, my friend Maddie wrote for The Colbert Report a couple of days ago, which made Nordic Boy and I act as though we had something to do with it, which, you know, we totally did, if by that you mean that we watched and squealed and clapped at the screen and looked at each other with smug faces.

This post is so grand, I think you should frame it.

Why You Should Be Thankful That You Don't Live With Me

I don't know what is going on when I fall asleep each night, but each morning for the past few days I have woken up with the most godawful soft rock oldies hits in my head each morning. And I have sort of loved it.

A few days ago, as I got ready in the morning, I sang to myself:
Some guys have all the luck...some guys have all the pain...some guys get all the breaks...some guys do nothin' but complain...

Nordic Boy: Wow, really? Rod Stewart at 6:30 am?
Me: You knowing what that song is makes me love you all the harder, my friend.

The next morning.
Me: Ya mo beeee there, (up and ovah)...ya mo be there, (up and ovah yah)
Nordic Boy: Why are you singing that?
Me: Why indeed.

The next morning:
Me: You can do ma-gic! You can have anything! That you desire! MA-GIC! And you know you're the one who can put out the fire! Youknowdarnwell, whenyoucastyourspell, youwillgetyourway, whenyou HYP-NO-TIZE, withyoureyes! aheartofstone will turn to clay!
Nordic Boy: Why is this happening to me?

This morning:
Me: She's! Just! Sixteen years old! Leave her alone! They said....
Nordic Boy: NOT THE EDDIE MONEY PEDOPHILE SONG.
Me: If I could fly! I'll pick you up! And take you into the night! And show you a love! Like you've NEEEEVER SEEEN! NEEEVER SEEEEN!
Nordic Boy: I knew there was a line somewhere. And you, sweetheart, have crossed it.

Trips to Portland and Suburbia

Last week, I took a vacation day and went to Portland with Nordic Boy. We arrived late, late on Wednesday evening (ok fine it was 11pm but that is way late for us), singing Journey songs at the top of our lungs the entire way there. It's a good thing we did that because it was most depressing for us to realize that when you drive to Portland at night, you can't get a good look at the Hamiliton Corner billboard, which for those of you that are unaware is a giant billboard along the I-5corridor with a big drawing of Uncle Sam on it and an everchanging string of right-wing batshit crazy written in big block letters, usually having to do with the Mexicans wanting to take jobs away from us including Obama (who is really Mexican, or Kenyan, or just, you know, brown) who is also interested in taking away all the guns that the folks in Real America use in order to defend their homes from the rabid Commie librarians who want to turn all of our children gay by reading them picture books about the two male penguin parents. Is it wrong that I sort of love that billboard? Maybe love is the wrong word. I just look forward to reading what it has to say every time I drive to and from Portland. But at night there are no lights for it so we missed out on the crazy. Rats.

While in Portland, I met an old friend for lunch. He's a friend of mine from high school who I literally have not seen since 12th grade but through the magic of the Faceplace we are all the sudden friends again. I must cop to a small amount of trepidation for this meeting because you never know what a person who knew you in middle school might remember about you that you have totally blocked out about yourself (hey, remember that time you pooped your drawers in Algebra class??). The friendship also has the misfortune of his knowing me starting in 7th grade, when he moved to Flint. 7th grade, can I just tell you, was not my finest hour. It was, actually, my worst hour. I know many of you feel that way about middle school, so I won't get much sympathy. But for me, 7th grade was the year that I pulled a total Angela Chase and dropped my childhood friends for the cool crowd. Dudes, it was GROSS. Luckily I snapped out of that shit by 8th grade but of all the years to make a first impression in my life? Seventh grade would be last on my list.

Luckily, my friend either did not remember this about me or was gracious enough to not mention it, and we had a lovely lunch. I am always amazed at how many cool people I seem to meet everywhere. Aren't cool people supposed to be, like, rare? In my world, they seem to just come out of the woodwork everywhere I go. Perhaps you are thinking that that is because everyone is just cooler than me, so I have a skewed perspective or something, and to that I say an unequivocal WHO ASKED YOU.

Speaking of cool people, Nordic Boy and I then had dinner with the ever-lovely @metaleah that night. She was in town for a museum conference (a librarian crashing the museum world! like a secret agent or something!) and so we went and picked her up from her hotel (in Nordic Boy's company car which this week was a gigantic white pimping Pontiac that was just begging to be donked) and went out on the town. Once again, cool person, in my immediate vicinity. I must have a magnet in my brain or something.

We got back to Seattle in time for a lovely weekend, which included a field trip out to the burbs with BioGirl for a day of getting ridonkulously lost in mall-land. This is not unusual for me (people who plan suburbs, do you not believe in grids? Or numbered streets that actually go in number order? Or sidewalks?) but BioGirl is my go-to guide whenever I need to burb it up. She's like a burb sherpa or something. However, this time, she seemed just as lost as me. Which takes some doing, let me tell you.

Yesterday Neighbor J came over for the day and we just sort of ran our mouths for the entire day. Sometimes I think that if there was such a thing as a conversation contest, Neighbor J and I would be like, the Tiger Woods of that sport. When we lived in the same building as each other, we would talk on the phone for 3 or 4 hours a day. We both had to invest in a headset phone just so we could stay verbally attached while we went about our day.

Finally, last night I watched The Way We Get By. Don't let me stop you from watching it because I thought it was great, but let me tell you it was depressing. It really crushed the everloving hairy Jebus out of me and made me go to the bad place where I just wanted to hug Nordic Boy by the neck and weep about him not dying and leaving me all old and alone with my cats and the headboard of our bed. Never mind that I don't have cats and that you don't know what the headboard reference is unless you have seen the movie. Just watch it, but be warned that you might feel like shit afterward. Wow, how is that for a recommendation? Nice one, LG.

At any rate, to combat the depressing, we then watched Beach Girls and the Monster. Which might qualify for the weirdest double feature ever.

Hope you all are having a loverly Monday!

I'm a Pecker, You're a Pecker

Do you have jokes that have been with you for years and years- so long that you don't even remember what they mean but they can still bust you in two laughing about them?

When I was in high school, my friend Michael and I thought that words that sounded like "penis" but weren't penis-related were funny. As most teens (and some adults, um, you know, like me) do. Like pianist. When we would warm up in choir class we would shout out "where's my pianist? I do believe I have lost my pianist!" and fall over laughing. Another one was peony. We would say things such as "I picked a peony last night and boy did it smell good!" We would slur these words as much as possible so as to make them sound like "peen-ist" and "peenie." Because we were raised to act a fool like that.

Related to this was the fact that Michael used to spend his summers in Georgia, and while there he had a job at the local McDonalds. He would tell us stories about a regular customer, an older gentleman who would drive up to the drive-through daily to get his Dr. Pepper. Only the old coot never said Dr. Pepper. He called it Dr. Pecker. Which, come on, comedy gold.

The combination of the Dr. Pecker thing and the pianist/peony thing somehow- I can't for the life of me remember how or why- resulted in the phrase "I'll have a Dr. Pecker and a small peenie, please!" said in the thickest southern accent one can muster. And we said it CONSTANTLY. I can't think of what type of situation would call for this type of tomfoolery, but we made it work. Heaven forbid you ask us any sort of question about what we would like, or what we would have, or what our preference was on any matter. You would be met with this phrase.

This resulted in the very strange conversation that I had with Nordic Boy this weekend. It happened in a restaurant and I hope to HIGH HEAVEN someone was eavesdropping on us.

Nordic Boy: You know Amy? She got one of those dogs. What are they called? Those small ones?
Me: I don't know. A poodle?
Nordic Boy: No. Fluffier than that. Um. A Peony?
Me: That's a flower, not a dog.
Nordic Boy: Are you sure? Those fluffy dogs? They aren't called a Peony?
Me: You mean a Pekingese?
Nordic Boy: That's it!
Me: A peony...as a dog...that's funny.
Nordic Boy: Well, I was close.
Me: (yelling) I'LL HAVE A DR. PECKER AND A SMALL PEENIE PLEASE!!
Nordic Boy: Wow. Did you just have stroke?
Me: In a sense.

I'm Kind of a Big Deal

I have discovered something today, and it is this. I think I might be an a-hole. And you know what else? If you're my friend, it turns out you might be one too.

Happy Wednesday!

I was reading this post at the Maiden Metallurgist today, where she talks about how oftentimes women take the self-deprecation a bit too far. Like, those "I'm so fat" comments that women say, and so forth. She told all her trusty readers that if they do that, then to stop that shit, and I heartily agree. It was a truly inspiring post and says a lot about why I think she's pretty dang awesome.

However, it also showed me that I am an a-hole.

Why? Let me demonstrate: because she ended the post by asking readers to list, in the comments, three great things about themselves. And many people did, but said it was hard. I didn't list, but not because it was hard. I didn't list because I thought to myself "ONLY THREE? That is way too little, for I am delightful in scads of ways. Scads!"

A-hole. Me. I know.

Granted, I didn't always feel this way. I wrote about it a couple of years ago in one of my favorite posts about when I told some old ladies I went to rodeo clown school, this process that I've been in, especially in my 30s, to own being proud of myself. And it's working out pretty darn good. Practice really does win the day. When I get a compliment, it's super easy for me (now) to say "thanks." And I give myself a break pretty much as a rule. And I can't remember the last time I said "I hate my hair!' or the like. Not because I am better than anyone else. But just because I practiced it, intentionally, for a long time. And then it just started to come natural and I now don't have to think about it nearly as much.

And you know what? If that makes me an asshole, that's cool. I am ok with that. Because the stress I used to put myself through in my 20s? FUCK THAT.

So, instead of a list of why I am awesome, I am going to make a list of some of the reasons why I am able to even think that I could be the slightest bit awesome. Thank Jeebus for the following:

1. My mom, who raised me with good body image and always made me feel smart and pretty and good about my sexuality (yay girly parts!), and who taught me that I never needed to apologize for having a big assertive mouth (you're welcome, America!).
2. My closest friends, who don't put themselves down (which, as I stated above, might make them a-holes too). Since they don't put themselves down, I don't put myself down. Because when someone says "OMG my boobs are so ugly!" what other response is there except to say "your boobs? You haven't seen ugly until you've seen these knockers!" The more I thought about this one the more amazed I am at these friends. Thanks BioGirl, Neighbor J, Hopscotch, Sarah, Alli, Map, Cousin R, etc. You guys are my role models, for shizzle.
3. My Women Studies degree. Oh yes, one of my degrees is in Feminazism. And they beat the shit out of you if you put yourself down or disparage your uterus or what have you. Ok, not really. But kind of.
4. Nordic Boy, who has for many years loved everything about me, including the changing size of my ass and my ever-increasing Granny-liciousness.
5. And me. That's right, me. I deserve some of this credit too, because I, did I mention, am awesome. And maybe an a-hole. Holla!

Doc Octopus on a Plane!

Well there goes another Halloween down the crapper, and there are smashed up gourd innards on the street to prove it.

So: costumes. Let me explain mine to you. First of all, Nordic Boy, Neighbor J, Biogirl and I all think that screaming out "SNAKES ON A PLANE!" is a gutbuster. Hence, we made our Halloween costumes along those lines. BioGirl was an airplane passenger with a snake wrapped around her. Clearly, when you see her you should yell "Snakes on a plane!!!" right? That is totally the thing to yell, right? Or you can also stare at her and say "What exactly are you supposed to be again?" Either one of those responses were heartily accepted.

To confuse things even more, Nordic Boy dressed as an airline pilot and pinned a big photo of a cupcake to his shirt. And I had a flight attendant outfit on and a basket of snacks. Obviously, we were CAKES ON A PLANE and SNACKS ON A PLANE!

Yeah, don't feel bad that you don't get it. No one else did either. But when we thought these costumes up, we laughed our asses off, which is what matters in the grand scheme of things.

Our friends, however, rocked the costumes like you would not believe. People really get into this Halloween thing, did you realize that? I could go on and on about the costumery that I saw Saturday night because it blew my friggin' mind, but let me just tell you about my favorite costume- a kick-ass Dr. Octopus costume. It was SUBLIME. Check it!

COME ON.







R U SERIUS?

I know, my friends are way totally cooler than I am, I am highly aware.

Scary Halloween Post. Well, sort of.

There is a park in northeast Seattle that is being refurbished. (Is that the right word for a park? Renovated? Redone? Whatever.) Part of the revitalization is that it will restore a bunch of wetlands and other natural features. A few weeks ago, BioGirl and I went to check it out. While there, we came across signs and displays that tell you what sorts of re-doing has been done. Among these, there is a section called the Leaky Berms. Funny name, no? It sort of sounds like an old skool comedian. Ladies and Gentleman! Opening act for Soupy Sales and Red Buttons will be: Leaky Berms! Turns out it just means that there are sections of the land that have rocks and permeable fabric to help deal with water drainage.

And by the way, between Nordic Boy re-routing water in our yard and now this, how many times can I blog about drainage? I think I might have to change my name to the Pop Drainage Librarian.

Also, as long as I am being tangential, RIP Soupy Sales. Did I ever tell you guys that I met Soupy Sales once? It was in the early 90s and Alli and I went to the video store in our hometown in the middle of the afternoon one day, and there he was, sitting at a table, selling a dvd set of his old show. We got a glossy with his autograph and I distinctly remember that we were the only ones in the store who paid him any mind. It was sad.

You thought you were going to get some sort of witty story about my meeting with Soupy Sales, didn't you? Turns out, it was sad. And boring. Sorry.

So anyway. Back to the leaky berms. On the park walking map, there was this.



Why? Why is there a giant burrito on the map to denote the Leaky Berms? Are we not brainy enough to understand the concept of a leaky berm? Can anyone explain to me why the leaky berm had to be "aka the burrito"? Really. I am asking.

It's sort of scary actually. GIANT BURRITO IN THE PARK, AND IT WILL LEAK ON YOU.

Speaking of things that are slightly spooky, does anyone else think that Nikolas from Project Runway is related in some way to Severus Snape?





Scary when you put it together like that, right?

Also, since we are on the subject of scary (and it is almost Halloween after all so I am totally being topical), bike messengers? You are going to give me a mothereffing heart attack one of these days. Darting in and out of traffic like that? YIKES. Granny's ticker can't take it. It's super scary. They should make a scary movie out of that shit. Ghosts and masked killers don't scare me a whit, but a montage of bike messengers? Bring on the smelling salts!

Oh, and one more scary thing: TYRA MADE HER MODELS GET IN BLACKFACE. Oh yes, she did. And she did this horrid thing where she made fake ethnicity mashups. Like one lady she had dressed up as a mashup between Indian and Native American. She painted that stick figure brown and then put a sari on her and a giant feather headdress. Because TYRA IS SO CLEVER. She did this other mashup where the model was supposed to be Botswanan and Polynesian, which means Blackface, some garb made out of grass and a big ass necklace. And she told the person to pose as if she could hear music, because Botswanans always hear music everywhere. BECAUSE THEY IS TRIBAL SEE? And then one of the models waxed poetic about having always dreamed what it would be like to be brown, and that doing this shoot made her feel so EXOTIC. It was one tiny heartbeat away from Tyra sticking bones through these girls' noses and telling them to do the ooga booga dance. I swear! I am not even making it up. It almost made me barf up some leaky berm burrito.

Color Them Badd

We were looking at some buildings the other day, as we are wont to do, and the conversation went like this.

Nordic Boy: What is with the color of that paneling there?
Me: Where?
Him: Over there. It's like...mauve. No, not mauve.
Me: That one? That's puce.
Him: Sort of. It's not exactly puce.
Me: You're right. What is it?
Him: It's pucey.
Me: Maybe the actor Gary Pucey lives there.
Him: Yeah, he's even crazier than the original. Gary Pucey!

From this conversation, we came up with other Crayola inspired famous people. Such as!

The indie film director Jim Chartreuse
The why-is-she-famous-again starlet Burnt Sienna Miller
The son of an English rocker Cerulean Lennon
The lead singer of Red Zepplin, Robert Eggplant
Comedic Aussie actress Fuschia DiRossi
Sitcom star Matthew Periwinkle
80s star Sepia Zadora

Pumpkin Party!

It's nearly Halloween and my holiday-indifferent brain is all in a twist because I need to come up with a costume to go to a Halloween party next week. The best idea that Nordic Boy and I have come up with is to go as Piss and Vinegar, but (a) that is probably only funny to us, and (b) gross and (c) hard to interpret into an actual costume.

Before I get to Halloween stuff, remember how I said that it had been a while since a dance show had knocked my socks off? Well I solved that problem by going to see the Hubbard Street Dance Company who were here on tour from Chicago this weekend. My socks were blown off as well as a few other articles of clothing, they were so good. So once again, Chicago, you beat the pants off Seattle in terms of dance shows I have seen from both of these two towns. Dang you, Chicago. Seattle still has...um, mountains and stuff, and if mountain climbing were my thing I would mos def be sassing you about that. So there.

Things here in Seattle have taken a very rainy turn, and I have had to accept the fact that I won't see the sun for another 6 months or so and that all my white cohorts are going to begin glowing a translucent if soggy alabaster. I thank all of you for your coat suggestions- alas none of them fit my admittedly picky-bastard standards. Don't fret though- it's quite apparent that if I have not succumbed to a raincoat for over ten years then my neuroses is way stronger than any of you can help me with, clearly, unless any of you happens to be a therapist. You are awful nice for trying though. (Me, hanging head in shame. A very wet head.)

So far, this post seems to be all about what sorts of things are below acceptable standards, doesn't it? Costume ideas, dance in Seattle, sun levels, and raincoat appreciation. Yeesh. Let's turn this party around, shall we?

How about I share the fact that this fall has been such a pretty one in my town? Sometimes, our falls can be really short- we can go from summer to winter in a week, or at least it feels that way. But this month has seemed long and positively autumnal. I have some random neighborhoody photos that I've snapped offa my phone to illustrate. Take a looksie?









To celebrate the autumnity of the surroundings, as well as the upcoming Halloween eve, my friends M and B had a pumpkin carving party at their house over the weekend. And you know what you do when you live in the city and don't have a pumpkin patch handy to supply such an endeavor? You go to the local underground parking pumpkin patch, that's what!


Don't you just smell the mulled cider in the air? No? Too choked up with exhaust? Oh whatever.

At any rate, we got our pumpkins (Nordic Boy picked out a small white one, and BioGirl picked out a whopper of an orange one) and headed over to the party. I forgot to take a photo of ours (ok, fine, it should just be called Nordic Boy's since I didn't even touch the thing the entire evening because in case you haven't heard by now I am HOLIDAY DEFICIENT) but rest assured he carved the cutest pumpkin ever- it had little beady eyes and a tongue sticking out of its mouth.

How about you look at someone else's awesome pumpkin artistry instead?



Then we cozied up with a bunch of our friends and watched the best Halloween double feature ever conceived. First off, we watched Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster.


Followed by Queen of Outer Space starring the effervescent Zsa Zsa Gabor who ran around in action scenes in chiffon and sparkles the entire time.



I highly, highly recommend both movies. Highly.

Thus was spent another gorgeous weekend. One might say that the entire thing was full of piss and vinegar. And pumpkins. Piss, vinegar and pumpkins.

Where the Soggy Things Are

We have so much catching up to do. Let's do it now, shall we? Let's shall.

You didn't miss much from me last week because I was working hard for the money (dah-dum, dah-dum), so hard for it honey. Not to say that I don't usually work really hard, but compared to last week? It made me think: let's face it, I don't usually work that hard.

But talking about work is likely to keel you over dead with boredom so I'm going to skip to the end (please say "skip to the end" in your head like Prince Humperdinck during the wedding scene in Princess Bride, thanks) and get to the weekend. Unless you want to hear about how I was so tired that I ate popcorn and Smart Puffs for dinner due to tiredness? No? Ok then.

The only thing I will say about last week is that I attended a week-long conference type thing in my city at a fancy hotel. Lunch was provided and people got awesomely fed every single day. It was gourmet deluxe, which is very unusual for conferences in my profession. It was great. Except for the four vegetarians in the group. They (ok, we) got a cold, bland portabella and spinach sandwich every day. For five days straight. No chips on the side, no condiments even. I am not a picky eater and pretty much have the attitude that since I am in the minority about meat ingestion I should expect to just eat whatever veggie thing I'm broughten, but dang. You shoulda seen the spread that everyone else was getting. And I would have settled for a goddamn grilled cheese to break up the monotony. Something. A slice of tomato?Anything? An onion ring? But nope. Cold, unmarinated dry ass mushroom sandwich. For a whole week.

Oh well. My life is so hard, boohoo.

Friday night I attended my workplace's union meeting, wherein we all stood on tables with signs like Norma Rae, except ours said things like "librarians are hot" and "read a book, suckers" instead of your normal Norma Rae captions. Ok, we didn't really do that, but you know me, if I could live my life in a long uninterrupted string of movie clips that would be kind of ok with me. The library budget, much like everyone else's budget, is in the crapper for 2010 and so the meeting was not a barrel of laughs, that's for damn sure. Afterward, my friend J and I had to go brave the rain and cheer ourselves up with some avocado sushi rolls. We closed the sushi joint down and then talked in the car for a couple of hours, which made my evening last into the next day, which for a grandma like yours truly is sort of spectacular.

This weekend the weather gushed down in the form of large and in-charge raindrops of a Midwest variety. Seattle may be known for its rain, but seldom does it just POUR down in bucketloads. Rather, it seems perfectly unrainy until you walk around in it and find yourself inexplicably soaking wet from the teeny tiny mist drops that have been hitting you all the while without your knowing. But this week it was full on raining cats and dogs with some ferrets thrown in for good measure.

So when you have stayed up late the night before, and had a hellish workweek the days before that, and you have a weekend coming up and it's stormy outside, what do you do? Stay in and watch Tudors DVDs? Snuggle in your bed and listen to the bluster outside? Build a cozy fire in your fireplace?

Um, no. You get up at 7am and go to the dump and get super duper wet, and smell super duper smelly. Obviously.

Granted, I didn't have to get up and go to the dump. Nordic Boy would have happily gotten his ass up and done it himself. Wouldn't have been the first time. But remember when I mentioned Project Get Hella Involved? I am committed. I am not going to wuss out now. So we went to the dump to recycle a bunch of broken up concrete from a walkway of our yard. And I was reminded that I don't own a raincoat. Or rain-appropriate shoes.

That's right- over ten years in Seattle, and no rain gear. Because why? Because rain gear is ug-effing-lee. If there was ever a debate in my mind about whether form or function wins the day in the Land of Librarian Girl, that right there should answer the question for you. If it's ugly, I can't go there. I just can't. I'm not proud of this.

After the dump, we went rain coat shopping for me. At REI. Let me just say this right now- I am not an REI, Patagonia, North Face sort of chickee. I find the design of these clothes abominable, especially for ladies. The everloving CUT of these coats, people. It is as if they are all made for Rosie the Maid from the Jetson's. Big and boxey. Yick. It gives me hives just thinking about it. Plus, they were playing that song in REI? The one that goes, real fast: I gotta a pocket gotta pocket fulla sunshine I gotta love and I know that it's awl mine oh. Oh-oh. I am usually pretty ok with bad music and indeed I love a lot of bad music (hi Jody Watley) but I cannot HANDLE THAT SONG. So add REI box coats with a pocket fulla sunshine and I almost had to throw a pocket fulla coniption fits.

Needless to say from that story that a raincoat for me was not found that day.

Then Nordic Boy had to go in to work for a while so I had a nice long private makeout session with my couch. Don't tell him that, ok?

Then we went out with a bucketload of friends to see Where the Wild Things Are. Remember how that book is all wild rumpusish and full of joy and wild abandon and gleeful spirit? Well this version of the story is full of dysfunction and drama and not a small amount of outright disturbing violence. There was a little kid sitting behind me at the movie theater and she kept saying, in a really small scared voice "Why is that happening, momma? Why are they so mad?" It's pretty much guaranteed that that kid will have a straight up nightmare for the next few weeks of her life. So thanks for that Dave Eggers.

I'm not saying that the movie was bad or anything. But for some reason it made the group of us go to a bar afterward and talk about how sucky and often scary being a kid was over our beers until the wee hours. So that's my review of that movie.

Ok, I gotta go to work now so you'll have to wait for the riveting tale of Sunday and how Nordic Boy and I installed rain water collection tanks in our garage. Trust me, it's exciting. And I am not even being sarcastic.

Two weeks ago now...

Bloggie can you hear me?

I just sang that in my head as if I was Barbra in Yentl. Because that's just how I do.

Well there you have it- I just talked about my birthday and then fell off the blog wagon for over a week like I was giving you the silent treatment or something. Rest assured that the only reason that I was being a blog asshole was that work kicked me in the nuts last week and it was all I could do to drag myself home each night, take an Advil, and go to bed.

But just in case you care about the birthday, it ended up being pretty lovely. Aside from the fact that I spent a lot of the day on my birthday crying an effing river. It wasn't that I had a terrible birthday or anything, but for some reason I became The Most Emotional Birthday Girl Ever for the day. People kept saying/doing lovely things for me on my birthday and I kept bursting into tears over each and every one of them. As my tear ducts are usually akin to the Mojave on even a pretty bad day, this was throwing me all off. By the time BioGirl came over to my house ready to fire up the Kiss Me Kate dvd that she had brought over (sah-weeet!), I had to tell her not to even look at me funny or else I might just have a Hallmark moment with her and reprise the eyeball squirts.

Since then, I have managed to keep my face from leaking and have returned to my decidedly un-sobby personality. Ahhhh.

Here are among the things that have not made me cry since then.

1. The aforementioned Kiss Me Kate. How I adore that movie. Even if you hate old musicals, and cheese, and Technicolor (which, oh my god, are you made of steel?), you should rent it and turn the sound off if you must and just bask in the crazy costumes. Your retinas might burn out from the brightness, but it'd be worth it.

2. A lovely birthday dinner out with my newly preggers pal, Hopscotch. During which she graciously listened to a strange monologue I did wherein I gave her the play-by-play description of every pair of bedroom slippers I have ever owned. I don't even know how it happened, but I started to run my mouth and Feetwarmers of My Life was the topic I chose. Also, we got to share an odd moment at the fancy restaurant we were in where the server told us that the reason our dinners were taking so long was because they were having trouble heating up the cheese at the correct rate. Which made half of my brain think: fan-seeeee, and the other half of my brain think: boolsheeeeet.

3. I had the day off of work that Friday, and not only did Nordic Boy skip the Portland business trip that week (woohoo, birthday week!), he took the day off on Friday too. So we saw each other every single day for a whole week (what luxury) plus we had a whole day of uninterrupted usness. Best birthday present ever.

4. I also got material birthday presents, which were also awesome. I am all for material birthday presents. Just to be clear.

5. My friend M. wanted to get rid of some plants in her yard (which is a very beauteous yard) so she donated them to our yard (which is not beauteous but rather more like a boil on the ass of our neighborhood). We transported them over and now are hoping that they make the transition ok. We speak to them every time we enter or leave our yard as if we are in a Lifetime Original Movie and they are Janine Turner in a coma. "You can do it! You have to believe you can live! Do you hear me? Don't you quit on me now!"

So that's what happened on my birthday week. Which was over a week ago now. Perhaps I will get my blog-ass in gear and catch you up on this past week this week and then we can be in real time again. Shall we make that a goal? Ok, let's make that a goal.

(By the way, just so you know, I suck at goals).

Hopscotch plus Rambo = Hambo?

Remember a couple of weeks ago, when I said that one of my top ten favoritest friends of all time is pregnant? She's made it public now, so I can tell you that it's Hopscotch! Go read her post about it and join me in a happy dance.

Starting off right

In my house when I was growing up, birthdays were a big deal. Need I remind you of this grandiose cake?



My very first memory is of me at my 2nd birthday party. That's right, two years old. I have a crazy accurate memory of almost everything about my childhood and it goes back that far. It's not a fully-formed memory or anything. Just sort of a hazy sensory flash of myself, at a table, and my dad taking out a little wooden toy dog from a box. The dog was wearing skis.

Of all things to remember. Leave it to me to have a weird first memory. A wooden dog with skis? Why the hell?

Anyway, I have an ever more vivid string of memories of each birthday after that, all the way through adulthood. The only birthday I don't remember is the one where I was, you know, born and stuff. And I don't remember anything about my first birthday. Which is kind of a shame because I hear it sort of rocked.

At the time, my parents lived in an apartment complex which has since been torn down. Recently arrived in this country, they had four little kids in a teeny cramped two bedroom apartment. The apartment complex was full of other immigrant families, many of them with kids. This place gave my parents a sense of community and all of the people that lived there became very close, very quickly. When my mom brought me home from the hospital, I was the only baby around and therefore sort of the darling of the bunch. I hear I got passed around constantly and my parents were never short on babysitters. When my first birthday rolled around, my parents threw me a bash. It was in the basement laundry room of the apartment building, and all the kids came. Of all ages.

It resulted in this photo, which is one of my all-time favorites. Come on, can it get any more awesome than this?



I don't know what I love the most. My sweet sister, holding me in the middle? My brother, next to her in a crooked yellow dress shirt? My other brother, standing like a ramrod with his tinted glasses and checkered pants in the back? The other kid next to my sister flashing the motherlovin' peace sign? The little kid in the front who looks like he's getting his brain squeezed between that dude's knees and enjoying every last second of it? There is something especially touching to me about the looks on my siblings faces. I know that their transition into this country was unbelievably hard on them, and seeing their sweet faces smiling in such a happy moment, surrounded by all of their new friends, sort of breaks my heart a little bit.

So I don't know what I love most about this photo. All of it, I guess. I just love all of it. What a way to inaugurate a lifetime of birthdays. I wish every birthday of mine could be as sweet, full of love, friends, family, and crazy outfits, just like that first one. It's a hard one to top.

Librarian Girl

It's What Month Again?

Highlights from the weekend...

1. Nordic Boy got us tickets to see a ballet Saturday night. It was fine, but just fine. How I long for a dance show that really knocks my socks off- it's been a while for me. There were too many problems with this one for my socks to go anywhere, but it was fun to get gussied up and traipse to the show. Don't get me wrong, there were good parts to the show. Just not sock-knockers.

2. I just said knockers.

3. I am in some sort of deep, deep denial that it is October. There are lots of Octobery things happening around me, and I am feeling constantly shocked about them. For one- my birthday. It is this week, and yet every time someone refers to it, I act as though it is far, far away. Weeks away, at least, instead of days. And then yesterday was BioGirl and my 11 year friendy-versary, and I totally spaced that too. She brought me a card and a funny gift and I was all WUT IS THAT. Nice one. Also, I have already gotten invites to two Halloween parties. And still, I don't get that it's October. My inner clock is all effed up.

4. I have decided that in order to combat the fall doldrums that I am susceptible to, I am going to get HELLA INVOLVED with the home improvement projects around here. Yes sir, you heard me right. This weekend, Nordic Boy was building shelves for the scrap lumber we have stacked in our garage. I know this is not weird for many people but to me I find it funny that we OWN LUMBER. Enough of it to need shelves for it. Who does that? But I kept such commentary to myself since having me help on projects is one thing without adding lumber punditry of a sarcastic nature on top of it.

5. Part of Project Get Hella Involved was accompanying Nordic Boy to the hardware store and not completely disengaging. Which I DID! Usually, when I go to the hardware store with him, he shops, while I follow him around the store with my iPhone, surfing the web and texting my friends like a surly teenager. But this time, I like, helped. And I am proud to say that I found the correct style of compression connectors that he needed. Hell if I know what they do, but I found them goddammit. Small victories, people. I have to start somewhere.

6. We got bracing up on the garage walls, and the shelves now need to be cut from some of his scrap lumber. Aside from a point where I got too bored for words and I went into the house to watch America's Next Top Model for a half hour break, I was Hella Involved the whole day. I call this a success.

7. As we were walking down the street the other day, we walked past a pile of human caca, right there on the sidewalk. As you do. It was, pardon me for saying so, a long tendril curled up on itself. After which we had the following conversation:

Me: Someone pooped out a pretzel.
Nordic Boy: Looked more like a heart to me.
Me: You are such a romantic.
Nordic Boy: So true, so true.

Roll With It

My mom is an amazing cook. I'm not just saying that because she's my mom and people tend to like what they grew up eating. She is a true gourmet. She makes everything, and I mean everything, from scratch, and her repertoire extends across ethnic boundaries. Guests have come to her house my whole life and have talked about foods that she has made for them years and years later. We didn't eat Ruffles potato chips in my house, we had homemade potato chips. I never had a store-bought baked good in my life unless I went to someone else's house. She makes her own bread, she makes her own yogurt, she makes her own ice cream (without an ice cream machine). She grinds all of her own spices and makes her own special spice blends. For years she did this by hand, not just with a mortar and pestle, but with a muthereffin' smoothed out ROCK, for pete's sake. Only in her retirement years has she deigned to get an electric spice grinder. She makes everything from deep dish pizza to paper thin crepes (which, with her accent, she pronounces "craps," as in "sweetie, would you like to eat a crap for breakfast?") to crispy baklava to any flavor of trifle to traditional fijian daruka cooked in coconut cream to the lightest potato latkes you have ever eaten in your life. We never had the same thing to eat two nights in a row, ever. Not even the same thing to eat for weeks on end.

Many of the things my mom makes, she sort of reinvents. I can't count the number of times when she will make something run of the mill or not really that exciting-sounding, and then the lucky eater takes a bite and says "oh my GOD. This is the best [...] I have ever had in my LIFE." Her carrot cake for example. I don't know what she puts in there but she has converted more people into carrot-cake love than is really healthy for them.

This brings me to the subject for today. My mom's cinammon rolls. Whoever has eaten them has become part of the Cult of Mom's Cinammon Rolls. They are addictive, and awesome, and I have never been able to find another cinnamon roll to compare. But the love of the cinammon roll can take over. It can get freaky.

My mom, because she is awesome, will often ask loved ones who are going to come to her house what their all-time favorite food is. Whatever they say, she will make for them. You have a request for pho? You got it. You have a hankering for cheesecake? Coming up. But over the years, the requests have dwindled. Down to one thing. EVERYONE WANTS THE CINNAMON ROLLS.

My dear mother has confessed to me that she fears she will not be able to keep up with the incessant demand for her cinnamon rolls.

Last year for his birthday, my nephew who lives on the east coast did not ask for a toy. He did not ask for a bike. He did not ask for money. He asked his dear Nana to send him some cinnamon rolls. Which she did. A big batch of about two dozen. And you know what he did? He called her up to tell her, in little-kid earnestness, the cinnamon roll countdown.

"Nana, we only have 12 rolls left. Only 12! Mom says I have to share them with the whole family. So we lose four every day!"

On the plus side, he is learning math this way. On the minus side, loss of cinnamon rolls are causing panic in the heart of a child.

My other nephew, who lives in Seattle, had yet to taste the cinnamon rolls, until this year. At the age of 6, he was initiated with a care package full of the sweet cinnamon stash. And you know what has happened since? He has asked about those cinammon rolls when he talks to my mom on the phone. Often. "So, Nana, you can send more cinammon rolls whenever you want, ok?"

I know that my mom loves that she can make something that her little sweeties love so much, but I know there is a small part of her that is galled. She can make ANYTHING. Her repertoire is endless! No one wants a lemon merengue pie? No one wants homemade fudge? No one wants hot chocolate with homemade marshmallows? No one wants anything else? YOU CAN HAVE ANYTHING ELSE.

Nope. Everyone wants the cinammon rolls.

Nordic Boy has been gone for most of the week, and has been gone a lot this past month, and it makes me grumpy. Last night I came home to an empty house, tired, cold, and cranky, with unexciting take-out in hand. On my doorstep was a package. I hauled it inside, opened it up, and this is what I found.

Gallon-sized ziploc bags! Like 10 of them! Full of mom's cinnamon rolls! Happy birthday to me!



I texted BioGirl to tell her what I got, and her immediate text back? An RSVP to hold one for her. Since she came to my mom's house last summer, she's on the junk too.

Here is my advice to you. If you ever were to meet my mom, and if she were to ever offer you a cinnamon roll? Walk away. Just walk away. If you don't you will never be the same.

Librarian Girl

Weird Auntie Status? Check.

You know what I want for my birthday? To not get a cold or the flu (porcine or otherwise). Libraryland is RIFE with illness all of a sudden and I do not want a piece of that action, no way. October is not the ideal time to have a birthday I have discovered, because oftentimes this is when the weather changes and sickness happens and then I spend my birthday with a box of tissue and a snotty face. Or I am fine but Nordic Boy is the one with mucus issues.

In past years I have had grand plans for birthdayness- parties, hot dates, fancy dinners, sweet treats. Not this year. I just want to be snot-free. See how Birthday Madness Lady has calmed down over the years?

In other news, yesterday I started to write a blog post and it was all doldrums and blah and pbbbt. I don't know what had my panties in a twist (other than Nordic Boy is gone on another trip this week which seriously harshes my mellow when it's for three or more days in a row and I know this is not a huge problem in the grand scheme of things and I am being a giant baby but that's just the way I be's sometimes) but I just could not come up with something to make myself smile which is the whole point of this blog.

And then! You know what happened? I found out that one of my top ten most favoritest friends in the whole world is hella preggers! And it just took my panties right out of that twist (wow, that sounded kind of inappropriate, but you know what I mean). Seriously, I think I almost went to the squealy jumpy place, which I like to think I am incapable of doing. But it's just too, too happy.

So yeah. Doldrums are gone. That's usually what happens when I start to go to the stupid place. Not the getting pregnant part- I don't want you to think that my bad moods cause hyper-fertility or anything. I just mean that when I start to have a whine and cheese party, something usually makes me snap the hell out of it and remember how awesome things can be.

Does that sound Pollyanna-ish? I DON'T CARE. I'm gonna be an auntie. A weird auntie? Yes. Tell me something I don't know.

Orchards, I say Uncle

This weekend!

I almost had a friggin' heart attack because my iphone froze up and I couldn't get it to unfreeze. I realized, as I was freaking the eff out, that it really probably wasn't healthy for me to care that much about a phone. But I went there. To the bad place. About my phone. And then Nordic Boy fixed it! I love that guy. And by that guy, I mean my phone.

I was sort of mad that the Project Runway folks kept using the term "snoozefest" last week. Snoozefest is like, MY WORD, and they were using it! I was reminded by loved ones that I did not coin the phrase snoozefest nor do I have any rights on telling Heidi Klum she can't use it. But still. I felt robbed. Much like Christopher and Epperson must have felt.

I went on a pilgrimmage to find an apple orchard with a storefront that sells doughnuts and cider. I do this annually, and wrote about it a couple of years ago. When I was a kid, my parents always took me to this orchard in Michigan and I would run around in the leaves and we would drink cider and eat doughnuts and it's a memory that is just about as perfect as one can get. You know what's hard? Trying to recreate a perfect memory. It's not really possible, is what I am learning. Sometimes you have to know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em, and I think I need to give up on the orchard quest now. I gave it a good shot for a few years, but the disappointment is just a little too much for me each time.

Still, there were good things about this orchard, even if it's not the orchard of my dreams. There was a pumpkin patch that was pretty and made me wonder if the Great Pumpkin was going to visit next month.



Also at the orchard, there was a bunch of goats that were chewing everything and peeing themselves to kingdom come. Which is not really a great thing, I suppose. But it was notable. Goats may not have many talents, but if you want someone to chew stuff and lay some poops and peeps everywhere, goats are the tops. Everyone's got something to be good at.

I got called out on Facebook by Nordic Boy who decided that he needed to post on BioGirl's wall that this is the season where I begin my annual reign as a "holiday Scrooge." First of all, that is rich, coming from that dude. Second of all, he never logs in to Facebook, like, ever, and the one time he does it's to name-call me? Humpf. Third of all, I beg to differ about this defamation. I am not a Scrooge (despite the fact that I just said "humpf"). I am holiday-indifferent. Totally not the same. I am even benevolently indifferent. Really. Truly. Also, perhaps a little bit holiday-defensive.

Oh, and by the way, you guys? Apparently don't have any blog recommendations. Because out of all yall I think I got four blog recs. FOUR. That is sad to me. Is bloggyland that unexciting?

Come on, you know you want to recommend one. Just one. Your top pick. Give it to me.

Librarian Girl

Smizing at Garfield

Random things rattling around in my noggin...

1. Remember when I told you that when I was a kid, I thought the band Depeche Mode was pronounced "Duh-Peachy Mode?" Well, check this out.


It's times like these when I realize that I have never had an original thought, ever.

2. Lots of my favorite bloggy superstar favorites seem to be slowing down with the posting these days. This must be what it feels like when you get old and all your friends start dying off. Wow, did I just say that? Because yeah, Librarian Girl, that is totally the same thing. Yeesh. ANYWAY. Tell me, friends, who are your favorite bloggers? Who should I be reading? My google reader is so frickin' quiet these days.

3. I was at a fundraising event recently where they were giving out t-shirts. I went up to the t-shirt-giver-outer and asked for one in my size (small or medium). She looked me up and down and said in quite a tone "we only have large and extra large left, so I'm giving you an extra large. I am trying to save the larges for the truly smaller people." I am not one to usually be sensitive about body issues, but OUCH.

4. Everywhere I go, fire alarms seem to have gone off about a half hour before I arrive. I am wondering how I should interpret this.

5. Someone needs to do a study on the cognitive development of elementary school kids and what happens in their brains that makes them want Garfield comics so very badly when they come to the library. Because, man, they can not get enough of that cat.

6. I just realized this week that my birthday is a week and a half away, and for plans? ZILCH. I know Nordic Boy is cooking something up, but other than that, this may be a quiet one. I am just not feeling like a party this year. (This is where I turn to myself and say "Self? I don't even know who you ARE anymore!")

7. Is it just me or is smizing just a fancy word for squinting? How come nobody is calling Tyra out on this? Because, you know, with all that is going on in the world today, we should all be spending our time calling Tyra out on her weird word creation. Who's with me?

Bah, I'm going to bed.