Nordic Boy's 3 Part Birthday

This year, my dude asked for three things for his birthday. One: a day off work for both of us where we spent the whole day doing interesting stuff, but he didn't know what and wanted me to plan it. Two: a very low-key activity of some sort with his most favorite Seattle people. Three: a fancy dinner and a night out seeing something arty. I am happy to say that I came through for him on all three things. After months of him taking care of me, I really, really wanted to plan a bunch of stuff that was exactly as he wanted. And I did. Yay, me! (Oops, see how I turned that shit around and made it about me again? DANGIT).

We took the day off on Wednesday and I took him to a history museum which was a total score. They had old timey tools there, and old timey printing presses, and old timey factory machines. My guy likes old timey stuff in a Ron Swanson sort of way. We then walked around in the surprising sunshine and ended up on the Ferris wheel. It was good times. Thing One: DONE.

I tried to make us reservations to go bowling but the reservation lady jacked it up and so we didn't know whether we were showing up for bowling on Friday night or if we were showing up to shoot pool. I sent out an email to Nordic Boy's pals saying that all I knew was that we were going to be rolling some sort of balls around for sport, but I was not sure of ball size or rolling format. We showed up and it turned out to be pool, which was fine. If you play pool with me, Nordic Boy, or our friends, we are not pretending to be not good in order to pool shark your ass. We are really just that stinky at it. At any rate, drinks were drunk, balls were rolled, fun was had. Thing Two: DONE.

Saturday night I made us reservations at our current restaurant obsession, got dressed up all swanky, and went to stuff our faces. After that we went to the opera. Rigoletto (or "Rigatoni" as we like to call it because we are SO FUNNY) was the show. I have many things to say about that opera. First of all, it will never cease to amaze me the sheer volume that comes out of those humans. Like, it is blasting right out of their faces in a way that does not seem right at all. Second, this thing had all of the elements of an episode of Scandal- kidnapping, beating, murder, affairs, betrayal, all of it. Opera does not tone down the drama, y'all. Third, of all, I know it is a cliche but it really is true that sometimes characters in an opera take an awfully, awfully long time to die. This girly in Rigoletto got stabbed, and she sang, then she got rolled up in a bag and dragged around (NO JOKE THIS OPERA WAS THUGGISH), then she got unwrapped, and then she sat up and sang a bunch more and THEN she croaked. It was bananuts. At any rate, Thing Three: DONE.

Birthday times, over and out.

The Boy's Birthday

Oh my pretties! So many things.

My unlucky attempt at ice skating has left me no worse for wear, except yesterday all of a sudden my ankle felt janky all over again. On the plus side, when my ankle feels janky I get to call it my jankle. So there is always a plus side.

We spent a lot of our weekend at home this past weekend, so naturally this was the time for a rainstorm that caused the power to be out for a lot of the time. And lookit, I know my wimpy Seattle ass has no room to complain about being cold (when my mom is all "it really warmed up today! It was EIGHT DEGREES!"), but I hope it's not too annoying to say that I was feeling so much love for my furnace when that power came back on. I mean, I was marveling at the invention of all furnaces. Furnace people, I salute you!

Also, I forgot to tell you that I up and did a super un-me thing and made some New Year's Resolutions after all, yo! I honestly think this is a first for my whole life, maybe? I am fixing to read 100 books this year, watch 100 movies, and go on 100 dates with people I love. Oh and also I am going to try to take a photo every day. That's right, I have gone from no-resolution-lady to Ms. Resolution Up the Yin Yang! Go big or go home, is what I always (never) say. Actually my resolutions are less about making changes to my life (I already read lots and watch lots and love lots and photo lots) and more about counting this shit up and getting to make lists of them all. AND HOO NANNY I LOVE A LIST.

Lastly it was Nordic Boy's birthday this week and so we both played hooky for the day. We went to the Museum of History and Industry and learned us some stuff about local history like a couple of old farts (I guess you could say historic farts), and then we walked a bunch (the sun actually came out! In January! In Seattle!), and then I went to work for a few hours (oops, I only played semi-hooky), and then we went over to the Seattle ferris wheel and took a ride in that (this city is pretty pretty pretty), and then met up with Biogirl for dinner. It was such a lovely day for that dude o' mine.

Lifting

To me, grief is like a fog. For the past six months, it's been hard to focus, concentrate, see things in front of me. I would listen to my friends and family talk, and I would hear them, but it was like I was underwater. I can hear you, but there is a roar in my ears, a scrim between us. I am trying to listen, I hope you know I'm trying to listen. I did all the normal things, I went to work, I met friends for dinner, I smiled, and the smiles were genuine, but they were labored, under that thick, blankety fog. I've wondered, these past months, what the purpose of this fog is, where it comes from in the brain. It's effect, it seems to me, is to make one feel a bit numb, which makes sense, I guess. I can see why a little emotional anasthetic might be helpful in times like these. "Can people tell that I'm having trouble?" I would ask Nordic Boy. "No, I don't think so. I can't believe you're pulling it off, but you seem ok out there." I went to work, I kept up with people, with things. When I was particularly spaced out, Nordic Boy would catch my eye and just look at me with that lovely groundedness of his and it would help me re-focus. Being a cheerful girl by nature, this sadness felt confusing to me. What do I do here? How do I do this? I was lucky enough to have a dad for my whole life who was truly unconditional, who did nothing for me except love and support me, who gave me the gift of understanding, from how he treated me, what simple, uncomplicated, open, supportive love was. He loved me, and that was all, no qualifiers, no hard parts, no hidden hurts. It sounds stupid, maybe, but I felt frustrated for feeling so sad, for not being able to live in the gratitude of it and feel thankful after he died. I wanted to think "thank you, thank you, thank you for that love," but instead all I could think was "this sucks, this is devastating, how am I going to do this without you?" My attempts to reach through the fog to people in my life have been less successful than I would have wanted, but I'm starting to feel resolved about that. Sometimes we don't get what we need from people and sometimes we do- that's the way life goes and there's no use fighting it. And that doesn't mean we're not loved. That fog is a powerful thing whether you're in it looking out or outside looking in.

Nordic Boy makes me lunch to take to work every day to make sure I don't forget to eat something, and when I walk up the front stoop, he's watching for me to come home and opens the door before I get the key in the lock so I literally walk into a hug when I step into the house. He looks at me with kindness and calls me "sweetness" or "my love" which is not a new thing but I hear it anew now and something feels less broken every time he says it. He's pretty much been carrying me, every minute, without a lot of help, through our year.

Each morning, when I come into consciousness, my first thought starts to be "no, no, not another day already," but before I can completely think it, before I have opened my eyes to the day, Nordic Boy is saying "I love you, I love you, I love you," just like that, several times over, as if he knows about the fog and is pulling me back toward him. When he says this, I hear so many things in it. I hear You're ok, I'm here, We're together, I will take care of you, Our beautiful life, My sweetheart. All in this whispered morning mantra: I love you, I love you, I love you. And so there it is again: unconditional, simple, uncomplicated, open love. No qualifiers, no hard parts, no hidden hurts. In my lovely partner, I recognize it. I know what that is.

When I smile at that Nordic Boy, it feels like a real smile, a joyful smile, a me smile, and there is no fog between us.

Decembhair

Hey you want to talk about my hair some more? Because we're gonna. So, I recovered from bad Haircuttageddon 2013 and I went to Michigan to visit my mom. While there all sorts of things happened, and one of them was that I took a box of my Dad's things and mailed the box back to Seattle. When I packed it, I thought, hey, as long as I am mailing this box, if there is room in here I might as well pack some of my heavier items that would have gone in my suitcase, because Nordic Boy and I packed super tight (one week, one small carry on suitcase between the two of us LIGHT PACKERS AWARD) so why not take advantage of this mailed box and stuff some shit in there, thus alleviating the suitcase burden? I put in a book, and my boots, and a sweater, and my hair dryer. I was not thinking about the fact that it would take a week to get to Seattle. More than a week because of the holiday, actually. Which left me Hairdryerless In Seattle. Which meant that even though I had a good haircut again, I now had ugly non-blowdried hair for days.

I am so sorry to discover this about myself. That I am such an effing pain in my own ass about my hair. But I am so vain that that song is totally about me, you guys. Ugh. WORST.

I am vain, but not vain enough to go out and buy another hair dryer for a week and a half, so that says something, I guess. I will say that I did a happy jig when that damn box was delivered today though.

You know what else happened? I was paying my automo-bills (Destiny's Child, wut wut) over the weekend and I discovered that while we were in Michigan someone here in Seattle was running amok with our credit card number. SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS WORTH OF AMOK. It's that sort of discovery that makes you not worry about your hair for a minute. It seems like our credit card people are going to be cool about it, but that was a jolt to the old ticker, I tell you.

Oh yeah, and there was that whole Giving of the Thanky Feelings Day that happened too. We had Delium and Biogirl over for the vittle times for that. The rest of the weekend was spent going to a movie (Hunka Hunka Burning Shirtless Thor 2), snuggling up at home, and turning up the furnace.

I solemnly lemon pledge to you that we will not talk about my hair again for a very long time.

NaNoReBloPhotoIceLovesCoco

It is that time of year where people are writing a novel in a month for NaNoWriMo, and other people are writing a blog post every day for a month for NaBloPoMo, and other people are doing a Photo A Day Challenge for the month, and still others are reading as many novels as they can in a month for NaNoReMo. I toyed with doing each of these things but ha ha who am I kidding? I am not going to do any of these things let us be real just for one moment please. But maybe I can step up the blog a little bit? Like maybe more than once every couple of weeks? Expectations. Set them low, is what I am saying.

This weekend I went further into a hole of non-peoplehood. I didn't intend for it to happen. I started out my weekend by attending a dance performance with Nordic Boy and Delium which was pretty good, but not great. It was one of these companies where they are so into the theatricality of the show (crazy costumes! weirdo lighting! mondo sets!) that they kind of skimp a little bit on the dancing. Which, I get that those other things are cool too. I am just partial to lots of dance content. Plus, the theater that we were at was trying to burn us alive, they had the heat turned on way past original recipe and up to extra crispy. I am never hot, but I thought I was going to turn into librarian jerky by the end of that dang show. After the show ended and the lights went up Nordic Boy looked at me and said "WHOO IT IS LIKE KENNY ROGERS ROASTERS UP IN HERE" and the people in the row next to us stared at us but we didn't care because we were melting.

The following day there was a windstorm and branches were falling off trees and power was out all over the place. Nordic Boy got called to work and this is where I fell into a black hole of no-people-ness. It was a sad sort of day. Nordic Boy did get home and we just sort of curled up for the rest of the night and that was fine by me. I swear to you it is very easy for me to go to a place where I think that I could live pretty good in a bubble with just that dude and me and be just fine not seeing any other face ever again. He is just so effing sweet to me I can't help it. I become crazy live-in-a-survivalist-compound lady. I get this feeling a lot more since my dad is gone. I kind of don't want to be a part of the world, in a way, I guess. Let me just live in my cocoon of uncomplicated love and I'm good. I guess that is a normal feeling at a time such as this, right?

Anyway, we stayed in and watched Casablanca and played cards and made food. Our power stayed on too, which was nice. I mean, I am all for being in a bunker, but I want full amenities too. Let's not get crazy now.

The rest of the weekend was spent in each other's company just like that, joined at the hipbone. I still feel so sad a lot of the time, even though I pretend not to be mostly. With that dude of mine though, I still look at him and smile, like, from my soul. It's kind of the only thing right now.

Sunday

Walked in the rain with my dude today. The view from our walk looked like this. Sometimes it's good to remember that it's not raining everywhere.

Ring Around the Cozy



The days are getting noticeably shorter- I leave for work when it's still dark outside. It's getting rainier now too, which means that I have entered the Cozy Times. The Cozy Times are like the End Times, in that they both require hunkering down and hoarding food items and eschewing sociability because Going Outside Times are over. I have always been particularly prone to succumbing fully to the Cozy Times, what with my love for reading and blankets and watching the teevee and having good companionship in that dude that seems to be living with me, so I have to make sure I put some things on my calendar here and there so as not to completely submerge for too long. The problem I foresee with this as time goes on is that as we fix up our house more and more, it only feeds the Cozy Times monster. Our house is getting a little bit nicer and so why would we ever leave it again? I am asking.

After a Friday night dinner out with friends (where I ordered a drink called "Bollywood 411" which, I don't know, cute or ridiculous?), a Saturday at Delium's house where Nordic Boy inducted everyone into the society of how to install ductwork (get it I said inducted about ducting haaaa), we woke up on Sunday, went out for a quick breakfast (at a place where the waitstaff were Halloween costumed as the 4 ladies from The Golden Girls- our waiter was Dorothy) and then hightailed it home and vowed to not break the homebound coziness seal for the rest of the day. We read, we watched movies, Delium stopped by, I baked, Nordic Boy cooked a delicious three-course Indian dinner, we changed our sheets to flannel, we talked and talked. Why do I need to leave my house again? There's a world out there to see and experience? And other people? Are you sure? It seems pretty good in here.

Annual Aging Day

It was my birthday last week. The first birthday of my whole life without my dad. As the day approached, I felt more and more dread about it, and honestly I just didn't even want it to happen. People had started to ask me about what I would like to do this year, and my responses ranged from "whateverIdon'tknowIjust...[trailing off]" to "NOT FEELING IT DO NOT TALK ABOUT IT" to "nothing. I guess? I don't know. Something?" It was a lovely soup of confusing messages. Luckily, I have people in my life who know how to cut through the baloney talk (I am currently fluent in baloney talk) and know that it really doesn't matter what the venue- a party, a quiet evening, a home-cooked meal- what I really needed was a reminder that I am loved. Nordic Boy and the gang proceeded to ignore my weird mumblings and be bossy about the whole thing and orchestrated several birthday activities for me. Thank goodness. Here are some of the things that got cooked up.

A small group of my favorite Seattle pals gathered up for a fancy meal in a fancy restaurant. We got a private room in the back (sitting in the back rooms of restaurants feels like the mafia, only without the impending threat of violence), and ate up. The restaurant could not have been more tasty and the people running that restaurant were de-fricking-lightful. They gave us free bottles of Prosecco all around and the best, most warm service. Afterwards we went back to my house and we had cupcakes and there were presents and everyone sang to me and is there anything more awkward than having the birthday song being sung to you, but I loved it because what are friends for if not to embarrass you with their love for you.

My friends Alli and Map, in their lifelong tradition of showing up at my door whenever I need them no matter what, both flew to Seattle for a long weekend which was so, so lovely of them. I love those girls so much, I can't even tell you. I boohoo-ed a little bit with Alli the first day that she arrived, just talking about all my FEEEEEEEELINGS, but then Friday and Saturday I did not get teary once, you guys. The thing is that I have gotten weepy at least once a day, every day, for the past 5 months. A non-crying day is kind of a big deal these days, and those girls made it happen. How? Example: there was a point in the weekend where one of them yelled out in confusion "What the FUCK is a pudenda and do I have one?" and how can you be sad when that is being yelled at you? You cannot.

Nordic Boy took me out to dinner one night and to a ballet show afterward. The show was three pieces by Twyla Tharp and one of them is a classic of hers that is set to a series of Frank Sinatra songs. Those songs are so common to our ears because Sinatra is so iconic and they are everywhere- in movies, in ads, whatever-- it's almost like I don't really hear the songs anymore. The show made me really listen to a lot of it in a way I hadn't for a while, and hey, news flash, they are pretty much great songs. I am just only now discovering this, because I am super ahead of the times. I was watching the ballet, and the song "Strangers in the Night" came on, and is there a song that seems more corny than that song? But dudes. It is not corny, is what I sat there and realized. Maybe it was the song, maybe it was the dance, maybe it was the night, maybe it is the mood I have been in. It made me think about how well I am loved. I looked over at Nordic Boy. He was already looking at me.


(If you want to give it a listen).

High class water closet

It is 90 degrees outside today! I believe I am the only person in all of Seattle that is happy about this. I just want to get out there and BAKE IT LIKE A POLAROID PICTURE. I know that lyric doesn't make sense when changed that way, but wheeeee I am sun drunk and so who cares.

Hey, so the other day, Nordic Boy and I drove up to our house and there were FIVE raccoons just chillin' on our front porch. It was maybe 5pm. Aren't raccoons supposed to be creatures of the night? Is that not the pact that they have agreed to with us? Nordic Boy and I started up our front stairs, saw the raccoon gang, and we backed our shit up and got back into our car to discuss what the hell we should do next. Do you think we are fraidy cats? I don't care because raccoons are mothereffing badasses and they will tear you a new crack crater if you mess with them. It took a few minutes but they decided to move along- they paraded down our front stairs, looked us in the face as we sat in our car, and they were all "THUG LIFE" and walked right past us and crossed the street into our neighbor's yard.

Did I tell you that when I was in Chicago a few months ago, Alli and I were taking an afternoon stroll through her neighborhood and we were walking by these train tracks and we saw a pack of 4 skunks waddling along a few yards away from us? What is with my only seeing smallish wild mammals in packs? Thank goodness the skunks were not startled by us or else they surely would have did that nasty shart-like spray on us or what have you.

I am super well-versed in the ways of nature, can't you tell? A regular Marlin Perkins.

In other news, we worked on our bathroom this weekend. Want to see?

Here's what it looked like before we started:

The counter and sink were super low, which I guess was nice only in that I felt like a total giant every time I was in there, and the counter was also built slanting outward so the depth took up all the space in the room. When Nordic Boy and I were in there at the same time, it was squishville. I always felt like we were fighting over the mirror, which when I say it like that makes it seem like we are vain, vain people, pushing each other to the side to gaze lovingly at ourselves. Which, I guess if fighting over the mirror was such a problem, then maybe?

Anyway, so it got ripped out.

Then Nordic Boy put in new insulation, replumbed some stuff, rewired and put in new lights.

 Then we bought a medicine cabinet/mirror that was more suitable for our gigantic pair of faces. There are even mirrors on the inside of it so we can love ourselves even when it's open. And the storage space! Line up all the things in the cabinet! LINE THEM UP!

 And then there was a new sink and new storage that allows both Nordic Boy and I to be in there at the same time, cozy but not squished:

And finally, new tile, which classed up the joint:

Result: I just want to be in my bathroom all the time. I am considering moving in there.

Live in the Now, Brosef

I have been floating through my days this summer, not paying much attention to things that I normally would. Summer usually means trips, a full up social calendar, and tons of time in the sunshine (Seattle summers are so gorgeous, the entire city freaks out this time every year). I have been living in the present to a sort of ridiculous degree, which is mostly a good thing, but can also be kind of weird, when I stop to think about it. I find I am having awkward conversations with people where they are asking me perfectly reasonable things like "do you have any upcoming trips planned?" or "what are you doing this weekend?" or "do you want to come to my party next month?" and I feel like I am being asked to perform time travel. The future? Plan something? What sort of crazy talk is that? My days (outside of work, that is- I can get it up for work because people aren't paying me to  be a damn hippie) consist of me only thinking of the very next thing that might happen. I read a book for a while, until my stomach grumbles, and then I find something to eat, and then I might look outside and decide to go for a walk, and while on a walk, if a friend calls and asks me if I want to go out, I will do that. Just, consecutive decision making, one thing at a time. It's sort of awesome. I don't mean to overstate this- I mean when I think about it I am still doing things that are autopilot for me, like getting my groceries and cleaning my house and things like that, so I don't mean to say that my life lacks any structure. I am a pretty structured-time kind of lady (I know, so sexy) so certain things are just always going to be happening in my life because I have always been that way. So, just know that I am not patting myself on the back too much over Living in the Moment, Man. I'm just saying. For me, it's been loosey goosey.The downside of it is (aside from awkward conversations where I answer "I don't know" a hundred times because I have never before noticed how often future planning comes up in conversation but people are doing a poop-ton of planning, it turns out) is that things move a lot slower this way, and I can sometimes feel like life is moving along super fast for everyone else, and I am standing still, and look at all these things people are getting done, and what have I done, and omg, nothing, I have done nothing, and summer is almost over and I missed the whole thing, ahhhhhhhh! Life is not a race but it can sure feel like one when your friends have had babies, written books, gone on vacations, or remodeled their homes all during a span of time where you've just been dicking around wondering if now would be a good time to go for a walk or not.

Anyway, my weekend was really lovely. Much of it was spent at home with that dude of mine. We chatted and read and home improved a bit. On Sunday evening we took Delium out for a belated birthday dinner at a fancy restaurant and played Last Word with the topic: Comfy Mystery TV series, which lasted like an hour, because once somebody utters aloud the phrase "Father Dowling Mysteries" then it's required that we talk about that for ten minutes before someone else says "Rosemary and Thyme."

When Delium arrived at our house to pick us up for dinner, he rang the doorbell, Nordic Boy answered the door, Delium walked in, and I stood up and did a sort of Russian style jumpy jig while yell-singing "Ha---ppy birthday happybirthdayhappybirthday! Ha---ppy birthday, happybirthdayhappybirthday!" and Nordic Boy and Delium watched that shit for like, half a second before full on joining in, jumping, raising the roof, and throwing in some turns. "HA---PPY BIRTHDAY HAPPYBIRTHDAYHAPPYBIRTHDAY!" it went, from all three of us. This makes me think about how these dudes help me to live in the present all the time, by not thinking too much before deciding to act silly, by being present enough to join in on some dumb shit right in the moment, by not being worried about looking weird in front of each other, by bringing out joyfulness in something as simple as saying hello. I know that sooner or later this slow pace I have been in will end and I will speed up my life again. But I have people who bring out the present so vividly and exuberantly all the time, I won't lose this feeling.

Another Brick in the Wall

Jinkies, you guys. Should we talk about something else? (OH PLEASE YES, is what I am hearing screamed from the other side of the internets). You are right. We should talk about something else.

How about home improvements? The whole thing about our house is that it needs improvements. When we bought it, it pretty much had a really good framework and a long list of improvements and that is about all. And we were going to do every last thing ourselves, which takes oodles of time. Like, years of time. In other words, Nordic Boy's dream come true. We have a master project list that is The Thickness, y'all. It involves binders. With tabs. There are also stacks of notecards. There is never not a project going on around here. A lot of it is stuff that is unsexy, like when we ripped our roof off and replaced it, or when we insulated our ceiling. Now that we are winding up those types of guts-replacement projects, we are actually getting around to more cosmetic-y things that actually are fun to take Before and After pictures of. Nordic Boy totally disagrees with me on this, but there is nothing entertaining about a Before and After picture of a new electrical panel or some shit like that.
So, let's talk about my kitchen.

There are many things that do not work about my kitchen. First of all, it is (like everything in our teensy house) small, which would be totally ok with me except for the fact that it is enclosed on four sides, with only a narrow doorway and a small window over the sink. This means that there can really only be a maximum of 2 people in there at any given time (we call this the Two-Butt Max), which hey, that works because we are a family of 2! Except you know what? We know and love more than each other. And we often have those more-than-each-others in our house. And those more-than-each-others want to (SIGH) interact with us. This results in a situation where people are over, and we are in the kitchen, and the non-us people will inevitably squeeze themselves into the tiny kitchen with us because we are MAGNETIC, and then we start yelling "Two Butt Max! Two Butt Max!" as a sort of alarm because it gets sardine-like right quick. And then folks get out of our kitchen and go back to the dining/living room where they talk amongst themselves, and I'm sure they do not talk about their weirdo friends in the other room who have invented butt-quantities as a unit of measurement. And we, poor kitchen-folk, have to toil by ourselves in our lonely Two Butt Max world.

Here are photos of the old kitchen, taken the only way I could- by standing at the doorway and looking left and then looking right. Please also note the sad old electric oven/cooktop and the horrible wire shelving.

We decided that we needed to be able to see and talk to more than just our own two butts while in the kitchen. To accomplish this? Dress ourselves up like the Kool-Aid man and bust a hole through the effing wall! Ok, so there wasn't really any sugar-drink cosplay, but bust through the wall we did.

Whenever we do bigger projects in our little teensy house, the first thing we do is figure out what needs to happen so that we can actually live around the perimeter of the project. Nordic Boy is a genius about containing things so that our whole house doesn't go to shit every time we work on something because homegirl over here would not be happy.

In this case, before wall-busting, he framed out a temporary wall, covered it in plastic, and then constructed a thingy-do-bob that vacuumed the dust straight out the dingbusted window! Awesome.


(Living room side).




(Kitchen side).
Bonus: Is that not exactly like the final scenes of E.T.??? Phone home, kitchen wall!

Then the crash-through happened:



And when it was done, being in the kitchen went from this view:



to this view:



Hello, people hanging out in the living room!

And this is what it looks like from the living room (you can't see that the sad electric stove is now a beautemous gas range, but trust me, it is happening):






Hello, Two Butt kitchen toilers!

I am super in love with it.

Gorge-ous birthday

It is Nordic Boy's birthday this month and we have pretty much celebrated it by stuffing our gaping maws with as much fancy feast as we can get. (Fancy feast, lower case, meaning actual deluxe vittles, not upper case Fancy Feast for kitties. Don't get grotty). First of all, Biogirl gave us a gift certificate to what is arguably the hoity toity-est restaurant in town so we pranced over there in our finest and got our grub on. It was really grand, and we felt like Kim and Kanye Lady Mary and Matthew Blake and Krystal Carrington. They had $100 beer there, you guys! We did not order any. The waiters all kept one hand behind their backs at all times like it was Darlington Hall from Remains of the Day and shit. We did the tasting menu and at one point the waiter brought us "pine foam made from the trees you see out your window here." And he pointed at the trees outside the window. Let me say that again. PINE FOAM. Get out of here! We also had this sweet crispy light vanilla-tasting biscuit that came with sorbet and berries and the server told us that the biscuit was made from mushrooms. Are you fucking with me, Mr. Belvidere? Because I think you may be fucking with me.

I tried to take pictures of some of the food there but the lighting was so bad that all of my photos came out looking like shadowy turds on a plate, so I shall refrain from posting those here. It was really a lovely dinner though.

Then I decided that Nordic Boy's birthday cake should be a Junior's cheesecake overnighted from NYC. Have you ever had one of those? They are so effing delicious. Just, if you get one, don't look at the ingredients label because there are many many things in it that do not come from nature. Whatever the heck is in there is the bomb though.

Then! Delium and Biogirl took us out for a birthday dinner to another lovely place. The most noteworthy thing about that evening wasn't the food (although that was so good), but rather that the conversation took a really wrong turn and one of us (all of us?) came up with a new sexual term called Butt Cobbler. Which, you don't even want to know, trust me on this. By the end of the night we had even composed a slow jam r&b song about Butt Cobbler, so that just gives you an idea of how classy us effers get.

In non-birthday, non-eating, non-butt-song news, this week there is a big librarian conference in my town. If you're a librarian and you're here for it and you want to meet up, email me!  DO IT.

Recipe for a good month

I saw this birthday card recently that said the following: "Martin Luther King. Jr. gets one day where we celebrate his birthday. So calm down, Birthday Month People." It sort of cracked me up.

I mention that only because I want to emphasize that I didn't even set out to be a birthday month person this year, and yet, it just happened. This whole month has been super terrific happy times. These are among the things that have been making it grand.

1. Delium took me to see the Paul Taylor Dance Company who just so happened to be in town. They were so delicious and unitardy. I loved every minute of it.
2. Nordic Boy and I went to a fancypants restaurant and did a million-course tasting menu. The final course was brought out and the waiter explained what it was using not one word that either of us could define. It was also visually indecipherable. "You taste it first and tell me what it is," I said after the server had gone. Nordic Boy took a big bite and said "Oh, you'll like it. It tastes like a lemon muffin with Cool Whip!" Really, when eating fancy food you should take Nordic Boy with you for descriptive assistance.
3. Biogirl took me for a road trip down the Oregon coast for a weekend. In the car, she invented what might be the best mash up of all time: Demi Lovato's "Give Your Heart A Break" mixed with "Break me off a piece of that Kit Kat bar."
4. My brother took me out to another fancy dinner and regaled me with stories about my nephew who recently, after scoring a goal during one of his soccer games, with no forethought whatsoever, busted out into the Gangnam style dance in joyous celebration which led to all his little friends joining right in. Trust me, I know you don't know my nephew but this is hysterically adorable.
5. My coworkers made a really big deal about my birthday this year. I know that work-related birthdays are usually cheesy and excruciating but this one felt really genuine. I felt appreciated.
6.  I sent out a blanket invite to a bunch of friends to meet up with me at my local pub for a drink on my actual birthday and it was just the lovliest night. The weather was gorgeous, we sat outside, I got to soak in the awesomeness that is my life, and my friend Kevin actually brought me some Vernor's so I could indulge my newfound love for the Detroit Cooler.
7. All of my favorite faraway people called me or texted me funny, thoughtful messages. My parents, Alli, her husband Chris who I also adore, Map, Palindrome, my brothers, my cousin R, just my small but steadfast group.
8. I have discovered that there is a thing called a pajancho. Yes, I am taking this fact as a personal birthday present to me. Not the item. The word. Don't you just want to say it every day of your life? Pajancho, pajancho, pajancho.

hhhhhwhere have I been?

Is this thing still on? Anyone there?

(crickets, crickets)

So I may be just talking to myself at this point, but that's ok. Hi, me! How have you been? Well, me, I feel that I have to quote my close personal friend Inigo Montoya and say the following "Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up." Not that anything big has happened. Just livin' life, as T.I. would say.

Where else are you going to get Inigo Montoya and T.I. in the same breath, you guys? Did you miss me? Or does that make you not miss me? I could see it going either way.

So here's some stuff that I want to tell you, with no rhyme, reason, segues, or cohesion. In other words, I AM BACK.

I went to Michigan last month and Map told me a story about a coworker of hers who, when agitated, will over-aspirate her "wh" words. So like this: "hhhhhhhwhere are those budget numbers and hhhhhhhhhwhy haven't they been turned in yet? Hhhhhhhhwho is responsible?" I don't know why but this made Alli and me so completely delighted that we have been talking like this at every opportunity. I highly recommend it.

We went to the local state fair. Nordic Boy, who has spent part of his life working an actual family dairy farm when he was a youngster (and will not drink a glass of milk if you paid him ever since), revealed to me that he has never ever been to a fair before. To which I said hhhhhhwhat? How can that be? He's from Wisconsin, for pete's sake. Isn't it the law that everyone go to the fair in Wisconsin? It turns out that his family was more likely to have gone to carnies that would travel through his town, which actually rings true for me too. We didn't do the fair thing when I was a kid either, but we sure went to the local ethnic festivals or travelling carnies and did some fair-like things, like eating cotton candy and getting on rickety/dubious death-traps (aka rides). I have a lot of really fun carnie memories. But yet, whenever I think about the carnie concept all I can think of is that movie Two Moon Junction. Do you guys remember that? It was Sherilyn Fenn having sexy times with a burly carnie worker drifter guy who had veins popping out everywhere. It was all kinds of ICK. It is also one of Nordic Boy's mom's favorite movies. Which I sort of think is awesome while also is a thing I wish I didn't know. Like, simultaneously.

Thankfully, there were no burly drifters trying to sex us up when we went to the fair, at least that we could tell. We had an awesome time, although afterward, Delium was asking us about it and we realized that we had probably the most un-state-fair-est time of anyone who has been to a state fair. It went like this:

Delium: So did you go on any rides?
Me: No.
Delium: How about animals? Did you see those?
Me: Well, we actually skipped that part.
Delium: How about fair food? Slushies? Kettle corn?
Me: No, we skipped that part too.
Delium: You went to the STATE FAIR, right?

In our defense, we had no time for all those things, because we got sucked into three other, much more awesome things.

1. Giant vegetables. PUMPKINS AS BIG AS MY CAR, YOU GUYS.
2. Grange competition. There was this competition where these farms would put together a huge mosaic made from their produce. Which, yes.
3. Home arts. This was actually where we spent most of the day. Quilts! Crochet! Dollhouse construction! Pie contests! It was totally mesmerizing. There was even something called a "table setting competition" which, from what I could surmise, was just what it sounds like: pick a theme and set a table according to that theme. And then you get a RIBBON if your setting is superior! I have pretty much been demanding a mf ribbon every time I have set our dinner table every night since the fair. I will tell you if I ever get one.

In other news, it is coming up on my birthday and I have celebrated so far by sleeping wrong and pulling a muscle in my neck to the point where I basically couldn't move. I felt like I maybe would have benefited from one of those brace things like Joan Cusack wore in Sixteen Candles. Neck pull around birthday time makes me feel, let's see, how can I put it? Forever young, I think is how Rod Stewart would prefer I say it.

Also, in related old fartness, I have been out three times in the past month and have not been carded AT ALL. Now, I know I am way, way, way (waaaaaaaay) past being at an age where I should really be getting carded in bars and it was happening less and less over time, but I was still averaging a carding about a third of the time. Sure, it was probably sympathy carding that was happening but I WILL TAKE IT. But apparently not anymore.

So, to summarize: I find the home arts fascinating, I have a pulled neck muscle and I don't have to have ID when going to clubs that perhaps I am too old to be in in the first place. I am rolling up to this next birthday like a BAWSE.

Reminder

I keep forgetting my lunch at home. This morning, someone put a piece of homemade tomato mushroom focaccia (wrapped up, put partially inside my purse, wearing my sunglasses, with my work badge attached) by the door. Hint received.

Cornhole Tourney 2012

In which Nordic Boy's team takes 2nd place, and my team loses in the Loser's Bracket. These are not surprising outcomes on both counts.

Brotherly love

Text conversation that totally happened while I was in Vancouver.

Him: (photo of a new built in closet)

Him: ??? It's our new closet! I just finished it!

Him: Are you there?

Him: You must be having too much fun without me. I love you anyway, even if you don't care about my beautemous closets.

Him: Love you babe. Talk soon.

(An hour later)
Him: I'm going to eat lunch at SKUBBERS.* You love it. You know you love it.

(A half hour later)
Him: I'm going over to Delium's. Love you and miss you.
(A few minutes later)
Him: I'll call you later my love.

Why am I telling you about this text string? Because Nordic Boy pushed the wrong button on his phone and totally sent all of those texts to my BROTHER.

I don't know if you think that's funny, but we busted a gut over it last night when he finally realized what he had done.

(*"Skubbers" is what we call Subway in our house for some reason. Or Skubbles, Skubway, Skubbies. I don't know why. I sort of think Subway is a little nasty, and Nordic Boy disagrees).

Happy Friday everyone!

Summer wandering

Hey gang!

I had a professor in college who seemed like she was the feisty camp counselor in an 80s made-for-tv movie. She had red hair, curly like Mrs. Roper's, and she started every lecture by snapping her gum and saying "Hey gang!" in a way that was at once jolly and sardonic. Every once in a while I try to bust out a "hey gang!" in her manner, even though no one knows what I am up to so I just end up looking weird. I would love to be jolly and sardonic, but I will settle for weird. Apparently.

Let's catch up on the happenings around here. There is a regional "joke" in Seattle that says that summer really doesn't kick in until July 4th. This year that was quite literal. It rained up a storm (ha ha, now THAT'S a joke, fellas) (oh dear lord) right up until July 3 and then on the 4th and ever since it has been super gorgeous. Sorry to rub that in the faces of all y'all reading this in other parts of the country, where I know that the weather has been crap on toast. I would send you all a little package of this heavenly stuff here if I could.

My July 4th was as low key as could be. My brain has just been running amok lately and so I think I just needed to max and relax as much as possible. I took myself to a quiet lunch by myself, and then Biogirl and I hiked it over to a lakeside park and sat in the grass for the entire afternoon and then strolled over to get gelato and strolled some more. Nordic Boy and I spent the rest of the night in, no fireworks, no barbecuing, no nothing. America was pretty mad at us I am sure.

Once the weekend rolled around I found myself, still due to the previous month's madness, completely and totally without plans. I love a good activity-filled weekend, don't get me wrong, but a gorgeous, sunny, summertime weekend with absolutely nothing that has to be done? GOLDEN.

This meant that I spent the whole weekend just thinking, in the moment, "Self? What would you like to do next?" What resulted was a sort of unremarkable weekend, but it was the kind of weekend that I hope I will remember for a very long time.

About 10 years ago, when Nordic Boy and I lived next door to our friends Neighbor B and Neighbor J, there was this one summer evening where we were grumpy and tired and hot, and the Neighbors invited us over for watermelon. And we sat in their living room, which had a view of Lake Washington, and ate this watermelon, and it seemed the sweetest, tastiest shit ever, and we were laughing and talking and looking out the window to the lake in the distance. There was nothing about that day that was memorable, yet I have never forgotten it. I felt content, and happy, and just inside a cocoon of friendship and love, if you want to get right down into hokey-town. Just so ordinary, but so beautiful. I love those days the best. The ordinary and beautiful ones.

I got to have two of those this weekend, and here's some of what went down.

Nordic Boy and I wandered to a little Italian restaurant where I had some sparkly white wine that made me hiccup all the way home.

I met up with Biogirl and one of her high school besties and his wife who were visiting from California, and we wandered around Pike Place Market, eating ice cream and listening to the seagulls over Elliott Bay.

I saw Moonrise Kingdom, which seemed so appropriate for summer. If you want to see it, see it in summertime.

I had brunch with Biogirl at our favorite haunt.

Nordic Boy and I drove to Snohomish, which is known for its antique stores, and wandered around a bunch of them aimlessly, digging up World War II aviator goggles and 1970s McDonald's collectible juice glasses and cut glass grandma-style bowls.

On the way back from Snohomish, instead of hopping onto the freeway, we got onto some curvy backroads that cut through farmland and looked at blue sky, and wide green fields, and white-topped mountains on the horizon.

I sat on my front stoop and talked to my mom and dad on the phone, and we laughed a lot, and I missed them, so very very hard.

I opened up all of the windows in the house, put my feet onto Nordic Boy's lap, and read a book from beginning to end all in one sitting.

I wore summer dresses all day every day (which are hard to take self-portraits of, by the way).

Thanks, July. I needed that.

Consumables #60

A co-worker came to my office on Friday and simply said: "There's a little bit of sun peeking through out there right now! If you want to see any, go now! GO NOW!" And I dropped what I was doing, put my coat on, and went outside. It was still butt cold and windy, but I got that sun while it was here. I got you, sun! I got you! HA HA HA HA HAAAAA.

This is the state of mind I had when entering my weekend.

It turned out pretty dang good- I had not one solid plan for the whole weekend which felt really lovely. I usually like to have a plan or two in the hopper but this time around I really needed to just freeball it. And ew, sorry I just said freeball it.

Freeballing (and is it just me or can that term not be used without a paralyzing desire to sing Tom Petty? Now I'm FREE! FREEBALLIN'!) consisted of lots of take-out food and couch time, two brunches out (one with Biogirl and the other with Biogirl, Nordic Boy and Delium), a teatime meet up with Jenny where she accidentally shot a pony tail holder at a man at the next table, and that's really about the perfect level of excitement that I needed.

That's about all I have to say, so let's talk about what's happening with me and the pop cultures lately.

Project Runway All Stars

It hurts me when Mondo acts like a whiney buttmunch. Stop it Mondo! Go back to being adorbs.

Being Elmo

Documentary about the muppeteer who plays Elmo. I think it must be my generation but I am enthralled by most things muppet. I don't think this was the best documentary ever in terms of how it was put together and there were things that I wished they would have asked Clash about and they didn't, but still, I was all over it.

Staying Alive

I was in a grumpy mood last week and so I fired up this puppy, and man, did it do me right. Stallone directs Travolta in the sequel to Saturday Night Fever! Travolta gets oiled up and puts on a headband and a speedo-sized dance belt and does horrifying contempo jazzercise moves! There are smoke machines, and cage dancing! Oh it's masterful.

My Week with Marilyn

As a person who has watched classic movies over and over again, including everything Marilyn Monroe was ever in, I was super excited to see this. The Prince and the Showgirl (which is the movie that is featured within this movie) is interesting to begin with not because it's a great movie- I don't think it is although that can be argued for sure- but because it brings together Olivier and Monroe. The behind the scenes stories about this collaboration are legendary by now, and so trying to make My Week with Marilyn seems like such a daunting thing to do, and so I want to give it a pass on what I thought were some weak points. I thought Kenneth Branagh as Olivier was awesome, and I wanted to believe Michelle Williams as Monroe and sometimes I did, but other times I didn't, but maybe I was being a dick about that, I can't decide. Also, I think they overplayed Monroe's insecurities. Not that I think that she didn't have them and ultimately was probably ruled by them, but I wished they would have explored that in a less obvious way. Wow, this is getting dangerously close to a sort of review of the movie and we all know I don't really do that, so I'll stop. Oh, one more thing, and now you know I am getting way nitpicky, but Marilyn Monroe was not that skinny. I know we don't seem to have anything but waifs on the screen anymore, but seeing tiny Michelle Williams as Marilyn Monroe seemed really odd to me.

Kingdom Keepers #1, by Ridley Pearson

The first in a series about a group of kids who can turn themselves into holograms (sort of) and transport themselves into Disneyland at night after it has closed, where they battle the evil Disney characters who come alive. It's better than it sounds. I admit it did not appeal to me as an adult lady but I can see the kid appeal for sure, especially if they have been to Disneyland or Disneyworld or whatever.

Parade's End, by Ford Madox Ford

This book is about 7.4 million pages long with tiny font so technically I have not finished it yet, and I will likely read it in chunks throughout the year, but I have read enough of it to talk about it now. It is a book written for my inner old man (there is a part of my reading taste that is 80 years old) so if you have that part of you you will like this, I think. It's set during World War I in England, and there are class divides and political upheavals and some romance too, although it's not romantic. Think of it like Downton Abbey but less soap opera-ish and with lots more long-winded discussions of Tories and the disintegration of moral codes and the like. It's going to be made into an HBO/BBC tv series soon, so if you don't want 7.4 million pages, wait for that.

Fashion lectures

For the past couple of months Biogirl and I have been spending every other Thursday night attending a series of fashion lectures at the University of Washington museum (the Henry Gallery). The lectures were focused on the first half of the 20th century, so we got to hear about everything from the decline of corsets to the rise of the little black dress. The lectures were more philosophical and historical than anything, and I wished the lecturer would have blitzed us with a ton more slides (people who are interested in clothes want to hear about clothes, yes, but really we want to see lots of clothes more than anything). I don't have much to say on this other than to plug the idea of doing something like this on a topic that interests you. It's worth the time to try it.

Have a good week, everyone! Seattleites, take heart. Marvember will not be here much longer.

O brain where art thou

I feel so far away from my blog these days. Anyone even still checking this thing? Blog friends can you hear meeee? (Please sing that in a Barbra-in-Yentl sort of way, if you don't mind).


I have been in one of those spirals where I have been franctically busy for 80% of my time, and so then the remaining 20% I just hide in my house doing nothing but crossword puzzles with my blanket and Jon Stewart. (Not that Jon Stewart is with me under my blanket, but listen, I wouldn't kick him out if he was).

I have been conducting a little scientific experiment this week and it is this. I have been trying to prove that I have a finite amount of brain space, and once that space is used up, I become a complete and total blithering idiot. Ok, so I haven't been trying to prove it, so much as just proving it unintentionally.

First of all, Delium was over for dinner the other day, and he was telling me about this movie shoot that he was on (have I ever mentioned that one of the many things Delium does is be an actor? I feel like I have somehow never mentioned this fact, but that can't be right), and he was going on about how Bubbles was in this movie, and how he got to meet him, and it was so awesome. And the whole time he was talking, I was thinking "Michael Jackson's chimp is still alive? And he is in movies now? And Delium is hanging out with him? WHAT." Yeah, well he was talking about the guy who played Bubbles in The Wire. Which, if you had been there and heard the context of this story, would have been totally clear to you. I was excited about 2 degrees of separation from The Wire, but disappointed about there not being an awesome chimp story.

Brain space- that one wasn't so bad, right? That was earlier this week- Monday. It gets worse.

The next thing that happened was that I was telling Nordic Boy a story, and I wanted to say that I thought a certain thing ever since I was a kid. So, I could have said "Ever since I was a kid..." or I could have said "Since I was a kid..." Either one. But somehow I tried to say it both ways together, and so I said "Since ever since I was a kid," to which Nordic Boy was all "wait, what did you just say? Since ever since?" And I looked at him like he was a nut bucket and said, "UM YEAH. Since ever since I was a kid, I..." And he said, "since ever since? What is that?" And I honestly couldn't process what was wrong with saying it like that. I hereby declare it ok for you to sing "Since ever since you've been gone" whenever that Kelly Clarkson song comes on.

Then, at the end of my work day the other day, just before leaving, I was emailing with two of my friends about having them over for dinner. They have never been to my house before, and so I was typing out my address, and the more I looked at it, the more I was convinced that that wasn't my address. And the more I that I thought that, the more that I couldn't think of what my address really was. Finally, I had to open Google maps, type in what I had written, and map that shit out to see if it matched up where I live. AND IT DIDN'T.

I had to google map my own damn address people. And then it was wrong.

This weekend, you may find me with my blankie and dvr episodes of Jon. If I can figure out where I live and get home ok.