If you've spent any time around me in real life, you'll know that I occasionally like to use the er, salty language. I am especially tied to the word "bitch" which I feel I have reappropriated in a feministy way and use to describe, well, just about everyone. In a child-free context, I use it a LOT in conversations with my husband. "Hey bitch, do you want to go to the grocery store?" "Bitch, please. I am not washing your long underwear AGAIN today." Something like that. I need to get a handle on it. I should go to a Bitches Anonymous meeting or something. However, I feel that my husband and I are both really good at not letting our...sentence enhancers leak in to our family life. Except for the rare time when I stub my toe or inflict some other kind of mind-numbing pain on myself, my kids have never heard me say anything more salty than "crap" or "shii--take mushrooms in a cream sauce" or "Jesus H. Christ on a rubber crutch."
So, imagine my surprise when my five year old comes running giggling into my bedroom yesterday while I was organizing my closet and goes, "Mommy, you're a JUICEBAG." Then he runs off giggling, not waiting around for me to respond. Juicebag? He can only mean "douchebag." Which is a word my husband and I reserve for only the most hardcore, nasty people we can think of, i.e., people who don't use signal lights, Republican strategists, certain academics, and the occasional meter maid. I am surprised that we have used this word in earshot of Sam, but know that we probably have. Our non-swearing policy is kind of like abstinence only education--it works in theory, but well, you know, sometimes you're just in the back of a Mitsubishi Montero, and you don't give a damn what they told you about purity last week....
So what do I do? Do I wash the kid's mouth out with soap? Hardly. I continued hanging up my scarves and then proceeded into the living room where Sam is blissfully playing with Legos. I mean to say something to him, tell him not to use the word "juicebag" at school, but I don't. I choose not to draw attention to it. Were I to draw attention to it, I have a pretty good idea that "juicebag" would suddenly become Sam's very favorite word because he has just enough of my DNA to make him the kind of rebellious little beast that would do such an abominable thing. Plus...and this is going to sound really horrible...it was really, really cute. A juicebag? Come on, that's cute. That's something that Will Ferrell would have his kid do on The Landlord video and millions of people would watch it and think it to be quite awesome.
So, I have a pseudo-swearing child who I can't bring myself to punish because I think the pseudo-swearing is fun. And I'm writing a blog about being a parent. Nice. Having reached my fill of irony today, I will be retiring.
Friday, November 7, 2008
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Four Years Ago....
*If anyone reads this, which is doubtful, they will probably think me to be a typical liberal, part of that "other America" that Sarah Palin warned you about. And you know what? I would apologize for that and tell you that I'm a typical American (because I think the results showed that last night, Ms. Palin....), but I'm not going to. For the first time in four years, I am proud of my own beliefs, so if you don't agree, you don't have to read, and if that makes you mad...well, too bad. I am a bleeding heart liberal, I am PRO-CHOICE (with a vengeance), I think anyone who wants to get married should be able to do it, I'm all about affordable health care for all, and I invite oil companies to just come suck it. There. I said it. That felt good. If that's not American to you, then, to be honest, I really don't give a damn.
Four years ago, I was a college senior with a 1 year old and a 5 year old at home. Four years ago, I was happiest when I was in my Tolstoy class. Four years ago, I worked the 4-midnight shift at Books-A-Million's cafe, coming home covered in coffee and just hyped up enough on caffeine to finish my homework. Four years ago, I loved my family, but quietly wondered what else was out there.
And four years ago, I lost all faith in America, in the democratic process, and in my own beliefs.
Four years ago, I wrote a blog entry full of tears, complete with Ginsberg. I had worked my butt off for John Kerry, passing out bumper stickers, taking my baby to the polls with me in a stroller, where I passed out literature and helped old people walk up the step and into the room where voting was to be held. Being the quintessential naive college student, I had no doubt that my candidate would win, because, ultimately, I believed that people saw the same way I did. I was surrounded by liberal professors, who swore moves to Canada if George Bush did the unthinkable and won.
And, of course, he did win. Wednesday, November 3 dawned cold and dreary, like a pall was stretched over our land. I couldn't see why. I couldn't understand how our country was so divided. My favorite professor halfheartedly jested that he was thinking of moving to New Zealand to become a sheep farmer, and I felt tears spring to my eyes, not because of the outlandishness of such an idea, but because all of a sudden, that seemed preferable to the current condition. I took a picture of my family holding up a giant sign that read "We're so sorry" and posted it on a website that contained pictures of Americans, apologizing for their country to the rest of the world. After posting that picture, I silently swore off politics right then and there, and in fact, four years ago was the last time that I voted. I didn't even register when we moved to CA, so upset and stung was I by my loss.
But last night, it all came back. I felt alive with the political process. I felt proud of my fellow Americans, MY FELLOW VIRGINIANS (HOLLA!). I fell in love with my country again, with the dividedness and the togetherness, with the tears and the cheers. Not just because of Barack Obama, although he is pretty rad--I'm not naive enough to think that he spits lollipops and rainbows like I think some people do, and I do know that the road in front of him is a lumpy one. But because we, as a youth, as a people, believed in something, and we worked, and it paid off. We weren't shut up by oil companies, by strategists who tweak the strings of faith and scare the frightened and the foolish into voting against their own interests. We used Facebook, we used our communities, we used each other to become something great, something that we weren't able to do four years ago. And last night, seeing all those beautiful young faces, crowded into a cold Chicago park, I cried. I cried for four years ago, I cried for Prof. Anemone and all the sheep farmers, I cried for the world, I cried for the "I'm Sorry's", I cried for us, as a country.
We are something that makes me proud. We are beautiful, and we are doing the one thing that I think everyone, parents especially, should strive to do. We are trying.
Four years ago, I was a college senior with a 1 year old and a 5 year old at home. Four years ago, I was happiest when I was in my Tolstoy class. Four years ago, I worked the 4-midnight shift at Books-A-Million's cafe, coming home covered in coffee and just hyped up enough on caffeine to finish my homework. Four years ago, I loved my family, but quietly wondered what else was out there.
And four years ago, I lost all faith in America, in the democratic process, and in my own beliefs.
Four years ago, I wrote a blog entry full of tears, complete with Ginsberg. I had worked my butt off for John Kerry, passing out bumper stickers, taking my baby to the polls with me in a stroller, where I passed out literature and helped old people walk up the step and into the room where voting was to be held. Being the quintessential naive college student, I had no doubt that my candidate would win, because, ultimately, I believed that people saw the same way I did. I was surrounded by liberal professors, who swore moves to Canada if George Bush did the unthinkable and won.
And, of course, he did win. Wednesday, November 3 dawned cold and dreary, like a pall was stretched over our land. I couldn't see why. I couldn't understand how our country was so divided. My favorite professor halfheartedly jested that he was thinking of moving to New Zealand to become a sheep farmer, and I felt tears spring to my eyes, not because of the outlandishness of such an idea, but because all of a sudden, that seemed preferable to the current condition. I took a picture of my family holding up a giant sign that read "We're so sorry" and posted it on a website that contained pictures of Americans, apologizing for their country to the rest of the world. After posting that picture, I silently swore off politics right then and there, and in fact, four years ago was the last time that I voted. I didn't even register when we moved to CA, so upset and stung was I by my loss.
But last night, it all came back. I felt alive with the political process. I felt proud of my fellow Americans, MY FELLOW VIRGINIANS (HOLLA!). I fell in love with my country again, with the dividedness and the togetherness, with the tears and the cheers. Not just because of Barack Obama, although he is pretty rad--I'm not naive enough to think that he spits lollipops and rainbows like I think some people do, and I do know that the road in front of him is a lumpy one. But because we, as a youth, as a people, believed in something, and we worked, and it paid off. We weren't shut up by oil companies, by strategists who tweak the strings of faith and scare the frightened and the foolish into voting against their own interests. We used Facebook, we used our communities, we used each other to become something great, something that we weren't able to do four years ago. And last night, seeing all those beautiful young faces, crowded into a cold Chicago park, I cried. I cried for four years ago, I cried for Prof. Anemone and all the sheep farmers, I cried for the world, I cried for the "I'm Sorry's", I cried for us, as a country.
We are something that makes me proud. We are beautiful, and we are doing the one thing that I think everyone, parents especially, should strive to do. We are trying.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Despite Your Political Affiliations, This Should Make You Cry
Today, Barack Obama's grandmother, the woman who raised him, passed away due to cancer. I have an incredible soft spot for awesome grandparents, as I lived with my grandparents for 3 years as a kid when my parents got a divorce and my mom went back to school, so I find this nearly heartbreaking. This lady seemed like a truly amazing woman, who, despite any political affiliations you may have, definitely raised a decent, amazing son who was obviously adored by her and who she was immensely proud of. We can only hope that we will all be so lucky as to be able to raise our children in such a manner.
And, on a shamelessly political note, I'm sure she will be smiling down from heaven when her grandson carries on her legacy and is elected to the highest office in the land tomorrow, ensuring a presidency that is friendly to strong, wonderful women like his grandmother.
"Mommy, you should totally write a cookbook about the good stuff you make. With no mushrooms. Only stuff with no mushrooms."
Yesterday my mother in law gave me a cookbook that a person I used to know has compiled of her family's recipes. It is a cookbook that is designed for families with children, detailing "kid-friendly" recipes. Had this been two years ago, I would have turned up my nose at this and proudly let people know that I had no use for such a cookbook, as my child ate whatever was served to her. That was B.S., and by B.S., I mean, not the obvious, but Before Sam.
My daughter, Gabby, is a culinary superstar. She has a palate that many adults could be jealous of. Her favorite food is sushi, she loves vegetables (except for mushrooms, as the above quote can attest), and she will try just about anything. She is just as at home ordering off a noodle shop menu off the main drag in Chinatown as she is ordering off the menu at Applebee's. It's quite amazing--after watching her down an entire plate full of pickled ginger BY ITSELF, I had brief thoughts of sending her out on the freaky kid circuit to do Ellen with those kids that have the bass voices or can paint Dali-esque prints with bathtub paints. She is a marvel--a Gourmet magazine thrown haphazardly in a stack of Highlights.
Enter my Sam. Sam is five, and religiously follows the five food groups: chicken, potatoes, ham, macaroni and cheese and breakfast food. He doesn't eat anything that doesn't fall into that list in some way. Moreover, even if one of these items contains a sauce of any kind, it's not going into his mouth. He hates sauces, condiments, and even sometimes, for inexplicable reasons, pepper. If something is purported to be healthy, he is not interested and is not afraid to share these feelings, loudly listing his disdain to anyone who will listen. He is not only a picky eater, he is a jerky eater, famously thumbing his nose at anything that doesn't fit his high standards. He is everything that Gabby is not, and this bothers me to NO END. I have no idea how this has happened to me, me, the mother who once pushed her kids three extra blocks THROUGH THE SNOW to get them to a Ukrainian restaurant I had read about in a New York City For Kids: Gourmet travel book. I can take many things as a mother--hell, if Sam came home in 20 years and told me that he was a gay garbage man, I would be just fine. But a picky eater? Nothankyou. I want to take him to a church and have him exorcised.
Thankfully, there is one thing in the world that keeps me from doing this, and that is roast chicken. Roast chicken is the one thing that my entire family can agree on--it is economical (which my husband likes), my kids love it, and, yes this is going to set back the women's movement 50 years or so, nothing makes me feel more like a woman than roasting a chicken. Plus, it looks like you tried so hard, when in reality, you just kinda put it in the oven and forget about it. Which is perfect for me, because I like praise but I also like to spend a Sunday afternoon doing nothing other than snuggling up in bed with a Lifetime movie and a stack of magazines.
So...in the interest of fulfilling my daughter's wishes, I will give you my perfect recipe for roasted chicken, and a Sunday afternoon of bliss.
Morgan's Roast Chicken
1 5-6 lb. chicken (you can use a smaller one, but I've found that this size gives us enough for at least one more meal during the week, which falls into that whole "economical" thing--hey, more money for beer and shoes is not a bad thing...)
a few handfuls of fresh herbs, chopped roughly--anything you have on hand (basil, parsley, and chives are generally the ones I go to, but you could really use anything)
one rock hard bulb of garlic, seperated into cloves
olive oil, salt and pepper
1 lemon
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Take the chicken and lay it breast up in some sort of roasting pan. If you have a rack, use it, but if you don't, just use a large baking dish of some sort. Remove any giblets. Ok, now look at the breasts (the fourteen year old in me just guffawed)--you should see some skin at the top that you can grab a hold of. Go ahead and take that skin and pull it up so that you can run your fingers between the skin and the meat of the breast. Start shoving in the herbs. It should kind of feel like a pocket that you are stuffing. When your herbs are stuffed, put a little salt and pepper in the pockets, and leave it alone. Then drizzle a bit of olive oil over the top of the bird and use your hands to rub it in. Salt and pepper the outside of the chicken--you can actually go a bit heavy on the salt because it will keep it moist, and despite the fact that I've used what I consider to be a lot of salt on a few occasions, I've never really had salty chicken. Kosher salt is good for this. Then salt and pepper the cavity. Use a few of the garlic cloves to put into the cavity, and cut the lemon in half and shove that in too. Place the rest of the garlic cloves around the chicken. Don't worry about peeling the garlic, because after it roasts a while, it will just pop out of the skin. Yum.
Roast for 2-2 1/2 hours. If you have a chicken that has one of those little thermometers that pops up when it is done, then you are in business. You can baste it a little if you want--you don't really have to, but I think it makes the skin nice and brown if you do. Just use a brush to paint some of the juices back on the skin as it cooks.
Ok, now what to do on the side? Glad you asked. As you roast the chicken, think about roasting some veggies. I usually put them in when the chicken has a 45 minutes or an hour to go. I generally start with a combination of onions, peppers, and mushrooms, and then add 1-2 seasonal veggies to go along with it. When I made this last Sunday, I used acorn squash, which was pretty good. Just take the veggies, cut them up, and then drizzle with a bit of olive oil (don't go overboard here--you want these to be mildly healthy) and sprinkle on salt and pepper and a bit of Italian seasoning. Roast for 45-60 minutes, but check every 20 minutes or so and flip them around their pan.
You can serve your chicken and veggies with mashed potatoes and baguette smeared with the roasted garlic like I do (I'm not giving you my recipe for mashed potatoes, so don't ask. :-) ). Or, be like my friend Mara who serves hers with potato leek soup and baguette spread with herbed goat cheese. I wouldn't turn down a good white wine with either of these meals. Anyway you do it, it's a great meal that will give you leftovers and should please even the most picky of eaters.
My daughter, Gabby, is a culinary superstar. She has a palate that many adults could be jealous of. Her favorite food is sushi, she loves vegetables (except for mushrooms, as the above quote can attest), and she will try just about anything. She is just as at home ordering off a noodle shop menu off the main drag in Chinatown as she is ordering off the menu at Applebee's. It's quite amazing--after watching her down an entire plate full of pickled ginger BY ITSELF, I had brief thoughts of sending her out on the freaky kid circuit to do Ellen with those kids that have the bass voices or can paint Dali-esque prints with bathtub paints. She is a marvel--a Gourmet magazine thrown haphazardly in a stack of Highlights.
Enter my Sam. Sam is five, and religiously follows the five food groups: chicken, potatoes, ham, macaroni and cheese and breakfast food. He doesn't eat anything that doesn't fall into that list in some way. Moreover, even if one of these items contains a sauce of any kind, it's not going into his mouth. He hates sauces, condiments, and even sometimes, for inexplicable reasons, pepper. If something is purported to be healthy, he is not interested and is not afraid to share these feelings, loudly listing his disdain to anyone who will listen. He is not only a picky eater, he is a jerky eater, famously thumbing his nose at anything that doesn't fit his high standards. He is everything that Gabby is not, and this bothers me to NO END. I have no idea how this has happened to me, me, the mother who once pushed her kids three extra blocks THROUGH THE SNOW to get them to a Ukrainian restaurant I had read about in a New York City For Kids: Gourmet travel book. I can take many things as a mother--hell, if Sam came home in 20 years and told me that he was a gay garbage man, I would be just fine. But a picky eater? Nothankyou. I want to take him to a church and have him exorcised.
Thankfully, there is one thing in the world that keeps me from doing this, and that is roast chicken. Roast chicken is the one thing that my entire family can agree on--it is economical (which my husband likes), my kids love it, and, yes this is going to set back the women's movement 50 years or so, nothing makes me feel more like a woman than roasting a chicken. Plus, it looks like you tried so hard, when in reality, you just kinda put it in the oven and forget about it. Which is perfect for me, because I like praise but I also like to spend a Sunday afternoon doing nothing other than snuggling up in bed with a Lifetime movie and a stack of magazines.
So...in the interest of fulfilling my daughter's wishes, I will give you my perfect recipe for roasted chicken, and a Sunday afternoon of bliss.
Morgan's Roast Chicken
1 5-6 lb. chicken (you can use a smaller one, but I've found that this size gives us enough for at least one more meal during the week, which falls into that whole "economical" thing--hey, more money for beer and shoes is not a bad thing...)
a few handfuls of fresh herbs, chopped roughly--anything you have on hand (basil, parsley, and chives are generally the ones I go to, but you could really use anything)
one rock hard bulb of garlic, seperated into cloves
olive oil, salt and pepper
1 lemon
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Take the chicken and lay it breast up in some sort of roasting pan. If you have a rack, use it, but if you don't, just use a large baking dish of some sort. Remove any giblets. Ok, now look at the breasts (the fourteen year old in me just guffawed)--you should see some skin at the top that you can grab a hold of. Go ahead and take that skin and pull it up so that you can run your fingers between the skin and the meat of the breast. Start shoving in the herbs. It should kind of feel like a pocket that you are stuffing. When your herbs are stuffed, put a little salt and pepper in the pockets, and leave it alone. Then drizzle a bit of olive oil over the top of the bird and use your hands to rub it in. Salt and pepper the outside of the chicken--you can actually go a bit heavy on the salt because it will keep it moist, and despite the fact that I've used what I consider to be a lot of salt on a few occasions, I've never really had salty chicken. Kosher salt is good for this. Then salt and pepper the cavity. Use a few of the garlic cloves to put into the cavity, and cut the lemon in half and shove that in too. Place the rest of the garlic cloves around the chicken. Don't worry about peeling the garlic, because after it roasts a while, it will just pop out of the skin. Yum.
Roast for 2-2 1/2 hours. If you have a chicken that has one of those little thermometers that pops up when it is done, then you are in business. You can baste it a little if you want--you don't really have to, but I think it makes the skin nice and brown if you do. Just use a brush to paint some of the juices back on the skin as it cooks.
Ok, now what to do on the side? Glad you asked. As you roast the chicken, think about roasting some veggies. I usually put them in when the chicken has a 45 minutes or an hour to go. I generally start with a combination of onions, peppers, and mushrooms, and then add 1-2 seasonal veggies to go along with it. When I made this last Sunday, I used acorn squash, which was pretty good. Just take the veggies, cut them up, and then drizzle with a bit of olive oil (don't go overboard here--you want these to be mildly healthy) and sprinkle on salt and pepper and a bit of Italian seasoning. Roast for 45-60 minutes, but check every 20 minutes or so and flip them around their pan.
You can serve your chicken and veggies with mashed potatoes and baguette smeared with the roasted garlic like I do (I'm not giving you my recipe for mashed potatoes, so don't ask. :-) ). Or, be like my friend Mara who serves hers with potato leek soup and baguette spread with herbed goat cheese. I wouldn't turn down a good white wine with either of these meals. Anyway you do it, it's a great meal that will give you leftovers and should please even the most picky of eaters.
I'm a Bad, Bad Blogger.
Ok, ok. So, yeah. It's been a while. Like 4 months! Eek! And last time I wrote, I was living in CA and employed. So yeah...here's a handy run down of all the crap that has happened to me in the past four months:
- I moved back to my hometown, kind of unwittingly.
- I became a stay at home mom (or, more appropriately, stay at home badass).
- My daughter became a cheerleader at my old alma mater.
- I became the best Rock Band II player EVAH.
- Life became much simpler, much more fun, and just altogether easier.
I have actually been thinking of writing this post for a long time because now I have time to BREATHE, and I feel like I have so much to say about being a fun, ROCKIN' young parent because, for the first time ever, I am one. For those of you who knew me in CA, you did not know the real Morgan--you knew some stressed out shell of a Morgan who was too fat, too mean, and just altogether too pulled in too many directions. But despite wanting to set the record straight and write about all this, I've felt a bit shy about it. For one thing, it is terribly embarassing to move back to one's hometown, when it is a place that you never thought that you'd actually want to come back too. It is even more embarassing to like it. And for someone who spent the last three years or so being totally defined by what she did, it is EVEN MORE embarassing to find yourself doing nothing substantial, nothing wage-earning.
But you know what? Screw embarassment. I am doing what my family needs--I am giving them myself for the first time ever if I'm truly honest about it, and, further, I'm giving them the best life that I can physically give them right now. I am happy, my kids are happy, and I want to write about it. Why? Mostly, because I am a very self-indulgent person, and I like to write. A lot. I just started writing a novel, if you must know (try not to roll your eyes too big on that one--you don't want your face to get stuck like that). But also because I see a lot of my very good friends having babies, and I totally feel like so much of the advice that people give them is so much crap. Will mine be any better? I can't guarantee it. I don't get it all right, probably not even 50 percent. But I do try, and sometimes I think I can come up with a good tip or trick, a product that has saved me time, a TV show that you can regretlessly plop your five year old down in front of when you absolutely have to have that 15 minute magazine and hot cocoa break (I'm looking at you, Upside Down Show!). And also, my kids do cute things, and sometimes I just want to brag about them. Seriously. Have you seen my kids? They are pretty awesome. Just putting that out there. Lastly, I'll just say that it is incredibly hard to be a young parent. There just aren't that many of us, and we're all so stressed that we don't necessarily take the time to really communicate about the awesome things that we do with our progeny and how we keep our own lives befitting of the youth we are still hanging on to.
So, I hope that you'll continue to read this, and know that I will update it more and more, as I finally have the time (in theory at least). I will try to do it daily, but that is, of course, dependant on important issues, like the health of my children, and Law and Order marathons on TNT.
Monday, June 30, 2008
"I love your losing record, DOUCHEBAG!"
Ok, so you know that time that I wrote that post about not being able to muster up the energy to get angry? (If you don't, it was the last post that I wrote, and yeah, it's been a while since I wrote it, but I never said that I was going to be particularly good about this, and seriously, why don't you try to pack up and move across the country because it is damn time consuming.) Well, that's not wholly true. This past weekend I found the magical combination of things that piss me off to no end and transform this little sweet Southern girl to Axl Rose on a three day coke bender.
And yes, my friends, those two things are a) a losing baseball game and b) mass quantities of beer. Combine these two with a little childless evening out, shake vigorously, and BAM! You have a Molotov cocktail of 'tude that would make Sweet Lou Pinnella blush.
So, in preparation for The Move (which, at this point, has to be capitalized because it's so big and important and looming), my mother in law has come to stay with us. She is helping to pack, and then she is going to fly the kids home. However, her appearance means little more to my husband and me than "FREE CHILDCARE." In fact, she may as well have shown up at our front door with a neon sign around her neck advertising herself as such. When you haven't been on a date since before Britney Spears lost her damn mind, you see family members in this kind of awful, self-serving way. No apologies; that's just the way it is.
So on Saturday night, after a long day spent selling away our belongings, we (giddily) left our children safely in the care of their grandmother and ran like prisoners set free for the first waiting BART train. We had bought great tickets for the Oakland/SF Bay Bridge series, and being RABID Oakland fans, we were excited to see the game, and to see what we hoped to be a win. Actually, it was a bit more than hope--Oakland had swept the series thus far this year, and had quite a history of making the Giants look foolish (which to be honest, is not much of a feat--for the un-baseball inclined, San Francisco is a pretty wretched team, as one can imaging from a city that is known for being the home of The Gap).
But yeah. Best laid plans and all of that. The game was actually amazing--great, solid pitching from two of the best pitchers in the game, lots of suspense, lots of good-natured ribbing going on with the fans of both teams. And for me, lots of beer. Tasty, tasty $8.00 beer, coupled with garlic fries and pulled pork sandwiches. My husband and I were living up our date--sneaking kisses, talking, cheering for our team. It was all going along swimmingly until about the 7th inning or so. The Giants had managed one run off of an error, and the A's were still being shutout despite having tons of chances to score. And I was, well, full of beer. And despite my general good mood, three Giants fans in front of me were driving me insane. They would yell loudly every time an A got out, or a Giant got a hit, and turn around and face all of the A's fans behind them and say something incendiary. It went on and on. Finally, the Axl in me just broke out and started doing the Axl dance.
Queue Scene:
Dude in Giants Jersey: Hey A's fans! I like your scoreboard! (pointing out that no, we don't have a big, fancy HD scoreboard like the one in SF and that, well, the Giants had one run on the one we do have)
Tipsy Me: Hey, I LOVE YOUR LOSING RECORD, DOUCHEBAG!
It was one of those moments where everything got quiet. Like a stadium of 36,000 people just decided that they didn't have anything to say. And there I sat. Full of vitriol and hate. The guy just looked at me, as if he was plotting his next move, or maybe trying to see if I was for real. And, well, Axl could not be silenced, because Axl is very, very real.
"You know what else I love? THE NUMBER OF TIMES YOU'VE WON THE WORLD SERIES."
*beat*
At this point, I started to get some applause from my fellow denizens of the plaza level. I stood up. My husband put his head down and decided to always hate a small part of me for the rest of his life. And then, a few Giants fans started yelling "Let's go GI-ANTS!" clap clap clap-clap-clap.
Not to be outdone, Axl yelled "LOS-ING RECORD!" clap clap clap-clap-clap.
I continued this until a coliseum employee came and told our entire section to sit down and shut up and watch the game. I sat down triumphantly, hoarse, but full of pride at my somewhat buzzed performance. Matt looked at me and said, "Um, could you maybe not do that again?"
And I answered, "Sure." Because it's true. I couldn't do it again. It requires just the right level of buzzedness, and just the right level of hate for the fans sitting around me. Plus, this level of anger is only appropriate once or twice a year. Were it to happen more often, I might be typing this from some sort of lock-up program for troubled women.
But I must say, it was fun while it lasted. And I maintain, the Giants are a sure sucky team. Dude in the black Giants jersey, you coked up frat chimp, I hope you enjoyed the win Saturday night (and then, well, again yesterday). Because I'm betting the Giants are gonna get about 60 of those all year long. Out of 162 games. So yeah, that's a sucky record. Just like you have now.
See? I'm not as "on" when I'm not pissed out of my mind. I'm going to shut up now.
And yes, my friends, those two things are a) a losing baseball game and b) mass quantities of beer. Combine these two with a little childless evening out, shake vigorously, and BAM! You have a Molotov cocktail of 'tude that would make Sweet Lou Pinnella blush.
So, in preparation for The Move (which, at this point, has to be capitalized because it's so big and important and looming), my mother in law has come to stay with us. She is helping to pack, and then she is going to fly the kids home. However, her appearance means little more to my husband and me than "FREE CHILDCARE." In fact, she may as well have shown up at our front door with a neon sign around her neck advertising herself as such. When you haven't been on a date since before Britney Spears lost her damn mind, you see family members in this kind of awful, self-serving way. No apologies; that's just the way it is.
So on Saturday night, after a long day spent selling away our belongings, we (giddily) left our children safely in the care of their grandmother and ran like prisoners set free for the first waiting BART train. We had bought great tickets for the Oakland/SF Bay Bridge series, and being RABID Oakland fans, we were excited to see the game, and to see what we hoped to be a win. Actually, it was a bit more than hope--Oakland had swept the series thus far this year, and had quite a history of making the Giants look foolish (which to be honest, is not much of a feat--for the un-baseball inclined, San Francisco is a pretty wretched team, as one can imaging from a city that is known for being the home of The Gap).
But yeah. Best laid plans and all of that. The game was actually amazing--great, solid pitching from two of the best pitchers in the game, lots of suspense, lots of good-natured ribbing going on with the fans of both teams. And for me, lots of beer. Tasty, tasty $8.00 beer, coupled with garlic fries and pulled pork sandwiches. My husband and I were living up our date--sneaking kisses, talking, cheering for our team. It was all going along swimmingly until about the 7th inning or so. The Giants had managed one run off of an error, and the A's were still being shutout despite having tons of chances to score. And I was, well, full of beer. And despite my general good mood, three Giants fans in front of me were driving me insane. They would yell loudly every time an A got out, or a Giant got a hit, and turn around and face all of the A's fans behind them and say something incendiary. It went on and on. Finally, the Axl in me just broke out and started doing the Axl dance.
Queue Scene:
Dude in Giants Jersey: Hey A's fans! I like your scoreboard! (pointing out that no, we don't have a big, fancy HD scoreboard like the one in SF and that, well, the Giants had one run on the one we do have)
Tipsy Me: Hey, I LOVE YOUR LOSING RECORD, DOUCHEBAG!
It was one of those moments where everything got quiet. Like a stadium of 36,000 people just decided that they didn't have anything to say. And there I sat. Full of vitriol and hate. The guy just looked at me, as if he was plotting his next move, or maybe trying to see if I was for real. And, well, Axl could not be silenced, because Axl is very, very real.
"You know what else I love? THE NUMBER OF TIMES YOU'VE WON THE WORLD SERIES."
*beat*
At this point, I started to get some applause from my fellow denizens of the plaza level. I stood up. My husband put his head down and decided to always hate a small part of me for the rest of his life. And then, a few Giants fans started yelling "Let's go GI-ANTS!" clap clap clap-clap-clap.
Not to be outdone, Axl yelled "LOS-ING RECORD!" clap clap clap-clap-clap.
I continued this until a coliseum employee came and told our entire section to sit down and shut up and watch the game. I sat down triumphantly, hoarse, but full of pride at my somewhat buzzed performance. Matt looked at me and said, "Um, could you maybe not do that again?"
And I answered, "Sure." Because it's true. I couldn't do it again. It requires just the right level of buzzedness, and just the right level of hate for the fans sitting around me. Plus, this level of anger is only appropriate once or twice a year. Were it to happen more often, I might be typing this from some sort of lock-up program for troubled women.
But I must say, it was fun while it lasted. And I maintain, the Giants are a sure sucky team. Dude in the black Giants jersey, you coked up frat chimp, I hope you enjoyed the win Saturday night (and then, well, again yesterday). Because I'm betting the Giants are gonna get about 60 of those all year long. Out of 162 games. So yeah, that's a sucky record. Just like you have now.
See? I'm not as "on" when I'm not pissed out of my mind. I'm going to shut up now.
Friday, May 23, 2008
"I should invest in an anger management center. But it would probably go under. And that would piss me off."
Visit our house after the kids go to bed (or at least, go to their rooms under the auspices of going to bed) and you will see a transformation. Gone are the cheesy comments and passive aggressive remarks directing someone to the bath or away from a certain television show. Gone is any sense of decency and/or language barrier. And, further, gone is any good natured use of our Nintendo Wii.
Yes, after the kids go to bed, my husband and I are transformed into a couple of foul-mouthed sailors who roll around in their ship, looking for a foreign land (that I don't think we'll ever find) where we are completely relaxed, and well, like most other 25 year olds. We watch bad TV. We write on blogs. And we play video games. And for my husband, this means we curse. A lot.
My husband playing MarioKart is one of the more hilarious things you ever want to see. During the day, when he plays it with the kids, he is remarkably contained, winning races for my four year old and earning the moniker of "best buddy in da wuu-rr-ld." But at night, he is a MarioKart demon, attempting the hardest races, trying to set records and yelling nonsensical garbage, mostly directed at Princess Peach, who always seems to be doing something tantamount to ripping out his intestines through his big toe. I prefer to sit back and watch while he thrashes and nashes his teeth; to me, this is the kind of thing you just want to see, like a homeless guy admonishing tourists about the "overlords" in San Francisco or Britney Spears armed with an umbrella and a shaved head. He is delightfully angry, every bit of energy in his body combining for one sheer purpose: to be a MarioKart asshole.
And this, interestingly enough, is one of the bigger differences between us. I, reared as a sweet Southern girl, have really no tendency toward anger. I am remarkably mellow. As my boss puts it, "Morgan doesn't really let anything get to her." But it is more than that: I am mellow to the point that I don't think my body is physically capable of producing an angry reaction. When encountered with stuff that should make me boiling hot, I just bawl. And it isn't pretty. At those points, I wish for the day that I could just explode, unleashing a torrent of curses on the person who so wronged me. But I can't. And I don't.
Watching my husband play MarioKart has pushed me to realize that I am the emotional equivalent of one of those people who doesn't have a sense of pain. If you ever saw that Grey's Anatomy with Abigal Breslin where she gets socked in the stomach so much that she is bleeding internally, but can't feel it, then you know what I am talking about. Emotionally, I can stand myself at a stove, and put my hand right into the gas flame, and not have the wherewithall to pull it back because I don't feel the thing that is eating away my flesh. I just keep telling myself that it can get a little bit worse, that I don't need to pull away just yet. And sooner or later, I'll get to the point where I'm missing a hand. And I won't understand what happened to it.
This disturbs me. A lot. But to be frank, I don't really know what to do about it. I'm not posting this as some "Look at how I improved my life!" kinda bit. In fact, it is just the opposite. It is more like "Look at what I'm doing to lead myself into an early death!" or "Look at how much I suck." I also post this for the very sick reason of that I don't know if I'd really change this if I could. This inability to feel any sort of anger is an amazing coping tool--one that allows me to work crazy amounts of hours at work without feeling a whole lot and keeps me smiling in the face of those around me who are complete and total douches. But there is that whole possibility of going postal someday and offing everyone within a 10 mile radius.... so I guess it's not really that fair of a trade-off.
Anywhoodle, just putting that out there. This is truly the post about nothing, huh? Today's quote comes from my husband, who recognizes that his anger toward MarioKart probably needs some professional help.
"I should invest in an anger management center. But it would probably go under. And that would piss me off."
Yes, after the kids go to bed, my husband and I are transformed into a couple of foul-mouthed sailors who roll around in their ship, looking for a foreign land (that I don't think we'll ever find) where we are completely relaxed, and well, like most other 25 year olds. We watch bad TV. We write on blogs. And we play video games. And for my husband, this means we curse. A lot.
My husband playing MarioKart is one of the more hilarious things you ever want to see. During the day, when he plays it with the kids, he is remarkably contained, winning races for my four year old and earning the moniker of "best buddy in da wuu-rr-ld." But at night, he is a MarioKart demon, attempting the hardest races, trying to set records and yelling nonsensical garbage, mostly directed at Princess Peach, who always seems to be doing something tantamount to ripping out his intestines through his big toe. I prefer to sit back and watch while he thrashes and nashes his teeth; to me, this is the kind of thing you just want to see, like a homeless guy admonishing tourists about the "overlords" in San Francisco or Britney Spears armed with an umbrella and a shaved head. He is delightfully angry, every bit of energy in his body combining for one sheer purpose: to be a MarioKart asshole.
And this, interestingly enough, is one of the bigger differences between us. I, reared as a sweet Southern girl, have really no tendency toward anger. I am remarkably mellow. As my boss puts it, "Morgan doesn't really let anything get to her." But it is more than that: I am mellow to the point that I don't think my body is physically capable of producing an angry reaction. When encountered with stuff that should make me boiling hot, I just bawl. And it isn't pretty. At those points, I wish for the day that I could just explode, unleashing a torrent of curses on the person who so wronged me. But I can't. And I don't.
Watching my husband play MarioKart has pushed me to realize that I am the emotional equivalent of one of those people who doesn't have a sense of pain. If you ever saw that Grey's Anatomy with Abigal Breslin where she gets socked in the stomach so much that she is bleeding internally, but can't feel it, then you know what I am talking about. Emotionally, I can stand myself at a stove, and put my hand right into the gas flame, and not have the wherewithall to pull it back because I don't feel the thing that is eating away my flesh. I just keep telling myself that it can get a little bit worse, that I don't need to pull away just yet. And sooner or later, I'll get to the point where I'm missing a hand. And I won't understand what happened to it.
This disturbs me. A lot. But to be frank, I don't really know what to do about it. I'm not posting this as some "Look at how I improved my life!" kinda bit. In fact, it is just the opposite. It is more like "Look at what I'm doing to lead myself into an early death!" or "Look at how much I suck." I also post this for the very sick reason of that I don't know if I'd really change this if I could. This inability to feel any sort of anger is an amazing coping tool--one that allows me to work crazy amounts of hours at work without feeling a whole lot and keeps me smiling in the face of those around me who are complete and total douches. But there is that whole possibility of going postal someday and offing everyone within a 10 mile radius.... so I guess it's not really that fair of a trade-off.
Anywhoodle, just putting that out there. This is truly the post about nothing, huh? Today's quote comes from my husband, who recognizes that his anger toward MarioKart probably needs some professional help.
"I should invest in an anger management center. But it would probably go under. And that would piss me off."
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
"I'M SO EXCITED! I'M SO EXCITED!" (uncontrollable weeping)
I am a person who thrives on routine. I get up every morning at 6:00, without an alarm. My eyes just pop open; my husband (lovingly) calls this "setting the Kramer alarm." After getting up, I walk into the bathroom, weigh myself and change into my work out clothes. Then I come into the living room and do some sort of work out video which generally involves some sort of groaning and sweating and hopping and a great deal of me saying nonsensical stuff to myself. I work out for an hour and then settle into the couch with a bowl of cereal and a glass of orange juice. And every morning I turn on the TV and watch one of a few shows. This is my favorite time of the day--I am the only one awake, I have that post work out level of bliss going on, and I can unabasedly watch some very horrible television before starting my day.
The television show is the one place where my routine sometimes alters. Some mornings I watch a 30 minute show from the DVR, and basically that means I watch Snapped, which if you don't know (maybe because you watch good television shows?), is a show about women who snap and kill their husbands. Yes, this sounds like a rather depraved way to start the day (especially now that I see it typed out like that), and to be frank, I don't do it that often, as I've seen a lot of these things and end up only having one on my DVR on Monday mornings. My other options are Sportscenter and Saved by The Bell. Usually, I flip between the two of these, watching a few minutes before my attention wanes and I flip to the other excitedly, loving every minute of my breakfast.
I have a long and lovely relationship with Saved By the Bell. The first time I saw the show, I was about 10 or so, and it was a snow day. I had gone to a friend's house to play in the snow and we came in to drink hot cocoa and warm up. At that time, TBS ran two SBTB episodes at 5:05 and 5:35, and WGN followed this with episodes at 6:00 and 6:30. When my friend turned on TBS on that snowy afternoon, I had never seen the show, and despite my misgivings at not getting to watch one of the movies I saw on their shelf (I remember they had Turner and Hooch which was a big favorite of mine), I soon became enamored with the characters. When my mom picked me up at 6:00, I rushed home and turned on WGN, just as I had been instructed to do. From that point on, I was hooked. I spent the better part of the next 3 years stuck to the couch, eating Chef Boyardee ravioli and learning all I could about high school, ultimately setting up expectations that would tumble down in a messy, sad heap the second I stepped foot into the hallowed halls of St. Paul High School.
The reason these expectations failed so miserably is pretty obvious if you have ever seen even five minutes of SBTB. High school is delightfully messy; the love lives of Zack Morris and Kelly Kapowski are as clean and blemish free as my four year old's unspoiled cheek. There are no strict lines of social class and rank in high school as there are with the pocket protector and cheerleading skirt demaracations on SBTB. Contrary to what Kelly Kapowski would have you believe, you can be stunning and also be quite intelligent. Further, the school athlete is not always a stand up guy with killer dimples who dates the valdedictorian (SURPRISE, I know). And, most importantly, you can't get addicted to, and subsequently ruin your life with, caffeine pills in a span of about 4 days.
This morning's episode was actually a clip show, centering around a time capsule unearthed by the class of 2003. The whole scheme is that the gang (Bayside Class of '93) buried a time capsule containing a video for the lucky class who would discover it 10 years later. I won't even get started on the sheer idiocy of doing anything on a video that you want to survive for any period of time. ANYWAY, the tape is filled with clips and the gang sharing sage advice about how they managed to stay so overwhelmingly pure while attending high school in L.A. All subjects are approached--sneaking into the girl's locker room wearing assorted disguises, dunking the principal in a dunk tank, you know, the usual--and then we get to the VERY special part of the episode where we see Jessie struggle with drug abuse. And seriously, I know Elizabeth Berkley isn't exactly known for her restrained Method acting, but shit ya'll. Homegirl LOST HER SHIT in this performance. You would think she was addicted to meth, crack, and the occasional Dirty Sanchez with the way she was acting. Zack ends up restraining her, while she screams about how she needs one of her little pills, NEEDS IT, in order to go to The Max and sing in some sort of hokey ass singing concert. And, of course, I'm sitting on my couch, clutching my oj, and remembering that when I was in high school, in order to get myself to the point where I could actively participate in something just as incredibly horrible as singing Motown tunes in front of my BFF's, I would have needed about 3 bottles of Boone's Farm and a quick trip to the back seat of my boyfriend's car. NOT SOME GODDAMN CAFFEINE PILLS THAT YOU BUY AT THE DOUBLE KWIK.
All of this just makes me think about the overwhelming insanity of whoever wrote this shit, and just how much I wish life imitated Saved by the Bell. Everyday, I work with teenagers, who, like Jessie, want nothing more than to go to Stanford and fulfill all the expectations of those around them. This morning, I found myself basically begging that caffeine pills be the extent of the lengths they would go to to achieve those goals. Sadly, I'm not naive enough to think that this would be the case. But oh! If it were. Perhaps then I could get a decent night's sleep at night, and not be forced to look at my four year old son and worry that someday I'll have to bail him out of someplace where no one sees just how absolutely angelic his eyes are when they catch the light in a certain way.
So here's to Jessie, and her caffeine pills. Here's to Stanford and singing and geometry and all of the "really hard" stuff those crazy kids had to deal with. Oh, Jessie, you do it best--cry us off...
"I'M SO EXCITED! I'M SO EXCITED!" (uncontrollable weeping into the arms of the man who will someday marry your best friend because you were the smart one, not the pretty one)
Yeah, I made that part up.
The television show is the one place where my routine sometimes alters. Some mornings I watch a 30 minute show from the DVR, and basically that means I watch Snapped, which if you don't know (maybe because you watch good television shows?), is a show about women who snap and kill their husbands. Yes, this sounds like a rather depraved way to start the day (especially now that I see it typed out like that), and to be frank, I don't do it that often, as I've seen a lot of these things and end up only having one on my DVR on Monday mornings. My other options are Sportscenter and Saved by The Bell. Usually, I flip between the two of these, watching a few minutes before my attention wanes and I flip to the other excitedly, loving every minute of my breakfast.
I have a long and lovely relationship with Saved By the Bell. The first time I saw the show, I was about 10 or so, and it was a snow day. I had gone to a friend's house to play in the snow and we came in to drink hot cocoa and warm up. At that time, TBS ran two SBTB episodes at 5:05 and 5:35, and WGN followed this with episodes at 6:00 and 6:30. When my friend turned on TBS on that snowy afternoon, I had never seen the show, and despite my misgivings at not getting to watch one of the movies I saw on their shelf (I remember they had Turner and Hooch which was a big favorite of mine), I soon became enamored with the characters. When my mom picked me up at 6:00, I rushed home and turned on WGN, just as I had been instructed to do. From that point on, I was hooked. I spent the better part of the next 3 years stuck to the couch, eating Chef Boyardee ravioli and learning all I could about high school, ultimately setting up expectations that would tumble down in a messy, sad heap the second I stepped foot into the hallowed halls of St. Paul High School.
The reason these expectations failed so miserably is pretty obvious if you have ever seen even five minutes of SBTB. High school is delightfully messy; the love lives of Zack Morris and Kelly Kapowski are as clean and blemish free as my four year old's unspoiled cheek. There are no strict lines of social class and rank in high school as there are with the pocket protector and cheerleading skirt demaracations on SBTB. Contrary to what Kelly Kapowski would have you believe, you can be stunning and also be quite intelligent. Further, the school athlete is not always a stand up guy with killer dimples who dates the valdedictorian (SURPRISE, I know). And, most importantly, you can't get addicted to, and subsequently ruin your life with, caffeine pills in a span of about 4 days.
This morning's episode was actually a clip show, centering around a time capsule unearthed by the class of 2003. The whole scheme is that the gang (Bayside Class of '93) buried a time capsule containing a video for the lucky class who would discover it 10 years later. I won't even get started on the sheer idiocy of doing anything on a video that you want to survive for any period of time. ANYWAY, the tape is filled with clips and the gang sharing sage advice about how they managed to stay so overwhelmingly pure while attending high school in L.A. All subjects are approached--sneaking into the girl's locker room wearing assorted disguises, dunking the principal in a dunk tank, you know, the usual--and then we get to the VERY special part of the episode where we see Jessie struggle with drug abuse. And seriously, I know Elizabeth Berkley isn't exactly known for her restrained Method acting, but shit ya'll. Homegirl LOST HER SHIT in this performance. You would think she was addicted to meth, crack, and the occasional Dirty Sanchez with the way she was acting. Zack ends up restraining her, while she screams about how she needs one of her little pills, NEEDS IT, in order to go to The Max and sing in some sort of hokey ass singing concert. And, of course, I'm sitting on my couch, clutching my oj, and remembering that when I was in high school, in order to get myself to the point where I could actively participate in something just as incredibly horrible as singing Motown tunes in front of my BFF's, I would have needed about 3 bottles of Boone's Farm and a quick trip to the back seat of my boyfriend's car. NOT SOME GODDAMN CAFFEINE PILLS THAT YOU BUY AT THE DOUBLE KWIK.
All of this just makes me think about the overwhelming insanity of whoever wrote this shit, and just how much I wish life imitated Saved by the Bell. Everyday, I work with teenagers, who, like Jessie, want nothing more than to go to Stanford and fulfill all the expectations of those around them. This morning, I found myself basically begging that caffeine pills be the extent of the lengths they would go to to achieve those goals. Sadly, I'm not naive enough to think that this would be the case. But oh! If it were. Perhaps then I could get a decent night's sleep at night, and not be forced to look at my four year old son and worry that someday I'll have to bail him out of someplace where no one sees just how absolutely angelic his eyes are when they catch the light in a certain way.
So here's to Jessie, and her caffeine pills. Here's to Stanford and singing and geometry and all of the "really hard" stuff those crazy kids had to deal with. Oh, Jessie, you do it best--cry us off...
"I'M SO EXCITED! I'M SO EXCITED!" (uncontrollable weeping into the arms of the man who will someday marry your best friend because you were the smart one, not the pretty one)
Yeah, I made that part up.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
"My good sweatpants are in the wash."
So here's the thing. I'm starting a new blog. If you know anything about me, you're rolling your eyes right now. Because, in fact, I already have a blog that I haven't updated in about two months (about that...) and another one that is connected to Myspace. But that Myspace one doesn't really count, you know, because Myspace is just the white-trash cousin to Facebook and because of this perceived level of trashiness, I don't allow myself to go to Myspace at work where my screen could be seen by my high minded co-workers. So I can't write on that blog at work. So it kinda doesn't exist. Anyway, I'm starting this new blog not because I have anything lovely or earthshattering to say, but rather because I'm bored and the A's just lost and we don't have any beer in the house and I need to write more. It's a mixture of all those things.
The idea behind this blog is a simple one: quotes. I hear a lot of funny things during the day, and I always say something akin to "If I had a quote list, I'd write that down." Because I once totally had a quote list. In college. I had this little notebook that I toted around and I would write things in it that professors spit out during lengthy lectures and things that my boyfriend (now husband) said, possibly while inebriated, and funny things that I heard in the check-out line at Ukrop's. It was all part of that heady thing you experience in college when you think everything is SOOO intellectual, so telling of the human condition. And when you actually say things like "human condition" without feeling like a total douche. Let's just say I've changed since then. I no longer derive a whole lot of meaning from the things I hear, but they do amuse me. And I want to amuse you. Somewhere out there, someone is making a Goodfellas reference after having read that, and if it is you, I want you to be my friend.
So today, my quote is from me, and it's a pretty darn good one if I do say so myself. Actually, my friend Erin said it was good earlier today, so if you don't like it, take it up with her. She's good at math--you could probably beat her up. Anyway, this morning, I dressed up. This is not such a foreign thing--I like to dress up and in fact, that other blog that I told you about is a fashion blog. I put on a new black wrap dress and some black patent high heeled Mary Jane shoes. I actually fixed my hair. It was a good day. I felt good in the dress because I'm on this diet and when I put the dress on, I could tell that the diet is working. Just a good feeling all around.
And then my daughter made her appearance in our foyer. Now, my daugther is 9 years old, and she's just the best little thing. Unless you live with her. Then she loses her luster a little. Ok, somewhere out there, someone is firing up the ole gmail to write me that mean email that puts me in my place and tells me to appreciate what I have and that some people can't have children and what have you, and to that, I sigh a big, heart-wrenching sigh and remind you that the A's lost tonight, and I'm a little tetchy, so just SAVE IT, OK? Anyway, my daughter reminds me a lot of Alex P. Keaton. She is going through a very Keaton-esque phase, I think. To start out, my daughter is just wise beyond her years. And not in that pole-dancing Kardashian tween way. Like she just knows too much about the way the world works and feels pressured by all the knowledge. Further, she has developed this quiet matter-of-factness and clear disdain for anything that my husband and I do. But it's like a passive aggressive disdain. I guess it's hard to explain, because it's really not that bad, and with the description I just gave, she should be downstairs right now, slaughtering a neighborhood cat and making a careful diagram of its bones. It's just this little way she has with her words. And if she didn't have those big ole brown eyes and freckled cheeks, that little way would really get her into some trouble.
So anyway, this morning, she takes one look at me, and goes, "You're wearing that?" And she's looking at me with those big brown eyes and wearing some shirt with a penguin on it which doesn't totally equate with the very Christian Siriano type accent on her comment. When I reply that I indeed am, she looks at my shoes, still waiting expectantly by my purse, and says something about me not looking like "the other moms" at her school. Now. I don't know where that came from. Because no one had mentioned the other moms at her school. This was not a topic of discussion. But yes, it's true that I don't look like the other mothers at her school. Why? BECAUSE I'M 20 EFFING YEARS YOUNGER. And also because I haven't developed crippling depression, a gimp leg or the desire to quit showering cold turkey.
Gabby continues to look at me in her sweet, yet stabby way, and I smile back at her. She's so much like me that it kills me sometimes. I once told my mother that she looked like a banana (and SHE DID), so comparatively, Gabby's comment is pretty innocuous. I strap on my humongo heels and try not to reveal to my daughter that I'm about to fall over as I get some applesauce and a cereal bar out of the bottom cabinet. I'm sure she notices it anyway. In fact, she touches my back lightly, as if to keep me from toppling over, as if to remind me, that between the two of us, she is probably the more responsible one, at least for the next three years or so until she hits puberty and loses her damn mind. As we leave, she says something to remind me of the previous comment, something that just restates how unlike the other mothers I am, and that I should wear something more appropriate.
And I, being rather proud of the fact that I am different and that I have sired such a complicated and fun child, reply with a "Sorry, Gab. My good sweatpants are in the wash."
Welcome to my blog.
The idea behind this blog is a simple one: quotes. I hear a lot of funny things during the day, and I always say something akin to "If I had a quote list, I'd write that down." Because I once totally had a quote list. In college. I had this little notebook that I toted around and I would write things in it that professors spit out during lengthy lectures and things that my boyfriend (now husband) said, possibly while inebriated, and funny things that I heard in the check-out line at Ukrop's. It was all part of that heady thing you experience in college when you think everything is SOOO intellectual, so telling of the human condition. And when you actually say things like "human condition" without feeling like a total douche. Let's just say I've changed since then. I no longer derive a whole lot of meaning from the things I hear, but they do amuse me. And I want to amuse you. Somewhere out there, someone is making a Goodfellas reference after having read that, and if it is you, I want you to be my friend.
So today, my quote is from me, and it's a pretty darn good one if I do say so myself. Actually, my friend Erin said it was good earlier today, so if you don't like it, take it up with her. She's good at math--you could probably beat her up. Anyway, this morning, I dressed up. This is not such a foreign thing--I like to dress up and in fact, that other blog that I told you about is a fashion blog. I put on a new black wrap dress and some black patent high heeled Mary Jane shoes. I actually fixed my hair. It was a good day. I felt good in the dress because I'm on this diet and when I put the dress on, I could tell that the diet is working. Just a good feeling all around.
And then my daughter made her appearance in our foyer. Now, my daugther is 9 years old, and she's just the best little thing. Unless you live with her. Then she loses her luster a little. Ok, somewhere out there, someone is firing up the ole gmail to write me that mean email that puts me in my place and tells me to appreciate what I have and that some people can't have children and what have you, and to that, I sigh a big, heart-wrenching sigh and remind you that the A's lost tonight, and I'm a little tetchy, so just SAVE IT, OK? Anyway, my daughter reminds me a lot of Alex P. Keaton. She is going through a very Keaton-esque phase, I think. To start out, my daughter is just wise beyond her years. And not in that pole-dancing Kardashian tween way. Like she just knows too much about the way the world works and feels pressured by all the knowledge. Further, she has developed this quiet matter-of-factness and clear disdain for anything that my husband and I do. But it's like a passive aggressive disdain. I guess it's hard to explain, because it's really not that bad, and with the description I just gave, she should be downstairs right now, slaughtering a neighborhood cat and making a careful diagram of its bones. It's just this little way she has with her words. And if she didn't have those big ole brown eyes and freckled cheeks, that little way would really get her into some trouble.
So anyway, this morning, she takes one look at me, and goes, "You're wearing that?" And she's looking at me with those big brown eyes and wearing some shirt with a penguin on it which doesn't totally equate with the very Christian Siriano type accent on her comment. When I reply that I indeed am, she looks at my shoes, still waiting expectantly by my purse, and says something about me not looking like "the other moms" at her school. Now. I don't know where that came from. Because no one had mentioned the other moms at her school. This was not a topic of discussion. But yes, it's true that I don't look like the other mothers at her school. Why? BECAUSE I'M 20 EFFING YEARS YOUNGER. And also because I haven't developed crippling depression, a gimp leg or the desire to quit showering cold turkey.
Gabby continues to look at me in her sweet, yet stabby way, and I smile back at her. She's so much like me that it kills me sometimes. I once told my mother that she looked like a banana (and SHE DID), so comparatively, Gabby's comment is pretty innocuous. I strap on my humongo heels and try not to reveal to my daughter that I'm about to fall over as I get some applesauce and a cereal bar out of the bottom cabinet. I'm sure she notices it anyway. In fact, she touches my back lightly, as if to keep me from toppling over, as if to remind me, that between the two of us, she is probably the more responsible one, at least for the next three years or so until she hits puberty and loses her damn mind. As we leave, she says something to remind me of the previous comment, something that just restates how unlike the other mothers I am, and that I should wear something more appropriate.
And I, being rather proud of the fact that I am different and that I have sired such a complicated and fun child, reply with a "Sorry, Gab. My good sweatpants are in the wash."
Welcome to my blog.
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