Serious Discussion

TR: Greg, I really want to move somewhere that's warm year-round.

Biggy: You wouldn't like it. Then you'd complain that you miss the change of seasons.

TR: Oh, please. Don't confuse me with yourself. I only like spring and summer--and can only tolerate fall for as long as I can wear my clogs without socks. You can have winter.

Biggy: Well, I don't want to move.

TR (gathering courage): So, what would you think about my living somewhere else for three months out of the year?

Biggy: SOLD!

Saturday Things You Might Not Know

Tommy Lee Jones and Al Gore were roomies at Harvard. Jones also roomed with John Lithgow.

Or was I the last to know this?

The Gap's New Branding Strategy

Getting What's Coming to Me

I usually listen to Q100's The Bert Show on my way to work in the mornings. More than half the time, the Bert Show blows, being a cross between a Jerry Lewis telethon and the Jerry Springer show, with the very worst of The View thrown in. Other times, however, it's like one of those rare and beautiful AA meetings where they actually have Splenda for the coffee and the stories rival Faulkner. During these other times, I can endure Melissa's freaky cackling over Jeff's stale fart jokes, Bert's self-aggrandizing over his good deeds, and Jenn's bawling because her friends with children don't properly appreciate her professional status. Why? Because the man who agreed to take the heat for his neighbor who was surfing midget porn makes it worth my suffering.

Regardless of the content, though, one thing is always the same. The hosts of the show butcher American English, screwing the most fundamental rules of grammar, using words that don't exist, and exhibiting all the command of a high school cheerleader with a reading tutor. And I'm not talking about the abysmal "conversate," which some argue for as colloquial. Think concoctions like "comfortability." Then heap every possible permutation of "get my blank on": Get my drink on, get my party on, get my tan on, get my smooth on, get my sex on...These folks are in their mid-thirties, mind you, and they still use "like" every other word and refer to each other as "dude," bad habits I try hard to ignore for the pleasure of hearing the caller who plans to crash the quinceanera of the teen her husband is seeing on the side.

Yesterday, though, I guess the lackluster interview with Andrew Morton wasn't satisfying enough to make it worth overlooking the show's faults. I snapped. What can I say? I rushed off an email to Jenn Hobby--a rant, if you will, that made her none too happy. Her heartfelt response has inspired me to take pause. In the service of full disclosure, I thought I should share our correspondence:






From: tania@portfoliocenter.com
Subject: Raising the Bar
Date: January 17, 2008 11:56:28 AM EST
To: JHobby@AllTheHitsQ100.com

Since Q100 is about to reach even more listeners, you might consider a little grammar refresher course. This morning, for instance, you said, "Melissa and I's interview with ...."
and you referred to the Tom Cruise biography as a "novel" during the interview itself. You do that me/I thing all the time, by the way--all of you, and it's extremely annoying.

It should have been Melissa's and my interview...Or if that's too complicated, try simply OUR interview.

Here's a tip: Mom took Melissa and ME to the store. (Mom took Melissa to the store. Mom took me to the store. Mom did not take I to the store.)

However, Melissa and I are going to the store. (Melissa is going to the store. I am going to the store. Me ain't going to the store.)

I love reality TV and listening to radio shows like yours to hear about the ridiculous situations people get themselves into. It's fun and entertaining. Your listeners/callers are really the stars of the show. I'm not some cerebral smarty-pants, in other words. But you guys, taking the lead, should do your best not to make the South look like a bunch of idiots lacking in basic language skills.


From: jenn@allthehitsq100.com
Subject: Re: Raising the Bar
Date: January 17, 2008 9:35:49 PM EST
To: tania@portfoliocenter.com

Tania,
I would be happy to accept your criticism, if it didn't come with so much condescension. I was nervous in the hosting role today and was doing my best. If I mixed up my words and it irritated you, I apologize and will certainly try to improve. I would, however, challenge you to remember your own short comings before you click send on such a mean-spirited message in the future. You are sitting upon quite an ugly high horse. The view from up there must be blurring your memory of manners and common courtesy.
Regards,
Jenn



From: tania@portfoliocenter.com
Subject: Re: Raising the Bar
Date: January 17, 2008 10:31:47 PM EST
To: jenn@allthehitsq100.com

Dear Jenn,

I'll give that some thought and try to work on my manners. But shortcomings is one word.

T

Friday Nostalgia

Laverne and Shirley, 1976-1983

Tree, Acorn, and All That....

(This afternoon, Georgia called me):

Georgia: You never told me that when you get a pap test, they pull something OUT of you!!

TR: They just go in there with a cotton swab, George.

Georgia: Not according to K. She just got back from the doctor, where she was traumatized. They pulled out a hunk of her flesh and then said it wasn't big enough and went back and got another.

TR: They must have been doing a biopsy. Maybe they saw something odd. I mean, no one has ever done that to me.

(The conversation went on for a few more minutes before my daughter cut me off.)

Georgia: Well, I told her I'd asked you if that was normal and call her back.


(I got off the phone wondering if times had changed or if I could have blocked out something like that. A little later, I received an email from George with the transcript of the girls' next conversation):



K: Hey, what are you doing?

Georgia: Just got out of class early, waiting for another one at 2, you?

K: Absolutely nothing. I've been watching t.v all day, How did that conversation go with your mom??

Georgia: She said I need to Google Pap Smear because what you got was NOT a pap smear. She was astounded by the tweezing bit.

K: ewwww! Don't google it! Maybe it was called a culture sample....But I thought everyone did that...OMG if I didn't need that!

Georgia: She said shes never heard of that, and I got second AND third opinions who have never heard of that either. Your doctor is a sadist....

K: I'm so mad..I got molested by my gyno!

Georgia: and tweezed!!

K: Georgia! I don't want to have the same doctor anymore, she didn't even NEED to do that at all!! She just wanted to! She TOLD me that, shes is a FREAK, whyy me?!?!

Georgia: Why did she do it then?....more importantly, why did you LET her?!

K: I told her I didn;t want her to, and she was like, well it wouldnt hurt to just get it examined, and i didnt think that she would TWEEZE me!

Georgia: I think if your gyno gets enjoyment out of your pain and humiliation, its time to try another one on for size.

K: Seriously, and i STILL havent had my period, I have to call her today. Why cant my body be normal so I dont need to keep going back there? It will be my FOURTH time!

Georgia: Well, never is better than every two weeks... unless you're harvesting a fetus...

K:...God I hope thats not whats happening....

Georgia: God me too!

K: You should probably go, every two weeks is just not....right...

G: After your traumas!? No, way, I don't want my vag tweezed

Bliss

Biggy is fixing his Eggo's in the kitchen, from where he can see the goings-on in the sunroom, where I am. Fay is tossing and rolling in something small and brown on the floor, and I'm feeding all the rodents:

Biggy: What's Fay got--a bug?

TR: No, it's a piece of dog food. She pretends it's alive.

Biggy: Stupid dog.

TR: She's not stupid; she has a good imagination. something you wouldn't know about.

Biggy: Have you given the guinea pigs anything to chew on?

TR: I'm taking good care of them; don't you worry.

Biggy: You know, you're going to be one of those old ladies with, like, a hundred cats and shit everywhere.

TR: Is that all you've got, really? Did you come up with that all by yourself?

Biggy: (silence)

TR: Make sure you leave the butter on the counter so I can put it up like I do every morning. I wouldn't want you to stretch your imagination and think of something else to do with it.

Standards

Monday night, as we're getting to the table, and Biggy's wrestling the remote away from Lola, who's tuned in to Josh and Drake on Nickelodeon:

Lo: This is my show!

Biggy: We're going to watch something everybody wants to watch.

Lo: But I called it!

Biggy: (channel surfing) ...Animal Planet...

TR: That'll work.

Biggy: ...Fox News...

TR: Completely inappropriate.

Biggy: ...Family Guy...

JackMan: Lola can't watch Family Guy.

Lo: Hey, Family Guy!

Georgia: That show's BAD.

TR: I KNOW. I don't even want you and Jack watching it. Find something more appropriate, Greg.

Biggy: ...Cops...

All Together: COPS!!!

Alternate Universe

Georgia and Blaise, decked out for the Monster Truck Show. I'm so proud.

A guy who'll don a mullet wig is a keeper.

From Lo's Birthday

When I think of all those mornings I woke up surprised that I have children...

Laverne and Shirley

The newest students at Portfolio Center. Come by my office to meet them.

This Year, Things Are Gonna Be Different!!

Evidently, Lola didn't behave at the Monster Truck Show last night.

Adding Insult to Insult

This morning, I was sitting on the floor, messing around with the gecko cage, when Lo walked by: "Mom, you really need to dye your hair. The top of your head is all black. . . . . And gray."

Saturday Things You Might Not Know

Looking for hard-to-find products from days gone by? Say, Body on Tap shampoo, a Flicker razor, or Clark Bars? Try the Vermont Country Store.

I Didn't Know that I Was!

When I bragged to Biggy about what someone had googled to get to my blog, he suggested I let you guys answer their question:

Friday Nostalgia

Unfortunately, this was the only clip available, and no dialogue.

The 1943 movie Song of Bernadette, starring Jennifer Jones, was the reason that, when I was a kid, I used to put a towel over my hair, stare at myself in the mirror, and imagine I was destined to be a nun or a saint. I spent hours mulling over my immanent holiness.

A Poem For Lola

From A Child's Garden of Verses, 1889
by Robert Louis Stevenson

Good and Bad Children

Children, you are very little,
And your bones are very brittle;
If you would grow great and stately,
You must try to walk sedately.

You must still be bright and quiet,
And content with simple diet;
And remain, through all bewild'ring,
Innocent and honest children.

Happy hearts and happy faces,
Happy play in grassy places--
That was how in ancient ages,
Children grew to kings and sages.

But the unkind and the unruly,
And the sort who eat unduly,
They must never hope for glory--
Theirs is quite a different story!

Cruel children, crying babies,
All grow up as geese and gabies,
Hated, as their age increases,
By their nephews and their nieces.

Bravo!

So simple. So well executed.

She Reads My Blog, Which Was Warning Enough

So when E!--and that's what we'll call her, because she'll be good for our entertainment--came into my office last quarter and said she was thinking of taking some time off from school, because what with working her restaurant job while trying to do things such as branding the entire Olympics, creating a scale model restaurant, designing and writing a children's book, and re-setting the type for the entire book of Genesis, she was feeling a bit overwhelmed, I told her to buck up.

Where there's a will there's a way, I platituded, to which she responded that she had considered everything, exhausted every possibility; she couldn't keep up with both school and finances. And when I came back with, "Well, until you ask if you can live at my house, I'll have to assume you haven't thought of everything," I imagined that would get her brain in gear. She sure didn't need to drop out this close to the finish. It would be like dropping out of the Iron Man with 1/2 a mile to go.

It was quite the challenge I issued, really. I figured that flipping pancakes at Huddle House and living in their broom closet would be more appealing than staying with us. So I expected she'd come up with a plan, or she'd puss out and quietly vanish. But E! had more fortitude than I gave her credit for. She really does want to graduate. Right now, she's sitting at the table in the sun room, laptop in the slime of hamburger casserole, elbows in the Oreo crumbs, doing her homework.

God help her.

No doubt, this will make her somewhat of a celebrity at school--a la a Fear Factor or Rock of Love contestant. When E! told instructor Melissa about the arrangement, Melissa was so astonished, she yelled, "With HER?!" pointing at me as I tucked my chin and skulked toward the stairs. True story. Anyway, don't be asking E! what REALLY goes on here. She's sworn to secrecy.
And she's way too busy to gossip.

But I am not.

Trust

Monday Is Garbage Day

The noise outside my window at 6:30 a.m. reminded me of this scene from Men at Work.

YouTube Comes Through

I always assume that when I come across something that tickles or annoys me, I'm probably the last person to see it, so I really hate it when I go looking for it on YouTube and can't find a clip. Take that Always commercial with the maxi pad riding a mechanical bull--still NOT on YouTube. What the crap?! (Worst. Commercial. Ever.) A couple of weeks ago, I saw a TV spot for Sunsetter Awnings and thought, Holy crap--is that John Edwards? Guy looked just like him until I squinted my astigmatism away. Well, of course I went straight to YouTube so I could share, but no one had posted it.

Today, I was watching Spongebob--the episode where Squidward promises to go jellyfishing with Spongebob and Patrick, then rides off on his bicycle, laughing to himself because he has no intention of going anywhere with them. You have to trust me that it's a funny scene, the laugh itself enough to make you wet your pants, because it is nowhere to be found among the various video forums. Yet. But when I went to find it, my last search came up, and here--finally--was the Sunsetter commercial:

Saturday Things You Might Not Know

I was wondering how the bra was invented.

Friday Nostalgia

I almost forgot. It's hard to keep up with what day it is.

Brilliant!

I have an idea for a movie where the characters get an email describing their death and then they die.

In the sequel, the characters blog, and someone posts a comment telling them how they're going to meet their end, and then they die.

In #3, the death messages come in the form of thirty-second radio spots for Jared...

For #4:The Return, the song Love Rollercoaster (which is not even on their playlist!) plays over their iPod, and when the scream happens, the character has a heart attack.

And I Was Such a Good Grasshopper

Must I abandon my dream of Holly Hunter hair? The hope itself was Rio's fault. Rio--Jennifer's hair stylist--recommended by her. Rio was the master. Rio would change my life with a quick flick of a scissor.

I went along with Jennifer, to see for myself. I watched in awe as Rio cut her hair with the flair of a flamenco dancer and the care of a Mohel. I listened, feeling guilty myself, as he scolded her for various hair offenses. When we left, she looked beautiful-chic and I had an appointment for the following week.

I was even more impressed after my own session. Contrary to what I expected, when I left the decision of my style up to him, he opted NOT to cut all my hair off--a drastic departure from the clipper-happy pixie-makers of my past. He suggested I actually grow it out--to add weight to tame the pouffiness and to prevent "old lady hair." He trimmed the dead ends and added some long layers and spanked me with a hairbrush for using Pantene. His final edict: "The bangs HAVE to go." That was ok. I trusted.

Since then, I have adhered to all of his rules and training. I bought a shampoo and conditioner that didn't come shrink-wrapped together with a free sample of gel. I've strengthened my arms for proper blowdrying. I found a paddle brush I can also use on my own backside if I backslide.

Now, it's time for my next visit, and I've come to find out Rio has left the salon and gone to teach at the Aveda Institute.

Woe, oh woe, is me.

This is Some Awesome-ness

Thought for the New Year

I saw this poster at school a couple of quarters ago and the quote has reverberated through my skull ever since. I asked Andrea Foster, the student who designed it, to send it to me so I could share.

2008

Happy New Year! Pay attention to your lives.

From "The Worlds in this World" by Laure-Anne Bosselaar

And all along that year the winds
kept blowing as they do today, above oceans
and steeples, and this one speck of dust
was lifted from somewhere to land exactly
here, on my desk, and will lift again — into
the worlds in this world.

Say now, at this instant:
one thornless rose opens in a blue jar above
that speck, but you — reading this — know
nothing of how it came to flower here, and I
nothing of who bred it, or where, nothing
of my son and daughter’s fate, of what grows
in your garden or behind the walls of your chest:
is it longing? Fear? Will it matter?

Listen to that wind, listen to it ranting
The doors of heaven never close,
that’s the Curse, that’s the Miracle.

Real Soft Porn



I came across this little gem while looking for info on guinea pig care.

Lazy Saturday

Yesterday, with the house all to myself, I was supposed to clean the carpets. But by the time I got the rooms "picked up" and the laundry done, I just didn't feel like going to Publix, renting the steam machine, and dragging it out to my car in the rain, much less actually using it.

Instead, at 7 pm, I put my pink flannel pajamas back on, got in bed with the dogs, ate fried chicken off one of my new French Paper melamine plates Biggy gave me for Christmas, and watched all 12 episodes of Weeds, season II.

It was awesome.

One More Gift

Biggy and Lo left this morning for his parents' in South Carolina. He took the rest of the presents from under the tree. Or so it seemed.

A little something from Fay--all she had to give.

It's the thought that counts.

Can I Shop Frederick's Online?

Fay is a big fan of the flannel pajamas...


but I'm beginning to worry about Biggy.

Friday Nostalgia

1972

The Ref--A Holiday Tradition

What Was Santa Thinking?!

Under the tree this morning, Tebow and Rusty:


Lola was ecstatic. This was proof Santa is real, too, because as she said, "Dad would have never let me have ONE guinea pig, much less TWO." All the rest of the stuff she got--the games, toys, clothes, sleeping bag, treasure chest suitcase...did less to impress her.

The big kids were none-too-pleased about getting up at 6 a.m., but Jack was happy enough about his iTouch.


Georgia, however, couldn't work up any excitement for her cash.


We spent the morning getting everyone acquainted. Do note my new flannel pajamas, courtesy of my son.




Stella wasn't interested in anything except the snowman blanket.



For those of you keeping a tally, that makes A Jack Russell Terrier, two Chihuahuas, a turtle, a gecko, a parakeet, and two guinea pigs.

*Pics taken with the new Sony Cybershot my sweet husband and blog enabler bought me.

Merry Christmas!

Tip # 1: Don't

Today's post was inspired by my trip to Publix yesterday. I'm writing it as a mother of four, a wife, a daughter, and a granddaughter. So spare me the excuses for the violations. The following are rules for grocery shopping during holiday peak hours--peak hours being those times when the only parking spaces available are the ones on the shuttle route.

1. Be patient as you look for a spot to park your Suburban; you don't have any more right to park than the teenager in the Taco Bell uniform, driving a Ford Escort.

2. After parking your vehicle, collect at the crosswalk. Wait a couple of minutes for the folks who are coming up behind you (THEY should be hurrying). In the meantime, wave a couple of cars through so they can actually get OUT of the lot to make room for others. The alternative is a lazy string of crossing pedestrians, with a line of cars waiting for them, blocking the entrance from the main road.

3. Unless they fit in the buggy and are asleep (baby) or wearing a muzzle, do NOT bring your children. And by 'fit in the buggy,' I don't mean sprawled on the rack on the bottom with their hands and legs hanging out. Extra bodies are bad. Extra bodies crying, whining, and begging for Cookie Crisp are a capital offense. The only people who should be in the store are those who are actually shopping, their mission being to get in and get out.

4. Along those same lines, do not bring your spouse or significant other if all they're going to do is shuffle behind you and take up space. If they must accompany you, give them half the list, and have them carry as many items as they can in their arms and bring them back to the cart. (Never use more than one cart per party.)

5. No one over 75. It's too dangerous. That's just common sense.

6. Do not park your cart on one side of the aisle and stand directly across from it on the other side of the aisle, creating a roadblock while you try to decide between Bumblebee or Chicken of the Sea. If you move your cart ahead a bit, diagonally across, other shoppers will be able to weave through.

7. During holiday peak hours, you should only be shopping for the items you need for the season's dinner and staple foods for you and your guests. You should have already stocked up on the non-perishables that you know you always need: toilet paper, tampons, pet food, shampoo, vitamins, batteries, Gas-X, and beer.

8. This is NOT the time to purchase lottery tickets or money orders.

9. Nor is it the time to catch up with your PTA friend in the canned vegetable aisle.

10. Don't even THINK about writing a check.

Saturday Things You Might Not Know

about rats...

Last Minute

I've listened to a lot more radio lately due to the interstate sludge that is holiday traffic. Awful, unimaginative 30-second spots hawking the worst ideas for Christmas presents since summer sausage. In addition to those are the usual terrible television commercials, like the one with the couple driving down the road where the man looks like Jeffrey Dahmer, and the first time I saw it--before I found out it was a jewelry ad, I thought something BAD was about to happen. Or the one where the woman is singing "These Are A Few of My Favorite Things" with a voice like Melanie Griffith on crack.

As a result, I've composed a list of a few Things I Do NOT Want for Christmas:

1. A "Journey" pendant. Hello--the emperor has no clothes! Looks like it was designed by a chimp.

2. Laser hair removal. I don't care what the commercial claims, don't give your lady anything that says "you're hairy."

3. The "big maroon envelope" from Spa Sydell. A massage might actually be nice, but the commercial promises the buyer he's sure to receive a "special" thank you from his loved one, and I don't think we should have to do certain things on Christmas.

4. Donna Karan's new fragrance for women, Cashmere Mist. The woman in the commercial seems to suggest taking the bottle somewhere private, and I don't want to smell that.

5. A Lowe's gift card.

Friday Nostalgia

I LOVED Mr. Magoo when I was a kid.

Celebrate

World Orgasm Day starts tomorrow. Check the schedule (for those of us in Georgia, it's Saturday, 1:08 a.m.) to sync up and do your part to promote peace on earth.

I don't know if I can stay up that late.

I Plan to Write this Evening

but in the meantime...

Our House is Haunted

But is it the ghost of Christmas Past, Present, or Future?

For the second morning in a row, I came downstairs to find the television on and the volume turned up loud. Yesterday, I assumed Jack had gotten up in the middle of the night and decided to watch TV, even though I thought it was odd he'd be watching Nickelodeon. I didn't mention it to anyone and didn't think about it again. But Jack spent the night at a friend's, so I knew it couldn't have been him this time. Then I figured one of the dogs must have stepped on the remote, but I remembered we've been using the batteries out of the remote for the miniature flashlight since the kitchen pantry bulbs burned out last weekend.

I asked Biggy if he'd gone back downstairs after we went to bed, and he assured me he hadn't budged. When I told him about the TV, he got that look on his face he gets when he believes he might have to use a public restroom for a sit-down. And he reminded me about another strange incident: When he got home from work yesterday, he asked me where the dish towel he'd stuck in the door to the back porch was. I told him I'd found a towel on the floor but didn't know where it had come from; I'd thrown it in the laundry. He told me the rubber molding had worn off that door and he'd stuck the rag there to keep the draft out. The door, by the way, had been deadbolted...

Exactly Like Me

Except I'm not a pharmacist.

Saving Me From Myself

Because Biggy is very much aware of my history as a victim of domestic violence, he sometimes drops little reminders to help me avoid further incident. He's really thoughtful that way. Sunday, we were in the car, somewhere between Target and Best Buys on our Christmas shopping circuit, when I tried to call JackMan at home to make sure he let the dogs out. Having been unsuccessful at reaching him on either the house phone or his cell, I tossed my own cell phone into the cup holder and sank into the seat, a little frustrated with my son. Meanwhile, my husband must have been daydreaming.

Biggy: Did you get ahold of him?

TR: Do you hear me having a conversation?

(silence in the air of sarcasm)

Biggy: That's how you get a black eye, Babe.

But Merry Christmas!

Click image to read page one (yes, there was more) of the for-real, no-joke holiday letter we got from one of Biggy's college friends and his wife.

Friday Nostalgia

Turn-of-the-century excellence. Magnolia, 1999.

Happy Birthday Lola!

She's 8 today.

And an old poem (but she hasn't changed):


LOLA CUTS HER HAIR

Four, she’s mostly boy, all
rib cage and small

of back, naked to the waist.
When I offer

a simple yellow sundress--
the final remnants

of my little princess
dreams, she shakes

the memory
of her copper curls,

swears, Never!

Spirit of the Season

Email I received yesterday:

To all my Democrat friends:

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2008, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere. Also, this wish is made without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.

To all my Republican friends:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

*************************
And my response:


To all my Republican friends:

Please accept my tax-free holiday wishes. May your SUV's keep their shine, your country clubs stay exclusive, and your health insurance cover your Viagra. May the only illegal immigrants you have to see be your housekeepers and landscapers. May all your churches build gigantic recreation centers and none of your karate instructors be pedophiles. May all your mission trips be to Jamaica and all of your volunteer work and charitable contributions be written about in the paper. May your husbands be heterosexual and your wives forgiving. May your daughters be Tri Delts and your sons be Dekes, and may they remain virgins until they marry (just as you did) and become Junior Leaguers and Freemasons.

And, of course, may all your Christmases be white.

Career Change

This morning, during a segment on the Today Show about how increased air traffic is leading to dangerous close calls between planes in the air and on runways:

TR: You know, air traffic controllers make really good money.

Biggy: You should do that. You could blog while you work.

Honesty. Passion.

My Wish List

Nick and Nora flannel pajamas. I already have the monkeys, but there's a flamingo print and some dogs I like too.




Any set of melamine plates from French Paper:


Guess What/Chicken Butt Tee:

Petty Beef

The cup of coffee I bought at Starbucks today has been bothering me all afternoon. I mean the cup itself. Where they usually print 'The Way I See It' was a holiday pass-the-cheer story that goes like this:

"At a Starbucks drive-thru in Riverside California, a customer spontaneously decided to pay for the drink of the person behind him. That delighted person was then inspired to pay for the drink of the person behind her, who then did likewise. What then transpired was an amazing chain reaction of cheer passing that lasted for seven cars."

What the heck!

The proper response when someone performs a spontaneous act of kindness is to thank them (even if it's just in your heart), enjoy the gift, and let them be the hero. Then--LATER--a day, a week--you can pay it forward and be a hero yourself.

I'm telling you, if I'd been the original giver in this case, I'd have been-like "What was the point?!"

Friday Nostalgia

The Carol Burnett Show, 1972

How Fair Is This?

Biggy is here:


and I am here:

God Bless Cindy Crawford

*UPDATE
Because Georgia thought I was being vain and mean, I want to clarify the sentiment behind this post. I wasn't trying to make fun of Cindy Crawford. I was elated to see the pictures of her on vacation, paddling a surfboard (in another), enjoying the sunshine, celebrating her good health. She's a real woman, with a real woman's body, albeit a beautiful real woman's body. She's fit. She takes care of herself, and she wears (proudly it seems) the scars of her history and the history of her children's birth.

In my dreams, men love their wives inside and out. When the women give birth to their children, the husbands honor that process and respect its sacrifices. They continue to love and long for the woman they married, and embrace the changes that come with motherhood. They don't start ogling other women or scouring the Internet for "Barely Legal."

But my own experiences and those of many women I'm close to, have proven otherwise. I read once that one of the prime times men cheat on their wives is when the wives are pregnant. I couldn't believe that, but then it happened to me. Often, when a woman's body has been "damaged" by pregnancy and childbirth, she's no longer prized. This is clear in the general response to Cindy's photos. But one would hope her own husband would feel quite otherwise.

I felt I was being punished once my children were born and I no longer met my ex's "standard." I became self-conscious and inhibited. I was ashamed of my body; no amount of exercise or cosmetics could fix the stretch marks or c-section scar. Eventually, after my divorce, I learned once again to celebrate my body and all of its wonderful stories. But even that hard-won victory was short-lived.

One of my favorite poets, Adrian Blevins, has a moving poem called "Turning Thirty-Six" about this very subject. Here's an excerpt:

but what could we have known of the births that would take our
bodies from us?

No matter what, the bodies of girls will fatten on semen
and burgeon with milk
while the fathers with zilch in their hands amble off drunk,
broke, bawling, blind.
In their divergent dreams do the febrile men see us as we once
were,

when we were still little birds in the water? Do they carry us in
the pockets
of their hearts? Do they take us out and throw us down
while we rock like hags in the deadbeat dark?

Malcolm

Because we automatically turn the TV on in the morning so we won't have to talk to each other, and because we're too lazy to find the remote and leave the tv on whatever channel Lo was glued to the night before, Biggy and I have recently caught a couple of episodes of Malcolm in the Middle--one of the funniest sitcoms ever written. If you've never seen it, you should do yourself a favor and catch it in reruns. Better yet, buy all 151 episodes on dvd for about 30 bucks.

If anyone cares, I'd like that for Christmas.

When 'No Thank You' Would Suffice

This morning at breakfast I asked the visiting Georgia if she would like to have the nightgown, since I'm not allowed to wear it:

Georgia: Um, no. Never.

TR: It's so comfortable! You could just wear it in your dorm room. No one except Martha would ever have to see it.

Georgia: I don't want to turn myself off.

Saturday Things You Might Not Know

Megan Mullally (Karen from Will and Grace) on China Beach.