25 Things

Those of you who share my Facebook obsession will have seen this, since that's where I got it, but I had so much fun writing it I decided to share anyway. And hey--who am I kidding--easy blog entry to ease me back into writing.

Rules: Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged . You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it’s because I want to know more about you.

1. I can do algebra in my head, and on long car drives by myself I make up equations: If I’ve gone x miles in 45 minutes, how many miles should I have gone by this time? My high school math teacher Mrs. Dubois would be proud.

2. The Lord & Taylor on 5th Ave in Manhattan is my happy place, and can fix almost any problem in my life. Dealing with a breakup? Visit the shoe department. Need a last-minute dress for a wedding? They’ve got me covered. Add in the beautiful architecture, and the gorgeous window displays, and the cathedral ceilings, and well, it’s just about perfect.

3. On my list of things I want to buy but keep convincing myself are unnecessary expenditures are laser hair removal, a GPS for my car, and a new living room carpet. I still have the hand-me-down braided rug my sister gave me when I moved to New York, and it’s hideous.

4. My high school guidance counselor changed my life. She knew my family couldn’t afford college, so she told me about Hofstra, and that they gave academic-based scholarships pretty liberally. I got a full scholarship and a room for all four years, majored in the only undergraduate publishing program in the country, pledged a sorority, and fell in love with New York. The rest, as they say, is history.

5. My first concert was Tiffany, with New Kids on the Block opening for her. I had never heard of them, and when they came on stage I was surprised, because I thought they were Black. I never did get on board with the New Kids obsession.

6. I had all sorts of existential angst about whether there really was more than one path to happiness, and whether I could be happy without kids, and whether I’d regret not having them if I didn’t, and then my goddaughter was born. And none of that crap mattered anymore.

7. I feel like I need to defend my decision to remain Catholic, because I think educated people think it makes me either less smart than they are, or sheep.

8. I hate moving, and therefore have lived in exactly 3 places my whole life: my parents’ house, Hofstra University dorms, and my current apartment. My kitchen has a bug problem in the summer months, but the apartment is huge and rent-stabilized and it will pretty much take dynamite to get me to give it up.

9. My oldest sister and I are nineteen years apart, and I became an aunt at 4 and a great-aunt at 33. When my niece got engaged, people kept making comments about my niece being married before I was like they felt bad for me. I was fine with it. I thought they were weird.

10. I love Christmas. The music, the decorations, the gift-giving, the parties. Just love everything about it. One of my friends calls me Chrissy Christmas around this time of year.

11. I’m a member of MENSA. So when I do something funny or stupid or silly and say “I’m kind of a genius,” I actually am.

12. I have a lifelong soft spot for anyone I’ve ever been close to. I’m always happy to hear from ex-boyfriends, I still wonder what ever happened to my best friend from third grade, and it took me somewhere in the vicinity of a decade to get over my first love. I still occasionally dream about a high school friend I lost touch with.

13. I still consider Boys Don’t Cry by The Cure to be my all-time favorite song, with Candy by Iggy Pop and Kate Peirson a close second.

14. The coolest publishing experience I’ve ever had was for the Steinbeck anniversary, when I got to hang out with his son and hear him talk about his dad, how he used to live in my neighborhood, which of his books was his favorite. Arthur Miller and Studs Terkel were there too. It defies words.

15. I have an almost pathological fear of sharks, and will only swim in the ocean if one person stays out deeper than me at all times as bait. I will explain to them, with no embarrassment, exactly why they must stay out deeper. Despite this, I once snorkeled in a shark tank, because the only thing worse for me than being afraid is letting that fear stop me.

16. My first job was doing take-out and bussing tables at a Chinese restaurant. I hated every second of it.

17. I truly don’t understand why anyone who’s not a millionaire and has any interest in social justice would vote Republican. I try to respect others’ views, but I just can’t.

18. I have more than 500 people in my Blackberry contacts. I kind of collect friends.

19. I didn’t hate high school. Those were far from my glory days, and there’s not enough money in the world to make me go through all that teen angst or live under my dad’s thumb again, but mostly I remember it being a fun time.

20. I love coffee. Way too much. I usually limit myself to one cup a day, but every time I pass a Starbucks, I spend a little bit of energy convincing myself I don’t need to go in. Even at inappropriate times like 10 pm.

21. One of my sisters had a falling out with the rest of them, and my family hasn’t all been in the same place in 8 years. It breaks my heart.

22. My friends are breeders. Between my biological nieces and nephews, and the children of just my very closest friends, I have 21 nieces and nephews, with another on the way. The amount of Christmas wrapping I do is insane.

23. When I moved to New York, I had my first publishing job but no permanent place to live, only $200 in my bank account, and brought only the essentials I could fit into my parents’ borrowed Chevy—clothes, shoes, books, a stereo, and CDs. Eleven years later I still haven’t decided if that was incredibly brave or incredibly stupid.

24. I got my belly button pierced on the dock outside Fat Tuesdays in Cancun after a Tequila booze cruise during spring break senior year. I didn’t have enough money with me, so a Merchant Marine paid for it. I decided that since it was an American doing the piercing and I saw her open the needle, it was okay.

25. I have my dream job. I’m a marketing manager for a major book publisher. Sometimes I get antsy or start thinking about leaving the industry for more money. But then I remember that there’s nothing in the world I want to do more than what I do.

The Girl Is Back

So I heard the word is on the street that I've been missing. Evidently, a girl disappears for 2 months without calling, emailing, or blogging, and people begin to worry. Sheesh. Some people are so oversensitive...

For those of you who have asked, no, nothing's wrong. As a matter of fact things are fabulous. Fabulouser than they've been in a very long time. But if I make up a story about grave illness and personal tragedy, will that make you less mad at me? Because I'm not above that.

For now, though, I'll bribe you with pictures. I scored not just one but TWO yummy new nieces this summer. Comet, one of my closest friends/sorority sisters gave birth to little Miss Catie, who not only is adorable but is also the first baby in my New York crew. The first baby within drop-by distance?? Can you say spoiled??? The fact that she's gorgeous and the sweetest, happiest baby ever just clinched the deal.

And my niece had her baby a couple of weeks ago, and named her Abigail Muriel, after my mother. (Mrs. Bookgirl's name is Muriel). So she had the first baby in our family in 13 years, the first girl in 29 years, and named her after my mom. As my sister Michelle put it, she has won so many points with my mother that no one will ever catch up. The race for favorite is over...

And just in case all that yummy girl-baby-ness is somehow not enough to melt your cold, cold hearts and you're still mad, I'm throwing in a bonus picture. Ella took this delightful self-portrait. Yes, that's my goddaughter. Sarah had no way of knowing what an apt pairing that would turn out to be...

Ouch

Maybe Baby wrote a blog about stupid injuries and asked people to write in with their own stories. Now, as you all know, I am the clumsiest person on earth. But while my embarrassing injuries are too numerous to count, one stands out above the others. I was originally going to just email him the story, but I realized I never shared it with all of you. And you know how I love offering up my personal humiliation for your amusement.

About 5 years ago, before Polly Poppins had Secret Lulu, she decided that before she had kids of her own she wanted to be a good godmother and take her six-year-old goddaughter to Disney World. Mr. Poppins, having a highly developed sense of self-preservation, wanted no part of that. She was on her own. So she convinced me that I should take my godson Jeremy, who was eight at the time, and we'd make a trip out of it. Okay, so it actually took no convincing. My sister Michelle didn't have grandkids yet, so she was still putting up stiff competition for the "cool aunt" title, and I had something to prove. Also, I have a deep-seated love for Epcot that completely baffles Polly. But that's another story.

The time came for the trip, we both headed back to Rhode Island to pick up the kids (who, by the way, had only one thing in common: they were both notoriously difficult) and we were on our way. Through the combined efforts of flight delays and really bad directions that got us hopelessly lost, we didn't make it to the hotel until 2 in the morning. So the next morning, we're rarin' to go. All we've seen of Orlando is the rental car, that same tollboth we accidentally went through four times, and our hotel rooms. We've got a full day at the Magic Kingdom ahead of us.

And that's when it happened. I had just gotten out of the shower, and I was putting on sunscreen in the bathroom. Now, until this point, I had always thought that my body was incapable of doing a split. But it turns out that's not entirely true. See, if my legs start to slide in opposite directions on the bathroom floor, and my hands are slippery so I can't grab onto the counter, it turns out that I can go all the way down into a full straddle. It's not a good idea, mind you, and there were noises that can only be described as popping and tearing, but it's possible. I know it sounds terrible, but believe me when I tell you that the pain was far, far worse than it sounds. Even now, I get queasy just thinking about it.

So now I'm sprawled on the bathroom floor, completely naked, in excruciating pain, and I can't get up. I'm stuck there. I can just reach a hand towel, which I use to cover my juicy bits, and I yell for Jeremy to "go get Polly. Tell her it's very important that she come immediately." She, thank God, had the foresight to get us adjoining rooms. So Polly comes to check on me, but she can only open the door a couple of inches, because it's bumping up against the top of my head. And oh, right, I can't move. I explain what happened, and Polly, ever the pragmatist, tells me, "Look, here's the deal. Normally I would call an ambulance. But since you're naked, I'm going to let you make that call..."

I blessedly have blocked out the details on exactly how we got me off the floor, but I do remember Polly putting my underwear on for me the first few days of the trip. I could only lift my feet, when sitting, about an inch and a half off the floor, and only one at a time, so she had to hook the underwear around my feet, and then, since I couldn't bend, pull them up above my knees so I could reach them to pull them the rest of the way up. Jeremy had to put on my socks and shoes for me, because my feet were so out of reach they may as well have been in another zip code. With the help of a heavy-duty prescription painkiller Polly just so happened to have in her bag, and enough Tylenol Arthritis Relief to cause permanent liver damage, I managed to make it to Disney that day. But it wasn't pretty. And well, let's just say Polly and Jeremy were kind enough to take turns pushing the wheelchair...

I had to move so slowly that a full week later, after I was back in New York, I was heading to the subway one morning and an old woman with a cane, I kid you not, cruised right past me. Injury, here's insult. Nice to meet you.

Name Game

I know you've been waiting patiently for a new blog. And since it's taken me so long to post, you were expecting something insightful and fabulous. This isn't it...

You know how much I love silly names. And I found this on Big Girl Underoos, a blog I recently discovered courtesy of Polly. She has a great voice, and "put on your big girl pants and deal with it" is an expression I use all the time. So I'm already a fan. Also, she uses the same blog template I do, so she must have fabulous taste.

I had to use Book Girl for my first and last name, since the ones involving combining names had way too many consonants with my real name, rendering them unpronouncable and no fun at all. And you know what they say--If Bookgirl aint't happy, ain't nobody happy.

Okay, no one says that. But they should...

1. WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (Mother and Father's middle name): Therese Joseph
(no, my family's not Catholic or anything...)

2. NASCAR NAME: (first name of your mother's dad, father's dad): William Wilfred (that sounds more like an actor than a driver)

3. STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first name): Girbo

4. DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal): Red Panda

5. SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born): Ann Providence

6. SUPERHERO NAME: (2nd fave color, fave drink, add "THE" to the beginning): The Pink Margarita (what would my super powers be??)

7. FLY NAME: (first 2 letters of 1st name, last 3 letters of your last name): Boirl

8. ROCK STAR NAME: (current pet's name, current street name): None 35 (That could totally be a band)

9. STRIPPER NAME: (name of your fave perfume/cologne, fave candy): Allure Truffle

10. PORN NAME: (1st pet's name, street you grew up on): Goldie Bernon (but you've all heard that one before)

Grandma, What Big Needles You Have

Since the fall, I've been seeing a chiropractor for lower back pain. It got better for a while, and then much, much worse, and nothing he did was making a difference. So my doctor decided to pull out the big guns (or needles, as the case may be.) He sent me for acupuncture.

Last week was my first appointment. Since the pain is in my extreme lower back, the doctor had me take off my pants and cover with a towel, kind of like when you go for a massage. Now, in his defense, before he had me take them off, he asked if I was wearing underwear. And I said yes. But what I was really thinking was "sorta." (Yes, it's another blog about my underwear. Deal with it.) As previously mentioned, my underwear don't have a lot of "there" there.

So he did his thing with the needles, and it was all good. But then he had me move over onto my back for stretches. And this, my friends, is where the situation got awkward. See, in addition to being essentially a triangle of fabric and some string, my underwear are also older than Ella. So the elastic situation, it's not what it used to be. The days when they stayed put without any wiggle room are only a memory. This man who I've just met has my legs up in the air, flexing and stretching them. And all I can think is "you SO better be looking at my face." I believe in some cultures, this might mean we're engaged. But just in case we're not, I dug up some underwear with more coverage for tomorrow's appointment...


p.s. I finally did laundry, and got to try out the new underwear, and they're lovely. Thanks for asking.

p.p.s. My sister Michelle, who was P.J.'s mom, decided she was ready for a new puppy. She's picking him up this weekend. I'm totally in love.

Why I Love My Job

I know we all get bogged down sometimes in what we don't like about our jobs, but I love the little reminders of what's great about mine.

Overheard this morning
A woman having a conversation with her (very high-ranking) boss:
Boss: Just how drunk were you last night?
Girl: My eyeballs hurt.

Overheard at the copy machine:
Motherfucker!!!!! (Screamed at the top of someone's lungs)
Is this normal behavior at other people's offices?

When bad spellcheck happens to good people:
I was reading a manuscript this week for an erotica collection. (Yes, I work on smut) and throughout one whole story, a certain piece of female anatomy was referred to as the colitis. In that same story, the heroine also had a virginia. That's not going to stop being funny for me any time this decade.

Not work-related, but still funny:
I was talking to my sister this morning, telling her that I'm going to a Mensa event on Sunday. There's a social group for us twenty- and thirty-somethings, and we're going to the movies.
Den: Will there be a discussion after, or just the film?
Me: We're going to dinner after, but it's not like we're seeing Apocalypse Now. It's Leatherheads.
Insert her laughing to the point where she can't speak.
Everyone really does think we sit around at Mensa events and talk about Quantum Physics or Philosophy, don't they? Sigh...

Be a Dancer

The world is made up of dancers and critics, and I'm more committed than ever to being one of the dancers.

See, I just got back from this weekend workshop. Or training. Or class. Or retreat, depending on who I was talking to and what I felt like calling it. But it was a life-changing, eye-opening, kick-in-the-ass, make-me-look-at-the-whole-world differently experience.

The weekend was designed, among other things,to help me figure out what it is that I really, in my heart, want most out of life. And just a hint? Me, little miss I live in my office, my job is my whole world? It turns out that having my career be my whole life isn't it. Surprise!

Midge did the Momentum training last year, and has been trying to convince me to do it ever since. My response, of course, was something along the lines of "not so much." But in February, when I was in that funk and felt like I was drowning, she tried once more. And I grabbed on like someone had thrown me a life raft. A month later, when it came time to actually go, however, it was a totally different story. She kept emailing me to ask if I was excited. I ignored her emails. Because seriously, how was this something to be excited about?? Finally she called me the day my training was set to start, and I couldn't avoid the question anymore. No, I was not excited. What I really was was nauseated. What if I hated it? What if it was stupid? What if I didn't like the other people? What if they didn't like me? What if? What if? What if?

I was wrong. She was right. There, I'm saying it. In print even. Because I am not the same person I was when I walked in that door on Thursday. I learned about how I feel, how I look at the world. I made new friends, I made peace with with crap I've been carrying for a decade. I opened up and let go and learned about myself. And more important than anything else, I came face to face with the way I treat other people, and how very differently I treat myself. It seems that just about the only person in my life who didn't think I was fabulous was me. Yeah, I'm working on that...

Unmentionables

I've got a problem. A personal problem. An underwear problem.

See, my approach to underclothes can be best summed up as "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." This is going to sound way more like Polly Poppins than what you would expect from me, but I channel her every once in a while.

With few exceptions, I own one style of bra, one style of underwear, and 2 styles of socks. Period. My bras are all the same style, except in different colors and patterns. Some have lace. Ditto for the underwear.

(For the record, those aren't my boobs. That's an underwear model who happens to be wearing my most recent bra purchase.)

My work socks are all from the same store. They each have a little picture embroidered on the ankle. Do I want leopard-print purses today? High-heeled shoes? No one else can see the embroidery, but they make me happy. My gym socks are from the same store. (Oh, and p.s. The store is in Connecticut. Nowhere near where I live.) They're white, with different embroidered patterns. (Flip flops? Beach chairs?)

When the underwire pops on a bra or the socks get a hole, I throw them out, go back to the same store, and buy more. They're always comfortable, they're always what I want. No muss, no fuss, no thinking about it. I like it that way.

But lately I've had what could only adequately be described as an underwear meltdown. See, the store where I buy them stopped making my style. So I stopped getting new ones. I've had the same undies for years. I don't put them in the dryer, so they've held up. Until now. I noticed a few weeks ago that a pair had a hole. So I threw them out. Then I threw out another pair the week before last. And two more last week. It seems if you buy your underwear all at the same time, they wear out all at the same time. Crap.

Now, I know it sounds easy. Just find a new brand. But see, that's not as simple as it sounds:
First of all, I'm plus-sized. Clothes shopping in general is never easy for me. Think of all the stores where you normally shop. Now imagine that out of all those places, only one carries your size. Maybe two if you're lucky. And those places, well, their selection can be dismal. I'm under 60, so that rules out about 75% of everything that comes in my size.
Second, they must be cotton. I am unwilling to negotiate on this point.
Third, and I know this is a shocker, I'm a little particular about my underwear. They should not come up to my bra. I cannot emphasize that point enough. (See earlier "I'm under 60" comment). I should not feel like I'm wearing my bathing suit under my clothes. Panty lines are not sexy. I cannot feel pretty in underwear I can imagine my mother wearing. If there's anyone from the lingerie world reading this, here is what I want you to take away from this blog: "Chubby girls need thongs too."

So I went shopping yesterday, and I found one store that had what I was looking for--the elusive plus-sized, 100% cotton thong. They had just gotten them in, so I bought everything they had in my size. (I really hate doing laundry.) If they fit well, I'll go back and buy more. But I'm seriously concerned I might be heading for a Rain Man-esque "Definitely not my underwear" freakout until I get used to them. I hate when that happens....

You Say It's Your Birthday

Yes, it's true. I turned 33 last weekend. Polly keeps telling me that it officially makes me a grown-up hobbit. But I like to refer to it as my "Jesus year." (For those of you not versed in Christian history, the Bible says Jesus was 33 when he was crucified.) I can never come close when it comes to influence or importance. But I am hoping my year ends better than his did. Execution for a crime I didn't commit is so not on my to-do list.

That said, I had a fabulous birthday. I stopped at the bookstore on my way home from work on Friday and bought myself some purely indulgent, mindless reads. And then I spent most of the weekend reading like it was my job. I made it through two and a half books by the time I went back to work on Monday. One of them was poking out of my bag on Saturday (Bookgirl fashion rule #22: when taking the subway by yourself on your way to a night out, always carry the sequined purse that's big enough to hold a paperback) and my friend Mary asked me, "Is that one of your trashy romance novels?" My response? "Even better. Vampire romance."

I was showered with attention all day: phone calls and singing and emails and texts and one very special "Happy Birfday" message from the girl. A small group of my closest friends took me out to dinner for my birthday, and I was reminded all over again of why they're my best friends. One of the boys nonchalantly text messaged me from the other side of the table during dinner. The message said "You look adorable." I'm pretty positive there were hearts coming out of my eyes like Pepe le Peu in those old cartoons. I swear I'd fight his boyfriend for him if I thought I could win.

And let's not forget the Venti skim toffee nut latte from Starbucks. Oh, the latte. See, every year for Lent I give up the same thing--chocolate. It's the hardest thing I can give up and still stick to. (One year I gave up potatoes AND pasta, and chocolate was still tougher.) But since I've been giving up chocolate since junior high, I started giving something else up along with it. This year it was lattes. I couldn't give up coffee entirely, because that just wasn't fair to the people who have to be around me every day. (To my coworkers, you're welcome.) For me, lattes are the good stuff. Coffee is just utilitarian.

After Lent began, a Starbucks opened up in my neighborhood. Two blocks from my apartment. I've lived in this neighborhood for 10 years. That's a full decade of serving hard time, waiting for Jackson Heights to finally get a Starbucks. And once we finally did, I couldn't go. Heartbreaking. But I have one caveat to my Lenten sacrifices, and it's this: they don't count on my birthday. No, Jesus did not come out of the desert for my birthday, but without this rule I would have never in my entire life had a birthday cake worth eating. And I just don't believe a just God would want that to happen in his name. So I got the biggest latte they sell at Starbucks, a medium-sized bag of Cadbury mini eggs, and went. to. town.

The night before my birthday I was a little sad (also a little tipsy, thus the sad), thinking that I was starting a new year with all the same issues I always swear I'm going to change about myself. I'm still broke, still overweight, still not entirely sure what's next for me. But when I woke up the next morning, that was all gone. I was just utterly grateful. Maybe I'll never be rich or thin or have it all together, but I'm loved. Utterly, completely loved. And what else do I really need?


p.s. For those of you thinking, "I thought Bookgirl was going to blog more often now that she has the new laptop??" all I can say is, so did I. But every night this week, I would put on the laptop and the television, intending to write while I was cleaning out the DVR. And it turns out that while I'm an ace multitasker, and there are a zillion things I can do while watching television, being creative and witty is NOT one of them. Lesson learned.

I'm Okay. Really.

For those of you who have called, emailed, texted, or commented to ask, the following all apply.
Yes, I'm okay.
No, I'm not mad at you.
Yes, I'm really okay, not just saying I am.
No, we're not in a secret fight.
No, Polly. We didn't break up. You should still buy me a birthday present.

Sorry I fell off the planet for a couple of weeks, but for you Ya-Ya fans, to quote Vivi, I dropped my basket. I got some news a couple of weeks ago that threw me for a loop and I just shut down. After a week of nearly continuous meltdowns, I shook it off and got back to normal. (Thank you, Prozac, for the recuperative powers you offer. If this happened a couple of years ago, the meltdown might still be going on. There was no "shaking it off" pre-medication.) So I had to spend all of last week doing all the things I didn't do the week before, when I was coming home from work and going directly to sleep. But I'm back in my groove now. Which means you all once again are a captive audience to my babbling.

The weekend before last, I went back to Woonsocket. The spontaneous tears stopped the day I knew I was going to see my mom. A coincidence? I think not. I swear, that women has some kind of old-world healing magic she's not aware of. (Either that, or I've been reading too many Nora Roberts trilogies lately, and I want to believe my life has magic too. Odds are, it's the latter.) I parked myself in my parents' house for 3 days, and left only to go to mass, Target, and to see Ella (my holy trinity of feel-good outings).

We had a joint birthday party for me and my godson, who turned thirteen.

And by joint party, I mean he got to choose what we were eating, he got all the cards and presents, and I couldn't eat the ice cream cake because it was chocolate, so I had to make my own.

In my family's defense, I didn't get presents because my birthday isn't for another couple of days and they didn't want me to have nothing for my actual birthday, the food Jeremy chose was exactly what I would have picked, and I made my own cake because I had something specific in mind and wanted to see if I could figure out how to make it. But still...

When my niece got to my mom's house, I was completely fascinated by her teeny little baby belly. Evidently, I was a lot less subtle than I thought, because after a minute or so, my mom said, "If you're done staring at Jenn's stomach now, I could use some help." Um, oops.

Then on the way back to New York, I stopped in Connecticut to visit one of my sorority sisters and her new daughter, Anna. She snuggled up on me and slept pretty much the whole time. Yeah, I hated every second of it.

So I think we've got the formula down. If you've got a sad Bookgirl on your hands, add downtime, family, and a healthy dose of baby love. The rest will take care of itself.

Blogless

Yes, kids. I know I've been a bad, bad blogger. I've been yelled at. But I can't go online at home, and I've been either working late every night or leaving here to be somewhere else at a specific time, neither of which puts me at my computer after hours with some free time. But there's a great big yellow light at the end of the tunnel, and this is what it looks like.


I bought myself a laptop. A shiny, new, bright-yellow-to-lend-itself-to-creativy laptop. One that has wireless internet that actually works, unlike my old laptop which got a virus because a friend used it to download gay porn (seriously) and then I kept forgetting to have it fixed until my warranty ran out. I'm not making any promises, but there might even be some shirt fiction coming your way. That's how excited I am about this computer.

But while I haven't been blogging, I've learned some valuable lessons:
1) At a home with toddlers, always lock the door when you're in the bathroom. I slept at my friend Kerri's last weekend, and my 3-year-old niece came barreling in when I was in the shower because she had to go potty. Which is fine. I grew up in a house with five girls and one bathroom. I'm used to sharing. But she then proceeded to watch my entire shower, asking questions. "Whatcha doin' Auntie Bookgirl?" "What's that?" "Why did you do that?" "Is that your soap?" "Did you bring it from home?" "Why are you putting lotion on your legs?" "Are those your undies?" "Why is that towel on your head?" It's shocking that she doesn't ever pass out from lack of oxygen.

2) When your team loses in the Super Bowl against the team that plays where you live, you learn who your friends are. Most people were sympathetic. Tons of people asked me how I was doing. Even the friend who really hates my team and whose trash talk tends to get mean managed to limit her comments to one "Holy crap!" text message. But there was one guy, just one, my friend's husband, who sent taunting emails. And he will forever more have a black mark next to his name as far as I'm concerned. For the record, though, no. Believe it or not, I wasn't that upset. As much as I love football, it's a game. And not even a game I was playing in. Plus, I'm a firm believer in the five-year rule. After your team wins the Big Game, you're not allowed to bitch about anything they do for five years. Get caught cheating? Oh well. Lose in the Super Bowl after an undefeated season? Meh. No complaining allowed.

3) The Secret might actually work. After circling my neighborhood for 40 minutes at 2 in the morning with no parking spots anywhere, I started to get desperate and began repeating "Parking spots come easily and often." Swear to God, I found one within 60 seconds, two blocks from my apartment. I've decided to start keeping a gratitude journal. I'll keep you posted on how that works out for me.

4) Keeping secrets is no fun. Someone very close to me has news. Big, big news. News she's not willing to share with the world at large until she's had it for, say, 12 weeks. And I've kept from blogging about it. But it's KILLING me. Killing me, people. (By the way, if you're reading this and thinking, "But Bookgirl told me this news already" that's because you don't know her, there was no way of it getting back to her, and you couldn't possibly ask her about it if something goes wrong. Therefore you're safe.)

5) I now understand why it's so easy to become addicted to prescription drugs. It's because I wasn't taking the right kind. I had this horrible back pain yesterday that I described as "feeling like all the muscles and nerves in my lower back were in a vise and shooting pain down through my hips and legs." Good times, I tell you. And I remembered that somewhere in my medicine chest (and by chest I mean gallon-size Ziploc bag) I had muscle relaxers left from a previous back pain. I took one, and then either fell asleep or lost conciousness (I'm not really sure which) at 7 pm and except for a brief stumble from the couch to bed slept through the night. The bad news is that was my last pill. The good news is that was my last pill.

Why I Hate Facebook

So being in marketing, I’m always looking for a new way to market my books. I need to understand where people are going to talk, to exchange ideas, to swap stories. And of course, a big part of that happens online. I’ve got MySpace down. I have a Friendster profile left over from before that was passé. I’ve been on Gather, because they’re an especially book-friendly site. I’ve logged onto Second Life, but haven’t been able to go so far as creating an avatar. And of course, the site everyone’s talking about these days—Facebook.

But I’ve got a confession to make. And it’s not pretty. Facebook makes me feel old. I just… don’t… get… it. At first I made excuses. It’s just because I’m new to it. It’ll all make sense. But it’s been a while. And it still doesn’t. Stuff shows up on my profile, and I can’t figure out why. People email me things that I have to sign up for. And at first I just said no to everything. No, no, no. But then I realized I wasn’t learning anything that way. So I started accepting these requests. And they’re confusing. Worse, they’re not grammatically correct. I got this message today:
”Added you to one of circles. Which circle do you want to put in?”
Seriously, that’s not English!! It looks like something my barely literate super would post on a sign in our laundry room.

I’m not happy, my friends. I feel the way my mom must have felt back when I was trying to teach her how to program the VCR. It gives me sensory overload, that same slightly panicked, out-of-control, I’m-out-of-my-element feeling I get in Best Buy and Home Depot. I briefly considered begging one of my friends for a tutorial, but then I realized that would officially make me pathetic. And that’s not an admission I’m willing to make yet.

I’ve heard that you have two choices in life: to master that which intimidates you, or to have it master you. But I disagree. I think there’s also a third option. To abandon the attempt entirely and pretend that it never mattered to you in the first place. And right now, that option is looking VERY attractive.
p.s. If you didn't click on the link to my MySpace profile, go do it. Now. My profile song would make my top songs of all times list. But that's another blog...

You Ain't Mickey

Dear Mr. Mouse,

Listen up, you little bastard. Me and you, we’re going to have a throwdown. And I’m going to win. You know why? Because I’m bigger, and I have technology on my side. I have traps. Where are your traps? Oh, right. You don’t have any. Suckah.

New York City is a big place, and there’s room enough for the both of us. My loathing for your kind has never been a secret, but up until now we’ve been okay. I stuck to my turf. You all stuck to yours. When I saw you on the street or in the park, I didn’t cause trouble. Because hey, I wasn’t defending my territory. But coming right out into my living room in front of my roommate? With the lights and the television on? Not smart, Mickey. Not. Smart.

I asked around to get people’s opinions on the glue trap vs. traditional trap questions, and they started talking about which kind was more humane. (You might not want to read this part, Dol, bless your Buddhist heart.) But let me make this clear. I’m not looking for the method that will be the most kind. I’m looking for the one that will get you the most dead.

It didn’t have to be this way. If you had stayed outside, or even in the walls where I couldn’t see you, we would have been okay. You could have played happily with your vermin friends until you reached a ripe old age. But this is war. And remember, you started it. It’s on.

Monkey Wrap

Rhea Bouchard Powers is a columnist for one of the local Woonsocket papers, and when I lived there I always loved reading her columns. They're very real, very "a day in the life," and often very funny. My mom reads it, and a few years ago there was my all-time favorite column. It was about that great bane of my existence--Christmas wrapping. Ugh.

Ms. Powers's theory is that people all fall into different categories of wrappers. There are the Martha Stewart wrappers, where every package is a work of art. The precision wrappers, whose edges are folded with military precision. The average Joe wrappers, whose packages are unexceptional. And then way down at the bottom, the monkey wrappers, so named because their packages look like they were wrapped by a monkey.

Now when this column ran, I had long since moved to New York, but my mom cut it out of the paper, saved it, and stuck it on the fridge with a cow magnet. Every time one of my sisters came over, she'd make her read the article. And the day I got home for Christmas break, she handed it to me and said, "This is for you. You're a monkey wrapper." Now, another girl might have been insulted by that. But I know the truth. And the truth is that she's absolutely right. My wrapping is atrocious. I have actually given packages where I ran out of wrapping and the piece I had didn't quite wrap all the way around the present, so I cut off a strip from the end and just taped it in between. Somehow, even when I actually try to make my wrapping decent, it still always ends up baggy. And I have gotten out of wrapping countless birthday presents by telling my nephews "You can have it now, in the bag it came in, or I can wrap it. But then you're going to have to wait for it." (For the record, that one works every time. Foolproof.)

So monkey wrap became a standard expression in the Bookgirl family lexicon. And over the years, we've expanded it to fit other activites that require patience and/or manual dexterity. My sister Denise, for example, in addition to being a monkey wrapper, monkey folds laundry and is a monkey texter. (I know the buttons on the phone are little, and it's easy to make mistakes, but I have to regularly respond to her messages with, "I don't know what that means" or simply "monkey text," in which case she knows to try again.

With Christmas coming, I was really wishing I had the original article to share with everyone, so I sent a letter (typed even) to the the author, asking her if she might consider rerunning the article, or at least emailing it to me so I could pass it around. Not only did she rerun it AND email it to me, I even got a shout out in her column. Made me happy, I tell you.

Note: Today’s column, previously seen in 2001, is appearing again by popular demand. Well, actually, one woman named Bookgirl, formerly of Woonsocket but currently living in Jackson Heights, N.Y., wrote and asked if I could rerun it, and since I’m up to my eyeball in Adopt-a-Family stuff and have no time to write from scratch, it seemed like a good idea.



Monkey Wrapping
By
Rhea Bouchard Powers


I have long maintained that the gift-giving world is made up of those who hard-wrap and those who soft-wrap. Those who feel that every item of clothing should be placed in a tissue paper-lined box prior to being wrapped, and those who feel that boxing is superfluous and that paper alone should suffice.
I had never really given it any thought until several years ago when I volunteered to help wrap gifts at Adopt-a-Family.
There was a winter coat waiting to be wrapped, so I unrolled a length of paper and placed the neatly folded coat on it.
“Aren’t you going to put it in a box? Bobbie asked.
“No,” I replied. “I think boxes are a waste of money.”
“But they look so much neater,” she persisted.
“Soft-wrapping takes less time and less paper. Besides, soft-wrapped packages pack a lot more easily,” I countered. The good-natured debate has gone on throughout the ensuing years with neither of us changing our mind.
I also believe that the world can be further subdivided into various styles of wrappers.
For instance, there are those to whom wrapping is an art form. The Martha Stewarts of the world who see each box as a blank canvas just waiting to be turned into a masterpiece and whose gift wrapping almost qualifies as a gift on its own. You know the ones I mean. They’re the ones that have people “oohing” and “aahing” before they even see what’s inside the package.
Then you have the precision wrappers. They’re the ones whose packages never have a raw edge showing. Their seams are double folded. Their ends are neatly trimmed. All their folds are sharply creased and their corners as neatly mitered as well-made hospital beds. These are the people who, if they were in the army, would have quarters bounced on their beds.
Next in the hierarchy are your average Joes, gift-wrappers whose packages are unexceptional. They’re neat but not militarily so. Their work attracts little or no attention. It’s just gift-wrap.
Last but not least, at the bottom of the feeding chain, so to speak, you have the category my family refers to as monkey wrappers (the group into which my sister Bev and I fall), so called because the finished product invariably looks like it was wrapped by a monkey. The more gifts there are to be wrapped, the more monkeyesque it gets. Get Bev and me wrapping together and the quality slips even further.
When we wrap in tandem, Bev usually does the cutting because she’s the only one who can get the scissorless paper cutter to work. She cuts, I tape. The only time we’re particular about trimming the paper to fit the gift is when paper is running short or we need the trimmings to wrap smaller gifts. Otherwise we just fold it all up and tape it in place. Paper a tad too short? Not a problem. We’ll bridge the gap with tape. Running a little low on tape? That’s okay. We’ll put the peel-and-stick gift tags to double use holding the main seam together. Crude, perhaps, but it works.
When it comes to bulky or oddly shaped items we employ the “bunch and tape” method whereby you wrap the paper around the widest part and anchor it with a piece of tape. Then you bunch the paper up and tape it all together as best you can. Again, it may not be pretty but it gets the job done.
We have been doing this for years I have to tell you truthfully, we’ve never had a single complaint. Kids, especially, don’t care how their gifts are wrapped. All they want to know is what’s inside the paper.
It works for me.

So in what can only be described as true irony, a project came up last week. We (and in this case we, said by anyone, means me) should send our key bookstore buyers copies of our big new release as holiday presents. Oh, and they should be wrapped. And again, since marketing translates loosely into "anything that doesn't fall clearly into someone's else job description" that left me with a giant roll of gift wrap, a handy paper dispenser, and 100 books. Now, I've never minded being bad at wrapping. It's not an aspirational talent for me. Anyone lucky enough to be getting a gift from me loves me for many reasons that have nothing to do with my ability to fold and tape. So I've always happily monkey wrapped, cringing just a little at the final product.

But these were going to VIPs. With my publisher's name on them. Shaming myself is one thing. Shaming her was something else entirely. So I wrapped a few, and then went for a second opinion. I called one of my colleagues to come take a look. Were they really that bad??

The look on his face was priceless. I'm not sure if he was more appalled as a gay man or as my Advertising and Promotions Director, someone whose whole job it is to make things look good, but all he could say to me was, "What are you? Six? Those look like they were wrapped by a child." At which point he made me sit down with him, gave me a step by step tutorial, and then made me do a couple while he watched, critiquing my every move. Now again, another girl might have been insulted. But I was just too grateful that my packages were less pathetic to take too much umbrage. Just in case he started thinking that insulting me was okay though, I waited until he left for the night and covered his office with rolled up gift wrap scraps. Yeah, that showed him.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

Those of you who are new to my world may not know this, but I love Christmas. I really love it. At this time of year, my friend Nancy calls me “Chrissy Christmas.” (Aside #1: I know I usually switch things to Bookgirl in this blog for consistency, but Bookgirl Christmas doesn’t have the same ring to it. Aside #2: Just because Nancy calls me Chrissy doesn’t mean you can too. The list of people allowed to call me Chrissy is short. If you’re not sure if you’re on it, you’re probably not.)

But back to the topic at hand. I love Christmas. And everyone who knows me knows that. So every Christmas people buy me more ornaments and decorations and Christmas-themed housewares. Friday night, I purposely didn’t make plans. I went home after work to unpack my Christmas boxes and take stock of what I had. Out came the boxes. And boxes. And boxes. And I realized something. I am not okay. I am the poster child for conspicuous consumption. I counted, and if you count anything large enough to stay in its original box as its own box, I have 11 boxes of Christmas decorations. Eleven. I have three decorative Christmas pillows. Twenty-five Christmas CDs. Three boxes of onrnaments. Christmas dishes. Christmas glasses. Christmas wine charms. Pot holders and dish towels, place mats and cloth napkins. Napkin holders, spoon rests, salt and pepper shakers, and sugar bowls. It’s shocking, and a little bit embarrassing. But it sure is pretty. I like to think that I try to keep my decorations tasteful, and that all those tiny white twinkle lights all over my living room give everything a soft touch. Deep down I suspect that it might just look like Christmas threw up in my apartment, but I’m okay with that too.

On Saturday, my sister Denise and I had our annual Christmas shopping and feel-good movie day. Every year we meet at the Connecticut outlets in the morning (about an hour and a half drive for each of us), shop all morning, have soup and sandwiches at the same little café for lunch, shop a little more, see a movie, shop the rest of the day, and then go to Friendly’s for dinner. We somehow even get the same waitress every year. We’re creatures of habit, Denise and I. I got a ton of shopping done, totally loved the movie Enchanted, and even found these two great sweaters that fit perfectly and will show up under the tree on Christmas Eve to me from Den. (She has such great taste. I don’t know how she knew I wanted them. It might have something to do with my picking them out, trying them on, and then handing them to her and saying “Merry Christmas to me, from you.” Oh, and it turns out that on open highway with no traffic, my beautiful new car can go 90 without even shimmying. Um, not that I tried it or anything….

So yesterday was the big day—decorating day. I left my apartment, all bundled up, pushing my little rolling cart through the gently falling snow, off to get a Christmas tree. An hour later I came back to my apartment, cold, wet, and treeless, and said to my roommate, “You know those things I do, that will be really funny when I’m writing about them later?”

I’m not sure how people get Christmas trees in other cities, but every neighborhood in New York has at least one Christmas tree stand set up on the sidewalk. These nice people come down from Quebec with their trees and live out of their vans for the month of December. So I walked (4 streets and 2 very long avenues, this will be important later) to get my tree. Sure, I have a car, but why take it out in the snow when I have my trusty cart that’s served me so well in past years? I got there and explained specifically what I wanted—6 or 7 feet high, it had to be very fat and very round, and it had to have the stiff needles. No wussy soft needles for me. (It turns out that the technical term for what I want is balsam. I’ll forget it by next year, but good to know.) They go digging into their stash and come up with The Tree And I come up with the perfect solution to the whole “struggling to put the tree in the stand” torture I go through every year. I’m just going to throw some money at it. So I tell the nice Canuck. “I already have a tree stand at home. But I’ll buy one of yours if you put the tree in it for me.” He gets more money, my roommate and I don’t have to fight over whether or not it’s straight. Everybody wins. So far so good.

But now it’s time to pay for it. And this is where the problems start. I have $3 in cash, and I lost my ATM card. Again. I know this would be a big deal for someone more organized than I am, but I lose it pretty regularly, and it usually shows up, so I’m not all that worried. I had taken my American Express card so I could take a cash advance against it. Yes, I knew I’d have to pay a fee, but today was the day I was putting up my Christmas tree, dammit. I refused to let a little thing like service fees get in my way. So I leave the pretty tree and go into the drugstore to get money from the ATM. Transaction Denied. Shit.

But wait. The ATM had a weird message when I got there, and it made me wait while it loaded. It’s obviously the machine. I go across the street to the bakery and try again. Transaction Denied at this Terminal. Ah, that’s it! American Express won’t let me take a cash advance at a store ATM for my safety. That’s so nice of them. I need to go to a bank! Great. So I walk 3 long avenues and 3 streets to the nearest bank. I’m good. I’m getting my money. Transaction denied. Okay, now I’m in trouble. They already cut the tree for me, put it in the stand. I can’t just not go back, because I left my cart with them. Besides, this is decorating day, dammit

So I head back to my apartment (one long avenue, 1 street) and show up (cold, wet, and treeless) to explain to my roommate that this will all be very funny later, but right now I need her to give me her ATM card so I can go get cash to pay for the tree. I walk to her bank (2 long avenues, 1 street) and back to fetch the tree (4 long avenues, 3 streets). I’m in business. I’ve got my tree. It’s in the stand. I’m ready to go. But oh, one little detail. See the stand is too big to fit in my cart so they’ve had to tie the tree across the cart. Which means I now have to make it home (4 streets, 2 long avenues) with a 7-foot wingspan. In the snow. In New York City. I wish someone had been there to see me. Tilting the cart to get around trees, just giving up at some points and pushing my cart down the middle of the street like a homeless person. And of course, giggling out loud, because even I can see how ridiculous I look. Anyone who saw me had to think I was insane.

So finally. Finally!!!! I get home. I push my cart up to the ramp that leads to my side door and all I have to do is get the tree off the cart and I’m home free. But did I mention that it’s tied on? Really tightly? I try sawing through the rope with my house key. This is going to take forever. I try just standing the tree up and holding it, with the cart still tied on, sticking off the front like a three-foot tumor. There’s no way I can get it inside without killing myself. Now I’m screwed. My super is out there shoveling, but he’s conspicuously ignoring me and avoiding eye contact. I’m going to have to leave my tree outside, unattended, and go inside for scissors. My beautiful, beautiful tree that I have now worked REALLY hard for.

Just then, one of my neighbors comes to my rescue. He has nothing to cut with either, but that’s okay, because his window is right above where we’re standing. And he calls his wife and has her (I couldn’t make this shit up) drop a steak knife out of their kitchen window down to us so he can cut the rope for me.

So my beautiful tree made it inside my apartment, I got a workout, I made friends with my neighbor (and his wife, who I met when I returned the knife) and my apartment is totally decorated. I still love Christmas, but right now I’m glad it only comes once a year.

p.s. For those of you who remember the Fourth of July Lost Key Debacle, I still haven’t found my ATM card, but while I was looking for it, I found the key to my dad’s car. It had somehow fallen between the head of the bed and the wall, and gotten stuck under there. Because I evidently took my car keys to bed with me the night before?? For those of you who were with me, just how much tequila did I drink that night??

Where Do You Live?

You all know how to figure out your porn star names, right? Combine the name of your first pet with the street you grew up on. That would make me Goldie Bernon, which you have to admit is a GREAT porn star name. (I wasn’t allowed to have real pets, so after a while I stopped even naming the goldfish. They were just all Goldie.)

And there are a million games out there where you can use your real name to figure out different nicknames. You can get your Gangsta name. Mine is Purple-Headed Monkey Smuggla, but you can call me Purp for short. If you want a silly name, Captain Underpants can give you one. There, I’m Buttercup Bubble Fanny. I’ve always loved that one. And when the Ya-Ya movie came out and Polly, Diosa, and I went to see it together, smuggling in alcohol, we even got to figure out our own Ya-Ya names. I’m Princess Road Rage. (No comments, please, from anyone who’s ever driven with me…)

Plus there are the million nicknames my friends have for me, or any of my sisters’ names, all of which I’ll respond to. (Someone saw me at the mall last weekend with my mom and thought I was Celeste. She’s aged remarkably well, but seriously?? Did you think she just magically stopped aging sixteen years ago???)

So with all these made-up ways to identify myself, you’d think I’d be happy. And I was, for a while. But then those AT&T ads popped up, the ones that show people calling all the places they do business or their loved ones are, and making up a name for where they live, based on those places. And suddenly the made-up names weren’t enough. I wanted a made-up place too, dammit. So I got to thinking (way more than is normal, given the task at hand) and came up with the perfect one for me.

I love in New York, my family is in Rhode Island, and my best friends are in Massachusetts and San Diego. So I need a phone that works where I live, a place I call New Rhosachusiego. Thanks, AT&T. While I have no intention of switching to your network, I sure am enjoying your ad campaign.

Let the Good Times Begin

Today's the day!! Liz and Diosa are coming to New York to stay with me for the weekend. (There so better be a blog from each of them on this next week, or they're dead meat.) Polly was invited too, in a sort of backhanded "You can come if you really want to, but I'd rather you didn't" way. It's not that I don't want to see her. I ALWAYS want to see her. But if she's finally going to come visit me after 10 years, I want it to be when I haven't already run out of vacation time. And I want to be able to tailor it completely around what I know she'll love. This is the "Liz's first trip to New York" trip, so this one's planned around her. (And yes, Polly, I know you've technically seen me in New York, but slotting in a few hours with me in between other activities does not count as visiting me. I want quality time, dammit.)

I love playing tour guide. And I've been told I'm good at it, which of course makes me like it even more. I've worked up a whole itinerary--activities, restaurants, the whole deal. I hope those girls weren't expecting a laid-back, relaxing weekend...

Although Diosa and I have been friends since the first grade, this is the first time we meet Liz. So of course the obvious choice was to invite her to stay on my couch. Duh. My "personal safety" friends (the ones who worry about things like this) are of course completely freaked out. But I'm just excited. Even Polly, normally one of my PS worriers, thinks it's a great idea. Evidently Liz and I are the same type. And that type doesn't tend to be a threat.

Liz and I kept joking when we were first planning the trip that it would be great, as long as neither of us was secretly an axe murderer. I had a brief fantasy of borrowing my dad's chainsaw and leaving it conspicously out in my living room for her arrival, but that felt like way too much work to go through for a prank. Once I rejected the idea I told Liz about it, and she said she'd laugh her ass off. And then check into a hotel.

Of course, if I never blog again, then you'll know that Liz's whole "happy-go-lucky mother of two" online persona was just an act. I hope you'll miss me.

p.s. The Rockefeller Plaza Christmas tree went up today, the red cups arrived at Starbucks yesterday, and this morning I had my first Eggnog Latte. So I couldn't resist. Christmas music season began this morning in my office. How much do my coworkers hate me?

Gulp

Gulp. Gulp. Gulp. That's the sound of me drowning.

I've got worked piled up so high I've started having avalanches in my office, I still haven't mailed my godkids' Halloween presents, and I'm leaving tonight for vacation. I'll be in Florida until Wednesday with 3 of my college friends, celebrating my friend Vicki's birthday. She's one of my favorite vacation buddies, and her parents have a house on Marco Island. I love that about her.

But have no fear. I'm bringing my trusty laptop. With any luck, I'll come back on Thursday tan, rested, re-energized, and with lots of great blog fodder.

Miss me!



p.s. I LOVE kids in costumes. I usually come home early on Halloween, wander around the neighborhood baby-watching (there are literally THOUSANDS of kids in my neighborhood), and then when the little ones start to fall aslleep, go home and post a note in the hallway saying that trick-or-treaters are welcome in my apartment. But since I'm flying in on Halloween night, I'm missing my tradition. So help a girl out. If you've got kids, send me their Halloween pictures please.

p.p.s. In the pre-Ella days, I used to have fierce baby envy at Halloween, but now I just buy her costume. This year, when all the other little girls are going as fairies and princesses, she's going as a linebacker, in her Tedy Bruschi jersey. That's my girl...

Say Nice Things to Me

I'm baack! Sorry I've been missing. But don't worry. I got yelleded at. There were emails. I got a stern talking to from my friend Tracie. One person even delurked just to yell at me. But I'm back now. Thanks, everyone, for the kick in the ass.

I had a crappy week last week, and it wasn't crap I could blog about (hugs and kisses to all my coworkers who I told about the blog, forgetting that I may some day want to bitch about people they work for). So I couldn't rant, and I didn't have the energy to do anything else.

The highlight of my week was the day that a complete stranger walking behind me on the subway platform called me a whale on my way to work. Actually, he said to his friend, "Why do I have to be stuck in front of this whale, son?" The fact that he was a grown man who a) doesn't seem to know the difference between in front and behind and b) still uses the word "son" in 2007 softened the blow considerably, I must admit. But wait, there's more. I had a morning incident I can't blog about (but I'd like to take this opportunity to tell that person "I really hate you.") and then an afternoon incident I can't blog about, with someone I hate considerably less. Which all culminated in my closing my door and and crying. Me, little Miss "I Cry Twice a Year" crying at work. I know. It's an outrage! You hate the people too, don't you? Don't you? You should.

So I left work that day, went directly to the gym, and then headed home, picking up comfort foods on the way: steamed dumplings at the Chinese restaurant; A bottle of Reisling from the liquor store; cauliflower from the vegetable stand; and oatmeal and bananas for the next morning's breakfast. (Yes, cauliflower is my comfort food. Yes, I know it's weird.) And then I shook it off. That's one of the things I have going for me. I bounce back fast.

We have an expression in my family: "say nice things to me."
My oldest sister was sick or sad (I don't remember which), and she said to her son, "Say nice things to me." So without missing a beat, he responded with "Backhoe, bulldozer, front end loader." Because if you're a 4-year-old boy, those are nice things...

So ever since then, whenever things get tough, one of my sisters will send me a list of nice thngs. They usually involve at least one of the following: the beach, shoes, Ella, ice cream. So for me, since I've been bummed, and you, since you had to listen to me whine, I'm signing off with a list of nice things:

Starbucks Nonfat Pumpkin Spice lattes
Having you guys miss me when I go MIA
Shoes
Cold white wine
The Pats' 6-0 record

What are your "nice things"?

Mischief Managed

Third time's the charm. I finally have an NFL Burger King Pats jersey for my car. Who's excited?? I am!!!

I got home from the gym at almost 9 last Wednesday, and still had to go to the supermarket for my book club the next day. (Because why would I actually plan ahead, just because I was making dinner for 6?) I was exhausted and starving, and limited to things I could eat while driving. So I decided to give it one more try.

The guy behind the counter went to the back and dug through the spare boxes. He returned with handfuls of jerseys, and dumped them on the counter.
"We have everything else. But not that the Patriots."
I was sad, dejected, almost ready to give up the fight. Then I spotted the Pats jersey in the pile.
"That's it," I told him.
"Are you sure? Isn't that a Pirates jersey?"
"Yes, for that nonexistent NFL team called the Pirates. Jackass."
(Okay, I just thought that last part.)
What I really said was, "No, that's the Richard Seymour jersey." And was instantly morified at how geeky I sounded, since he clearly knew nothing about football and cared even less.

So I got my jersey. And I was in such a good mood I even threw out the french fries that came with the kids' meal. A giant thank you to everyone who ate fast food (or forced their kids to) in a valiant effort to earn me a cheap toy. I thank you. My neuroses thank you. My love of a good challenge thanks you. And your future cardiologist thanks you, since his kids will some day have to go to college.

p.s. Despite the fact that I only came up with a menu at 10:00 the night before, the book club dinner was actually a hit. I did a fall theme--spinach salad with cranberries, cheese, and pecans; tortellini with roasted butternut squash; and an apple pumpkin pie. I may do everything last minute, but that doesn't mean I don't do it well.

p.p.s. My mother has told me I couldn't pay her to come to one of my parties. It stems from the time I had a Christmas party for 30 and only came up with the menu the day before, based on what I could find at the market. Evidently, that makes her nervous. She's funny that way.