Archive for March, 2006
I wake up cranky and thwarted. “Damn it! I can’t even cheat on you in my DREAM. This stinks.”
“Mmmph,” says my husband. He would like to be more asleep than he is, but morning has landed hard on his chest. His wife is not even out of bed yet and already she is making very little sense.
“Do you cheat on me in your dreams?” I have a right to know. I keep an apartment in his head and if I’m going to bump into anybody in the lobby, I want to be prepared.
He opens his eyes. Some squinting. “Do I cheat on you? In my dreams?”
“Yes.”
He thinks. He thinks some more. “I really don’t.”
“It’s okay. You’re allowed to, you know. We’re supposed to be allowed to do that.”
“I know. But I really don’t.”
I believe him. Damn his noble mind. Damn my thwarted, less noble mind. It’s all very aggravating.
A few weeks later, the same damn thing. I wake up devastated and schlump around all day, knowing I have let the opportunity of a dreamtime slip right through my fat wedding-ring-laden fingers.
I bring it up with my husband that night, when he gets home from rehearsal. I am kind of mad at him. It might be his fault. His sweet Canadian-Jedi Mind Control. These aren’t the dreams you’re looking for, eh.
“I still can’t cheat on you in my dreams,” I say. I am being a little whiny. “Do you remember that conversation we had? Do you want to change your story?”
“I really don’t dream very much.” He pauses. “But I don’t think I ever cheat on you in my dreams. No, I never do.”
He is such a nice man; I can tell he is racking his brain for evidence of dream-cheating. He told me when he went to see The Dukes of Hazzard in Illinois during his business trip. He is that honest. He would tell me if he had dream-cheated; he would be happy to tell me. He has a hunch I am getting disgusted with the two of us and our unnecessarily loyal subconsciouses.
I make my little disgusted noise to confirm that I am getting disgusted. I like to confirm his hunches about me. I think it strengthens a marriage. “Errgh.”
He smiles fondly at me and takes a bite of the homemade meatloaf that Mama Stop ‘N Shop made for our home. I see now that my husband is pleased that we are not cheating on each other when we are lying side by side in bed at night.
My cheating heart is not pleased. “Last night? I met my celebrity boyfriend from The Office, and he thought I was great. He really liked me and I let him hold my hand for five seconds…AND THEN I TOLD HIM I WAS MARRIED.”
“Wow.” My husband is impressed.
“And then my celebrity boyfriend said, ‘Why did you have to move to the Berkshires?’ As in, he lived in the Berkshires too, and now he would have to be heartbroken and tortured with longing knowing that he and I lived in the same place and might run into each other. I am such an idiot.”
My husband chews his meatloaf thoughtfully, sympathetically. He doesn’t cheat in his dreams either, but all similarities between his brain and my brain stop after that.
I am very very very mad at my subconscious! I do not understand why It Hath Giveth and It Hath Taketh Away my celebrity boyfriend! It is so mean, my subconscious! I have been suffering from this dream-loyalty affliction for a very long time now. Before sleep, I beg my subconscious to let me pretend to be someone who looks like me except hotter and very not married. I tell my subconscious that I will make it a Mexican tin altar or a bathtub shrine with a picture of Freud pasted over the head of the Virgin Mary, if it will only let me be an oversexed adulteress in my head once every few weeks.
Now I’m indignant, all sizzly and jumpy like the stir-fry vegetables at that famous Japanese restaurant where you sit around and politely watch the chef be a chef but all you really want to do is hold a gun to his head and point at your plate because you’re tired of working so hard at looking revved up about him and his jazzy Ginsu knife.
That was supposed to be an analogy about the stir-fry vegetables, but somewhere along the way, it turned into something else. Let’s move on. We were talking about not cheating when you could be cheating with your celebrity boyfriend from The Office.
“I just think it’s all a HUGE STUPID WASTE,” I say. “A waste of PERFECTLY GOOD DREAMSPACE. We are wasting opportunities for GOOD GUILT-FREE EXTRAMARITAL ACTION.”
“Hmm,” says my husband. He is through with his meatloaf, and has now moved on to his carrots. In his case, a carrot is really just a carrot. I love him for it, but I still want my celebrity boyfriend. Come back, celebrity boyfriend. Please come back to me. Dangle your carrot that is not just a carrot.
March 30th, 2006
An afterschool special on the sad state of American ballet.
Sophie: (pretending to be a trembling impoverished waif, panhandling) Please, mister, I’m a poor girl, can I have money for a tutu?
March 26th, 2006
First off, let me say that your comments on the topic of home unimprovements have cheered me right up. Where are you people? Why don’t you live on my street so we could all host potlucks and get drunk and commiserate in person?
My excellent friend Sarah came over yesterday to help me. She is even better than seventeen Shaker handymen. Everyone should have a Sarah! While our girls played Yodeling Princesses, Sarah and I primed nearly half of the kitchen’s old beadboard and trim. Okay, she primed faster (and way more expertly) so it would be more accurate to say that she primed nearly half of my kitchen. But she says I can take credit for it too. I know it’s just primer, but I am so excited I keep sneaking into the kitchen to stroke the beadboard. Would you like to see? Would you would you?
Here are two BEFORE photos:
And the AFTER:
HA! HA HA! Now you know what the inside of my brain looks like! No gray matter! My brain is made out of cheerful red Provence tablecloth fibers!
The actual delusion-free AFTER:
So clean! So white! So full of promise and possibility! It makes me want to learn how to bake cookies and figure out what a roux is before I die. I will make you all cookies with roux on top! Roux cookies for all!
March 24th, 2006
Half-Assed But Happy: Interior Design for the Broke and Impatient.
This is the book I am going to write. I have been looking for this book, but it doesn’t exist. It would feature real pictures of small, cramped houses and terrible flooring and hideous wallpaper that won’t budge and bad light fixtures and awful furniture and the poor people who live in these places, people who can’t go and hire an architect or a designer or a Ty Pennington to make things better. Then I would take pictures of the people doing $50 improvements. Maybe $100, if it’s a big job. I’d help them skip steps. Skip the priming. Skip the sanding. Skip the cleaning. We’d just dive in and DO STUFF. And then I would take “After” pictures, and everyone would be happier than they were before, even if it still looked crappy, because at least it would look LESS crappy.
Would you buy my book? I would buy it. I am going to write it and then I am going to buy it from myself and collect royalties.
I am getting mighty cranky reading about “simple” home solutions and “weekend projects.” Removing all of my kitchen cabinet doors, setting up a woodshop in the garage that I do not have, sanding down every surface of those cabinets with power tools, priming those sanded cabinets, sanding and priming and painting the cabinets, sanding and painting and priming and painting the INSIDE of the cabinets, reinstalling the painted cabinet doors, drilling new holes, and adding new hardware IS NOT A WEEKEND PROJECT, not even if seventeen diligent Shaker handymen came over to help.
My kitchen looks truly ridiculous now and I am hyperventilating just thinking about the work I have ahead of me. My hands are tingling so it’s getting hard to type to you. I would take a picture but I think I would drop the camera and then David would be mad because a digital camera is about the last thing we should be spending money on these days. So I think I have to go lie down or breathe into a plastic bag.
But I wanted to tell you that I am still Officially At It in there. I am still At It.
Okay, I got the feeling back in my fingers. Here’s what I’ve been thinking about these days: I’m going to continue my half-assed but happy decorating and get people all over the world excited about my revolutionary approach to home design. I can’t be the only one who’s tired of waiting for life to hand her a yellow and blue and white kitchen with charming wood floors. So I’m going to grab the bull by the horns and paint his horns, people, possibly with a sponging or ragging or combing technique, I haven’t decided which will look best with his nose ring.
Here’s my latest half-assed but happy kitchen idea: I am going to remove the upper cabinet doors and paint the insides and everyone will see my cute yellow Fiestaware inside! Tearing the doors off! Genius! No sanding, none of that crap! Maybe I’ll prime, but that’s it! Underachievers get more done fast!
David says he suggested the open-shelving idea three years ago but I told him it was impractical and our Fiestaware would get dirty and disgusting. I have no recollection of this. Now I think it is a brilliant idea and I am going to go on thinking that I came up with it.
And I’ve begun slapping BIN primer all over the wallpaper. That’s right. ON THE WALLPAPER, above the beadboard. Don’t you go arching those plucked eyebrows at me. Don’t you go shrugging those manly lumberjack shoulders. I know the kind of people you are. You are the people who like to do things RIGHT. You are the people who have SHE TOOK THE TIME TO STEAM OFF THE WALLPAPER and HE ALWAYS CLEANED HIS TOOLS BEFORE PUTTING THEM AWAY on your headstones. You are either a contractor or you’re married to a contractor or you’ve hired a contractor at some point in your life. You think anything under 3500 square feet is a small house. You worry when your savings account dips below $20K. You know the right people to call for things like trimming low tree branches and fixing a broken sump pump and yanking out the old medicine cabinet with the hardwired lighting fixture. You would consider Berber carpeting, or a tasteful kilim rug from Afghanistan. You do not order books from Amazon about Flea Market Style.
You would not be happy living here, so you should thank your lucky stars that you are accustomed to the beauty-and-organization-for-hire lifestyle and don’t have to live with me. At 35, I have decided that I would rather do things wrong in our house just to have finally done SOMETHING.
I know my limits now. Wallpaper removal is not for me. I don’t care what the guys on This Old House say. I don’t have the resources, I don’t have a handyman or a nice Shaker man to seduce. Even if I did seduce a skilled handyman, I wouldn’t have the stamina to keep him entertained for as long as it would take to do my kitchen the right way. And it seems pointless to seduce a half-assed handyman when I can just seduce myself and get the same results.
I have to earn a living and take care of two children. I feel guilty when I buy my kids clothing from anywhere other than eBay, and I feel ashamed when people see our front porch. For a long time, I’ve been yelling up at the universe to lend us a hand, maybe throw us a little decorating bone in the form of a book contract or better pay.
I am officially not talking to the universe anymore. I will always long for a cranberry storm door and a beautiful farmhouse dining room that will seat 20, but my new home-improvement mantra is Imperfection and Instant Results. From here on in, I’m not going to wait for the dumb old universe to send us somebody to do the job right. Screw you, dumb old universe! I bet you live in a coastal home with painted wood floors and a cupola, you dumb old jerk of a universe!
From now on, I am going to plunge ahead and do the job wrong. Every home improvement I can do, I am going to do it badly, and I am going to be happy about it because at least I did something.
After the primer (A really crappy streaky job! Thank you very much! You’ve been a great wall!) I am going to sponge a whole bunch of Benjamin Moore “Weston Flax” all over the place. And then my walls will look like ancient plaster in a French country manor. Ancient bubbling warped plaster with wallpaper seams. Some people play good money for that kind of thing.
Right now our kitchen looks psychotic, yes, yes it does. Sophie thinks it’s hilarious. She runs into the kitchen every day when she gets home to see what Mommy has done while she was gone. “Oh, Mommy,” she says, shaking her head and smiling at her favorite Obsessed Old Coot of a Parent. “It looks CRAZY.”
But I am still happier than I was before I started graffiti-ing all over the walls with Benjamin Moore and Pratt & Lambert paint samples, my little vials of aesthetic crack. I am happier about my kitchen because I have officially joined the ranks of People Who Are Renovating. I have joined the herd and we are all chewing our cud contentedly and my kitchen gets great light so who cares if it’s not a pro job? Visitors will still take one look at the sunlight bouncing off of my clumpy, patchy Weston Flax and ask for another cup of tea and a homebaked muffin that I stole from someone else’s house. And I will say, Of course! Stay as long as you like! It’s so nice to have you here! I’d bake some more but actually I stole that muffin!
March 22nd, 2006
I want to like weekends. I try to like them. But my children expect me to take them outside or play with them or something.
But our kitchen was in bad shape. Not just bad from my pathological and completely pitiful attempts at remodeling, but crusted crockpot and four-day-old blender residue and spilled potting soil and unidentifiable gunk on the floor bad. So I snapped on the rubber gloves and began scrubbing and pouring Clorox on everything. I told the girls to go play, something I was under the impression mothers were entitled to say once in a while. I thought it was a reasonable request, the kind of thing that even Ma Ingalls or Coretta Scott King might have said from time to time, while wiping their hands on their aprons and looking sturdy and respectable and fine.
Sophie was having none of it. She sat under a table alternately hollering and weeping: “You never do anything fun with me! I hate this house! I don’t like anybody who lives in this house! I want to be adopted by somebody and go live somewhere else!”
I told her that wasn’t going to happen, because Angelina and Brad have a lot on their plate right now.
“WHAT? WHY NOT?”
“Because Daddy and I would have to agree to let somebody adopt you. And there’s no way we would do that. We’re keeping you. So you’re stuck with us.”
She followed me into the bleach-reeking kitchen. “Why are you talking nicer to Hannah? You ALWAYS talk in a nice voice to her and in a mad voice to me!”
“Well, maybe it has something to do with the fact that Hannah is not yelling in my face and telling me she wants to live with somebody else.”
Soph flopped miserably against the counter.
“Don’t!” I bellowed. “Bleach! Chemicals! Don’t lean against the chemicals!”
She yelled, “THEN WHAT CAN I DO IN THIS LIFE?”
“You can do a lot of things in this life! You can go into any other room in this house! You can play with all of the toys you have, and that is a LOT OF TOYS! You can go to the bathroom! You can draw a picture! You can read a book! You can do all of these things RIGHT NOW!”
She stomped out of the room and immediately began fighting with her sister over a deflated soccer ball. Because this is also something she can do in this life.
I kept on scrubbing and greedily inhaling Clorox fumes, hoping for chemical-induced transcendence.
The day continued skiing poorly downhill. When I asked Soph to clean up her room before bed: “WHY DO I HAVE TO CLEAN UP MY ROOM BY MYSELF BUT YOU ALWAYS HELP HANNAH? YOU NEVER HELP ME! YOU NEVER HELP ME DO ANYTHING!”
“I never help you with anything? I help you all the time! I am your mother! HELPING YOU IS ALL I DO!”
As I huffed off to the bathroom with her cheerful little sister (who gets really really really sunny and serene when everyone else is grumpy), I heard Soph mutter under her breath, “THIS IS THE BADDEST LIFE I EVER HAD.”
March 19th, 2006
I like studies, particularly those nice European ones that say that pregnant women should eat lots of chocolate if they want happy, mellow, endorphin-loaded babies. I don’t know where those studies were when I was pregnant, but hot dang, those are some good studies! Those studies are my homeys! Those studies got my back!
But people keep telling me about some new bad scary studies! Have you heard of these studies? These studies say that siblings who share a room as kids tend to be much closer as adults. Which would suggest that siblings who do not share a room will hate each other for the rest of their lives and spit upon each other’s offspring.
Now, I never shared a room with my brother, and I’m crazy about him. I think my brother is the TOPS, plus he delivers babies, so he is ALL THAT and a BAG OF CHIPS and a HEAD FULL OF APGAR SCORES.
But I never had a sister.
I decided to broach the topic with Sophie. In her room. The room that she does not share with her sister and has no plans of ever sharing with her sister. Believe me, I know it would make a great home office. Don’t think I don’t know it would make a great home office.
Me: What if you and Hattie shared her big room?
Sophie: (firmly) Then she would cry and cry and yell and cry all night and hurt my ears and I wouldn’t be able to sleep. [playing with Calico Critters]
Me: But what if you and Hannah shared a room when she was older and she didn’t cry at night anymore?
Sophie: [still playing with Calico Critters and pretending I do not really exist] Then she would get on my bed and roll around in my bed and knock me out of bed onto the floor and I wouldn’t get any sleep.
Me: But what if you and Hannah shared a room and it was a lot of fun?
Sophie: (immediately) Then we would laugh and laugh and talk all night and I wouldn’t get any sleep and in the morning I would be so tired my head would fall in my cereal.
Me: Your head would fall in your cereal.
Sophie: YES.
Me: Some grownups I know told me that kids like sharing a room and that it might make you feel a lot closer to your sister. I told them I was pretty sure you wouldn’t like that very much.
Sophie: (definitively, forever and ever, amen) NO.
March 15th, 2006
My mom’s birthday is tomorrow (that’s right! go wish The Mater a happy birthday!), and Mother’s Day is coming up, so I’ve been looking for just the right thing for my favorite little lady.
So there I was, about a week ago, perusing the Gaiam (”a lifestyle company”) catalog wondering if my mom would like a Zen fountain or some yoga pants, when I stumbled upon this intriguing item.
At which point I checked the cover of the catalog to make sure it was, in fact, the Gaiam catalog and not another sort of catalog altogether.
Yup.
“Dear Gaiam Customer Service Team,
I’m searching for a special gift for my mom’s birthday, and the Kegelcisor (#43-0043 and #15-0786) really caught my eye. Your organic cotton pajamas (#04-0288) look very nice, but this year I want to get my mother something she’d never get for herself. I figure she’d get a week (tops) out of a vase of roses, but I get the distinct impression that the Kegelcisor is forever.
Before I splurge, I have a few questions:
1) Your catalog description says that the Kegelcisor comes in two sizes (the original Kegelcisor, 7″ long, and the Kegel Enhancer, 3 7/8″ long). I see online that the original Kegelcisor is $80, but the more petite Enhancer costs a full $10 more. This seems counterintuitive, but it’s true that I am not well-versed in Kegelcisors. I assumed the “more bang for your buck” concept would apply to the 7″ model, but now I’m wondering if the mini version (”ideal for beginners and those who want a smaller device”) is the way to go for Mom. Can you explain the price difference?
2) If I go in this direction for my mom’s birthday, I want to be sure I can explain the Kegelcisor’s features to my mother in full, so she doesn’t wind up using it as a rolling pin or as a stake for her tomato plants.
The Gaiam catalog description says “when inserted, the cool (70-degree F) temperature automatically causes your pubococcygeus (PC) muscle to contract correctly, and with regular use, helps reduce incontinence and enhance pleasure.”
Can you be more specific? My mother is the kind of woman who likes to follow a recipe exactly. Does the Kegelcisor need to be kept in the refrigerator between uses, or will it stay at room temperature? Does it require a cool-down period to keep it from overheating?
3) I know my mother will ask me about the three distinct lumps on the Kegelcisor. I was wondering if the manufacturer provided your company with any material on that feature?
4) I was thinking about having my mother’s bowling nickname engraved on the Kegelcisor, but I’m worried that the “lightly textured stainless steel” surface might not take engraving well. Thoughts?
5) I’m assuming this is a all-sales-final no-returns item?
Thanks for any additional information you can provide on the Kegelcisor, the gift that keeps on giving. Apparently!”
_________
Sadly, the Gaiam Customer Service Team has not responded to my product inquiry.
_________
I had better luck at the manufacturer’s site, where the customer reviews were compelling:
“I love my Kegelcisor! Being stainless steel, it shall never wear out! Every woman should own one!! Thank you!!!”
“All I have to say is wow. Sometimes I leave it in and do my daily activities. IT IS SO AMAZING!!!!!!!”
“Unintimidating, sturdy and effective. Easy to use but would prefer to have explicit exercise instructions. Quick note, being stainless steel it conducts heat easily so be prepared to gently warm it up on a cold day and definitely wait for it to cool if you have put in boiling water.”
_________
But I needed more info. I found another place online that offered the Kegelcisor—a friendly company called Babeland—and emailed my questions.
A very nice lady named Kerry responded right away:
“Hello Jenn,
Thanks for writing. The Kegelcisor does have a paper with slight instructions. For a warmer and thorough welcoming, you might want to include Betty Dodson’s book “Sex for One” and a bottle of lubrication with your mother’s gift.
We also carry Betty’s Barbell, but the Kegelcisor is made of solid stainless steel and doesn’t have the possibility of chipping, so it’s safer.
The PC muscles can be exercised with or without a weighty kegelcisor, by squeezing and releasing the kegel muscles in a set of reps; it’s the same motion as stopping a flow of urine midflow. The coolness of the Kegelcisor can definitely contribute to the PC muscles contracting. However, like iron weights at a gym, room temperature will suffice to keep it cool. If she’d like it colder or warmer, she can run it under water or put it in the fridge. The bulbous parts of the Kegelcisor ensures that it bumps against the right places.
I advise against engraving the Kegelcisor unless your mother uses it with a condom. Bacteria can grow in the grooves and lead to yeast infections.
Babeland’s 30-day returns policy allows returns for any reason for this product, even after it has been used, so it’s a no-fear purchase.
Your mom’s a very lucky lady to have a thoughtful daughter as you.
Good luck and tell your mom, Have fun!
Kerry
Babeland Customer Fulfillment”
_________
All of which left me thinking:
Who is Betty?
Why does she do that with her barbells?
I forgot to ask about gift bags.
March 14th, 2006
David: Sit down on your bum-bum.
Sophie: You shouldn’t say bum-bum. Bum-bum is a bad word.
David: Okay, then sit down on your tushie.
Sophie: Tushie is a bad word.
David: Okay, then sit on your behind.
Sophie: Behind is a bad word. You should just say penis.
March 12th, 2006
Sophie: (pretending to be an infant) Baby wants a foot massage! Baby wants a Diet Coke!
March 10th, 2006
Me: What’s up with that light hair? Hannah, is your daddy the milkman?
Hannah: No, the Muffin Man.
(As you can see, light hair is a relative term in our brunette household. To us, she’s platinum blonde.)
March 8th, 2006
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