Birthday and Crablegs Extravaganza!

Last night, we had my birthday party a little early since my birthday falls on Mother's Day this year and we were trying to keep it separate for un-big-dealness sake (anyone who has multiple groups of the same family within a 20-minute drive can understand the want for this, I'm sure.)

We had CRAB LEGS, shrimp, potato Salad, muscadine wine, Hello Kitty cake (from Sam's Club.  Yes!) and Chocolate Covered Strawberry ice cream from Blue Bell.  And presents!

Here are the pictures for your viewing enjoyment:

 Since we've all gotten so old, we have two candles representing the decades to the left, and the white candles on the right represent the years beyond the decade.  This many candles indicates 27 years.  And yes, those are Hello Kitty RINGS!

 I want to tell you a secret that you probably already know, but it must be said: I hate being sung to, and I particularly hate the Happy Birthday song.  But, alas, it is a necessary evil and I try to react like an adult instead of crying and pounding my fits into the cake and climbing under the table yelling "NO!" with my fingers in my ears.  So there's that, and that's what the weird fake-smile is about in the above picture.  My family is actually exceptionally good at singing it and making it sound fantastic, despite my feelings.

Hello Kitty rings!!  

While this picture was being taken, while I was trying to ready my camera, I lost my grip on it and threw it into the side of the cake pretty violently. I licked the icing off the side of my camera, and then no one wanted to use it to take a picture. Oh well.

Keens!

 Marcus got me a new travel iPod player to replace the one that's dying a slow, painful death in the bathroom!

I don't know how many times Mama made us kiss so that she could take a picture, but I was expecting it to start to feel like Kate and William.  It didn't.  It just looks great, right? 

Daddy enjoying his snow crab legs!!!!!!

Me enjoying my crab legs, and Marcus . . . watching happily?

So, I don't really have any affinity for Hello Kitty--it made it's comeback in popularity with little girls when I was in high school, so it was sort of lost on me, but I DO love sheet cake from Sam's and we were avoiding chocolate cake since Mama and I are tag-teaming it with migraines lately. According to my folks, it was either Hello Kitty or Spiderman. :-) They clearly made the right choice.  

Maybe I'll keep updating my blog with vacation happenings and pictures.  Maybe not.  You'll just have to wait and see.  And if it's June or July, and I haven't posted anything yet, you can probably go ahead and quit worrying about it.

Vacation!

Don't get too excited, those of you who would be getting excited over my inactive blog--I'm not writing much except to say that today is Friday, and it's the last Friday til my spectacular Vacation!  That's right!  I will be completely useless and happy for the next 9 days after today.  (Except, of course, for one or two of those days at the beginning and at the end where I have to do laundry.  Normally I don't mind laundry, but not on vacation where I should be playing the entire time.)

Vacation goals: (in no particular order)

-remedy my pastiness at the beach
-remedy my pastiness and accomplish a farmer's tan playing GOLF for the first time
-go canoeing and burn my shoulders and probably injure myself
-eat cake
-eat ice cream
-watch movies (theater AND Netflix!)
-go hiking!  I have it upon good authority that I'll be receiving Keen shoes which can be worn during the aforementioned canoeing AND hiking.  I love multifunctional things!
-read
-read in the woods after hiking?  This idea may be better in theory . . .
-eat crab legs and shrimp and potato salad
-play
-turn 27 (Dun-dun-duuuunnnn!!)

So yeah, I think it sounds like a pretty excellent 9 days.  Any further activity suggestions?  Marcus will be joining me for 100% of these activities (except turning 27. . . jerk.) Seamus will be joining me for 80% of the activities--he just won't be eating what we're eating.

Maybe I'll blog about the fun and games after it's all said-and-done.  Maybe I'll post pictures!

Stay tuned, but don't hold your breath! ;-)

The. Best. Weekend.

Mercifully, after one of the first non-death-related worst day in years, I had the best weekend I've had in years.

On Saturday I decided to take it easy.  See the blog just below this one to see how I woke up.  After breakfast, Marcus informed me that all of our towels were in the washing machine (and it didn't occur to me to use the in-reserve towels).  Since my shower was postponed, I was left with no choice but to take an old quilt into the back yard, change into an itsy-bitsy black bikini (that I would wear only in my back yard and never in public), and lay in the yard reading the rest of Cutting for Stone.   

I came inside when I got hungry for lunch.  I became increasingly aware of my desperate need for a shower, so I put string cheese in the microwave, melted it into delicious perfection (which, by the way, is the best snack in the known universe), quickly ate it, and hopped in the shower.  When I got out, I packed up all of the stuff I bought to make the Cinnamon Pull-Apart Bread from www.joythebaker.com, grabbed my husband, my most excellent dog, and high-tailed it to my folks' house.  

The thing I love most about baking (2nd only to eating the finished product) is the fact that I can sit and read between steps.  Yesterday's experiment had the dough "resting" for an hour, and then again for 30-45 minutes, and THEN baking in the oven for another 30-35.  That's a lot of sitting on my butt with my Kindle in hand.  I finished Cutting for Stone during those reading opportunities, and it was nothing short of fantastic!  

The Cinnamon Pull-Apart bread turned out perfectly, and we all ate way too much of it after eating lasagna leftovers, which were also magnificent!

Oohh... Ahh...

After we ate our fill of Cinnamon Pull-Apart bread and coffee, we all sat down and watched Eat Pray Love.  I liked the movie a lot better than I thought I would, and it made me want to do some serious travelling; even more than I did before watching the movie.  Marcus suggested we get flexible, mobile jobs and just do it.  Hmm.  Most places in the world are dog-friendly, right?

This morning, I slept late and went to church without a shower.  That's right.  On the way home, we decided to pack sandwiches to eat on the way, and drive down to the beach.  Need I say more?  

Well, I guess I sort of do, because after being thwarted by a no-pets sign and a man enforcing the sign at our first stop, we were forced to meander about Fort Morgan and hope we'd stumble upon a nice, dog-friendly beach.  Since we're not in Europe or Auburn or somewhere like that, I was a little discouraged and thought we'd driven all the way out there, only to have to drive home since we had Seamus with us.  

The next road we turned down, we were unsure of whether it had beach access.  We drove down and saw that there were little beach cottages all along the road.  When we reached the end, it looked like it was private.  There were no other cars parked suggesting that other people were there enjoying the beach, but we checked it out anyway.  

No sign forbade us from entering, much less from entering with dog or any other prohibited item.  We parked the Element (which, by the way, is the best beach-bound vehicle) along the road away from the no-parking signs, and we struck out.  When we got to the mouth of the entrance, we saw groups people scattered about 50-75 yards away from each other and we saw other dogs!  A secret, un-crowded even during Spring Break beach spot for people with dogs! 

We set up our spot, spreading the quilt out, removed our clothes, and went straight into the water.  It was relatively calm and cool but not freezing.  Perfectly perfect!  We waded in and Seamus swam against his will.  He follows us into the water, only to protect us.  He swims well, but prefers to play in the sand.

I made it extra big so you could see the sand on his face.  He was wet from swimming, and then proceeded to dig a hole and roll around in the sand.  So much fun!

Marcus and Seamus went on a couple of walks and allowed me to sunbathe.  I dozed off, but in-between noddings, plotted to convince Marcus to let us sleep there tonight.  He didn't go for it.  I must work on my persuasion skills.  

We left after a couple of hours and drove home.  I'm currently enjoying THE most spectacular beach-high!  When we got home, I got right in the shower and had one of those showers.  You know the kind.  The water temperature is just right, you're super dirty (at first, of course) and happy.  The feeling goes beyond the written word.  I almost reinacted one of those old Herbal Essences commercials, and I wasn't even using Herbal Essences!  

We just ate dinner and we're about to watch James and the Giant Peach on Netflix Instant, because I've never seen it and Marcus loves it.

I don't look forward to this weekend ending, but I bet I sleep GREAT tonight!

Morning thoughts

This morning, while I was sleeping, I dreamed that Marcus came running into the room, ran into the wall and fell down.  I heard the thud of his feet on the floor and the collision.  I opened my eyes and turned to see him dragging the clothes basket out of the bathroom.  I started laughing and told him what I thought I heard.  We both laughed.  I laughed until I wasn't sleepy anymore.  That may be the best way to wake up.

Let's design an alarm clock that makes us laugh.  I'd be a morning person everyday.

Seamus

We have a new habit.  This weekend, Marcus and I are going out of town to attend my cousin's baby shower in Memphis.  My mom agreed to take care of Seamus (and Neville, but Seamus is higher maintenance, being a dog) for us while we were gone.  Believe it or not, since we've had him. . . (August of '08 when he was just a tiny puppy.  Let's break for picture.)

Awww!  Look at how cute and tiny he was!

Anyway, I was saying, since we've had him, we've only left town once without him, when we went to Nashville for another cousin's wedding.  We boarded him, and thought that went really well.  However, when we went to pick him up, there was a dog crying somewhere in the back.  Marcus made a comment that that dog must be heartbroken, and the lady at the front informed us that that was OUR heartbroken dog, and that he had been crying like that all weekend.  Never again!  

Since then, we haven't left town except to go see Alex and Elizabeth in Auburn, and we took him with us those two or three times.  The first time went great because it was April and still relatively comfortable outside, and we were limited to all outdoor activities.  The second (and maybe third?  I don't remember) time, it was July or something and outdoor activities were miserable.  We considered then that it'd be a good idea to get someone to keep him at our house anytime we wanted to leave town instead of toting him with us.  This has been hard for me, because I love him and I'm happier when he's with me, and I miss him when we're apart.  Alas, some things have to be done.  

He's kennel trained, but is prone to barking and crying if life isn't completely perfect.  He eventually gets over it, but not without a lot of noise and stress on the other sleepers in the house.  I could be surprised, but I'd be willing to bet a great deal that whoever kept him, if his routine was followed, would not get much sleep.  

On to the new habit:  we're letting him sleep out in the living room.  He still seems to be kennel trained, because I open up the door and he goes right in and lays down.  I don't shut it behind him, and then I go in my room and go to bed myself.  He seems fine with this arrangement.  A minute or so after I've gone in my room, I hear his tenative footsteps on the hardwood floors, and listen as he gets settled.  I think he thinks he's getting away with something, which is fine with me as long as he knows to be sneaky, and therefore, behaves himself.  

We decided it was a good idea to go ahead and start this new habit this week, so that my mom has an easier time with him next weekend.

Last night, as I sat in bed and read with him at the foot of the bed, he looked at me knowingly and I thought, even if it isn't any good, that I ought to occasionally try and record his thoughts.  It's not going to be profound or meaningful (or at least I doubt it will be) like Don Miller's Lucy Blogs, but I thought I owe it to him to at least try to decipher his thoughts.  He looks at me with so much trust and with heavy thoughts behind his brown eyes.  His little tan eyebrows express such feeling that there has to be more than raw animal instinct going on in his head contrary to what many people believe.

Rombauer V. Crocker: Round One (and K.O., Rombauer wins!)

We won't talk about what just happened in my kitchen.  Okay, maybe we will a little bit.  I had a serious icing mishap.  Mishap is too kind a word, really.  I'm baring the shame in sharing this in hopes that someone who knows will stumble upon it and explain to me exactly what on earth I did wrong. (Sorry, Laura, this post will be boring since I just sent you the same story in an email! lol)

It all started when I decided homemade (Betty Crocker Cookbook recipe) caramel icing would be really fantastic on top of a Joy of Cooking recipe Fudge Sour Cream Cake.  I don't know if the two recipes got into a brawl while I was joining them . . . maybe Betty and Irma are bitter rivals, or what happened, but the outcome was disastrous!  (Irma said, "A CURSE ON THE CROCKER HOUSE!" and arranged for her recipes to reject any of Betty's. )

I made the icing exactly according to the instructions: I melted the butter, I added the brown sugar, I melted it into the butter and brought it to a boil, I let it boil for 2 minutes, I added the milk, I returned it to a boil, and then I removed it from the heat to cool.  After it cooled, I added the pound of confectioners sugar gradually, and beat the mixture while the saucepan sat in a bowl of cold water (what the heck?!) and made a huge, filmy mess of water and over spray of powdered sugar on the counters and stove top.  The finished product looked like icing, it tasted like icing, and for all intents and purposes, it was icing.

As I began to spread it onto the cake, I quickly realized that it had made a drastic and terrible transformation from lovely caramel icing into something very akin in texture to sugar cookie dough.  The "icing" would not stick to the cake.  It was like the cake had put on a protective icing-proof shield or something.  The "icing" rolled up, tore, crumbled, and certainly wouldn't think of spreading.  I picked up a few of the crumbles off the plate and put them back on top of the cake.  When I did this, I realized that the icing-dough responded a little better to my warm hands than the cold metal knife I was using before.  I washed my hands and slapped the rest of the icing onto the cake and manually formed the icing with my fingers to fit around the top layer of this two-layer cake, as the stuff wouldn't stretch any further than the top layer.

It looks truly ridiculous -- like I forced the top layer of my cake to wear a stretched-out wad of cookie dough as a tracksuit -- but it tastes incredible.  Oh well.  I won't be using that icing recipe again!

Check it out. . . this was the best I could do.

Hummingbird Cake - not as gruesome as it sounds.

This is the first Sunday I've stayed home from church since November when we started attending FUMC.  I have a good reasons, though:

1. I haven't had a very good night's sleep in about a week (loosely translated: I'm normally a narcoleptic as soon as I get in bed, and lately I've been more like a normal person), and I needed one morning to sleep as late as I wanted.  "As late as I want," evidently, means 8:20 am.

2. I'm filthy, and even if I wanted to sleep in and also go to church (thereby omitting the shower step), I couldn't because I'm in that awkward time where I took a shower on Friday night because I had to work on Saturday morning and didn't want to have to wake up too early to do that.  Saturday I was "clean" all day, but now it's Sunday and I'm back on track for my normal morning showers, but I technically haven't had a shower since Friday.  Anyway, omitting the shower for this morning would be totally unacceptable.

3. Today we are celebrating my wonderful Mama's birthday (which is actually on Tuesday), and I have the distinct honor of baking her cake for this party.  I want to do the best job I can, and also take my time and learn while doing.

This brings us to the purpose of today's blog entry.  Hummingbird Cake.  I'm not sure why it's called that, except maybe because it's so insanely sweet.  I've actually never been a huge fan of it, but that's why we don't eat it on my birthday.  It has crushed pineapple and bananas baked into the cake, and it's slathered with a serious overabundance of cream cheese icing.  I'm sure I'll eat it and scrutinize my skills (or lack thereof) when I normally would have passed on a serving.  However, until I get so confident in my cake-baking skills that I know without a shadow of a doubt that it's edible, I can't allow other people to be my blind guinea pigs.

I'm baking it in a stone 9x13 baking dish, which is a first for me, so we'll see how it turns out.

Here's the before picture:

There's a lot of Wal-Mart represented in this picture, as well as Pampered Chef.  Those lovely glass measuring cups in the background are actually Mom Diehl's, and don't have anything to do with the baking process of this particular cake.  I'll be giving those back today at the birthday party.  :-)

Anyway, I hope I can update this entry in a little while with successful during- and after-pictures.  In the mean time, have a lovely Sunday!

Shalom. :-)

P.S. Don't worry, I'm going to take a shower before I bake the cake!

Update: Sometime after Sunday's birthday party.

Here are pictures!  The cake was a total success.  It looked decent, and it tasted great!  Even I enjoyed it and had a second piece.  Here are the aforementioned during- and after-pictures:

Morning dreams are always so vivid.

I had an interesting dream this morning.  I'll try to remember as many bizarre little details as I can.

I was at some kind of house party and I think I was in Hopewell, though I didn't really know anyone at this party.  The person throwing the party was making pizza for everyone, but instead of making the pizza and baking it all at once, they were making the pizza, cutting it into slices, and serving it up uncooked, so that the guests had to heat up their own pizza.  Everyone seemed fine with this except for me.

I decided that I had better things to do, so I went into the laundry room of this house, pulled the door to, stripped off my clothes, and proceeded to shave my legs.  The shaving cream was avocado green.  While I was shaving, I realized I was hurting myself really badly.  I looked at the blade to see what was wrong, and there was no blade, but the absence of the blade was very sharp.  I put a new blade on and kept shaving.

While I was shaving, there was a woman talking to me through the laundry room door.  She asked for my credit card, and I started to look for it.  I finally asked her why she needed my credit card, and she told me that she wanted to sell me a bag of popcorn.  She showed me the bag of popcorn through the crack in the door, and the bag wasn't much bigger than a credit card.  It was TINY!  I pretended that I couldn't find my credit card and kept shaving.

I was having a hard time shaving my bikini area and I couldn't figure out why, so I moved onto the rest of my legs.  I had a hard time shaving them, too, but I realized that was because I was wearing multiple layers of pantyhose.  I removed a layer and tried to shave, and realized that there were still more pantyhose in the way.  I think I removed 3 or 4 layers of pantyhose before I got down to skin.  The reason I was having a hard time shaving my bikini area was because my razor was actually a bare-floor attachment to a canister vacuum cleaner, and the blade was about a foot long.

And then I woke up.

Thursday: in which I've started baking.

First of all, I'm in exploration mode.  This is okay.  I'm allowing myself to take the risk that this may be a phase, but I'm going to explore it as thoroughly as I can until the phase is gone.  If it doesn't go, or if I don't allow it to go,  excellent.  If it does, then on to the next and I hope I can find as much enjoyment in whatever may be next as I find in this endeavor so far.  I'm learning to bake.

I was speaking to my therapist (sounds so much nicer than shrink, don't you think?) and complaining about how unfulfilling my job is.  I complained about how it isn't me, and how I never would have wanted to be where I am now, career-wise, and I'm not pleased with how I've allowed it to go on this long in the name of a paycheck.

My therapist asked me to tell her what I enjoy doing.  I immediately tried to tell her that anything that I enjoy couldn't really be a job.  She told me not to tell her what I thought I could make into a career, but rather just tell her what I simply enjoy.  She prompted, "Do you enjoy photography?" and I told her that I like to take pictures, but not really as a focused hobby.  Then, she asked if I like to bake. Yes!  Yes, I do!  She reminded me that I'm still in my 20s, I don't have any children, and basically the world is my oyster.  I can allow myself to pursue hobbies without worrying about whether or not they are a phase.
And here we are.

Do you ever notice that when you hear of something for the first time, or you get an idea, or you want something to happen very much, that all you see are "signs" so-to-speak pointing to that idea?  Since I decided that I'd teach myself to bake, I've been bombarded.  It's probably just because it's a very pleasant, whimsical hobby with delicious rewards, and it's fairly popular, but that's okay.

The following is a list of the bombardment I've experienced in the past week:

- Publix has a bakery and I thought it'd be pretty neat to work there, but I'm in no way ready for that yet (skill wise) and since I haven't been to culinary school, I'd have to start out as a baker-trainee, and I'm willing to bet the hourly rate isn't what I need it to be.  Anyway, I saw a Publix baker deliver King Cakes to Belk at the mall the other day, and then at home that same night I saw a Publix bakery advertisement on TV.

- On Saturday when I was eating Lasagna with my family, my mom pointed out that Meme's Joy of Cooking cookbook was sitting on the shelf, unclaimed, and asked if I wanted it, to which I replied, "Uh, yeah!" I thumbed through the pastry section it this evening while waiting for my cake to bake, and it's very comprehensive and exciting and daunting and I could not be more thrilled to have it!

- Last night, we watched It's Complicated with Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, and Steve Martin.  (HILARIOUS movie, by the way.) In the movie, Meryl Streep's character Jane owns a bake shop somewhere in Northern California, which is two of mine and Marcus's dreams put together: Northern California in some form or other, and owning a bake shop!  Entrepreneurship has always been one of Marcus's goals, but not so much mine--however I could be convinced if it was a bake shop.  I swooned at her life (even if she is in her 50s experiencing it) and noted the added bombardment.

I've enjoyed baking since I've been married, but have only really realized that it could be something I'd like to explore deeper in the past year and a half or so, when we became involved in a small group at the church we were attending.  Each person (or couple) would bring a dish, and I always tried to sign up for desserts.  I looked for impressive recipes (except when I was lazy and made dump cake because it was easy and so popular), and felt satisfied and rewarded when people ate what I worked hard to make and enjoyed it.

Eureka! (I hope.)

So now, I'm sitting here wrapping this up.  I'm about to bust out the Kindle and read and wait for the cake to finish chilling in the fridge.  I'm making a Tres Leches cake, and after baking the cake, I poured three milks and rum (Where has the rum gone?  Why, it's in my cake!) into the cake after pricking it all over with a fork (seems so destructive, doesn't it?) and then put the cake in the fridge to chill before I ice it.  I have a good two hours to go for the cake's fridge time, and it's 9:15, but I couldn't be happier.  Cake, check.  Book, check.  Tea?  Not yet, but what a good idea!

Goodnight!

The first beautiful Saturday of a new decade

So, it took eight years, but I think I'm finally adjusted to the weather in South Alabama.  Today is January 29th, and the high was somewhere between 65-70 degrees.  I'm definitely okay with that.  Here are some pictures to document our first pretty Saturday of 2011.

Orange Street Pier, Fairhope

White Street Pier, Fairhope

View to the South from White Street Pier

My handsome boys - Seamus wanted to wander around because there was some interesting seagull poop to investigate, and Marcus had to kind of hold him still.

Cut Marcus's head off because I couldn't see, but Seamus is looking dashing!

Walking on Mobile Street

Now we're home for a few minutes before we head back out.  Marcus is going to a wedding with his mom, and I'm going to Papa's to visit with family and eat some good food.  I hope everyone else's Saturday is as pleasant as mine!

Last night, I ate a southwestern chicken burrito wrapped in a green spinach tortilla.

I didn't plan for this to be my next post--my next post was going to be a publicizable version of my list mentioned in the last post.  However, this dream was just too weird not to share, so without further ado ...

I'm not sure where I began.  I had Rapunzel hair (except it was still the same color--not blond), and there was a 3-year-old with me, and the 3-year-old was me.  I was talking to my 3-year-old self, and she was getting frustrated because I wasn't taking her seriously.

Skip to the next scene.  Someone had sent me to the grocery store to get a pumpkin because it was "Forest Day."  When I walked into Winn-Dixie, which was nothing more than an indoor produce stand, the cashier cheerfully wished me a happy Forest Day.  I was confused, but not worried about it enough to ask what exactly Forest Day is celebrating.  I found a beautiful pumpkin, and when I was walking to the register, I realized the reason the pumpkin was so beautiful and perfect was because it wasn't a real pumpkin, but a ceramic candy dish.  I bought it anyway, and left Winn-Dixie.

I was driving a big, giant pickup truck, and I was in downtown Fairhope.  I saw some baby ducks in the road, but I figured they'd fly away before I reached them, even though they were really too young to fly.  I couldn't reach the pedals in the truck because I had embodied my three-year-old self while driving.  I eventually lowered myself down low enough to hit the brakes, but it was too late.  I had run over two baby ducks.

Flash forward to the next scene.  I'm not sure whether I'm three years old or twenty-six, but I'm in a tiny cargo plane with my parents, who are telling me all about the next time they'll go on vacation.  My dad is at the wheel, and my mom is in the seat behind him.  The airplane is stopped and there is grass outside the open door.

I kept trying to interject something, and no one would let me talk.  I finally decided to give up and let them just keep talking, except I did throw a miniature fit (that only I noticed).  I was going to tell my mom about how I had these new panties, and I had them folded in my hand.  I decided to just toss the panties out the door of the plane, but when I did that, the panties fell and fell and fell.  What I thought was grass was actually the tops of trees from miles and miles up off the ground.  The distance was so great that really we probably would have needed oxygen masks and whatever other necessary gear in order to have the door open in a plane at that altitude.

My dad circled the plane around and my stomach dropped as I tried not to fall out of the open door.  He looked at me knowingly, barrel-rolled the airplane, and the door slammed shut.  If I wasn't so terrified, I would have mentioned that the view of the trees and mountains was really breathtaking.  There was also a princess castle sticking up beyond everything, which is case for me being my three-year-old self during at least part of the airplane scene.

Queue alarm clock.

Some Serious To-Do Lists

I’m writing this down as a part of a pre-plan.  I am SO bad with phases.  You can tell with this blog, even though I so don’t want it to be a phase.  I’m just going through a numb-time, if that makes any sense at all.  I’m not sure that it makes sense to me.  I’m pushing through.

There are things that I want to accomplish, but I don’t know what they are.  I keep thinking that I don’t want my life to just be another old life where nothing exceptional happens except for the regular exceptional things.  I guess that’s not fair.  My life is beautiful, but it could be so much more purposeful and meaningful if I could concentrate on something long enough to follow through with it. 

I sat and thought to myself why it is that I don’t do the things I want to do.  I’m not talking about the fact that my bathroom has needed cleaning for an amount of time I do not wish to disclose.  I’m talking about bigger things that I can’t quite put my finger on.  Things that require a great deal of time off of work, a lot of money probably, and plenty of creativity and bravery. 

I need to make a few lists, I guess.  The first list will be of all things, big and small, that I want with my life.  For starters, assume all things include Marcus, if not Marcus AND Seamus.  I am so much happier when he’s around. (Seamus, that is.  Marcus is a given.)

The second would be a list of obstacles in the way of list number one.  That’s the crappy list that is going to be VERY easy to make because it’s all I ever think about—reasons I can’t do the things I want to do. 

I’ll work on these lists and get back with you, because right now I’m late.  I’m always just a little bit late.  Sigh.  

To Delete or not to Delete

In response to Don Miller's blog this morning Handling Digital Clutter (and I promise I don't plan on responding to everything he has to say) I have definitely been considering removing the clutter that is Facebook.  My husband has done it.  I actually honestly judge people just a tiny bit when they mention that they have a Facebook account.  I feel like it's lame, chiefly because it generally takes up a tremendous amount of a person's precious 24-hours.  I haven't deleted mine because of a few reasons.

1.  I'm afraid I'll lose this group called The Book Club.  It hasn't been updated or posted on in forever, but I refer to it occasionally when trying to remember a specific book that someone recommended a while back.

2.  I understand that Facebook gives you the option of keeping pictures and saved information, but I'm not sure how that works, and I'm afraid of the unknown.

3.  I'm reluctant to delete it because honestly it doesn't take up ANY of my time.  I probably haven't even opened up a browser to Facebook in 2 or 3 weeks, and I'm sure it's been more than that since I last posted something on my own.  It doesn't tempt me at all, so there isn't any reason to remove the temptation.

4.  Facebook is the only way some people know to get in touch with me, but this argument is weak.  If someone really wanted to reach me, it would be easy enough without Facebook.

The main argument is #3 (I realized I put these in completely random order).  Why rid yourself of something that doesn't hurt anything or take up any space (such as an unwanted pair of shoes or half of the contents of your closet)?  #3 is the main reason I have left it alone.  I know I'll eventually delete it because I hate being a part of such an abomination of socializing, but no rush.

Tedium on the Kindle

There's really nothing as peaceful as sitting on the bathroom floor in my pajamas with a deep cleansing mask on my face, reading on my Kindle. Of course now I've ruined it by trying to blog on the Kindle during the 15-minute mask's set-in. Yeah, this is hard. That's all for now!

Yep, I brought it up because it was on my mind and I'm desperate for a subject that isn't inappropriate blogging material. Long subject.

Okay, no messing around, here we go.  I've got to quit writing in a Word document things that can never be put on the Internet if I value peace, happiness, job, life, and general well-being whatsoever.  It helps to get those thoughts out, but those should be saved for a diary or something.  

So anyway.

I keep forgetting that this weekend is a three-day weekend!  I do mental acrobats (cartwheels, back flips, etc) when I remember.  This has been happening several times throughout the day.  Monday I didn't realize it at all, but yesterday (Tuesday) was filled with mental acrobats.  And maybe some real life chair-dancing.  I don't have any plans for this glorious day, but maybe that can change.  Whenever I think of a nice, pleasant day-off, I'm usually outside.  I am outside much less than I'd like to be as a whole.  Normally, when I picture an ideal day-off, Marcus and I take Seamus for a hike somewhere, then maybe go to a park and I'd sit and read and Marcus would throw a Frisbee with Seamus.  We'd get tired, go home, grill something out, eat, maybe open a bottle of Moscato and enjoy the rest of the evening with either a movie or just visiting.  This ideal plan, however, does a whole lot better in the Spring or Fall.  

So, what about this wintry day-off?  I think people are prone to spend more money in the Winter (or in the dead of Summer in the South) because usually things that are free but not boring depend on the weather.  It's free to sit inside and work on deepening the butt-print on the couch, but that starts to get depressing, not to mention sore.  If you want to do something during these uncomfortable times of the year, usually money must be relinquished.  This brings me to another thought I've been having.

It's depressing and nearly impossible to be friends with couples who have gobs more money.  Their activities and lifestyles are shaped differently than ours.  No one is wrong or bad or whatever, but it's just tough on both.  The affluent friend suggests activities and trips and whatnot, and we have to slink away.  So we thought, okay so let's remember that we love our single friends, too, as long as they don't mind spending time with us, the couple.  The problem here is this:  When I was single, even though I only made $8/hour, I had TONS of money!  I was able to do whatever I wanted.  Money was never an issue.  Let's go to the movies!  Let's go see another movie after that!  Let's all meet at such and such a restaurant.  (I'll just have a water.  With a lemon.)  

One day something will act as the great equalizer.  Or, there will be a time when we can afford to have friends on a regular basis -- even if those friends can now afford to have Summer lodging in exotic countries and are friends with the President of the US and the Pope and whoever else, when we're just getting to where we can go out to eat anytime we want and go see two movies back-to-back.

Well, I guess I've brought up the uncomfortable subject and now everyone is shuffling their feet and dropping their eye contact and feeling weird.  Go ahead and hit the red x at the top left (Mac users) or top right (everyone else). 

And look at the time!  I'm late for my shower again!  

The 'ah-ha!' moment

I just read Donald Miller’s blog for this morning, which coincided with something I was just thinking (and this isn’t the first time this has happened with him and me.  Maybe we should be friends.  Let’s move to Portland!).  Anyway, he was talking about how people are too distracted to be brilliant anymore.  Here’s the last paragraph of his blog:

No culture in history has been more distracted. If you are wondering why there are no more C.S. Lewis’ in the world, no more stories as good as Tolkien’s, no cathedrals as great as the gothic’s, no music as moving as Pachelbel’s, it may be because the writers of these books, the tellers of these stories, the architects of these buildings and the composers of these symphonies are sitting on their couches watching television. I wonder what’s on tonight.

(The rest of Donald Miller's blog can be found here!)

His words are terrifying, even though I don't think it's as bad as all that.  There are plenty of great artists, but I think that there is more diliberate emphasis on the arts (to "save" them, if you will, for which I'm very thankful!) rather than an expected quality of life to be artistic as may have once been, if that makes any sense.  

I was sort of having a “what are we coming to?” fit of anxiety last night about the economy, about employers, about how we function as a society, and how incredibly fantastic it would be to do a cultural detox.  Maybe get out of town and make new habits.  What I thought was a separate thought from this stuff was that ever since we’ve been sitting and watching Friends every single night—multiple episodes until bedtime, I don’t have nearly as much to write about.  I don’t feel creative, and I feel less like reading my books.  Friends may need to be reduced to a once or twice a week occurrence.

I wonder if going to see a movie counts.  I’ve been itching to see something.  I haven’t seen a movie in the theater in a long time and sometimes it just helps to escape life, when life isn’t the greatest. 

We’ll see.  

Writers Block -> Calm -> Friends et al

As if it weren't obvious, I've been suffering some pretty intense writers block.  What's worse, I so don't feel like writing.  I'm having one of those moods that may be construed as a suffering self-image where I don't think anything going on right now is noteworthy.  I'm fine with everything going on right now (or not going on right now, as the case may be) but I'm having trouble extracting the minutely interesting from the clearly mundane. 

Things are calming down in our household since Christmas.  We finished our living room project, as everyone knows.  We went pillow and throw blanket shopping and even bought a wreath for the door for the concluding ceremony.  My justification is this: if we buy it now, the project is through and there's nothing that I'll want to do for a very long time.  I can just sit and enjoy the completeness of our home.  We even went so far as to buy frames for bettering the bedroom situation in the frame of mind that if I left the bedroom too desolate, my mad decorating frenzy may have spilled into there.

Also, now that Marcus has returned from the cold grip of UPS during the holidays, I'm spending more of my time watching Friends cuddled up on our couch after dinner instead of watching Marcus's head bob around.  Watching Friends together is an age-old pastime and one of my favorite ways to communicate.  Actually, no communication takes place here except "This is funny, don't you think?" but it's the best antidepressant – superior to all others and without the first side effect.  The first step of marital bliss is securing each other's safety from angst in the form of Monica, Chandler, Phoebe, Joey, Ross, and Rachel.  At least it is for us.

This causes a different problem – a girly problem – and this may be quite boring, but we'll see.  Because this was my favorite show in middle and high school, and because my friends and I used to decide which of us was which Friends character (I was usually Rachel), and because they always had the coolest clothes, the best hairstyles, and the prettiest makeup (the girls, of course, except I think Joey in earlier seasons wore some pretty intense makeup), I feel compelled to reevaluate my hair/makeup/clothing routine.  I don't realize I'm doing this until it's too late.  Instead of reading in my Kindle before I started writing this, I was mindlessly clicking through Sephora.  I'm not after anything in particular, but it just puts me in that mood.  Blah.  Except it is fun.  I'm a girl.  Let me be.

Well, those of you who never got into the Friends things will find this mind-numbing, so just ignore it.  It will always be my very favorite show due to its popularity during my formative years, but it also got me thinking about writing.  I remember never thinking of the fact that sitcoms have writers just like anything else, until they switched writers towards the end (season 8?).  It was all the buzz, and a light bulb popped up over my head and I realized that could be the most incredible job I could imagine—being a screenwriter.  I never chased that brief dream, obviously, but I can somewhat credit it to my perusal of other writing avenues.

This is my blog, and I'll neglect to conclude this entry if I want.  

Distracted!

I didn't think this would happen.  It isn't a problem, but-- Well, maybe it's a little problem.  It's a good problem.  My high school self is burying her head in her self-loathing, self-denying arms right now as I admit this: I'm distracted from my novel, Cutting for Stone, (which may be the best book I've read since The Help, of course not counting Guernsey) by Shakespeare!  Again!

"Twelfth Night" had me by the 2nd page.  The drunk guy talking up his friend to Olivia's maidservant lady about how tall he is.  Great stuff!  Viola's plan to dress as a eunuch boy, and the captain's weirdly intense promise to keep her secret.  I normally read my "current" novel at night before I sleep, but tonight is "Twelfth Night!"

An Earlywinter Night's Sloth

I just read A Midsummer Night's Dream in one sitting.  (Is it 'sitting' or is it 'setting'?)  Anyhow, I've read it before, but not all at once, and so I don't remember it being that short.  I think it took me 3 hours or thereabouts, but I wonder if all Shakespeare plays are that short.  We read Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet in high school, but of course I didn't want to read them or anything else that a lame-o teacher told me to read (despite myself and the fact that I would have enjoyed 90% of my assignments if I had just released myself from my stubborn ways), and so back then they felt intensely long and boring.  I could download those two plays and compare them to the length of AMsND, but I think my Kindle has had enough attention for one day.  I haven't done much else but read this afternoon.

Somehow or other, I managed to have always loved A Midsummer Night's Dream.  I'm not sure if it's because there was a movie with real actors performing a slightly abridged version of the play when I discovered it, but the movie's script was made entirely of the original script of the Shakespeare play.  (I doubt that's why I loved it so much, though, because around the same time there was also a movie of R+J, and while I appreciate the story, I never felt a connection with that one.)  I congratulate my 15- or 16-year-old self on being open-minded enough to listen and discover that I identified with Helena more than any other character in a play or novel or movie up to that moment.  I remember the profound sense of validation when I realized that I could identify with a Shakespearean heroine.  Maybe it doesn't seem like it should be that much of a dramatic turning point, but I remember sitting on my single bed in my room back in Virginia, staring at my tiny white TV set, feeling like I wanted to memorize all of Helena's lines, and feeling comforted in the fact that I wasn't the only one who had ever felt that way.

I never feel guilty for reading all day, but it happens so rarely that I feel like the time spent doing it is stolen (which makes it so sweet) and so I feel sneaky and guilty in that sense.  I do, however, feel guilty that my butt is sore from sitting, and that I didn't even get up to fix myself some supper--Marcus heated up a bowl of leftover chicken & broccoli casserole with rice for me.  Without being asked.  Isn't he fantastic?  Maybe he feels guilty because, while I've been reading, he's been playing Civilization V on the computer in the next room.  I think it suits both of us just fine, but because it happens so rarely, we have that sneaky feeling that, if the other was not otherwise occupied, there would be resentful feelings flying all over the place of the other's sloth.

Well, it's actually 10:00 on a Saturday night, and you know what that means?  I'm going to get ready for bed!  Last night was New Year's Eve, and we stayed out uncharacteristically late.  We're prematurely old and crotchety when we don't get our eight hours.  Actually, I'm sort of lying because I totally got my eight hours last night.  I slept til 10:20 this morning!  In my defense, the curtains were pulled and it was dark and stormy outside.  I was powerless to the intoxication of those perfect sleeping conditions.

Without further ado (which reminds me, I should download Much Ado about Nothing.  I liked that one, too!) I'm off!