Happy New Year! I think of you both often. Have made the transition to vegetarianism. Maybe vegan one day. It’s a process. I love the challenge to be creative and the health benefits as well. Come to Austin and visit me sometime.
Karen
Okay, so I am coming to this way late, but I just wanted to commiserate on the Money Pit situation. We are considering selling our house next year just to avoid putting in a new roof and furnace. I know I don’t want to stay in this house for another five or so years, so I know we’d never get our money back (we’d have to finance those repairs). Well, there are other reasons why we want to sell but those are big ones. As it stands now we have a huge To Do list just to get the house ready to show. Ugh.
GREAT letter! But I was shocked to see the notebook paper with FIVE HOLES! At a Catholic school? No wonder you Mount Saint Joe’s/Joe Paradox chicks were completely out of control!
I would still love to do a little “wax on wax off” with Ralph Macchio.
Ever since my Granny’s house was torn down - it just hasn’t been the same when I visit my relatives. I visualize every detail - details that they have no recollection of or attachment to ... sad. :(
I had no idea your AC was out!!!
And I’m so glad we get to share the GLEE obsession together!!
I feel the exact same way about my grandparent’s house and it has been 3 or more years since it was sold. I still can’t drive by because I don’t want to see it without the milk tin on the front porch.
That is an excellent point. Wheat and soy-based ingredients are so prevalent in vegan cuisine, so to take those out of the mix could seem daunting. And, it’s a competition, so I’m betting nerves played a part, as well.
Ok, how awesome is Rick Bayless’ restaurant to be so accomodating? That says a lot about his leadership as the owner, and about his philosophy of feeding people.
What you’re saying about fake meat products is so true. From time to time, we overuse them for protein, because they cook up fast and are easy to add to one-pot meals. The most delicious meals are the ones which feature one key, flavorful ingredient, or those that require a bit more creativity than just opening a package.
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About Me
vegan. teacher. opinionated. loves books, shoes, hanson, ‘the amazing race’, the 80s, ‘waiting for guffman’, mid-afternoon naps, musicals and breakfast cereal. four cats. one redhead. hi.
I don’t think I can say it enough. I love Ikea. With the exception of about three things, our entire house is has been furnished by the good company of Sweden. Some of my favorite new purchases include this lamp and these chairs. In red, of course.
I bought this book: Beginning CSS Web Development: From Novice to Professional by Simon Collison with a gift card over the summer. It’s fantastic! I am a complete novice with this sort of thing, but I’m learning quickly thanks to this book. Thanks to Collison, I’ll never forget to top center my background image again.
If you like playing with color and color palettes, you’ll love this site - Colour Lovers. I’m playing with a blog redesign right now and it’s the perfect place to create a palette. Fun!
I’ve really been neglecting my poor little blog. The advent of facebook drew me away from this form of communication, which kind of sucks, because I used to love to run here to tell the world all the things they needed to know, like, “I’m having Thai for dinner!” and “I slept on my neck wrong last night!” Now as I filter this uber-important information at lightning speed through my “status update,” the dinosaur known as Joe Paradox sits in cyberspace, collecting dust. Since there’s something still to be said for a platform without a character limit, here goes.
Last weekend my friend Audra and I went to New York City for a weekend of Broadway shows, shopping, and overall silliness. While I sat in the car for 6.5 hours, Audra luxuriated in her seat at her first show, watching Billy Elliott prance across the stage. Bitch.
You’d think the highlight of my weekend might have been the three Broadway shows we saw, or the great food we ate, or the good friends we visited, or the expensive shoes we ogled, but no. The single greatest thing happened when I pulled up to the door of the Marriott Marquis in Times Square, handed my key and a tip to the valet, and forgot about the existence of my vehicle for nearly four days.
Saturday afternoon we had every intention of seeing a matinee but my indecisiveness got the best of us and we ended up having a leisurely lunch and wandering around instead, which was just as enjoyable. Saturday evening we saw one of the final performances of Spring Awakening. Clearly the Rentheads found something to do after it closed. One such boy went up to another group of similar people outside the theater and said, “Hey, are you guys, like hardcore Spring Awakening fans?” And a friendship was born. We met a lovely young man in line while waiting to enter the theater whose Christmas gift from dad was a trip to New York to see shows. On the way up the stairs to the mezzanine, we discovered we were sitting in the same row and made plans to make OMG faces at each other during all the good parts of the show. I had to quick break up with him though when he started talking to the girl in the next seat. How dare he. Perhaps my greatest faux pas that weekend was not recognizing the fact that Steven Sater, the author of the show’s book and lyrics, was sitting two rows in front of me. I could have had my Playbill autographed by the show’s writer, but I was too busy looking for gum in my purse.
After Spring Awakening, we headed down to the West Village where we met up with my good friends Kim and Dania for a quick chat before they headed off to bed before an early morning train ride to the Cape and we walked across the street for a dirty drag show at Lips. The show was only a half-hour long, but it packed a punch. We got some nice parting gifts from Ginger, a lovely lady who made balloon objects with air that emitted from her ample bustier. I got some handcuffs and Audra got a nice whip. Totally awesome.
On Sunday afternoon, we saw Equus with Daniel Radcliffe and Richard Griffiths. Fortunately the appearance of Harry Potter’s wand was not nearly as traumatic as we expected from our on-stage seats. The play was so riveting we nearly forgot to look. We spent Sunday night with Trekkie Monster and the rest of the cast of Avenue Q, which was a treat considering I’d listened to the soundtrack but hadn’t seen the show on stage.
On the food front: On Friday night, when Audra returned from Billy Elliott, we wandered out in the bitter cold and stumbled upon a rather nice sushi place. I hadn’t eaten since my 11:15 am lunch that morning, so I was thankful to have something yummy to nosh. Saturday afternoon we went to one of my favorite restaurants in the city, Zenith. I’ll never understand why that place is empty whenever I go there, but maybe it’s better that I don’t know the reason. On Saturday night we went to a fantastic Vietnamese place, Saigon 48, with my friend Susan (who I haven’t seen since high school but it feels like we’ve been friends for the last 25 years and then some!) and her friend Aymee who is performing in Shrek, The Musical, and another cast member, her friend Jen. They were totally awesome and fun and we had a fantastic dinner together and it made me want to move to New York City right then and there. I adore these ladies.
Even though we had to return to our real lives of work, work, and more work, it was incredibly restorative and soul-satisfying to spend a weekend pretending we were ladies of leisure with nothing more in the world to worry about than where our next pair of Christian Louboutins were coming from.
Really? This is the eighth season? How did that happen? My friend Jen noticed last night that some of the kids auditioning were 9 when the series began. Nine. As in “years old.” Some observations:
* The minute Alex Wagner-Trugman walked on stage, the seedlings of a new obsession were planted. I can see this one inspiring Missy and me to purchase tickets to concerts we will never attend.
* Hey, I don’t know if you noticed, but this season there’s a BLIND GUY on the show. I know, you’re totally surprised by that, right? Because they didn’t mention “the most touching audition in Idol history” every three minutes during the entire two-hour show. They should really set that kind of story up with MORE promos so we’re not caught so off-guard.
* Trying to high-five a blind guy, Ryan? Not so much. And watching you “kiss” that chick made you look gayer than any slash fanfic that’s been written about you to date.
* “Thank you, Sexual” has to be the greatest response to any audition, of any show, ever in the history of all performing arts.
Simon’s name has evolved into Mr. Smoochy. He’s still Simon, but he’s Mr. Smoochy, too.
Mr. Smoochy has managed to give me more than a few new gray hairs. About a month ago, we took him to the vet because he had a swollen lymph node and slight fever. After a week on antibiotics, he still had a fever, and the lymph node had gone down only slightly. Blood was drawn. More antibiotics were prescribed. He was negative for FIV and Feline Leukemia, but positive for coronavirus, which is the virus that can cause FIP, a deadly disease. Unfortunately, the coronavirus has to mutate in order to actually cause FIP, so there’s no way of telling if the coronavirus he carries will or won’t mutate into the FIPV unless it actually does. Apparently most cats are exposed to this virus and few get sick, but the fact that the potential is there makes me a nervous living wreck. Not to mention that he has most certainly exposed the other three cats to it, too.
I’ve been watching his breathing, and we take his temperature every few days, checking to make sure his fever is down, which it has been since his last round of antibiotics. He’s happy and hungry and playful and energetic and every bit a kitten. Still, every little thing he does or doesn’t do worries me. It hasn’t been that long since we lost Linus and I can’t bear the idea of losing another cat right now. Not to mention that six years ago I lost Linus’ brother, Milo, to hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and that ordeal still seems like yesterday to me. I’m trying to take Tony’s advice to take every day as it comes. None of this is within my control, and all I can do is give this little guy a happy life for as long as he’s going to be with us, whether that’s eight months or eighteen years.
Thank goodness for hair dye. I’m going to need some.
Emmett got out last night. We had someone here finishing a carpet installation, and we think he ran out when the guy was packing up his van. It was late, and Emmett often floats around the house at night, so we didn’t think much of the fact that he wasn’t stalking The Smoosh or climbing on our heads.
My morning routine was hectic and rushed today so I didn’t notice he wasn’t underfoot as I got ready for the day. Tony realized he wasn’t around when Emmett wasn’t hanging around the bathroom while Tony got ready, so he started searching the house. He searched every closet, under every chair and bed, all of Emmett’s hiding spots. Nothing.
I finally checked my email around 8:30 to find a message from Tony that Emmett was gone. I quickly arranged for a substitute and got coverage for my class until the sub could show up. I zoomed home and started combing the same neighborhood Tony has scoured for the last three hours, imagining the worst. Before coming in to call the animal shelter, I walked around the entire perimeter of the townhouse groups on our side of the street. I shook a container of food and called his name. I thought he might be hiding under someone’s patio furniture or in a child’s playhouse. I lifted up all the patio furniture covers I saw. Finally, about fourteen houses down, I saw him, crouched under a chair (I think) up against someone’s townhouse.
I went to him and he immediately tried to hide from me. Maybe he knew he was going to be grounded for life, maybe he thought he was going to continue this ridiculous adventure of his, I don’t know. All I know is I lifted his enormous 18 pounds under one arm and grabbed my cell phone with my free hand to call Tony. I put Emmett on the ground and scruffed him gently, so I could dial. After I informed Tony that I had him, I started walking home, shaking all over, heart beating out of my chest.
We brought him in, no worse for wear - a little cold, maybe. Tony ran upstairs to get the collar and tag Emmett had wriggled out of recently and snapped it back on his neck. This experience was awful - I never want to relive it. I’m going to rethink microchipping the cats, too. I’m sure I’ve lost several years off my life this morning, but here’s one thing I know for sure. In a real crisis, you can see a person’s true character. My friends at work were wonderful - totally having my back as soon as I got the message from Tony - taking my class for me until the sub came so I could rush out to get home. But no one was more amazing in this situation than Tony. By the time I made it home, he had already searched the house and neighborhood multiple times and made fifty flyers to hang up. I can’t even articulate adequately how much I love him.
As for Emmett, he’s curled up in his favorite chair, clearly glad to be home. I’m sure he doesn’t even remember his big night out any more.
Last night we were sitting on the sofa. Tony was doing some work on his laptop, and I was on the phone with a friend. I look over and see Simon with his head buried in Emmett’s ass, licking away. Emmett was perfectly content to have his salad tossed. I had to put a stop to it. This kitty already emits the most foul odors known to man in the litter box, he doesn’t need any help from Emmett’s butt, too.
Around 5 in the morning, I woke up, not to my usual alarm clock, but to a familiar licking sound, which I usually hear when one of the cats is trying to eat something they shouldn’t. In the pitch dark, I jumped out of bed and picked up Simon to find out what he was chewing on. I put my hand to his face and felt something think and slimy protruding from his mouth. My initial reaction was panic that he had eaten something allergic, that his tongue was swelling up and he was going to die. I turned on the light. Yeah. I was wrong. He was munching on a giant HAIRBALL which Ariel had thrown up minutes earlier.
All of this wouldn’t have seemed so incredibly sickening if he also hadn’t tried to drink The Smoosh’s pee a few days earlier.
As Tony said, he is the only kitty WE could have adopted and the only two people who would put up with this. We heart him like crazy.
The house next door to ours has an SUV parked in the driveway. For the last two weeks the car alarm has gone off between 1 and 3pm every single day. We know this because a) we hear it and b) our neighbors tell us it happens throughout the work week. Last weekend my neighbor called the police to come over and have a look, and this weekend I called for them to come back.
I don’t even know who lives in the house. I know it’s a rental, and I know who the owner of the property is, but that’s about it. I’ve never seen the people who live there (they just moved in about a month ago). There’s a flyer in the front door that’s been there for about two days, so it’s clear that no one has entered or left the house. The yard is totally overgrown and all the window blinds are closed.
It’s probable that these people are on vacation. The police officer who came today to check things out smelled the doors to see if there was any evidence of decomposing dead bodies inside. Nope. And because the SUV is parked in driveway, on private property, he couldn’t go under the hood and disable the alarm, or have the truck towed.
All this is fine. Better than fine, really. This is what I want from my police department. Unless there is clear and present evidence of any kind of foul play or danger, I want my privacy (and my neighbor’s) protected.
In the meantime, I also have to listen to this g.d. car alarm going off every day. It’s a nuisance. I feel badly for the people who have to listen to this all week long and the kids whose naps are interrupted by this crap.
When the police officer was here, he told me that the SUV was registered to another address, with an unlisted phone number. Dead end. I gave him the name of the homeowner. After thirty minutes, he rang my doorbell to tell me they were unable to locate the homeowner’s number (I gave him the names of two real estate offices I knew she worked out of).
After he left, I googled the homeowner’s name. The first result that came up was her real estate office. I called. She wasn’t there. The secretary transferred me to her cell and I left her a message.
Now, why is it that I could locate the homeowner’s number in a matter of five seconds and the police couldn’t do it in a half-hour? I’m confused. As Tony said, “All I want my police to do is shoot bad guys, not look up phone numbers. If they can’t look up phone numbers I can live with that.” I agree totally. But still. It shouldn’t be that hard. Maybe they couldn’t find the number because they had to fill out Form #4218 (Finding Phone Numbers) and have it approved by three supervisors first.
My friend Jen (who has the CUTEST stuff for sale on her etsy site - go look go look!) sent this to me.
Band montage! Oh, and I’m just going to go ahead and declare a ha’s Take On Me as the best video of the 80s since I managed to completely abandon the tournament.
I’m back on the Clay Aiken bandwagon, y’all! And look out, because I think I’m gonna be on it for, like, ever.
Yesterday my friend Jane emailed me that Clay would be on the cover of People magazine, with his coming-out story in the pages. The first thing I did was yelp with joy, then I called Tony, and then I emailed my bestest Clay Aiken friends with the good news. I believe the subject line of my email was YAYAYAYAYAYAY! YAYAYAYAYYAYAYAY! was pretty much the tone of everything that followed for the next several hours. We’d been waiting for this day to come for what seemed like an eternity, wondering if he’d ever find the courage to just say it out loud, conservative fans and media jackasses be damned. It seems that his wee little darling baby (omg! cute pointy head! omg!) was the catalyst for the decision - one he’d made among family and close friends years ago. He says he couldn’t raise a child to learn to lie or hide anything, and for that, he gets a standing ovation from me. I don’t think I’ve ever been prouder of him as a fan, and I couldn’t let this day go unmarked on my blog. After all, he’s the reason I started writing online in the first place.
I’ve always said that while some of Clay’s decisions have not thrilled me in the least, I’d always have a soft spot in my heart for him. That soft spot has hardened at times, but it’s always been there. After today’s events, I am rather certain that there is little Clay could do to lose me again. I’ve joked about him on a silly, superficial level. I’ve been angry with him, too. But to come out publicly as his most honest self, showing the world that gay parenting is a beautiful thing - I have so much respect for that. And so today, there will be no jokes, no snark, no poking fun at Clay Aiken. Today I can only wish Clay all the love, peace and happiness in the world.
I suppose it was bound to happen sooner or later. When I bought the tickets to see Kasey Chambers and Shane Nicholson at the Birchmere, I didn’t realize that concert would be the one after which all other concerts would pale in comparison. I guess I thought I’d have more time…
But from the moment the first chord was struck, that fate was sealed. Goosebumps crawled from my wrists to my shoulders, never shrinking until the lights came on, signaling us to go. I’d only seen Kasey perform once before, with her band, and it was more than amazing. But the combination of this acoustic trio (Kasey, Shane, and her dad Bill Chambers) and the intimate atmosphere of the Birchmere tipped the scales. The perfect harmonies echoed through the room and I thought that if church were anything like this, I’d have found my religion. Kasey kept reminding the audience that she wanted us to feel like we were sitting in their lounge room, at a family gathering. Gatherings in my family usually involve a lot of tomato sauce and heartburn, so her invitation was a nice change of pace.
If you haven’t heard Kasey sing, you’re missing out on one of the great female voices of our generation. Few artists have grabbed me as quickly as Kasey Chambers. Her voice is uniquely powerful, every note and word dripping with raw emotion. In one of her many engaging in-concert yarns, she tells the story of her favorite song on the new album, Rattlin’ Bones. She informed Shane, who wrote the song, that the only way it could be made better is if she sang it. That could be true of any song ever written.
Kasey’s exuberance is yin to Shane’s calm, introverted yang, and the blend of their voices makes it sound like they were meant to make music together since before they were born. Indeed, Kasey and Shane’s musical compatibility is bound to surface in their son Arlo one day, and the secret track on Rattlin’ Bones proves that it’s already showing itself in Kasey’s son Talon. She said that every night before Shane tucks Talon into bed, they sing an old country or folk song of Talon’s choice. One night Talon said he wanted to sing the one about the ants.
“The ants?”
“Yes, you know. The ants are my friends. They’re blowing in the wind.”
At one point I had to wipe away tears of laughter when Kasey mentioned that she and Shane had gotten into one of those marital arguments backstage before the show. Like most couples, they’d agreed on the celebrity freebie. The rules were simple - one celebrity that you could hook up with and the other person couldn’t say anything about it. Their only caveat was that it couldn’t be an Australian celebrity. Everyone giggled when Kasey revealed that her celebrity freebie was Jerry Seinfeld. Shane seemed to have no problem whatsoever with that choice. And Kasey had no problem with Shane’s either - Sheryl Crow - until Sheryl Crow’s management called to see if Shane would be the opening act on her Australian tour. Shane claimed the exercise was rather pointless if you could change the rules whenever you wanted, but it seemed that the female population of the audience agreed with Kasey that there was absolutely nothing wrong with that. Even if we didn’t understand her choice of Jerry Seinfeld.
Tears sprang to my eyes one more time during the show, and this time, I wasn’t laughing. Kasey decided to try out her song The Captain on piano for the first time, even though she wasn’t really sure if it would work on piano. Shane moved from his stool to the bench and plunked down the first note. As the last note vanished in the air, the audience looked around, well aware that we had witnessed something very special. The Captain on piano - yeah. It works.
After the show, we hung around, wondering if Kasey, Shane and Bill would emerge to sign a few autographs, but the Birchmere staff told us it wasn’t going to happen. We walked to the back door, where Bill and the tour manager were loading instruments into their van. After a while, we agreed to just walk back and ask if Kasey would mind signing a few autographs, promising not to keep them long because it was late and they were probably tired. What happened next was something none of us would have predicted, and we almost still don’t believe it.
Kasey, Shane and Bill walked out, all smiles. Tony made a beeline for Shane to talk about his music while I thanked Bill profusely for stopping to sign a few of our things. He recognized me from my seat at one of the front tables and said, “Eh, you had a nice seat there, didn’t you!?!” I said yes, certain now of the many times during the show I thought Bill caught me smiling up at the stage, and smiling back. He took a photo with us and I moved over to talk with Kasey.
I asked her to please come back this way soon and she reiterated that this show was the best one they’d played in America to date. I told her my face hurt from smiling so much over the last couple of hours. She agreed, and was genuinely excited about this show, you could tell. And she agreed that Sheryl Crow really has nothing on her. Heh. Kasey, Shane and Bill were more than happy to stand for photos with us and sign our CDs. Although I didn’t feel so bad about quasi-stalking them for autographs considering they quasi-stalked Arlo Guthrie in a hotel lobby so they could stick their baby in his arms and get a picture of Guthrie with his namesake. I love them.
Still, we didn’t want to monopolize them any longer, so I walked over to Bill to thank him again for taking this time for us. He grabbed me in a huge bear hug and thanked us for being such a great audience. As her tour manager tried to hustle us away, Kasey ignored him, too busy sharing kid photos with Tony’s brother John to pay attention. Every artist should have the graciousness and class of these folks.
Even if we hadn’t had this very nice encounter with Kasey, Shane and Bill, the concert would stand on its own legs. I can’t imagine that anything will ever come close to this show.
