Woulda Coulda Shoulda

Funny thing about taking a mini-vacation from your stress: It’s right there, waiting for you, when you get back. Hmph.

And so today I can only offer this COMPLETELY hypothetical question, inspired by someone else, someone who is NOT ME:

Have you ever actually pulled a muscle in your arm while attempting to get into your “slimming” bathing suit? And if so, clearly that’s an indictment of the suit, and neither your arm nor the ass the suit got momentarily snagged on, right?

I’m just curious. Because I’m a seeker of knowledge. Yes.

It’s supposed to be 89 degrees here today. EIGHTY. NINE. DEGREES. In April.

(Nope, I don’t think I will ever get used to it. That’s some craziness, right there.)

When we did the big closet clean-out a few weeks ago, we took a load of the kids’ outgrown clothes to our local consignment shop, and picked up a few new things. Amongst them was a smocked sundress for Chickadee, suitable for Georgia summer, but completely UNsuitable for the 50- and 60-degree weather we were having at the time. She has asked to wear that damn dress every single day since we bought it. Yesterday I checked the forecast and she said, “NOW can I wear my new dress tomorrow??” I said sure, and now I’m the greatest person in the whole wide world. (Until I do something that offends her, of course. I’ve got that scheduled for about five minutes after the kids get home from school today. I figured I’d give her time to have a snack, first.)

Also, my garden is growing by leaps and bounds and the pollen is starting to dissipate a bit, but none of these things are the reason why I know it’s summer. (more…)

I’ve been on a bit of a tear around here, lately. It’s the spring cleaning bug, dontcha know. I start out cleaning, and then I plant an entire garden, and then half of it dies in a freak frost, and then I start spending hours outside, begging tiny wilted stumps of plants to JUST GROW. When that doesn’t work, I move on to other domestic chores.

All of which is to say, I can’t really babble for all that long, today, because I’m busy baking working like I’m supposed to. Ahem.

But I’d like to conduct a little informal poll. Say you’d been living in a house for coming up on two years, and you still had three unpacked boxes in your bedroom which had been opened, pawed through, rearranged, and then disregarded for who knows how long. Would you 1) go through them again, vowing to unpack or throw away or just 2) throw away without opening? I’m curious.

Also, would you list your first-wedding gown on eBay with an appropriately snarky commentary or would you just give it to Goodwill? And how much penance is appropriate for forcing your husband to live with your old wedding gown for two years, anyway?

Oh my goodness. You people are NUTS. I mean, I mean that in the best possible way. Like, gorgeous, generous and oh-by-the-way, INSANE. The current high bid on the Wii to benefit my kids’ school is $375 as of this writing. Which is crazy. And I thank EVERYONE who has bid so far so, SO much. You still have until nearly midnight tomorrow if you’ve been smoking a particularly large amount of crack and want to bid even HIGHER, which gets you the Wii, a copy of Sleep Is for the Weak, and the warm fuzzy feeling that comes from knowing you’ve really made a difference for a school in need.

And speaking of that little book thing, I’m doing a signing today at the Athens, GA Borders on Alps Road at 1:00 p.m. Come on over! I will not be auctioning any Wiis there, but I will be signing books and giving out Eco-Libris stickers and maybe telling embarrassing stories. Which is pretty much what I do here, every day (the embarrassing stories part, anyway), but it’ll be EVEN MORE GREAT because of that whole socially awkward thing. Yes. I hope to see some of you there!

Hi. Yes, I’m aware that the blog is sort of broken. Thanks for noticing.

Yesterday my blog was attacked because I’m a moron and hadn’t updated my WordPress install for a really long time. Once I deleted out all of the nasty spammage, the folks doing the attacking thought it would be charming to make the site disappear entirely! Which was then fixed by my good pals at Fusix (seriously, people—best. hosting. ever!), because they are rock stars. But since then we’ve managed to break things but good up in here.

If you’re some sort of WordPress ninja, feel free to shoot me an email. You know, because my comments are all broken. Woo, comments are fixed! Working on the rest; sit tight.

(GOD, get your mind out of the gutter. I am just doing something really novel and designating an evening to focus on Otto rather than working all night or reading Harry Potter.)

So, hi! Guess what? I would like to hang out with you. Yes, YOU. There’s a, um, thing I’ve been asked to attend in Decatur in a few months and I thought they invited me because they just LURVE ME, but I think it may be more because they think I know other people to invite. Which, whoops! They must’ve missed all the posts about WAH WAH WAH I DON’T KNOW ANYONE I was writing a little while back. Anyway. No matter!

If you:
1) Live in the Decatur area or would be willing to drive in to Decatur on a designated evening (yes I know there is more than one Decatur; I’m talking about Georgia),
2) Like food,
3) Have a blog,
and
4) Want to be my friend,

please mail me and we will perhaps get to hang out and eat stuff together. I don’t know about YOU, but I find food highly motivating, so even if you don’t particularly want to hang with me, just remember: FREE FOOD.

The stockings are hung by the chimney with care, and I am off-duty for anything even resembling home repair until next week. Can I get an AMEN? Yes. Thank you.

Merry Christmas to you and yours. This is my favorite time of year… such a good reminder that all things are possible. Heck, I know if you’d told me LAST Christmas where I’d be THIS Christmas, I would’ve asked what you were smoking.

The chocolate chip gingerbread recipe pictured here is below the fold. (Sorry for the delay; had to ask the owner if it was okay for me to post.) Enjoy! (more…)

I’m having some technical difficulties with my internet service. Please stand by while I rip my hair out and call to yell at the cable company some more, and then eat my weight in cinnamon crunch bagels at Panera so that I can use their WiFi.