Various wondrous things

by Mir on April 9, 2013 in It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Offspring: ecstasy and agony, Retail Therapy

Okay, “wondrous” might be overselling it a bit. There are varying degrees of wondrous. Like, there’s a whole spectrum of interesting that spans all the way from “truly wondrous” on down to “WTFness.” And I will leave it to you to place the following along that continuum as needed.

[Sidebar: Let us pause for a moment to acknowledge that anything you hear from me today or for the next several weeks will be completely allergy-addled. I woke up this morning and had to chisel my face open. For a few minutes I thought maybe I had pinkeye, but no, it's just regular ol' allergies. I guess. Everything and everyone I love is currently coated in a thin layer of yellow grit, and my eyes---long my favorite facial feature---are buried somewhere behind the crusty, puffy skin that has conveniently swollen to twice its normal eyebag size all the way to HOLY HELL WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOUR FACE. The pollen is taking over the woooooorlllld! And I am very cranky about it.]

Anyway. Wondrous. Wondrous! Yes, the miracles of ordinary life keep bowling me over. Allow me to knock you down with them as well. Don’t worry, there’s a nice soft pollen-drift right behind you to cushion your fall. (more…)

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Comments { 117 }

Beauty tip

by Mir on April 7, 2013 in It's not a regret, it's an "experience"

Yesterday was a full day; the sun was shining, we had a lot of going and doing and seeing people and enjoying the outdoors and whatnot. Eventually I went out with a friend for a girls’ dinner, then came home and Otto left to go watch basketball with some friends. (Tag-team parenting is my favorite.) I hung out with both kids, then Monkey went to bed and Chickadee and I watched some TV together and then she went to bed. I puttered around for a bit and then went to get ready for bed, myself.

The older you get, the longer your nighttime routine becomes. Right, ladies? I used to brush my teeth and then hop into bed. Now I also have to wash my face and smear gunk around my eyes and moisturize and peer at my various freckles and bumps. A few years ago I started developing these weird freckle-things every so often: they’re red (!) and raised and—sadly—permanent, though pretty small, and I haaate them. A chat with my doctor basically yielded a diagnosis of “yep, getting old sucks” and that was that.

So last night I was removing my shirt and realized I had YET ANOTHER new freaky freckle over one of my ribs, only upon closer inspection I ascertained that my new freckle had legs. Should this ever happen to you, I recommend screaming loudly, tearing through your drawer for the tweezers, swift removal/flushing of the offender, and then a full-body check conducted while still dancing the squirmy Dance Of Ick.

You’re welcome.

[Updated to add: Found a second one just now, in a location which I shall not name. Be right back, gotta go take an acid bath and burn my house down.]

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Gardening for carnivores

by Mir on April 3, 2013 in It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Oh look! Something furry!!

So hey, since moving down here to the south I’ve become a passable vegetable gardener. (I don’t know if it’s so much due to the move as that the longer growing season is a lot more forgiving, and also I have a fenced area here to keep the deer from eating everything we grow.) Each year around Easter I trot out the wheelbarrow and various tools and dig the weeds out of my boxes and start planning what we’ll plant this year.

I’d love to tell you each year has layered precious knowledge on top of what came before, and now—five years into my clueless time of gardening-with-Google—I’m an expert. But… mostly I am a person who 1) likes vegetables, 2) knows how to read, and 3) has sort of learned a little from past mistakes. To wit: After multiple years of trying to grow snap peas in the middle of the summer, I actually bothered to read up on them and now know that they don’t do well in heat. Whoops! So this year I planted some early, and theoretically they should be ready for harvest before we’re into endless weeks of 95+ temps.

Also, I’ve learned that tomatoes are pretty easy to grow as long as you don’t have to battle tomato horn worms. So the garden is always pretty tomato-heavy. We all like tomatoes and tomato sauce, so that works. (more…)

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Comments { 17 }

Strolling through nature’s beauty

by Mir on April 2, 2013 in It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Oh look! Something furry!!

It’s been a long, cold, lonely winter (in all senses both literal and metaphorical). The arrival of spring has us all but dancing around with cartoon wildlife. Never has a return to normal life and pleasant temperatures been more highly anticipated than this year, I’m thinking.

And never has there been a happier canine than one Spoiled Rotten Licorice, who is reaping the benefits of our spring-drunkeness in spades. The nice thing about a tiny little mutt like her—12 pounds of terror, man—is that she doesn’t HAVE to have a daily walk. She’s not an insane breed whose brain goes berserk without proper exercise, plus (let’s face it), at her size, we can toss a ball in the house or let her out into her run and she can get all the exercise she really needs. Still, walks are ZOMGEXCITING and lately she’s getting a walk every day.

Is there anything more soothing, more American, more simultaneously meditative and invigorating than clipping a small animal to a rope and then alternately dragging her/being dragged around outside on a beautiful afternoon? THERE IS NOT.

It has gotten to where as soon as anyone starts putting on shoes, the dog starts dancing around in little circles. (more…)

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Comments { 45 }

No, really

by Mir on April 1, 2013 in Detritus

I guess this is the part where I’m supposed to tell you a fantastic made-up story and convince you that it’s true. I’ve never been a fan of April Fool’s Day—as much as I love a good story, the calculated intent to trick never sits well with me—but we may as well get it out of the way.

So: Licorice is pregnant! Also, Licorice is actually a cat. Who recently won the lottery. SWEARSIES.

We good? Okay, then. (I know. I’m not very good at the whole trickster thing.)

Instead of that nonsense, I have a VERY SERIOUS burning question which I urge you to consider carefully because this is IMPORTANT. If you like eggs, and you like hard-boiled and deviled eggs, can you please explain to me why it is now de rigueur for deviled eggs to be all fancified with weird ingredients instead of just being, you know, regular deviled eggs? DEVILED EGGS ARE ALREADY DELICIOUS. (This question brought to you by Easter dinner.)

Please discuss. I require enlightenment.

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Comments { 79 }

Things which are scary

by Mir on March 29, 2013 in Haven't been hit by lightning yet!, Offspring: ecstasy and agony, Oh look! Something furry!!, Ottomatic For the People

When I was about Chickie’s age, I was busy chewing my way through everything Stephen King ever wrote. The freakier and scarier, the better. This came up when I tried to convince Otto to watch Bates Motel with me the other night; he’s not so much a fan of a series that is fairly unapologetic about the amount of blood and gore, whereas I love it. I found myself explaining that—for me—there is catharsis in stories filled with terror. I get to experience all the fear/loathing/panic my body can handle WITHOUT having to relate it to my own particular life, and afterward, somehow my brain goes, “Well, then. We’re fine. Thank goodness none of that stuff was happening to US!” And I walk away happier.

Apparently that’s odd…? Like, most people read/see scary stuff and it just freaks them out? I’m now wondering if I am the only person who enjoys freaking myself out this way and feels fine, after. (Example: I watch Bates Motel, I can happily move on with my life when it’s over. But I have a real-life encounter like the last one I told you about and I’m disturbed and squicked out for days.

This tells me that fear is relative (duh). So here are a few other recent frightening things: (more…)

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Comments { 53 }

This post is NSFA (Not Safe For Anyone)

by Mir on March 27, 2013 in It's not a regret, it's an "experience"

At first I was going to say that this post was NSFW, but upon reflection, that’s TRUE, but an incomplete caution. This post is not safe for work, home, in your car, with a fox, in a box, or with any breakfast product, rhyming or not. Honestly it’s not safe anyone at all.

If there are small children in the room, do not read this post. If you are of delicate sensibility, please do not read this post. If you are not in the mood to be completely horrified, for the love of God: I’m trying to explain to you that you should not read this post.

If you—like me—believe that the only redeeming value of being completely traumatized is in then sharing that trauma with others, and relishing in their anguished squirming and scream-whispers of, “No! NO! THAT DID NOT HAPPEN!!” then you might like to read this post. But you can’t say I didn’t warn you, because I did. REPEATEDLY.

Dare to read on? Alrighty, then. HAVE I GOT A STORY FOR YOU! (more…)

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Comments { 116 }

Georgia makes you work for it

by Mir on March 26, 2013 in Haven't been hit by lightning yet!, Job? Huh?

Far be it from me to complain about the south when, in fact, there is little I detest more than snow and coldness. I mean, yes, occasionally I need to whine a little bit about the bugs. Perhaps it is true that I have compared our little patch of land to a spot on the surface of the sun, mid-summer, when it truly feels like we will never be un-sweaty again. And ideologically speaking, it maybe wasn’t the very brightest move for this pair of pro-education northerners to find ourselves in a region where our congressman believes evolution to be “lies from the pit of hell,” true, but… hang on. I’m thinking.

Okay, yes. I complain about the south quite a bit. But it’s not my fault that we have cockroaches bigger than my dog or that politics here make my head hurt.

The thing is, working from home means that it doesn’t matter all that much where I live, because my job is largely unaffected by those in my immediate vicinity. Sure, I need to venture out for other stuff, but we’ve managed to find our niches. It’s all fine. I’m just so glad my work is unaffected by the… oh. (more…)

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Comments { 32 }

Minutiae for your Monday

by Mir on March 25, 2013 in It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Offspring: ecstasy and agony, Oh look! Something furry!!

I have a variety of not-long-enough-to-be-a-complete-post stories which are either 1) still interesting enough for sharing or 2) mind-numbingly dull but I don’t realize that and insist you must know, and therefore that shall result in this, a disjointed mishmash of unrelated things all in one place. It’s just like my junk drawer! Only with more words and fewer pen caps!! (Moral of this story: If you need a paperclip and a button, I’m your gal.)

There’s a slight twinge of remorse here that I don’t have a more exciting life or whatever, but on the other hand, I got up this morning and brought up Facebook and was immediately presented with several hundred of my closest friends (haaaaaaaa) complaining about snow. And I’m not doing that! This is going to be WAY more interesting (to me)!

Though—speaking of weather—we had a gray, rainy weekend, and nothing makes me adore my spoiled rotten dog more than a few days of rain. While her lovable traits are numerous, the fact that she will leap at the door as if bladder explosion is imminent (ZOMG MUST GO OUT NOW NOW NOW OPEN THE DOOR I’M DYING!!!), then will poke her head out onto the porch once the door is opened, listen to the rain for a moment, and flounce back inside, all, “Just kidding, did you know it was RAINING out there? I just had my hairs did. I’ll just flop down on your couch and cross my legs for a while and take a nap,” is endlessly hilarious to me. This is a dog who was picked up as a stray, clearly in terrible shape. What have we done over the last three+ years that now has her convinced she’s far too delicate to even get WET? (more…)

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Comments { 41 }

Poppin’ tags, suburban style

by Mir on March 21, 2013 in Offspring: ecstasy and agony, Retail Therapy

Know what Chickadee loves? Let’s take a brief quiz:

A) When I sing and dance along with Thrift Shop any time it comes on the radio.
B) When I refer to visiting our local Goodwill as “poppin’ tags.”
C) When I respond to any compliment on my attire—however slight—with a deep, booming, “I LOOK IN-CRED-UH-BULL!”
D) All of the above.
E) None of the above, and P.S., it’s not nice to taunt the teenager.

[Your quiz will not be graded. I am too busy cutting the plastic tag thingies off our latest haul. But here's Licorice's favorite video version as a reward for playing along.]

The thing is, I’ve been a thrift store shopper since I was a teen with babysitting money in my pocket. The fact that there’s now a popular song about it doesn’t automatically transform me into a hipster. (Especially when you consider that my most frequent purchases at Goodwill are t-shirts which still have their original store tags. I’m not after your “cool, old” stuff so much as I’m after the bargain on stuff I hope you don’t realize I got at Goodwill. Thank goodness I’m not telling the entire Internet that’s where I got my “expensive” clothes. Um. Oops?) Really the only thing that’s different now is that my kids think it’s cool instead of embarrassing. (more…)

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Comments { 30 }
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