What Writers Do at a Party.

While parties are not an everyday occurrence for us, I nonetheless feel compelled to document one on this blog for you, dear future children. This is a writer's party. You can see that there is natural light in the room, because this particular party took place at brunch-time.
You can also see that we are thoughtfully listening to one writer read from his work. When he finishes, we snap our fingers and sip from our wine bottles. And then we all grow beards and sleep with other*.

*Ha! Kidding! You know I can't grow a beard!

It's the Little Things (and the Big Things).

My week home alone included a number of ups and downs excitment-wise, and I must share with you one of the ultimate highs. A couple weeks ago, I lost my last long bobby pin, which had been the cornerstone of my coiffure. Without it, I was left scrambling to pin back my hair with dozens of short, stubby pins, and the results were mediocre at best.

But this week, while pulling clothes out of the washing machine, I FOUND IT!

Here you can see it beside a normal bobby pin, to get an idea of scale. And don't think I'm being overly frugal on this one. I have tried to buy more long pins, but I just can't find them. So cue the Hallelujah chorus, children. Mama's doing her hair!

D: The Most Beautiful Vitamin?

Not long ago, your grandmother Laurie (who is a doctor, of course), recommended that I start taking some vitamin D supplements. That's the latest craze in health right now, kids, which will probably sound quaint and old-timey when you read this, but what can I do.

Naturally, I have taken her advice. And isn't D a beautiful specimen? Doesn't it look like liquid gold?
Wait a moment... is that liquid gold spread out over the menu for New Kahala, the Chinese food restaurant?

And is that your mother, ordering herself dinner at (gasp!) 4:03 in the afternoon?!



Yes, children. I regret to say that everything you deduced from these photographs is true. You see, your father was in Tulsa this weekend and come Friday, I didn't care what I did anymore. Which led to me admiring my supplements and ordering greasy takeout food at a time when most people are still reasonably full from lunch (except the dignified English, who are taking their tea).


But ask me this: Do I have any regrets? No. I have no regrets.

(Note: You may be thinking that eating greasy Chinese takeout "cancels out" taking vitamins of any kind. Finely observed, children. I see I have trained you well.)

A Fetish for the Future?

I realized today that I might have a fetish for the future when, upon reaching approximately the center of what was once a tall rainbow notepad tower (this is what remains of it):

I discovered this note:


In fact, I was right. Present Brenna had completely forgotten that Past Brenna wrote that! But I did not feel the magical, transcendental time-travely sensation I expected to feel when I wrote the note back in ought-seven.

I guess that's just a lesson for you, children.

On a completely unrelated note, this is what your father looks like when he drives.

Dear Public Radio, I Love You, But...

... it's probably time to stop sending the bumper stickers. For one thing, we only have one car. For another, I'm not really a bumper-sticker person. Seriously. Stop sending them. Thanks.

One More Thing to Love about the USPS

As an avid supporter of "snail mail" (or as we supporters prefer to call it, "mail delivered at a dignified pace"), I enjoy nothing more than the ritual of mailing a letter to someone. I am particularly delighted by long addresses, and mailed an application to a seven-line address last week. SEVEN LINES! That's Stephen Dedalus sh*t, my children.

Anyway, I wanted to share how exceedingly delighted I was last week when I went to replenish my supply of postal stamps and found that the USPS is selling this glamorous collection:


Latin Music Legends. About time, USPS.

Eatin' Chick'n.

Children, you may have noticed that I, your mother, do not eat meat products. This is not, as you may have suspected, because of an abiding love for animals that I harbor in my breast. In fact, I do not like animals very much; it is this very dislike that prevents me from eating them.


I don't want them living in my house, and I don't want them dying in my oven. It's very simple. Anyway, your father is kind enough to accommodate my choices. Here we are enjoying a casual dinner he prepared, which consists of stir-fried vegetables, fish filets with mayonnaise (for him), and chick'n fingers (for me).

Oh, and also some of us decided to wear "poncho-style" garments to this meal, which may surprise you, as you know we have a strict no-ponchos rule in our house these days. Guess why I had to make that rule.

Siiiigh.

Blackbird Convention.

I don't know much about blackbirds, but I learned this weekend that they have conventions in people's backyards. Our neighbor is one of these people.


Also, when the convention is over, they leave in unison, as if they were all in an invisible airplane, which, for all I know, they might be because, again, I am woefully underinformed about blackbirds.


Anyway, that's the news from Carbondale. As you can see, we had a typically busy weekend.

A Cautionary Tale (Re: Moderation).

Dear children: I mention on this blog from time to time that I have a taste for a certain alcoholic beverage made with hops and yeast. But sometimes I get carried away and enjoy a biiiit too much of that lovely drink.

And here's what happens the next morning.

So, children, consider yourself warned. Nobody wants to spend the whole day in the fetal position inches away from where she tore off her party clothes the night before (see armrest) in her haste to get into pajamas, especially if she lives with the kind of person who would (admittedly after offering to get her popsicles and bringing her water) document that situation.

Gloves are off, John. You better not do anything you don't want the whole Internet seeing.

This Is How We Watch TV.

You know my feelings on the evils of television, children. But still, your father and I fall prey to its siren song from time to time. Unfortunately, we cannot fall prey to that song via our actual TV, which does not get NBC, but rather via Hulu (and thus the Internet), which plays all the hit NBC comedies to which we fall prey. (Could somebody diagram that sentence for me?)

So here's what it takes for your parents to relax and watch, say, this week's 30 Rock:


Milk crate plus laptop plus speakers (plus tissue box, for the sniffly one, though no names shall be named). Notice the "real" TV sulking in the background. What a whiner!

Grow Your Own.

You know that one plant everyone loves but many people are reluctant to buy because of the dangers involved? Well take a word of advice from your loving mother: grow your own! I am, of course, talking about lentil sprouts.


As we all know, store-bought sprouts are often subject to salmonella and Jah knows what other kinds of chemicals and diseases. To avoid such unpleasantness in your home-grown sprouts, be sure to soak the lentils in chamomile water overnight before growing.

Then plop those babies in one of the mason jars you've saved because you know how useful they are and can't bear to throw them away, no matter how much grief John gives you. Cover the top with cheesecloth and put those babies in the windowsill to engage in the beautiful and inspiring process known as photosynthesis.


Change the water every day, and after about a week...ta-da! Beaucoup sprouts for your sandwiches this week!


P.S. That second sprout-jar? Didn't take. I tried to grow pepper-seed sprouts, but no dice. Perhaps in the future, when you read this, I will be wiser on the subject.

In the Spirit of the Season...

Happy Valentine's Day, children! In honor of the day, I'll write about three of the things I love most: your father, beer, and poems.

1. I like my beer opposite of how I like my men: stout, dark, and rich.

2. What a gush of euphony voluminously wells! How it swells! How it dwells on the Future! -- how it tells of the rapture that impels to the swinging and the ringing of the bells, bells, bells*...

3. Look at that. Not only does your father wash dishes like a champ, he makes them tessellate in the drying rack. Am I a lucky lady, or what?


4. ...to the rhyming and the chiming of the bells*.



* My apologies to Edgar Poe.

The Gift that Keeps on Giving.

I had a birthday last week, kids. True to form, your father had set up a delightful and completely un-creepy surprise to greet me when I descended to the kitchen in the morning.



As you probably guessed, that surprise was the collectible M&M statue/dispenser he gave me four years ago for my birthday, modified this time around so that it had a speech bubble wishing me a happy day.

I'm so relieved that we do things in a normal way in this household.

The Differences in the Kinds of Meals Your Father & I Prepare.

Children, you may have already observed that your father and I have slightly different preferences in cooking and eating. Rest assured that these differences existed long before you came into our lives.


For example, your father, left to his own devices, will prepare himself a meal of bacon, Nutella, and Pabst Blue Ribbon.











Notice how nonchalant he is about not only eating the Nutella directly from the container, but also about eating it before the "healthy" part of his dinner.


I, on the other hand, make myself smoothies with kale in them.

Cheaper Per Ounce.

As an avid comparison shopper, I frequently come home from the grocery store with large containers of things we eat because, as I so often repeat to your father, the larger sizes are typically cheaper per ounce.


Despite this undeniable wisdom, your father persists in giving me a hard time about the quantities of various foodstuffs I buy. When I came home one day with this box of green tea, for example, he said, "One-hundred bags of green tea? We're never going to drink all that!"

Never, you say? THEN WHY IS THE BOX COMPLETELY EMPTY, JOHN? HMMMM?

Some Verse.

Two poets, both alike in dignity,

In my fair kitchen, where I lay my scene,

From liquor store and from the grocery,

One is a beer and one is tea that’s green.

From forth the tasty drops of these two drinks

Another poet finds her will to write;

Why wake at all without these two, methinks?

And how to start the day or end the night?

The quaffing of your mother’s constant thirst,

And the clearing of her brain’s daily smog,

Which happens in the early morning first,

Is now this entry’s traffic of her blog.

(And you thought poetry was dull and bland—

Not when it springs forth from your mother’s hand!)

Safety First, Chocolate Second.

What do we do after we take the cookies out of the oven, children?



Correct.


Turn that sh*t off.

The Neighbors Are Listening to "Rocketman." And That's an Improvement.

Children, be glad we no longer live where the past versions of your father and I who wrote this blog lived. This weekend was some epic drinking event for the undergrads at the university here in Carbondale. And because we share walls with our neighbors, who happen to be undergrads,* we got generously invited to share in this experience. By way of their gratuitously loud music. Which made our walls shake until roughly 3 in the morning.


Unfortunately, this photo doesn't capture the sound (how quaint, you must be thinking). But you can see by your father's expression roughly what he thinks about our neighbors' manners.

As you know, if those young men next door had been you, they would have gotten quite the stern talking-to.



*They are in their eighth year of study.