Picky Eater

I don't like beans. Yes, it's strange, but I've hated beans since I was 1 years old--according to my mom, I would pick each individual bean out of my azuki and rice she would make for me. I also don't like Feta cheese. My version of hell would be to have to eat a large brick of Feta.

I dated a few Greek guys and the thought of introducing me to their mothers always stirred up a bit of fear because of the Feta-hating. And oh yeah, the grape-leaves-hating.

Today we went to Tomatillo again and fortunately, we did not get my most unfavorite waiter. My unfavorite waiter messes up my order 80 percent of the time. He's this skinny hipster-ish guy who is the only white guy who works the tables. And every time I ask for a tofu burrito WITH NO BEANS, he can't seem to keep it straight and there they are, the dreaded pinto beans in my freaking burrito.

Since my parents own a restaurant and I'm with a guy who hates it when I return food to the kitchen, I always sit there and eat the messed up food, not enjoying it one bit.

Last time we went to Tomatillo, I said to Peter pretty loudly, "Oh good, that AWFUL waiter isn't here today." I didn't see him when we walked in, but the people at the table next to us seemed startled and a few minutes later, the awful waiter sat down next to them for a little bit of chit-chat.

Peter said, "They totally knew that you were talking about their friend."

So? He's a crappy waiter. I'm sure if they are his friends, they know this by now.

Today, when I ordered my meal, I made it a point to say no beans and the waiter, who is Mexican, seemed really confused. My anti-beanness confuses a lot of Mexicans. And he asked me, "You want the rice, right? And do you want the lettuce? And do you want the tomatoes?"

Every time he asked me a question, I said, "Yes, I want everything EXCEPT the beans."

"So, you want the tortilla?"

And after I ordered, Peter looked at me and he looked like he had a revelation.

"Is THIS why you're hesitant to go to Mexican restaurants? Because of this bean thing?"

"YES!!" I said. "And it's really tough for me, because I LOVE Mexican food."

When I was little, everyone used to tell me that I would grow out of the bean hating business, but I never have. People always ask me what it is about beans I don't like and it's the texture of the beans when I'm chewing it and it gets all clumped up in my mouth.

"But mashed potatoes are like that and you LOVE mashed potatoes!" My mother would say.

Yeah, that's because it doesn't taste like anything but tons of butter and gravy.

You also can't travel through Asia not liking beans because Chinese people LOVE to serve mooncakes to their guests and I would always turn them down. And my uncles would get all indignant and mad and say, "They're DELICIOUS! You HAVE TO EAT ONE!"

And of course, I would say, "No, thank you." Which is apparently a REALLY RUDE thing to say to an elder. When an elder tells you to do something, you're supposed to do it, especially in Taiwan.

So I would put it on my plate and leave it untouched.

I am still known in some parts of Taiwan as: "The only girl I've ever met who hates mooncakes."

Open Letter to SNL

Can't you write some funny skits? I mean, you only do ONE show a week, AND you have a musical guest who comes on twice.

I mean, seriously.

SERIOUSLY.

Hey Lorne Michaels! Stop appearing in those stupid skits and whip those writers into shape!

My IM Chat With Andrew

andrew: how you doing? when's the surprise "party"?

Me: the 10th! Guess what? EVERYBODY is coming!

andrew: wow. the Wicked Witch of Long Island too?

Me: yes, wicked witch is coming with her wickedlings

andrew: u know what would be the BEST SURPRISE EVER?

Me: if we didn't show up and didn't tell them?

andrew: if you and Peter weren't HOME! "like this, like this!"

Me: actually, now that there's so many people, we're not all going to fit! my suggestion was to disinvite people-- we're going to have to go to a restaurant and spend endless amounts of money!

andrew: wow!

Me: well, that's fine--although I'm glad that everyone's coming since it's for her, I'm not looking forward to dealing with these people--what WHAT WHAT was I THINKING!!!!!

andrew: wow, so generous!

Me: Although my parents ARE SO PROUD OF ME and I feel a little guilty because they think I'm a better person than I am--I ONLY invited these people thinking they weren't going to come! Some of these people didn't even go to their own father's funeral!
Suffice it to say, the SURPRISE! Is on US!

andrew: haha
THE BIG FUNNY!
u said u have a sizeable backyard? why not rent a tent and hold a circus with these freaks?

Me: I'm a little stressed out that everyone is coming! JERKS! And Peter's nephew--the one who DID NOT GIVE US A GIFT for our wedding EVEN THOUGH HE WAS A GROOMSMAN and we bought HIM a groomsman gift is bringing his girlfriend--and I'm sure, showing up empty-handed.

andrew: to be mentally prepared for thsi u really have to be prepared for the WORST absolute WORST that can happen
just imagine everyone screaming and fighting, and crying and storming out

Me: Them BEING there is already the worst (peter said that)

andrew: and being majorly ungrateful - then u'll be ready for anything!

Me: I'm a little worried that they're going to order up a storm knowing that it's on our dime

andrew: you could set a prix fix menu
tater tots for all!

Me: I know, but the local restaurant here is being a bit unflexible about that...I'm looking around
Peter wants it to be nice--I was thinking PIZZA PARTY!

andrew: MMMM PIZZAAAAAA

Me: my parents think they raised a wonderful daughter and now I'm a bit ashamed of how annoyed I am that they are all coming--- Can you come? I NEED THE SUPPORT!! Plus, it may be the only time you'll get to meet them.
There are going to be more of his family members there than at our wedding...

andrew: is that an incentive?

Me: and definitely more than my bridal shower because...no one came to that.

andrew: I'll be in Boston that weekend

Me: my sister is going to be there--and my mom might also.

andrew: u want more support than Peter and Jenny?

Me: I need the ROCK OF GIBRALTAR-sized support

andrew:well, i'll think about it

Me: My friend Marisol was going to come, but she can't because she's taking stupid weekend classes at YALE

andrew: watch it rain and nobody show

Me: YES!! If only!!

How Did 12 Years Slip By Us?

Yesterday Peter and I were sitting on the sofa and I realized that our 12th year anniversary of the day we met passed by us...on September 5th. Yup, about a month ago.

I asked him if our wedding anniversary were not on Halloween if we would have both forgotten it already. He said no, but I don't know....

Anyway, it was 12 years and a month ago when I went to a venue with my friend Paul to go see his coworker play in a band. Paul said, to me, "That's the guy who knows Beck," and of course Odelay was my favorite album at the time, the album I was listening to on my long, and I mean looooong, train rides back and forth from Ann Arbor, Michigan. So to hear someone actually KNOWS this guy?

So I sat down next to Peter and said, "I like your glasses."

And the rest, as they say, is history.

There's Not Enough Charm

Today we got word that Peter's sister, the one I'm not particularly fond of, has emailed him that she is attending the Surprise! party. great. The one person that I'm totally DREADING. She's so awful, we need to create another word for awfulness that will fully describe the noxious unhappiness and vitriol that emanates from each of her pores.

And you think I'm kidding? I'm not. She's HATEFUL.

After I sent out the party invitations, I spoke to my friend Marisol about it and she thought that I was CRAZY to invite all these terrible people. She has a little bit of experience because she's got a few clunkers in her family tree.

"You should have just planned a party with a few of her friends here and NOT invited the siblings, that way, she can call them and said, 'Yes, Peter and plue threw a party for me! And it was great!' You do NOT need to invite these people and have to be around them and serve them meals! WHAT were you thinking?"

I need to talk to Marisol before I make ANY decision in life. Because she is SO RIGHT.

On one hand, I'm happy that everyone is coming because it's going to make Peter's mom s'happy. But I am also surprised that Peter's OTHER awful sister, who should know better than to come because SHE DID NOT BOTHER TO ATTEND OUR WEDDING and should never think to DARKEN OUR DOORSTEP is now coming. Yes, technically, she was invited, but we have had NO CONTACT with her except for that 4th of July wedding.

You know that scene in "When Harry Met Sally" when Billy Crystal screams, "I WAS JUST BEING POLITE!"

Every few days, whenever I think about the fact that Peter's sisters are coming, I channel my inner-Billy-Crystal-from-the-80s and say internally, "I WAS JUST BEING POLITE!"

Lesson?

NEVER BE POLITE

So now EVERYBODY is coming and I started to freak out a little bit, because everyone is united in their awfulness and phoniness. These are people who HATE each other, but they will totally yuck it up with each other and I'm a bit afraid that they're going to totally take over this event with their awfulness (and I know I'm being selfish, because this is for Peter's mother, but I'm afraid that they're going to gang up on me and be TOTALLY MEAN to me like they've done in the past).

I was talking to my sister Jenny about this Surprise! party yesterday and I said, "I just don't know how I'm going to handle all these unpleasant people at one time."

She said, "Don't worry, we'll be there and we're CHARMING."

And I said, "Although we have charm in EPIC PROPORTIONS, there's NOT ENOUGH CHARM for THIS!"

It Won't Work For You

Never in a million years did I think that Peter's siblings would accept their invitations for the surprise party for his mom. I mean, these are people who didn't even attend his father's funeral. But sure enough, I got emails in my email box that have proven me WRONG WRONG WRONG.

Like this emailed response:

Hi. Hope all is well. We will see you on the 4th.

That was the email--uhm....okay, but who is this email from? I did invite MORE THAN ONE PERSON--and because they're Catholic, more than one person has THE SAME FREAKING NAME.

I had to send this person an email saying, "Great, looking forward to seeing you...but who are you?"

I frantically called my friend Andrew, who throws dinner parties all the time and is famous in San Francisco for his soirees and I asked him for advice. Or rather I said, "Please, you've GOT to HELP ME! Give me ADVICE!!!!!"

His response was, "But it won't work for you."

"Why NOT?" I asked.

"Because the most important ingredient of a successful even is to invite the right people...and in your case. YOU'VE ALREADY SCREWED THAT ONE UP."

OH NO!!!!!

But the one thing I can take home from all this is that when I invited my mother to the party, she was SO PROUD of me and went on and on about how WONDERFUL this was and HOW HAPPY Peter's mother is going to be...I think that this served as further proof to my mom she raised her kids right.

Eye Contact

Whenever I walk the dogs, I take them out across the street to a little park that's so small it only has two benches and a tree. It is our building's doggy urinal and whenever I see unsuspecting families taking a small break and letting their children roll around in the grass, I cringe. I don't think there's even one square inch on that grass patch that hasn't held urine or poop at some point.

Anyway, there's a stop sign I cross the street in front of and it drives me CRAZY when cars slow down, see that I've stepped off the curb...and keep going.

Hello?

You have a STOP SIGN ASSHOLE!!

Then, what really riles me up is when the car slows down, I MAKE EYE CONTACT and the bastard keeps rolling by...hmmm

Usually, when I'm on the road and I make eye contact with the pedestrian, it tells the pedestrian, "Yes, I see you...go ahead. After all, you have this thing called RIGHT OF WAY."

I'm a safe driver and obey all the rules of the road, just don't throw babies in front of my car.

I think that Westchester people think that a stop sign is just a pretty red lawn ornament that people stick in the ground like colorful lollipops. They don't pertain AT ALL to any RULES OF THE ROAD. It doesn't actually mean STOP. It just means let's try to race that bitch who just stepped off the curb.

I have a mind to start wearing a sandwich board when I walk the dogs that says, "STOP SIGNS=STOP"...and as you drive by, on the back of my sandwich board, it will say: "YOU JERK"

CASA!!

I can't wait for the next season of House.

What I like about House is that it's a show about a genius surrounded by smart people who get on his nerves because they are SO SLOW.

Peter hates it when I joke around that he's like the House of where he works--but he sort of is. But it's a little scaled down. He goes around pointing out all the stuff his coworkers have done wrong and then they get mad at him--but he doesn't save lives or anything...

And the only reason he points this stuff out is that he only wants the organization to not look stupid--so sometimes he HAS to point out grammatical errors before they get posted ON THE INTERNET for ALL THE WORLD TO SEE.

One time he said to me, "Do you think that in Italy, House is called CASA?"

"Hmmm." I said. "I guess in Taiwan it would be TSOO...or FANGZI in Mandarin, which would be the more likely..."

DMV Phone Calls

We share a few of the same numbers for a DMV office in Florida--except that our area code is 914 and the DMV in Florida is 904--so it is a very common for us to receive a phone call--while running out of the shower dripping wet and racing for the telephone, just to have some redneck yell at me about her motorcycle license.

And when I tell them they have the wrong number, they don't believe me and argue with me. And then when I hang up on them, they call back, just to be told that this is the wrong number.

I don't think that they're very bright over there in Florida...

I mean, don't you think the actual DMV would have some sort of recorded greeting instead of a person saying, "Uhm. Hello?"

Go Away, Kitty Kitty

That's it.

We're done.

We're giving away our cat.



Why?

Because it's time. She doesn't like us--and okay, maybe I do roughhouse with her a little too much and treat her like a dog--you mean, cats DON'T like to be manhandled? That's what big labs and Siberians are for? Oh well...

Now that we're moving into a new house, it's not going to be a good situation. So now I'm trying to pawn her off on my mother-in-law. We've asked her (as a favor) to look after the cat for us for 2 weeks.

Little does she know that we're not taking her back!

I think this is the meanest trick I've ever played on her. And by her, I mean Meow Meow.

YOU Don't Even KNOW

While we were at Rhinebeck, my sister Jenny looked after my Meow Meow--the cat we've been seriously thinking of ditching...I mean, finding a new home for...

The thing is, we just are not cat people.

When we were away, Jenny woke up and stepped into the bathroom...into a puddle of pee.

We're having a teensy bit of trouble in the toilet-training arena. For some reason, this past week, the Meow Meow hops on the toilet and faces the wrong way!!

She's been peeing correctly for a year and for some reason, she's suffering a sort of brain fart when it comes to toilet-facing.

As Jenny cleaned up the pee, she looked at Meow Meow--knowing that if she starts having accidents all over the place it will definitely be the end of her and us--and said:

YOU don't even KNOW!

Rhinebeck=Great Food

We've been spending the Labor Day holiday in Rhinebeck, NY and I have to tell you, we are considering moving here when we retire...next year. There's everything you could possibly want here, which means, there's FOOD TO EAT!!!!

The first night we were here, we went to a Thai restaurant called Aroi, which was really awesome--I can't get enough of the Thai Iced Tea, which is why I got the Thai Ice Tea Ice Cream later for dessert!

We had breakfast the next day at the Bread Alone Bakery, and I love a place that is painted my favorite color--orange. Their T-shirts were also s'cute.

Peter and I walked along the streets and we stopped by this shop window that had all these Life is Good T-shirts and Peter bought this one.

Today we went to the Apple Pie Bakery at the CIA--the culinary institute, not the place with the assassins. Although, wasn't it funny on Alias whenever there was a scene at the CIA headquarters, all you saw were signs for CIA, CIA, CIA!! Like, yeah, WE GET IT. You're at the CIA!!!!! The food was really awesome, although a TON of butter and cheese went into the Quiche and Macaroni and Cheese we got--we're still feeling it....a day later.

I didn't grow up eating a ton of cheese and butter--my mom cooks very nutritious meals for us--once, when my sister was watching Paula Dean's show, my mom looked up and said, "Oh, what's she making there, is that tofu?"

And my sister answered, "No, that's 8 sticks of butter!"

So now whenever we eat a meal with tons of butter, we say, "That sure is a lot of TOFU!"

Do You REALLY Want to be Friends?

My whole life I have struggled with friendships where I am the one who has to work on the constant upkeep: the phone calls andn the visiting and the sending of cards. After a while, it seems very one-sided and I stop. 99.9% of the time, the friendship just flits away into the ether--nowadays we have Facebook to deal with people like this.

I used to have a very close relationship with a cousin of mine and we were almost like sisters, but better than sisters because there wasn't any of the sibling rivalry. Our parents would send us to Japan for the summer, mine because they were busy with the restaurant, and hers because there were 5(!) kids in the house, so it was nice for her parents to send a few of them away for a little while. When I was studying in Michigan I went out to visit her in Minnesota, where she lives, and she drove 8 miles down to Chicago to meet up.

About 12 years ago, I decided to stop the phone calls because I didn't want to keep up a relationship where I felt that I was the only one who cared. And so we've stopped talking. I attended her wedding and she attended mine, but we've been pretty much out of touch. She does, however, come into New York a few times a year and she'll always go to my dad's restaurant to eat a free meal. In these 12 years not once has she ever called me to meet up with her. I took that as a sign that she's not interested.

Today, my father calls me up to let me know that she's at the restaurant and he puts her on the phone. It's sort of evident that she wasn't planning on talking to me, but I suppose my father put her on the spot. And in the conversation, she admits that she visits NY all the time, but it has never occurred to her to call me up. That statement alone made me want to hang up on her.

She makes a big deal out of asking me for my email address, which I give her, which has not changed in the past 15 years or so (even though everyone and his IT guy has been trying to get me to switch to gmail).

The thing is that I'm a pretty optimistic person. You know what they say, that a pessimist is really just an optimist who's been disappointed too many times.

I would love to actually think that my cousin wants to hang out and that she's genuinely going to email me the next time she's in town, but I just know better. A part of me always wants my friends to really be their best selves. The person that I remember when I really loved them. The person who might actually have genuine feelings for me and want to see me. I know that it's very difficult to maintain relationships when we're older and that there's something to be said for losing touch with an old pal, but sometimes we just have to let things be.

And by the way, I've learned my lesson. The next time my father calls me, I'm going to ignore it.

Portrait of Meow Meow Sitting on the Bowl

This was taken when we were on the green stage of the litter kwitter. She's staring at the toilet and saying to herself, "WHAT is wrong with THESE PEOPLE!?"

Shhhh!! Surprise Party!

Tonight I spent a few hours making surprise birthday party invitations for my mother-in-law's 85th birthday next month. I know! 1924!! Wow. Apparently, she's the same age as the Thanksgiving Day parade. At first I wanted to do a, "She was born the same year...blah blah blah happened." I thought it would be cute, but most of the events were pretty sad, like the first death by poison gas in the US death penalty system and a few other people getting murdered and assassinated.

So, nix on that idea.

I've wanted to throw her a birthday party each year, but every year, Peter shoots it down, saying that no one will ever come. This year, I came up with a BRILLIANT IDEA. For those of you who used to watch The Facts of Life in the 80s, you know what that sounds like.

The whole reason Peter didn't want to throw a party was that he was afraid that everyone would not show up and then his mother would be heartbroken. So I came up with the surprise party idea. That way, if no one shows up, no one is the wiser. She won't know that all her kids are heartless jerks. We can just take her out to dinner and the latest Jennifer Aniston movie like we usually do.

So he was all for it and I made these really cute invitations. When I showed them to him, he smiled and looked at me and said, "You know, if everyone DOES show up, she's going to be SHOCKED."

I said, "I know. I was going to write that in the invitation, but felt it was inappropriate."

We'll be moved into the house by then and it would be nice to have everyone over. This will FORCE me to get the house ready by that time.

Although, I had to write something in the invitation that actually said: Do Not Let Her Know About This Party--and I really hope they pay attention to it. The last thing I want is for people to call her up and say:

"Oh, by the way, I can't come to your surprise party...SURPRISE!!"

She's an Easy Lover

Me (singing): She's an easy lover...

Me (normal voice): Who sings that terrible song?

Peter: Phil Collins.

Me: Why? Why, Westchester WHY???? Why do you play Phil Collins everywhere? What is it that makes you so LAME? No matter WHERE I GO in Westchester, there's that DAMNED Phil Collins!

Will Smith, African American Hero

My sister Jenny went to a school recently as part of her new job where she educates children about the importance of fresh foods and vegetables. She noticed that the bulletin board still had the Black History Month decorations on them from February. I remember my teachers were really diligent about keeping their classroom borders festive with the current holiday themes, but I suppose the February display should get some special play--after all, it's already short-changed by being such a short month, so hurray for that teacher.

On the bulletin board were the photos of 5 prominent African Americans:

Malcolm X
Harriet Tubman
Barack Obama
Martin Luther King, Jr

and...

Will Smith

I wonder if Colin Powell would be like, "HEY!"

But then again, Will Smith has so improved all our lives by teaching us how to get jiggy with it.

How Did It Get So DIRTY?

The first time Peter and I had rented a place to strangers, the two youngsters kept the place pretty spotless. Not only that, but they painted the walls in terrific colors which made the place look AWESOME and we ended up selling the place for about $30K more than we listed it the year before we rented to them.

So, let's just say that we were kind of Flabbergasted today when we went to take a look at our house. Our renter moved out and we're planning on moving back in--had we known she wasn't going to stay, we might have just moved back to the house last year, but ALAS! These things happen.

I'm actually looking forward to moving back to the house--I've been missing having a nice huge yard and not having to take the dogs out three times a day. It's so much easier to just open the kitchen door.

Anyway, when we went to take a look at the place, it was SO DIRTY. The lady smokes so everything smelled like the bottom of an ashtray. She had just had a cleaning service over the house so I can only imagine what it had been like before they got there. When I opened the kitchen cabinets, there were dirty crumbs of gunky stuff EVERYWHERE. Now, I use my cabinets A LOT. We cook all the time and I have tons of STUFF, but I don't have crumbs all over everything. There was grime and dirt and grossness EVERYWHERE.

I did get a little freaked out by how much mess ONE PERSON can make in three years.

But the way I see it, she was paying a pretty good rent--so whatever it takes to fix up and clean up the house is fine.

Peter was a little worried about me and said, "Don't worry, we'll have this all fixed up and it'll be totally fine. Are you freaked out?"

"No," I told him. "If she can't be bothered to shave that mustache ON HER FACE, how can I really expect her to wipe up some crumbs in the kitchen cabinet."

"I know, right? Every time I was talking to her, my eyes kept wandering to the mustache. It was really distracting."

Rhinebeck

Peter and I are going to Rhinebeck in a couple of weeks--mostly to get away from it all--or rather, get an hour and a half away from it all. So if anyone has any good suggestions for something to do up there, I would appreciate it.

We're planning on having dinner at the Culinary Institute up in Hyde Park, which should be interesting, since it's run by all students. I've been reading Trip Advisor ratings to no avail since the reviews are mixed--it's the craziest thing--it's all:

"Hate it! The students are IDIOTS!"
"Love it! "The students are GENUISES!"
"Hate it! My food was cold!"
"Love it! My food was perfect!"

I guess it depends on the random group of students who happen to be there at the time you visit.

A few years ago, Peter and I drove up to Hyde Park on a lark and I told my mom and she said:

"Oh, yes! Hyde Park! That's where the culinary school is and FDR's old house."

The strange thing is that my mother doesn't know anything about anything most of the time, and yet she'll randomly know something about an obscure place up in the middle of New York State. When I asked her how she knew about this place, she said:

"Well, you know, when our Japanese friends come to visit, it's one of the tours. They go up to visit FDR's home and have dinner at the culinary school before they come back down to the city."

Anyway, that's about all I know about the area also.

Christmas Tree Shops Don't Sell Christmas Trees

While my sister and I were in Albany (Did I mention that I went to Albany?), we went to the local mall to place a reservation at the Cheesecake Factory--unfortunately, there was a huge line and the earliest reservation was for 9pm--so we had two hours to kill.

It took us about six minutes to traverse the whole mall, considering we didn't want to purchase any candles or greeting cards. At the tail end of the mall, there was a place called Christmas Tree Shops and Jenny wanted to go inside.

"But I don't even like Christmas Trees," I said.

"Oh, come on! I went inside that Halloween Store you wanted to go to," she said.

Reluctantly, I walked in the store with her...and I found one of the most AWESOME places on Earth!

I found cookbooks for $5.
I found bags of organic whole wheat rigatoni for $1.65.
I found a shower mirror/radio for $5.

Then I heard Jenny yell, "Utz! Utz! $1 for UTZ!"
She stocked up on bags of Utz selling for $1 each.
Jenny also found a basket for transporting her baked goods for $4.
Jenny found a tea towl to cover her basket for $1.

We spent 2 whole hours browsing through this story and I couldn't find ONE Christmas Tree.

It was kind of upsetting because I've seen these stores whenever I've gone to the mall in Paramus and there's one in Hartsdale, but I assumed it sold Christmas trees and never went inside.

"It's terrible marketing," Jenny said. "This is exactly the kind of store we like and we didn't know about it."

It's true.

The next day, while we were driving back home, I told Jenny, "You're gonna be mad because there 's a Christmas Tree Shop in Amherst and you didn't know about it the whole 4 years you were there."

She said:

"FUCK!!"

"Uhm, okay," I said. "I knew that I was going to get a reaction like, Ooooooh, No Way! or Too Bad!, but FUCK!!? You're taking this really badly."

The Best View in Albany

I'm in Albany with my sister Jenny--she's on a business trip and I've been working on a fellowship application. We're staying at a local hotel and I was disappointed with the fact that our hotel room's window looks out onto the hallway. That's strange, isn't it? What's up with that?

When she mentioned that to a friend of hers, he said, "Why's she disappointed? That's probably the BEST VIEW IN ALBANY."

Word.

No offense, Albanians!

Everyone we've met here is unbelievable super-nice and friendly.

Northern Beans Gone BAD

I have been trying to be better about cooking--I really have--but going out to eat is really one of the only things Peter and I look forward to doing. When both of you work at home all day, it's not only about being too lazy to cook, but it's a reason to GET OUT OF THE HOUSE.

However, because we're trying to save money, I am trying to cook more. And since Peter is a vegetarian, I feel that he should start adding more bean-eating to his diet because pulses are good for you and we must support the pulse farmers of America.

The only problem with beans is the soaking. That means that you can't willy-nilly think of something to cook 30 minutes before dinnertime. It means that you must have soaked the beans overnight, with the intention of cooking the beans the next day.

A few days ago, I put a bag of Northern beans in a metal bowl and filled it with filtered water to let the beans soak. I then proceeded to forget all about said beans for THREE WHOLE DAYS AND NIGHTS.

We came home the other day to the most horrible SMELL. This smell was the most godawful smell that ever was released onto the earth. It was a smell worse than cat pee. It smelled like the regurgitated bowels of three hundred devils, devils who really FUCKED UP and did a whole bunch of BAD SHIT while they were on Earth.

Peter went over to the bowl, lifted the lid I had put on it and said, "What the HELL IS THAT?"

"Oh! It's the...uhm...northern beans I was going to make for you a few days ago."

Those beans went bad. I mean, they went so bad, they went to another realm of bad, the realm known as PURE EVIL.

Not only did it smell like the depths of hell, but they were fermenting and forming a disgusting foam--the kind that SATAN probably bathes in. And of course, since this was ALL MY FAULT, I had to get rid of it, almost throwing up twice in the process.

All this because it's much cheaper to buy dried beans and soak them overnight instead of the handy-dandy canned beans. Suffice it to say, I will be buying more cans of beans.

Northern beans, when you go bad, you go VERY VERY BAD.

When I Die, I Want to Come Back with YOUR Life

When the property manager came through to inspect our apartment (because of the leak in the ceiling), he saw that Peter was sitting on the sofa in front of the television and he asked Peter, "What is that, a video game?"

Peter said, "It's MLB Power Pros."

The guy looked at him for a moment and then said, "When I die, I want to come back with YOUR life."

After he left, Peter said, "Hey, I don't blame him. I love my life."

I Don't Think I Should Win the Lottery

About a month ago, I was in the kitchen with Peter and I happened to look up at the ceiling. What I saw made me SCREAM. I saw this dark brown THING, which I thought was a bug, but when Peter saw what I was looking at, he said, "Oh SHIT!!"

I'm a bit overdramatic, but Peter always has his shit together, so the fact that he was freaking out did NOT make me feel better. Basically, what I thought was a bug was actually a small brown MUSHROOM growing out of the corner of our ceiling. Not only that, but we noticed that there were bumps forming all along our wall.

Apparently, our neighbor upstairs had been doing some "work" in his bathroom and had been taking showers in his untiled bathroom. Right. So who knew how long the water had been leaking down our wall.

To make a long story short, he fixed up his bathroom, called his insurance company and we were awarded $2,000 for the damage, which was really great because it cost about a quarter of that to actually fix the problem.

However, the day after we were told we were going to receive 2 grand, we discovered that the roof of the garage was totally kaput and rain was pouring down the walls. The cost of the damage? $2,000.

Hmmm.

It seems that every time Peter and I get a chunk of money somewhere, something goes wrong and instead of being able to put it into our savings accounts, we have to shell it out to fix some stupid thing or another.

I'm almost afraid to pay the lottery. I mean, what if we win? What horrible thing would happen?

All this damage to our apartment and our house seems to be coming from water, so I wondered if there was some Chinese feng shui thing we could do to prevent this from happening.

I called my mother and asked her if there was something I could do, burn some magic papers in a bowl and mix the ashes with water and pour it over my head? (Okay, that's something I ACTUALLY did a few years ago because my mother told me it would bring me luck...and she had already paid the fortune teller some money to get the magic papers, so I HAD TO do it. And the thing is, I was afraid not to.)

Her reaction was something I totally did not expect. She said:

"WATER? That's GREAT! Water problems are a GREAT SIGN! It means that you and Peter are going to be coming into A LOT of MONEY! Water problems are GOOD LUCK!"

When there was a fire in our building a few years ago, my mother said that fire was also good luck.

What's wrong with these people?

Buy One Get One All Over Your Feet

I took my sister out to lunch today for a "first week at work" celebration. She started her very first full-time job this week helping people in need apply for food programs in the city. We headed out to a Mexican restaurant and I had the enchiladas, but since I am anti-beans, Jenny asked me to request the beans on the side so she could have it. When I told the waiter, he looked at me kind of funny and said, "But they are ALREADY on the SIDE of the plate."

I explained that I would rather the beans be in its own plate--actually, if it were up to me, beans would be on another planet. My hatred of beans has gone back as far as I can remember and even my mother will testify that, as a toddler, I would patiently pick out the azuki in the rice and beans she made one-by-one, flicking them on the floor.

After lunch, I thought it would be a good idea to take advantage of Jamba Juice's buy-on-get-one-free coupon. We drove over to 86th and Lexington Ave and boy, was it hectic. There were about 17 cops milling all around, so I didn't want to be caught double-parking. As I came back around the block, I called Jenny, and when she went to pick up her phone, her Jamba Juice fell to the floor and splattered all over her foot.

When she got in the car, I saw that she only had one Jamba in her hand, which was mine. I felt really badly about it and had a lot of elder sister guilt about it. Thoughts like, "Why did I CALL her?" "I should have gone through my lesson of how to carry Jamba Juices! I know she's almost twenty-two years old, but that lesson got passed over!" I was well-taught by my Chinese parents that any fault or defect of a younger sibling and any failure they may come up against in life is MY FAULT because I DIDN'T DO MY JOB PROPERLY.

Their job was to put food on the table and a roof over our heads and my job was to make sure that my sisters were raised right.

Jenny tried to assure me by telling me that she didn't even feel like having a delicious juicy treat. And HEY! You can turn this tragedy into a semi-funny blog post.

Too Much Information

The internet is a great thing, but at one point pre-internet, you would lose touch with a friend and occasionally hear news about them through a third person and you would be glad to know how they were doing.

Now, you can find their personal blogs on the internet, especially personal blogs told from the point of view from their children.

I got a phone call from an old boyfriend of a friend and we were talking about another friend who had a baby a few years ago--did you get that Internet? 3 people! This is what I call making Peter happy and not using first names of our friends who may get upset to be mentioned on my anonymous (perhaps soon to be non-anonymous?) blog.

Whenever any man calls me, Peter is convinced the dude is trying to see if we're still married. Y'know, 'cause the divorce rate is 50% and you never know... Although I think it's sweet that with all the young single girls in the world, Peter thinks that some guys are still holding a torch for this boring and married old lady.

Since her name came up during that phone conversation, I googled my old friend and found this personal web blog that is told from the point of view of her child. The whole blog is all, "Mommy is so wonderful. She's so beautiful and talented and kind."

Okay, so it's kind of strange if she's the one posting that she, herself, is wonderful from the point of view of her child, but it may be even slightly more disturbing if it's the husband posting the entries. I mean, why does he have to constantly stroke her ego? Is anything going on?

And that's not the strangest thing.

They do this thing.

They do this thing when they travel with their child.

They fling him high up in the air and take pictures of him "flying" in front of national landmarks and historical sites.

I know that any description of these photos will not convey how comical they are, but I don't feel right about posting them because that's a violation of privacy...even though these people have posted them ON THE INTERNET for all the world to see. I still don't think it's right.

Peter thinks that we will probably do a million things to our children that other people would criticize and that's true, but that's not going to stop me from talking about my friends behind their backs when they put Coca-Cola in the baby bottle (fine, I don't know anyone who does that).

Anyway, it's just way too much information than I need to know about my old friends from college.

Thanks internet.

Eric Bana Sucks...Energy

The other day I was listening to NPR and the host was interviewing Eric Bana and he was describing his character in the Apatow movie "Funny People."

"I play this guy who sucks all the energy out of the roomKSHHHKSHhhkKshhhhh."

Not only is he a movie ruiner, apparently, he also sucks all the energy out of the RADIO because NPR went all static and I couldn't listen to the rest of the broadcast.

This confirms it. Eric Bana sucks.

Wu Di San Bao Mei

This is an actual summary from the back of a DVD from the third-highest rated drama from Taiwan. According to my sister, this may be a bad translation, but it's a fairly accurate summary of events.



Since small, San Bao (Amber Guo Cai Jie) wish to has a sweet love before married. But, her first love dislikes she's too strong and the barbecued pork scent from her body. From that day, San Bao tries her best to cover the barbecued pork scent and keep searching the loves one. Sadly, the guy she admires runaway once he found out she has incredible strength and barbecued pork scent. Due to this, San Bao feels uneasy and she wants "Guang Ji" to bankrupt so that she can free herself from barbecued pork. However, she was greeting as "Chest Ghost" after "Guang Ji Barbecued Pork Shop" was involved in a shooting. Since then, San Bao is facing another problem. San Bao's first love rejected the San Bao lunch box she gave. So, she gave it to a boy who she saved. The boy, Sun Wu Di (Nicholas Teo) is the young master of Tenkorou. Few years later, both of them meet again but don't recognize each others and they're enemy.

I Feel the Same Way About PEOPLE

My sister told her friend about my Meow Meow dilemma--about how I can't really bond with her even though she's a nice cat who causes no trouble and hasn't even peed on my shoes yet.

"The thing is," my sister told her, "She's the least annoying cat ever and she goes in the toilet and everything, but my sister still doesn't like her."

And her friend said, "Are you talking about a cat? Because I feel the same way about most PEOPLE."

The Google Buddy

One day when we all have the internet strapped to our brains and we won't need any apparatus to consult Google, we won't remember what this is like, but today, my sister Jenny called me and her first words were:

"Where are you?"

That can only mean one thing. She might as well have asked, "Are you in front of your computer?"

Generally, I am strapped to the sofa in front of my computer 99% of my waking life. I only take breaks to make lunch and to supervise the cat as she does her business in the toilet. But today, I was doing something else for a change.

"No, I'm on my way home to visit Mommy and Daddy and Judy."

"Oh," she said. "I was hoping that you could Google something for me."

I'm her Google Buddy. A Google Buddy is someone you call so that they can Google something for you, like, "How many perfect games have there been in Modern Baseball?" (18) "How old is Kim Deal?" (48!) and, "What causes your left eyelid to swell up?" (conjunctivitis)

Jenny is my Google Buddy so it makes sense that I'm hers. Right now neither of us have iphones, which would be really great, but who needs to pay $70/month when we're on our Mom's family plan for free. Hey! There's a recession going on!

The Google Buddy has to be a person you can call who you know loves you enough to understand that you REALLY need to know what Marc Bolan's real name is right-this-minute-right-now or it will drive you CRAZY (Mark Feld). Someone who will not roll her eyes up toward the skies and blow you off because she REALLY GETS YOU.

Get in Line Westchester!

I had gotten a gift certificate at the Womrath Bookstore in Bronxville. I ordered a book there about a month ago and haven't been able to make it down there to pick it up.

They've called the house around five times asking me if I'm planning on picking up that gosh-darned book already. One time, Peter picked up and the lady from the bookstore said something like, "Is she still interested in coming to get the book?" She sounded really snide, so Peter couldn't resist and told her (very nicely even though she was rude):

"Well, she is interested, but the problem is that she's been very busy and your store closes very early."

I don't know who they expect to shop at their store when they close their doors at 6pm, right about the time when most people get home from work.

Today, I suggested to Peter that we go to Bronxville so that I can pick up that book already and we could go to lunch at one of the cute cafe/bistro type places in Bronxville.

So we went and walked around the four or five blocks around the Pondfield Road area in Bronxville and almost every restaurant we approached was full of meat dishes and maybe one or two salads. Or there would be one or two dishes with vegetables titles, but when you read the description, the asparagus is sitting on a bed of steak.

We were about to give up when we came across Wild Ginger. Now, we've already had a terrible experience at their sister restaurant Water Moon in Rye. The food at Rye wasn't good and they sat us in a plush seat where someone had spilled their entire drink onto the chair and so when I sat down, I got my pants completely soaked. And of course, when you're a girl, you don't want to be sitting in wetness for a few hours because that's the kind of environment my friend the pesky yeast infection likes to hang out in.

But, at least they served some things with tofu in it and so we went in. Then the miso soup came out and there was a red seaweed Peter was convinced was fish so he wouldn't drink it. When we ordered, I expressly asked if the meal was vegetarian and the waiter said yes. So of course Peter was grossed out to get two chicken dumplings in his bento box and a few pieces of california roll. I felt that the waiter should have been attentive to the fact that I asked for a vegetarian meal considering there were only two other diners at the restaurant at the time, but the thing is, Westchester does not cater to vegetarians and so it's probably much too much to ask for.

This is why we only go to three places in Westchester. It's so annoying to try someplace new and get upset and irritated. I don't blame the restaurants, but it's the whole Westchester vibe. In some ways, Bronxville is the epitome of Westchester, a place that's not really interested in doing a great job. When you go to a restaurant in Manhattan, most of the time, you feel like the people are trying to do their best. They take pride in the food and they want you to have a great meal.

In Westchester, there's a bit of a "get in line" attitude. As in: You want food? Well, we've got food! Get in line! What? You wanted food, didn't you? Well, didn't you get food? What do you want?

No one's competing to be the "best" restaurant around here. They're just all here, waiting for you to get hungry. They don't care that you said you wanted vegetarian. They don't care that you asked for a Coca-Cola and not Diet Coke. And THAT'S why we drive an hour into the city to get dinner.

The Meow Meow

We have had our cat for about a year now. The one officially named Emily Mortimer, but I have always called her Meow Meow. Last night, I said to Peter, "This cat doesn't have a real name."

"Yes she does. We call her Meow Meow."

"But that was sort of an interim name until I could come up with something better, something more suitable, except that I never fully believed we'd keep her and now she's stuck with this stupid name."

"Meow Meow, isn't stupid."

Well, isn't it? Sorta?

Her name isn't exactly Meow Meow since I call her, "The Meow Meow." As in:

"When did you feed The Meow Meow?"

"Did you see The Meow Meow?"

"Has The Meow Meow peed in the toilet today?"

When we found her last year, we figured we would clean her up and find a nice home for her, because we FO SHO did not want to add "cat owner" to our resume.

But she's been a very easy cat to deal with. When my friend Marisol came over and we asked her if she wanted a cat, she said:

"Hell, no. I don't want a keep a litter box."

"Oh," I said. "She does all her business in the toilet, so you won't need to keep a litter box."

"Well," Marisol said. "I don't want a cat to scratch up my stuff."

"She doesn't do that," I said. "When she wants to go scratch, she goes to her scratch pad."

While talking to Marisol about The Meow Meow, I realized that we have raised a pretty nice cat. She isn't much trouble at all. The only down side to her personality is that she isn't very friendly. She's not the kind of cat who runs up to you for pets, unless she wants to eat. But I think the reason for that is that every time we give the cat attention, our huge dogs run up to us all, "Hey! What're you DOin'?"

So why do I still have moments when I want to get rid of her?

I'll just say it. I'm not a cat person. I don't really like cats. I like going to other people's houses and petting their cats and hanging out with them for a little while, but I'm just not that crazy about them.

The Meow Meow is almost no trouble at all and that's why she's still here, but I always feel that perhaps she deserves to be in a household of cat lovers.

But then she'll look so cut sitting at the windowsill, or meow at me to ask me to watch her pee in the toilet and almost every time she goes in the toilet, Peter says, "Awww... Look at how much she loves you. She wants to go for you."

And then another day will go by. And I'm faced with the reality of having to keep her for 15 more years.

My Firsts

I got this tag from someone about my firsts:

1. Who was your FIRST prom date? junior prom:Jimmy Panageotopolous (at least I think that's how he spelled it.

2. Do you still talk to your FIRST love? My grandpa? I email him.

3. What was your FIRST alcoholic drink? Frangelico

4. What was your FIRST job? babysitter

5. What was your FIRST car? '99 Maxima

6. Who was your FIRST grade teacher? Miss Adams

7. Where did you go on your FIRST ride on an airplane? Taiwan

8. Who was your FIRST best friend & do you still talk? Vivian, she moved away when we were 9

9. Where was your FIRST sleep over? my cousin Mark

10. Who was the FIRST person you talked to today? Peter

11. Whose wedding were you in the FIRST time? My cousin Shone

12. What was the FIRST thing you did this morning? Talk to Peter

13. FIRST piercing? I don't have any.

14. FIRST foreign country you went to? Taiwan

15. FIRST movie you remember seeing? E.T.

16. When was your FIRST detention? Eighth grade

17. Who was your FIRST roommate? Yukari during my Japanese stay junior year of h.s.

18. What is something you would learn if you had the chance? Juggling

19. What was the first sport that you were involved in? Track

20. What were the first lessons you ever took? Piano/Art

21. What is the first thing you do when you get home? Take off my pants.

The Spacetime Continuum Brought to You by MLB Power Pros

Peter: So, I'll have that glass of water you offered me before.

Me: You mean, the glass of water I offered to pour you three hours ago?

Peter: Was it THAT long ago? When I'm playing this video game, I can't seem to keep track of time.

It's Different for White Folks

The other night Peter and I had dinner with a friend of mine and her boyfriend--yes, a couples date sort of thing. They are moving to San Francisco, the land of perfect weather--a place that only rains so that the city can show off its large rainbows that stretch across the entire heavens. Sometimes the city is so generous, she'll give you two huge rainbows simply because she loves you. (That bitch Chicago will only give you slushy rain/snow and hail because that's just how she rolls.)






I was telling the boyfriend that I would love to move somewhere with warm weather, but I didn't want to go out to the West Coast. I'm a bit nervous about the South because I'm Asian.

"Southern people are the nicest people you'd ever meet," he said. "They're not racist at all."

Hmmm... Southern people being racist? Where would I get a CRAZY idea like that?

I tried to explain that I'm sure that many many Southern people are perfectly wonderful, but there aren't very many Asian people down there.

I happened to have grown up in New York City, the melting pot capital of the world--and still having my fair share of racist bullying from the kids at my elementary school in Queens. So I sort of know what I'm talking about.

But he kept going on and on and on about how Southern people are great and get a bad rap until Peter said, "But you're white. Of course they're nice to YOU."

Plus, aren't Southern people nice to you to your face and then they put sheets over their heads and run you out of town?

I've been to Superbowl parties at my sister-in-law's house and their friends, the people who they claim are the NICEST people in the world--people they have entrusted as godparents to their children--start using the N-word as soon as they get a few drinks in them.

I really do hope there are less racists in the world than I think there are--that would be great. After all, we did elect a black man into office and how we're getting a woman of color in the Supreme Court. The times--They are a'changin'.

I hope we really are ushering in a new era when we can say, "Americans are the nicest people you can ever meet. They're not racist at all."

Pasty Butt? That's Not Real

Several of the little girls in the writing class I teach have chicken coops in their backyards. They told me about a phenomenon called "pasty butt." That's when the poop clogs up the hen's butt and if a human doesn't clean it up, the hen will die. 

"WHAT?" I could not believe this. "How can hens survive out in the wild then if they can die from not being able to wipe their butts?" 

The girls really didn't know the answer to this--they figured those hens would just die from not being able to poop. The girls are around 9 years old, which means that they are just fascinated with poop, farts, and burping and so many of their stories are peppered with aliens farting. 

I came home and told Peter about pasty butt.

Peter: Pasty butt? That's not real. That must be what the girl's mother calls it. 

Me: Well, what would YOU call that condition?

Peter: I'm sure there's a real and scientific name for that. And it's not going to be pasty butt.

Me: Like we go around using the scientific name for everything. Pasty butt is probably an accepted term in the chicken keeping community. 

Peter: Not likely. 

Me: Well, what would YOU call it when a hen can't poop out of her butt?

Peter: I don't know. I think I would need a few days to think about it.

Me: I'm only going to give you 5 minutes.

Peter: Uhm.... Butt Shut or Shut Butt.

Me: Right. Because THAT sounds MUCH better than pasty butt. 

Haymarket in Northampton--What Happened?

Peter and I just spent a weekend in Burlington, VT. It was mostly a trip to see what the town was about and to figure out if we wanted to move there one day. 

On the way home, we decided to stop by Northampton, since it was on the way, and have dinner at our favorite restaurant--Haymarket. We love their curry, the sandwiches, my sister loves their salads, Peter is mad for the rice and beans and banana. 

I called my sister to let her know that we were going to stop by and she was so excited--but then we got there and....THE FOOD WAS GONE!

Okay, the food wasn't gone, but their regular menu was not available and they presented us with this new fancy shmancy dinner menu and the downstairs was all covered with gauze curtains and lit candles on the tables. 

Huh? Whuh? 

WHAT DID YOU DO TO THE PLACE I LOVE!!!!????!!!!

It's like you meet this cool girl and she loves all the same music you like--like The Cure and The Smiths and The Pixies--and then one day she decides to listen to the Kelly Clarkson and then it's just a dangerous and slippery slide down to THE DAVE MATTHEWS BAND.

And then you have to look at her and realize...she's changed. Do you still want to be with her now that she's become just like everyone else?

The Haymarket host dude was really smug about the fact that they would not make the old menu--not even for someone who has traveled three hours just to get to their restaurant--and my father owns a restaurant, so I know restaurant kitchens. And he would never refuse to make something for a customer if it was in his power to do so. 

We ended up having dinner there anyway, because I have never been disappointed at the Haymarket...until last night. 

I got a mushroom risotto and Peter got something that he can't even remember and the consensus was that the food was nothing special. If I wanted to go to a nice sit-down restaurant with great food, I would go across the street to Paul and Elizabeth's. 

I know this is silly, but Peter and I spent the next two hours of our ride home moaning and groaning about what happened to our favorite place.

Why do people do that? Why do they decide to FUCK with a good thing? 

Sometimes, I Think: "Do They Know Me?"

My sister told me that the day Michael Jackson died, my parents came home from work and said to her, "I hope your sister's not taking it too hard. He was her favorite."

Although I am sad to find out that a childhood icon of mine has died, he wasn't one of my favorite artists. I never owned a Michael Jackson album (not even Thriller) and I don't know where my family members get this idea that I like him. My aunt gave me a Michael Jackson picture book biography and poster for my tenth birthday. 

I guess sometimes family members get this idea of you in their heads and they don't really take the time to really find out your true personality. We see this all the time during family events. Peter's siblings will say something like, "You were always a lazy teenager." And he'll be all, "What? I had three jobs and taking a full course load in college!" People just see what they want to see. 

Hulu is playing Prelude to a Kiss right now and it's my favorite movie because it completely demonstrates this exact feeling. Rita, Meg Ryan's character, has been transformed into an elderly gentleman (it's sort of like a Freaky Friday romantic comedy) and Rita's parents don't even realize this because they only see what they want to see. The play is one of my favorites and the movie does a good job of staying pretty close to the original script. I used to buy a copy of the play for boyfriends to see if they "got" me. Sad to say, most of the time, they never even cracked it open. 

I have wondered if it was because of this play that I became partial to boys named Peter. 

You can check it out here. It's free!

Week 1 of Infinite Challenge

Have yet to crack open that book. That enormous, heavy, heavy book. Just looking at it makes me tired. Maybe the publisher could have split it up into 10 pieces so we can at least carry it around in our pockets. 

I can't put that thing in my purse! 

Maybe I should try to get the audiobook and listen to it during my commute. 

I just checked. Seems like there is no audiobook. I guess the trouble lies in the 100 pages of endnotes. 

My sister told me that she read an article which informs us that we shouldn't tell people what our goals are because simply the act of telling someone fools our brain into thinking that we're already doing it, which doesn't push us to actually accomplish the task. 

Therefore, if you really want to do something, don't tell The Internet. 

I wish I had known about this before. 

Lesson

Me: Don't flick that pineapple at me! Pineapples are so sticky!

Peter: Do you mind if I touch the pineapple to your nose?

Me: If you do, I'll punch you.

Peter: Your punishments never fit the crime.

Me: Let that be a lesson to you. 

At the Movies

Last Tuesday I went to the Mamaroneck Clearview Cinemas box office and requested two tickets to The Hangover. The lady behind the glass window asked me for a photo ID. This took me aback and I asked her why. I noticed that she didn't ask the couple ahead of me on line for their ID. 

"It's a rated-R movie," she said. 

This has happened to me before, being carded at a movie theater. About nine years ago, I couldn't get into the movie Erin Brokavich and the box office lady wanted to shield a teenager from the profanities of hexavalent chromium contamination. 

But that was when I was 27. Now I am 36 years old. I might look young, but I don't think I look like I'm still in high school.

"Wait a minute," I said. "Do you think that I'm UNDERAGED? You think that I might be 16 years old?"

She rolled her eyes and said, "COULD be!" in a very sarcastic tone, like, YEAH girl. Duh. 

I showed her my ID and watched her jaw drop. 

Throwing Down the Infinite Gauntlet

I remember flipping through a copy of David Foster Wallace's book, Infinite Jest, at the Ann Arbor Borders (which is my favorite Borders of all time, not only because it is the original Borders, but because they allowed you to bring your dog--I didn't have a dog at the time, but the fact that they kept dog biscuits behind the information booth desk makes it s'awesome) a few years after graduation. I was living in Ann Arbor (or A-squared or Tree Town as the locals liked to call it) on a lark, working on a novel that took place in a Midwestern town. 

The reviews for the novel were mixed, some people were ecstatic and promoted Wallace as The Voice of Our Generation. Others, not so much. Just looking at the size of the book was daunting. I mean, it's a thousand pages! 

I asked my friend John, reader of books and trusted critic, whether he read it and he said, "Well, no. It's an investment of a huge amount of time and I'm afraid that the book's not going to be that great and then the joke's on me. And I will NOT be made a FOOL of!"

There's a website that was launched a few weeks ago at www.infinitesummer.org. Its call to arms is:

You've been meaning to do it for over a decade. Now join endurance bibliophiles from around the web as we tackle and comment upon David Foster Wallace's masterwork, June 21st to September 22nd.

A thousand pages ÷ 93 days = 75 pages a week. No sweat.

I don't know if I've been meaning to do it for a decade, and I'm not one to usually follow the bandwagon, but it seems like a good time to read the book. 

Plans for the summer:

1. Learn Spanish

2. Read Infinite Jest 

This Is the Way I Should Look

I was talking with my friend Marisol the other day and she told me that a friend of hers was set up with a police officer. So, I guess, you're thinking, a police officer? He must be a pretty fit guy. I mean, he needs to know how to chase bad guys down the street... like we see... on television... which is... oh yeah... fictional..

This police officer was HUGE! 

And her friend was all, "Uhm. I don't date huge."

Apparently, the guy really liked what HE saw. He told her, "You look really great for your age."

"No," she said. "This is the way I should look."

In other words. This is what we should look like at this age. YOU look TERRIBLE. 

Frogger

My sister ran over a frog the other day. She said:

I saw a frog jump in front of the road while I was driving.  I thought that I was totally going to miss it, but then I heard a crunch noise. 

I guess this was an actual frog playing the game Frogger...and he lost. 

I Don't Read Chinese

I know that I have an Asian name. But it's always funny to me when I get junk mail IN CHINESE. Funny that Peter never gets mail in Italian. They're never like, "Oh, he's Italian, so he's not going to know that the McDonald's is now offering a Delicious Coffee Drink unless we send him that coupon in Italiano."

The thing is, I don't know how to read Chinese. Well, except for some of the three hundred words I can still remember from my one year of Mandarin class senior year of college. The Chinese class for non-native speakers my Chinese friends referred to as "The White Man's Chinese Class."

When I visited Taiwan one summer, I had to explain to almost every restaurant waitress that I can speak, but am illiterate, so they would have to read me the menu and they were all, "Huh? Didn't you go to school?"

And I was all, "I'm in college!"

And they were all, "WHAT?" 

I appreciate the coupons, but one of the plus sides of being married to a vegetarian is that you don't really visit fast food chains that often. 

Sometimes I Think Cops Are Not Smart

Today I saw the most heart-wrenching story on TV. A yellow lab was hit by a car on the Major Deegan Expressway and her companion dog, who I found out later was her son, barked at and shepherded the oncoming traffic around her so she wouldn't get hurt. There's a link to it on youtube here.

The footage is so sad, mostly because that yellow lab clearly couldn't get up and the pavement was smeared with her blood. I kept thinking about my own yellow lab and how helpless dogs are now that they depend on people for everything. 

I've heard this story reported on in many news programs today, but it really irks me that no one mentions the policemen who almost botched the whole rescue operation. First of all, they seemed afraid of the barking dog and couldn't get to the injured dog for about 15 minutes. 

They should have tried to grab the healthy dog first so that he wouldn't get hit by another car, but they just stood around staring at him. I mean, how many cops does it take to catch a dog. Form a human chain and close in, for crying out loud! Do I have to be in charge of EVERYTHING?

Then, when the policemen were trying to get the injured dog through the left passenger side of the car, one of the them opened the door on the right side and just walked away. Although injured, there was a small chance that she would have tried to make a run for it--I was so frustrated to see how these guys were bungling this whole thing up.

Then, as they rescue the injured dog, the healthy dog runs off and is running around in traffic. 

These are the people who are supposed to protect us? 

All the news programs were commending these clowns. 

My Broken Pedometer

Now that we weather is nicer, Peter and I have been taking the dogs for walks. I fished out my pedometer from the glass jar it has been sitting in the past few months and we walked down the main street in our town. 

My grandpa used to walk around with the very first pedometers when I was a young girl and it's pretty funny to me now how popular they have become. At the time, I thought my grandpa was a bit anal and nerdy. He used to have this special belt strap that he hooked a pedometer, a box of really hideous-tasting silver mint balls, and a pocket English-Japanese/Japanese-English dictionary. 

The dictionary he only carried with him when I was around because many times during a conversation I would say something like, "Do you want to go to the place-with-a-lot-of-books-that-is-not-a-bookstore-because-you-don't-buy-them-you-borrow-them later?" I mean, my parents never taught me the Taiwanese word for "library." That's when he would reach down on flip open the plastic pouch on his belt and whip out the dictionary for me to flip through and point to the word. 

During the day of the walk, Peter and I were in agreement was that we were going to walk one mile and head on back home. Peter's ride to work is about 4.25 miles away and he wanted to try to see how long it would take him to walk that distance. So, we figured, we would multiply the time it took us to walk two miles and extrapolate. 

So we leashed up the dogs and took off down Main Street. It was so nice to be outside and to not be wearing flannel mom-jeans. I love this time of year, right before the horrible NY face-melting summers. 

Periodically, I kept checking the pedometer. After what seemed to us like a huge distance and we approached the next town over, the pedometer said we had only walked half-a-mile. Peter was all, "I don't THINK so. That thing is BROKEN."

I didn't think that it was broken because I had counted out some steps the pedometer was accurately counting my steps. Also, I wanted to hit that 10,000 paces mark, which Peter and I have NEVER approached during a walk. It's the magic per-day number of paces that scientists say a person should walk for optimal health. So I kept encouraging him to keep on walking farther and farther. 

"We'll walk until it says one mile and we'll go back home," I said. 

About 2 HOURS later, we were on our way home and Scout just stopped walking and refused to move. She's going to be ten years old in a month and must be getting on in years, because she used to have the crazy boundless energy, and in all these years, she's never once stopped in the middle of a walk. During this whole walk, Peter would point out random landmarks and say, "Now, I KNOW that this (fill-in-the-blank-post office/ dry cleaner/ fire station) is AT LEAST (1, 1.5, 2) miles away from home."

Peter looked at me and said, "If I have to carry this 60-pound dog home, it's going to be all your fault." 

At that point, we could almost see our apartment building, so we urged Scout to keep walking. We are all super-tired and my feet were threatening to go on strike. My shoes hurt my feel terribly, but I didn't feel like I had a right to complain, since I was the one who kept pushing everyone onward. 

When we got home, I Mapquested the route we walked and discovered that we had almost covered 5 miles! 

"Throw that pedometer AWAY," Peter said. 

"Hey, look at the bright side," I said. "We conquered the 10,000 paces! Scientists want us to spend two hours walking a day. Although walking to work is going to set your commute back two hours in the morning."

Acela Express Train Straight to HELL

The other day, Peter was at his mother's house when his sister called--keep in mind, this is the sister he no longer calls because the last time he called her she shrieked at him to NEVER call her house after 8pm or he'll WAKE THE BABY!!!!!

To this day, he has never called her house again, so that baby sure is VERY well-rested. 

When Peter's sister found out that he was there, she asked to speak to him--and during the phone conversation, she could not stop shit from falling out of the asshole she calls her mouth. 

Of course, there's the obligatory, "It's really great that you go visit her (meaning their mother)."

I asked Peter what he said to that, he's a much better person than me, because I would be all, "Coming to visit her more than once a year wouldn't kill you, y'know."

But he's not as confrontational as I am so he replied, "Well, she IS my MOTHER." 

And then, later on in the conversation, his sister casually mentioned that her son had his First Communion last week. For those of you who are not Catholic, the First Communion is one of the rites of passage which is traditionally a HUGE family event and although it is a big relief that his sister didn't make a big deal out of it and make us all go, I did feel terrible for his mother, who was a bit shocked and, I'm sure, very upset not to be invited--it's almost on par with you calling up your mother and telling her that her grandchild had gotten married last week and she wasn't invited. 

After he hung up the phone, Peter's mom started to talk about the First Communion, but he really couldn't take another, "Your sister treats me so terribly after I've given her EVERYTHING" conversation. It wasn't that long ago that his sister purposefully snuck out of the house to get to Christmas Mass so she wouldn't have to take her mother. Remember?

The way she has shown favoritism to her daughter really sickens me, especially after she gave Peter's sister the money his grandmother left him (by the way, Peter's sister pulls in $10K per week, so she really doesn't need the dough) during a time we were really struggling after we bought our first house. 

Peter was the one driving his mother to visit his grandmother every week and towards the end, every day, and his grandmother wanted to give him the only money she had left as a token of her appreciation. Peter's grandmother gave the money to his mother and Peter's mother kept it in her own account for years (and used it to buy really expensive gifts for Peter's sister and her family) before putting it in a trust for Peter's nephew and niece. By the way, his sister didn't even attend this grandmother's funeral even though she was in town that day. Don't even get me started on THAT.

I'm always asking Peter how he can still have the relationship he does with his mother and visit her every week. I mean, I'm sure people have turned their backs on their mothers for much less. He always replies by saying, "I know she's not a good person, but she's still my mother. I don't like her very much, and she makes it very difficult to even deal with her on any level. But I'm the kind of person who sees things through. And she's one of those things."

I've gotten mad at my mom for wanting to go to the mall with my sister instead of me. This is one of the many things Peter teaches me every day. He does try to live his life with integrity. Suffice it to say, he is very different from a lot of other guys. 

I asked my friend Andrew about the importance of the First Communion. He is the person I turn to for all things Catholic--and he was HORRIFIED that Peter's mother wasn't invited to the First Communion. 

"Mothers are such a HUGE part of First Communion," he said. "In fact, at my church, the First Communion is always held on Mother's Day, to honor all the mothers and grandmothers. What did Peter's mother do?"

"Well," I said, "She quickly sent her daughter a check as a gift, which I think is totally wrong, because it just reinforces the idea to Peter's sister that she didn't do anything wrong."

"She doesn't deserve a CHECK! She deserves a ticket on the Acela Express Train Straight to HELL!"

That Poor Guy!

Yesterday I went to the movies with my sister and mother. We ended up going to a showing of Valentino, which was really interesting. But before we had made up our minds, I was thinking of taking Judy to go see Wolverine. My mother asked me what that movie was about and I couldn't really come up with a decent explanation so I asked my sister if she could help me out and she said:

It's about this guy. He starts out a normal human and one day a scientist kidnapped him and implanted metal into his hands. 

Hearing this, my mother says, "Oh, that poor guy!"

Phenominal

Peter has a friend on facebook who is always posting these things about her kids, which to someone with no kids, can be the eensy-weensiest bit annoying. I know this is impolite to say, but we really don't care what your four-year-old did at 4pm yesterday, even though it might have been totally great. 

Yeah, we're jerks. 

We barely want to know what YOU did at 4pm yesterday unless it's INTERESTING. 

What's happening with facebook is that people aren't differentiating between interesting and boring anymore. 

So the other day, Peter gets a message on his Blackberry and he shows it to me. This friend has written:

"Just saw Grey Gardens and it was phenominal! What great clothes and such a great life!"

I turned to Peter and said, "Uhm...Great LIFE? Did she SEE THE SAME MOVIE we did? Did she see the part where they were abandoned by everyone in their entire family and living with cat feces under the bed? If that's her idea of a great life, she's more crazy than those old bats!"

Peter said, "The lady spells phenomenal with an "i"--can we really trust her judgement on anything?"

Queer Eye For the Straight First Lady

I was talking to my friend Andrew last night and I was telling him about my horrible Easter Sunday experience and how my brother-in-law is so unhappy that Obama was elected he took it out on us for voting for him. 

So we got to talking about Michelle Obama and what a great job she was doing, especially in getting attention to little-known clothing designers. I love that whenever they talk about Jason Wu they're always bringing up the fact that he's Taiwanese. 

Andrew doesn't think that her outfits are that great. 

"Okay," I said. "I know that she really loves J. Crew, but I think enough is enough. It's okay for her and the daughters to wear something that isn't off-the-rack. I mean, the other day I was watching a show and a woman was talking about how she was going to wear the same dress that Michelle Obama wore for the cover of some magazine. It's a little weird. Women want to dress EXACTLY like her and it's sort of freaky. To combat this weirdness, she should wear things that are one-of-a-kind."

"Personally," Andrew said, "I think she needs a little bit of a Queer Eye for the Straight First Lady."

GOOD Time?!

This past weekend we invited Peter's mom over to our apartment. I made sure that I was home the entire time she was here, because last time we went out to do a little shopping and I came home to find my jewelry box propped open in my underwear drawer. 

I understand that when a mother-in-law comes to visit some snooping may go on, but c'MON! My underwear? You touched my underwear? You KNOW I had to wash everything again.  

Peter said that it was embarrassing on a few levels. 1. because his mother is cuh-razy and 2. the quality of the jewelry in my box. 

Most of that is my fault because I don't really want fancy baubles and I like silly plastic rings with snow globes on them. Although we did chuckle a little at the idea of his mom lifting up my plastic snow globe ring and thinking, "What the HELL?"

This visit went reasonably well except that she kept asking questions every freaking second.

"Where's the flush to your toilet?"

(on the side of the toilet--just like hers)

"What's that noise?"

(the mailman)

"What's THAT noise?"

(the front door)

"What's that noise?"

(the upstairs neighbor)

"What's that noise?"

(me turning on the water faucet)

"What's that noise?"

(the horribly ugly chiming clock you gave us)

"Can you turn off that clock chime?"

Do you get the pattern? 

Then, in the middle of the night, I went to the bathroom and when I opened the door to leave, I saw a scary figure luring in the darkness and I SCREAMED. It scared the BEJESUS out of me. I no longer have any more bejesi because they have all been scared out of me. 

It was my mother-in-law, standing right outside the bathroom door. Why in the world would anyone wait for the bathroom outside the door? I mean, it's not like she needed to beat Peter to the line at 4am in the morning. Any normal person would have listened and waited until I was done. After all, her hearing has been proven to be quite acute.

Apparently, she couldn't sleep, what with all the NOISE in our noisy apartment full of noise made by noisy people living a noisy life. 

Other than the loss of all the bejesi, I thought that the visit went really well. Peter made this awesome pizza and he made delicious corn pancakes for breakfast and we had pasta with homemade pesto made out of our delicious basil plants. 

The next day, when we dropped her off, I turned to her and asked her, "Did you have a good time?"

She kind of did a guffaw kind of thing and snorted and said, "GOOD time?!?" As in, yeah right!" 

This kind of stunned me, because I thought that we were perfect hosts. And also, even if you didn't have a good time, even if we had spent the whole visit pressing toothpicks into your fingernails, the polite thing to do is to say, "Oh yes! It was wonderful!"

She must have seen the look on my face and she rapidly backtracked and said, "Well, I like spending time with Peter...and with you..."

At least she's learning now that she needs to backtrack when she says something shitty...that's progress!!

Just Who is Ashton Kutcher, Anyway?

So who is Ashton Kutcher, anyway? 

He's this guy who did a TV show and a movie with Amanda Peet and then he married Demi Moore and now he's got a Twitter page that a million people are following. 

So? 

And he looks like he's got very silky skin? 

What do you mean? 

His cheeks look silky. 

I guess, but WHO is he? 

Uhm... I don't know, but he's also a twin. I think he kinda sucked all the good parts in the womb and his twin is all messed up and Ashton Kutcher's perfect. 

Oh.....So he's the Devil, then.

How can you say that? 

That's something that the Devil does. 

Grey Depressing Gardens

This past Saturday I wanted to watch the HBO film "Grey Gardens." Of course, we don't have HBO...but Peter's mother does. So I suggested that we make our weekly visit this time on a Saturday. 

Thinking back on this, I should have warned both Peter and his mother about what this movie was about--which means--it's about CRAZY ladies!!

When the movie first started and my mother-in-law saw that it was starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange, she said, "Ohhh!! This is going to be GOOD!" 

And then...

Yes, the two ladies morph into a sad pile of cat-keeping ice cream-eating recluses. This is very far from the kind of movie that the two of them were prepared for--causing Peter to turn to me in the middle of the movie and say, "Why CATS?"

Interpretation: "Why do crazy people keep cats?"

I really don't know. 

At the end of the movie, Peter and his mom were completely traumatized and Peter was all, "You KNEW what this movie was about and you didn't give us ANY HEADS UP? That's so NOT COOL."

And yet, even though it wasn't cool--it was kinda funny. Actually no. Make that REAL funny. 

Cat Clipping

As I've said before, I'm not really a cat person, so when this little creature came up to us in the parking lot, no one could be more surprised than I am that she's still here. 

I don't know much about cat care, but she's been pretty good. She doesn't scratch on our things (so far) or do anything other than hang out in her bed and run away from me when I approach her. 

Lately she's been pawing at our dogs and her claws are SHARP! She took a swipe at me the other day when I tried to adjust her while she was positioned wrong on the toilet and I came away with a bloody hand. I don't want to the dogs to get hurt so I've been reading up on what to do. 

Peter's last cat had been declawed and he said that it completely changed his personality. I asked a couple of my friends with cats and everyone is pretty mixed on the declawing issue. Some people think it's deplorable, others say that their veterinarians have told them that there's nothing wrong with it. I have one friend who said that she left her cat with her mom one time when she had to go on vacation and she came home to discover that her mother had gone ahead and declawed the cat. 

"This is why I NEVER leave anything with my mother anymore," she said. "I come back and it's broken!"

I've been clipping her claws and I think it makes them less like tiny knives and more like tiny not-as-sharp pencil points. But it's still scary to think that she'll go at the dogs with those pencil points. I might try the plastic claw tips and do more research on declawing. 

No More Cupcakes

For Easter Sunday, I decided to make very delicious carrot cake cupcakes with cream cheese frosting topped with a colored chocolate egg. They were so cute! 

Of course, when dessert time rolled around, only Paul, Peter's nephew, had one. He's the only one who ever eats anything I bring, which is why I like him the best. After I mentioned the cupcakes for the third time, Peter's brother's wife said, "I'll take them home."

When you read between the lines, she's saying, "I'd rather eat these dried-out pastries I bought at the store than your freshly-baked cupcakes made lovingly with organic ingredients. But if you insist, I will bring them home with me and throw them out later." 

Peter has beseeched me time and again to not make anything to bring to the dinner table. But I always do, because it makes me happy to make something. The thing is, he always gets really upset when people completely ignore what I bring and then go on and on over some yucky desserts they bought at some no-name bakery. This time, on the way home, he asked me to please not to bring anything over there anymore. 

Although, I don't know when we'll see them again. The good news was that Peter's sister called a few hours before dinner started to let his mom know that she wasn't coming. Apparently, her husband's gout flared up. I didn't even know he had gout. Every time she makes these health excuses for her family it just gets worse and worse. When she didn't make it to my bridal shower she said that everyone had the flu and they were throwing up all over the house. But we all knew that she was fine since we found out later (Peter's mom blabbed) that they went to PA to visit her stepdaughter at her college.  

Unfortunately for us, that meant that Peter's brother and his wife focused all their attention on us and why we are so misguided to vote for Barack Obama, who will drive the economy to the ground and bankrupt the entire nation, leaving our grandchildren to a life of dirt-eating and begging on the streets of Calcutta--therefore, we should watch Bill O' Reilly's show to get the REAL facts. 

It's okay if you don't want to eat my cupcakes, but if you want me to take you remotely seriously, you really can't bring up Bill. 

Is That What You're Wearing?

Today I asked Peter what he was wearing to Easter dinner tomorrow. 

He answered with a smirk and a roll of the eyes. 

"So you're wearing a look of annoyance?" I said. "You know what? I think I might put on that EXACT SAME OUTFIT tomorrow."

Movie Star Legs

Peter and I went to see the play, "God of Carnage." I got the tickets because I LOVE Hope Davis and think that she is awesome (Jeff Daniels, Marcia Gay Harden & James Gandolfini are also in it).

We were pretty stressed out by the time we got there because, although we left the house 1.5 hours earlier (it usually takes us half that time to get downtown), we were still cutting it close. Plus, we got into the biggest fight in the car. And then we had the most ridiculous parking experience ever created (which I will be posting about tomorrow).

So, by the time I got to the theater, I was pretty huffy and puffy. I showed my ticket to the usher and although my seat was only about 5 seats in from the middle, this bouncer-type usher person insisted that I get to my seat from the left side, across about 10 people who were already seated. 

I started to argue with him, pointing out that it would be much easier to get past the four skinny people seated at the other side of the aisle instead of the ten rather corpulent people on the left side. 

During this time, I kept pointing at the aisle and the bouncer/usher was all, "NO WAY. GO TO THE OTHER SIDE. DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT GETTING IN THE LOGICAL WAY."

The skinny people kept looking at me like, "Why is that lady pointing at us and arguing with the usher?"

And the corpulent people? They were SO unhappy to have to move any more than they had to and I had to wade through their force field of unhappiness. They were harrumphing and grumpling left and right. 

Then, when Peter got to the theater, they made him do the same thing and I told him about the stupid bouncer/usher person I had a fight with. 

"That's Kevin Spacey sitting right there," Peter said. "That's probably why they didn't want you to go that way."

Apparently, one of the skinny people was a movie star. 

What makes those movie star legs so fancy that they can't move aside to let people get to their seats?

MY David Letterman

Tonight Julia Roberts was on David Letterman and Peter said to me, "I guess she must really like him and that's why she's always so flirty with him. Even though he must be about twenty years older than her."

"I could see myself being flirty with Jon Stewart. I guess he would be my David Letterman," I said. 

"Uh. No.... Jon Stewart's not THAT old."

"Well, then who would be MY David Letterman?"

"David Letterman."

Why is it that I'm so much younger in MY MIND than I am in REALITY?

Kitty Toilet Training Update

The kitty pooped in the tub today. 

ARGH!!

That's right. This is so upsetting that I'm reduced to expressing myself through dialogue from a bad Archie comic book. 

I simply don't understand this. She's been doing everything fine for the past two weeks. I guess sometimes she just says to herself, "I am NOT doing THAT today. I'm just not." 

I don't know why she takes these random stands. I'm afraid of reprimanding her too much because she might decide she wants to poop on our bed instead of the bathtub. Although that would just make the decision to throw her out the window that much easier. 

Timeless Celebrity Craziness

My friend Andrew and I were talking on the telephone the other day and we LOVE to gossip about celebrities. One time, he had gotten me a subscription to The National Enquirer, not only for the gossip, but also for the crossword puzzles that are easy enough that even I can complete them and of course, The BLUE DOT! 

And if you don't know about the blue dot, then you've never cracked open a National Enquirer. 

After Andrew got me that subscription for my birthday, I started to get all this crazy junk mail. Apparently, a National Enquirer reader is the target audience for porcelain kitten statues and hideous garments from a myriad of ugly clothing manufacturers. 

One of the things I miss about living in Mount Kisco is that the library carried the National Enquirer. It really is the only library I've ever been in which carried that periodical. I used to stop by on my way to the post office to read the current issue. 

For some reason, the library had the current issue, but no back issues you could take out. So you would always have to get to the library each week to look at the gossip. And would it make me seem ridiculous when I admit that when the next Monday rolled around and I had missed last week's issue, I would actually be a little sad? 

Anyway, we were talking about the Miley Cyrus and I said,

"Well, before you know it, her parents will be pimping her out just like Alyssa Milano's parents did in the eighties."

To which Andrew replied:

"We should start a new blog that compares today's celebrity craziness with celebrity craziness in the past. We could call it Celebrity Craziness--Yesterday and Today."

I'm sure lots of people would be interested in comparative essays on celebrity gossip. 

Conversation About Easter

Me: So, who's going to be there for Easter?

Peter: I don't know.

Me: What do you mean, you don't know? That's all your mom talks about for weeks before everybody gets here. 

Peter: Well, I try not to pay attention to her. Anyway, why do you need to know?

Me: Because I want to know. So I can prepare myself. 

Peter: I have no idea who is coming. 

Me: Really. You have absolutely no idea. I find that hard to believe. I think you just don't want to tell me. That's fine. Because when I don't make enough cupcakes, you can tell your niece and nephew that they don't get any because their Uncle Peter told his wife that they weren't going to be there. 

Peter: Oh. They're going to be there. 

Me: Then you have an idea of who's going to be there? 

Peter: I might. 

Me: PETER!!

This Makes Me Happy All Day

I think that I can understand a little bit about parenthood, just from dealing with my new kitten. 

We've been trying to toilet-train her for the past few weeks and have now gotten to the point where there's merely a small rim of litter underneath the toilet seat. I was afraid that when we took away the second-to-last toilet litter kwitter ring, that we were going to have an upset. 

The last time we moved one stage over, Meow Meow showed us her displeasure by pooping on the bathroom floor, then not pooping at all for three whole days, then pooping in the bathtub, and of course, pooping in her scratch pad. 

But this time, so far so good, she's been pooping (and peeing) into the toilet--YAY!!

And then the rest of the day, every time I thought about the kitty, it made me smile. I caught myself with the biggest grin on my face as I was driving home from Trader Joe's and I thought, "Wow. The fact that my cat pooped in the toilet makes me happy ALL DAY. Is that normal?"