I hate to go to a gathering empty-handed. Housewarming? I bring a pineapple. Birthday? At least a homemade card. And so it bothers me incessantly that each year my parents refuse to admit any shortcomings on the day before Thanksgiving. I've spoken to one parent or the other three times today, mostly to come up with a winter-weather strategy. Each time I've asked, "So, remember anything you've forgotten yet?" Each time the answer has been NO. They are simply too good at this.
We are bringing the following unsolicited items to Thanksgiving dinner:
1.) 2 dozen freshly-baked M&M cookies on a leafy plastic plate
2.) Creme de Cacao (my father makes kick-ass brandy alexanders)
3.) my mother's black sweater, with newly replaced buttons
4.) a bottle of cheap red wine, although my mother specifically requested Canei (yes you can!)
What are YOU bringing? Don't be a stooge. Come on, you've got to bring something.
We awoke this morning to the kind of snow that would make the entire state of New Jersey weep with fear. I was lying in bed when my snow instinct bell went off -- a sensory skill perfected during winter mornings in upstate New York, waiting, half-awake, for one of my parents to come into my room to say we were having a snow day. It is tripped by a curious muffled silence and the occasional distant creak of a footstep or car wheels. I can't see the parking lot or any roads from here, but the woods out back are coated in that beautiful whipped cream white, four inches at least and it's still coming down. You can keep your pansy wintery mix; this is fucking New England, baby.
There's nothing like meeting with a personal trainer to destroy any positive body image you might have had. I worry constantly about my body image, more than I worry about my actual body, mainly because my mother, and, for that matter, pretty much every woman in my life, has suffered her entire life from a negative self-image. My mother has paid out thousands to various businesses, so that they can sell her more information, more negativity, more crap than she knows what to do with, all of which tells her that she just needs to pay more money to be thin, without ever defining a healthy goal for her. Asking me, "well, how much weight would you like to lose?" makes me swallow back an angry, "none."
Would I like to be healthier? Yes. Lead a less-lethargic lifestyle? You bet; that's why I joined a gym, bucko. Look better naked? But of course.
But do I want to "lose weight?" Thanks, but not particularly.
Trainer: Well, what size do you wear now?
Me: Fourteen.
Trainer: What size would you like to be?
Me: (through gritted teeth): Ten?
Trainer: Let's really get serious about this... when was the last time you were an eight?
Me: When I was twelve.
In retrospect, he had some good points. I don't schedule my eating well. I rarely eat breakfast, and have a light lunch and a huge dinner. He insists this forces my body to store the food I do provide under the assumption that it doesn't know when the next meal will come. This makes sense. And I can't argue with the fact that I'm a lazy bum. Giving up the sports-centric lifestyle I've led my whole life has taken its toll. It's just that smarmy vibe that comes from anyone making their living off someone else's health. This was just a complimentary meeting, a "reward" for joining the gym, and facing the state of my health in any capacity always makes me feel like this. I know he can help me, and I know he didn't mean to make me feel "fat" or "sick," but he (or maybe just growing up through the eighties and nineties, watching my mother continuously dieting; being told lately that I have a "pudgy little belly" growing; watching E and MTV and the Victoria's Secret fashion show; feeling menstrual, stressed out from the move, and exhausted) did.
I have a husband for whom assembling a modular shelving design purchased in 46 separate boxes is not a chore, but the highlight of a week that includes the biggest turkey dinner East Greenbush has ever seen.
I love orange. Anything orange, I'll take it. I'll put it on a high shelf and worship it in my orange shrine. I'll surround it with other happy little orange things, so it can feel the joy of the orange community. Hence, it's taken me a while to show any real interest in redesigning my (quite orange, you will note) website. I dread deserting Blogger; I so rarely find a company with such a nice orange logo. The only colors that come close to making me as happy as orange are taxicab yellow and sportscar red.
Years ago, when the time came to decorate a particularly beige bathroom in a peculiarly vanilla apartment, my mind naturally drifted to orange. Trouble was, there were no orange towels to be found. Anywhere! Really, try it sometime. Go to a store, any store with a linens department, and scan the racks... no orange! Melon, maybe. Seashell, to be sure. Coral? Of course. But never, never orange.
Until Ikea. A few days before the big move, we paid a preventative visit to Ikea. It was with a nod toward furnishing the apartment we'd seen but once, with dimensions we'd neglected to note, and a color scheme we'd never seen while blinded by the sheer giganticism of the place. We searched couches (blech.), beds (bah.), and dining decor (don't think so.), and concluded we'd outgrown the Scandanavian ways of our youth. Until we entered the cursed Marketplace, and began loading up the giant plastic bag with items of varying utility.
And then! In the corner! There! they! were!
At long last, my orange towels. With a pleading glance at Marc (more of a mauve man, truth be told), I rushed toward them. They were a little rougher than I'd hoped, with a ribby surface instead of the plush finish I'd imagined, but they were unabashedly, unapologetically, undeniably orange. Almost orange and a half. 110% orange, at least.
Which was a good thing, because they have proceeded to spew lint over half of the apartment. I've already washed them several times, and yet it continues. In fact, just now, in a mistake of creative laundry sorting, they managed to take the lives of both of my favorite wool mittens. A matching set, once of powder blue with cute hand-knotted red yarn bows, they now have an overfuzz of reddish orange that will have to be hand-picked away. Such is the price we pay for the ass-kick-orange bathroom I've always wanted.
I just left the apartment alone for the first time in two days. I was nearly broadsided by a light blue pickup truck as I turned left onto Route 1. He was running a red light and I didn't bother double checking the intersection because I was being blinded by the sun. He didn't even swerve. He just kept right on going in the left lane, completely oblivious to the situation. I turned into Dunkin Donuts instead of pulling up alongside him at the next light, because I knew my New York plates would have left me obliged to give him the hand.
If you've ever been a NY driver or encountered an angry one, I'm sure you know of the hand. It lies somewhere between a flip of the bird and a smack upside the head. It's the most powerful weapon in an urban driver's arsenal (I've been known to avoid eye contact, just to prevent transference of the hand), and as such it appears rarely. In certain circumstances, however, its use is unavoidable. Beware the New Yorker bearing the hand.
It's true, things have slowed down around here. The arrival of broadband, cable (mostly TLC, HGTV, Discovery, and the 7 omnipresent MTVs), a comfy futon and the complete unpacking of the kitchen have led me to a state of loungey lethargy. The main problem at this point is that, while the apartment is huge, we just have so many small things. Things that need shelves and drawers and cubby holes that just aren't available. Yet.
But we've got a plan. A monolithic structure of Ikeac proportion will be built, lightly sanded with a warm honey finish and a protective coat of varnish, with attractive wrought detailing and fine Scandanavian craftsmanship. We moved out of the city so we could justify buying a truck so we could go back to the city so we could buy Ikea furniture and actually be able to transport it out of the city, or something like that.
We're building, in the post-college, pre-grown-up way that only a couple of twenty-somethings legitimately can: with an allen wrench, an offering to Sven, the god of cross-supports, a poorly translated instruction sheet, and, hopefully, not too many left-over parts.
Futon here.
Futon big.
Futon curiously tall.
Futon first opportunity for multiple-sitter type sitting since, oh, I don't know, March-time.
Futon interim living room solution until couch and chair delivered. Then futon part of (hopefully) complementary furniture set.
Futon kicking ass out of sitting on broken Ikea chair.
We're here, finally. The movers, despite my efforts to screen, were more than slightly impaired. They completely misjudged the amount of stuff we have and it took them an extra trip with a van to finish the job. Actually, it was hardly that simple... but after much yelling ensued, our belongings were reunited.
Last week was incredibly busy. We have CT drivers' licenses. We have broadband. We have about 70% of our belongings either unpacked or in the general vicinity of where they belong. Marc made the observation that if we got rid of all of our books and CDs/cassettes/videos, we would have about half as much stuff. Our kitchen is incredibly well organized, thanks to me. Furniture (real grown-up type furniture! A couch! A chair! A dining room table! A futon! A new bed!) has been ordered and is in transit. We bought Marc his very own Subaru Forrester. (I'll stick with the Seven for now.) We've even traveled to Albany and back, testing out the all-wheel-drive in a bitter ice storm, all to see my brother play M. Jacques in Moliere's "The Miser."
Now, finally, it's Sunday night and we're beginning to settle down. We've just returned from Mystic Pizza and we're getting ready to watch The Sopranos on our cable-enabled TV. We caught last week's episode on Wednesday night; holy crap. Thank goodness we're finally rid of you-know-who.
There's so much more to say. I'm feeling pretty good. This is just a start.
We're packing. I swear. Anyway, before we go, here are some new pictures I've just uploaded. Mom's retirement bash! Crafty ladies make marble magnets and cheesy pumpkin goody bags! Halloween at the nursery school! The NYC marathon! That'll keep 'em occupied, I say.
Marc says they are too big. Are they? Are you seriously still using dial-up internet service? They take, like, two fractions of a second, now, on DSL.
The movers will be here soon. We had one last NY Italian dinner last night, then headed to Remote Lounge for an anonymous goodbye to the faces of this fair city. On one hand, I will miss being a New Yorker (again), but on the other hand I can't wait to get the hell out of here. I'm not sure if the nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach is because we're both now unemployed, because we've been stirring up the dust in here for the last hour, or because I haven't eaten anything yet today. In any case, things will be quiet around here until Tuesday, when we're scheduled for the cable modem hookup. Already we will be reaping the benefits of rural living -- the cable guy could have come even earlier, but we had to put off the appointment because he was available before we would even move in. Average hookup delay in NYC: about 1 month. See you sooner.
I get a surprising number of hits on this site from people apparently looking for this post, "you know you're from the capital district when...". Well, I know my audience, so allow me to now present (yet another e-mail copied and pasted from my dad) this even-better list:
You know you're from upstate New York if:
1. Your idea of a traffic jam is ten cars waiting to pass a tractor on the highway.
2. "Vacation" means going to Lake George for the weekend.
3. You measure distance in hours.
4. You know several people who have hit deer more than once.
5. You often switch from "Heat" to "A/C" in the same day.
6. You use a down comforter in the summer.
7. Your grandparents drive at 65 mph through 13 feet of snow during a raging blizzard, without flinching.
8. You see people wearing hunting clothes at social events.
9. You install security lights on your house and garage and leave both unlocked.
10. You think of the major food groups as deer meat, beer, fish, and berries.
11. You carry jumper cables in your car and your girl-friend knows how to use them.
12. There are 7 empty cars running in the parking lot at the Stewarts at any given time.
13. You design your kid's Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit.
14. Driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow.
15. You think sexy lingerie is tube socks and flannel pajamas.
16. You know all 4 seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter, construction.
17. It takes you 3 hours to go to the store for one item even when you're in a rush because you have to stop and talk to everyone in town.
I don't readily drop the band info into conversation, you know. Some folks seem to think that bandliness is next to godliness, and I really don't want to be mistaken for one of those people, you know. There's more to me than just my talent, you know. There's so much more. Honestly, you think you know, but you have no idea.
The first band was called Street Beat. We were alternately known in some circles as Street Beet, depending on who assembled the press package. We had a brisk, poppy sound, and our lyrics were replete with references to the toys we wanted for Christmas (I was hoping for my two front teeth; my cousin Brian just wanted a harmonica), the power of love and how we desperately needed to get back in time. Yes, we were a cover band, and our instruments might have just been old wood from my uncle's garage, but we painted frets on those boards and decorated them with sequins and yarn from my grandmother's sewing box. As you may have deduced, we had only two records to lip sync to, but my cousin's house had an outdoor power outlet and we would blast those two records far and wide, set up staging out near the street and wait for "traffic" to drive past. Once, a driver threw a tennis ball at us as he passed. We fought over that ball for three hours.
Next there was the Bloomingdale Bombers, actually just the next generation of Street Beat, formed when Brian and his sister Kristy moved further down the street and decided they didn't want to play with me or my brother any longer. Our sound was lighter, more "easy listening." This was because my cousin owned the record player and all Matt and I had was a battery-powered radio with the dial stuck on my parents' station.
I left the Bloomingdale Bombers for personal reasons. I won't get into them here, but I will mention that there are no lingering feelings of animosity among former members of either the Bombers or the Beat. In fact, we look back on those years fondly, except for the question of who ultimately wound up taking the tennis ball home. My musical career wandered a bit, through years of piano lessons and a brief, embarrassing stint with an actual guitar, crafted in Korea of the finest polycarbonate/ABS blend. Then there were the H years, and my time spent with Alternachiquita (AKA Big Ass Funky Girl Band, a name we dropped after noticing the ambiguity regarding the actual sizes of our asses), a band crafted from the "hype first, play later" school of music. I don't remember much about the 'chiquita, or maybe I'm just blocking out that cover of Rock Lobster.
Full story here. "New York's comic book alter-ego Gotham has its Dark Knight in Batman, but it turns out the real city has its own caped crusader. Lotharios everywhere, beware, because Terrifica, scarlet-costumed avenger and protector of women, is on the prowl on the city's party scene."
But the character I'm really interested in is Fantastico, Terrifica's arch-enemy. Ladies, look alive!
Note: I fixed the link.
I seem to have developed a minor digestive allergy to (wait for it) alcohol. It's the common thread in three recent bouts of gastrically distressful nights. Today (yesterday) was Marc's birthday. We were supposed to go to his parents' house for a special dinner and cake, but then his sister came down with mono, so we decided to cancel. So the extended in-laws and we headed to the only hip restaurant in the Bronx, Tosca, where I helped myself to a complimentary apple martini (Marc's cousin is a waitress there and knows the bartender). And now, here I am.
Does anyone ever successfully execute an amicable departure from their job? When I quit back in March, everything was all, "what can we do to keep you?" and "let us know if you need anything," for about a day. Then it was more like, "what exactly are you accusing us of?" and "I don't really think we should have any more contact after you leave." This made for a pleasant final three weeks, as you may remember, during which I would cry myself to sleep and spend my days in a sullen stupor until the whole deal finally culminated with a forced, somber farewell party with a couple of sincere friends, a few professional acquaintances, and a bitter, evil, former boss who croaked out some quasi-enthusiastic compliments when pestered for a speech as jaws around the room dropped. After all that, I managed to leave with a smile on my closed mouth and my dignity intact.
As Marc prepares to leave his job, I see the same thing happening. He's on the phone for hours at a time, defending his professionalism and ethics, and I just want to grab the phone and protect my husband, screaming into the phone on his behalf, "do you have any idea who you're speaking to? This is the most sensitive man you will ever have the pleasure of working with. He sat up nights wondering if this or that was the right thing to do and the right way to do it." Marc made his own professional contacts and has executed a deal independent of his former employer. And while that's precisely the sort of employee that it sucks to lose, his courage has made him fierce and I don't see him caving in to these ridiculous accusations, not any time soon, anyway. He may be sensitive, but he's not exactly the sort to cry himself to sleep at night.
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