Two New Members of the List Family!

Previous entries here and here, but now please welcome

102 (or thereabouts).  Go on Jeopardy, win money, and express extreme disappointment in Alex Trebek's moustachiolessness.

Good.

Better.

103 (or thereabouts).  One time, randomly, in a spirit of celebrating the mundane, buy the next round for the entire bar.  Bonus points for telling everyone it's because I found out that I'm pregnant after I dramatically drain my glass.

Viva!

Buy Yourself This After You Stick a Sock in it.

Hi, folks!  Yes, I am aware that I have been a neglectful blogger.  And, no, I will not be picking up the pace just yet.  We are excited here at Me Show HQ about our upcoming location to a WHOLE NEW HQ.  So posts will be less frequent as we box up our goods and transport them to our new digs a whopping 10 blocks away.  Oh, Ballard!  I just can't quit you!

Until then, suck it up.  Let this be your inspiration.

Follow my lead, plebes!  Get your copy of this poster here.

Or, if you're really desperate for some hot Me Show action, then get your parasitic arse over here and pack a box or two to hasten my return.  We are currently accepting applications for Moving Buddies, so submit yours today!

Tidbits and Whatnots

I haven't posted in over a week, which is dangerous when one has such a devoted fan base of obsessive parents, in-laws, and grandparents as I have.  But Livy, SLB, and I have been sick - REAL SICK - all over again, and I haven't wanted to take pictures or observe my own life, let alone formulate coherent blog posts about any of it.

So, here.  This is what you get.

1.  I have a cousin named Candice (known better as Kansas, Gorkus, Candy, and Candybaby).  She is awesome and can kill you with one shot from a hundred paces, no shit.  She's in the Navy and just got back from overseas where she fixed aircraft and did not have to put her sharpshooting skills to use, thank goodness.  She is as stubborn and hard-hearted as I am, and our family has speculated about the potential outcome of a fistfight between the two of us for decades.  Now that she can do a million pushups in a minute or whatever the military requires and I'm a squishy mom speculation has dwindled to... well... this blog post.

Livy is convinced that Candy is a celebrity because she's in 3 of the pictures on our fridge.  That means a lot when your exposure to the world generally consists of trips to the grocery store and reading a book about a mermaid parade 7 times a day.

2.  We are bad parents.

It's my kid in a box!  (Anyone wanting to make a joke about her birth will have to remember that I had a C-section).

3.  The Deschutes Brewery in Portland has both delicious beer and crafty beer bottle holiday lights.  There are tiny holes drilled in the back of the bottles to accommodate the twinkle lights that are strung behind the whole row.  If I ever get a fancy glass-bottle-hole-drilling machine I might make some of these.  But most likely I'll just post them here.

Perfect for a man cave.  O.K., the coast is clear; you can make your vagina joke now.

4.  With all due respect to The Pipettes, The Morah and I are the prettiest girls you've ever met.

We wear interesting jackets like the future candidates wives we are fast becoming.

5.  One of the best things about sharing a camera with SLB are the secret gems he leaves me on our memory card.  Viking dog agrees.

Jag håller med.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have more expectorating to do.

Whistler's Daughter

"When I was your age I had to walk to school uphill both ways...

...BOTH ways, dammit."

So This Is the New Year

Oh, hell, you all knew I was going to quote this song, didn't you?  Yeah, act surprised.  I'll consider it a late Christmas gift.

The funny thing is that I actually do feel somewhat different.  I'm approaching 2011 with a different goal than I usually do.  I've written before how my resolution lists are generally multi-page affairs with cross-referenced headings and numerous sub-headings and -goals, but not this year.  I've simplified it to one word and one action.  The word for this year is Energy, since I feel like my attention and vitality were sucked dry last year by family traumas and poor SAHM life management skills (Pajamas 'til 11?  Why the hell not?!  And, hey, who needs to go outside anyway when we have books inside?).  So this year, as of yesterday actually, I'm attempting to pay attention to where my, um, attention and time go rather than ruminating on sadness and miring myself in the couch cushions.  So far, so good.  And the action to accompany this single-word intention into the new year is to go to the gym every weekday morning before SLB gets up and leaves for work, barring only my sickness or his travel.   This will aid in approaching my life with vigor (Why do I always want to pronounce that loudly and with a thick New England accent - VIGAH! - like an enthusiastic Katharine Hepburn or Kennedy?) because 1) duh, it's exercise, 2) I can already be up, fed, and dressed by the time Livy gets up, and 3) it'll force me to go to bed early.  Win-win-win!

VIGAH!

VIGAH!

Also, since this is a time for resolutions and my lovely friend Carolina, she of the fabulous Kittens and Grits, namechecked me heartily in a new post on her life list, I'll make up for lost time and update you on my life list (part 1, part 2).

Things I've done:
17. Go out for a lovely meal with excellent food and spectacular service BY MYSELF.
I took myself out to Steelhead Diner one day for lunch while my mom took care of Livy.  It was delightful and decadent for about 10 minutes, after which time I got lonely and wanted some company to talk to about my delicious meal.  I do love being alone and take pleasure in my own company, but I love talking to other people about food even more.  Solo movies, plays, and travel are all cool - but eating alone just isn't my bag, apparently.

20. Fit back into my wedding rings.

There's more than one way to skin a cat, so instead of going on a forced march of punitive dieting I had a jeweler enlarge my rings by half a size.  I even picked them up on my way to Steelhead Diner.  Victory!

24. Attend one of Christine Kane’s retreats.

I've compromised on this for now and am taking her Uplevel Your Life course at home.  It starts in earnest on Monday, and I'm so excited!  What a better time to get clear and conscious about your life than at the New Year, eh?

40. Learn how to stand up for myself without resorting immediately to nuclear options.

This is clearly ongoing, but 2010 has been a banner year for setting logical boundaries and communicating calmly and clearly.

48. Vacation in the San Juans with Livy and SLB
49. Take Livy and SLB whale watching
Done and done, friends.

58. Make this silly little house feel like a silly little home.
This, too, is ongoing, but is going well.  I've decluttered like a mutha this year, and we even decorated for Halloween AND Christmas.  Also, we've hung more than 3 pictures on our walls after 5 years of living here. It's almost like we live here or something.

65. Invest in good food, good bras, and good shoes.
Yes, yes, and yes.

84. Come to a decision on the tattoo issue.
The answer is "no."  What appeals to me now is hardly likely to appeal to me in 10 years, just as the tattoo I wanted 10 years ago would seem trite and childish now.  Unless I get really drunk and get John Hancock's signature inked above my C-section scar, I shall die untatted.

It suits me, no?

85. Drink more champagne.

It's now my standard aperitif when we go out to a nice meal.

92. Watch AFI’s 100 best films
Working on it (And who are you mofos who like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?  Top 100?  Seriously?  Likewise, Network.  Faye Dunaway's nipples do not a good movie make.  Chinatown (Faye Dunaway's nipples and all) and Annie Hall are two new favorites, though.)

Oh for the love.  A temporally incongruous musical interlude will never convince me that this useless scene is charming.

100. Love this little family, and tell them I love them every, every, every day
Well, yeah.  Of course.

AND I got rid of the secret item on the list that I wouldn't tell you about.  I'm still not telling, either.

So, thanks to Carolina for helping me remember my list!  I think I'll print it out and put it in my planner to remind me of my awesome goals.  

So, what's on your lists, friends?  And what did you do this year to fulfill it?

2/5, Holiday Edition

Remember that one time when I confessed that Jack Black and Jason Segel represent 2 of my 5 celebrity "gimmes"?  Did you also know that they made a cartoon of themselves singing one of my favorite Christmas carols, the David Bowie/Bing Crosby version of "Little Drummer Boy"?

Well, they did.



Merry Christmas to me!

Christmas Eve Eve Makes Me Feel Fine

Livy is at Oma and Opa's having the time of her life (Did you know that she sings Opa's name when we practice singing together?  That little girl has a serious case of Opa-love.), I've taken a 2 hour nap and wrapped the final pile of presents, SLB is on his way home from work to take me out to a new gastropub in the neighborhood, and Amelie is going to be on TV in about 5 minutes.  Life is good, people.

So, until the holidays are over and we have some time to breathe, let this suffice as a Merry Christmas to you, dear readers.  You are the reason for the season!  Well, you and these people:

All tuckered out from an exciting holiday show (Yes, those ARE puffed sleeves.  You only get one chance to be a little girl in a Christmas dress.  Go big or go home.)

Singing to SLB's fine accompaniment

My peeps.

And to all a good night!

In No Way Safe for Work, So Don't Be Stupid

I had forgotten how much pure, sweet pleasure this brings me.  Aaaaaahhhhh...



And this ends my recent spate of NWA references.  I promise to talk like the college-educated, privileged people that Ice Cube and I are.  And, Mr. Cube, to answer your question:  Yes, we are there yet.

Promises

Olivia, that loving little cherub, has a great new trick.  Whenever we're out in a crowd, usually when shopping, she likes to reach out toward people, grin, and say "HI!" in her cutest voice.  Absentmindedly, I'd been saying "Are you making buddies?  Is that your buddy?" whenever she'd do that.  So now she skips me as the middle man and just shouts "HI, BUDDIES!" at anyone she thinks will say "hi" back.  And that's where things get weird, because about half the time the person she's just greeted won't say hi back.  I've seen people stiffen and avert their eyes as if she'd just asked them for change.  It's cold, it's weird, and it's far more socially awkward than saying hello to a cheerful little girl.

How dead inside do you have to be to give this smile a cold shoulder?

So, I hereby promise to greet in kind any child who says hi to me.  I'm happy to teach kids by example that if they go out of their way to be friendly that their effort will be reciprocated.  Also, I promise to buy lemonade from any sidewalk lemonade stand.  I do not promise to drink it, but I promise to make my quarters jingle in the piggy banks of young entrepreneurs.  Yeah, it's nice to be nice, and it's even nicer to teach kids to be nice through our niceness.  God bless us everyone.

Breathing Easier

I just hauled myself off of my sickbed (sickcouch, really), took a shower, put on deodorant, and dressed myself in nonpajama clothing.

Celebrate with me, won't you?

Eat This: Sweet Potato and Pepper Soup

"Eat me!," says the soup.  You'd do well to listen to it.

I've made this recipe so often over the years that SLB and I now just call it The Soup.  In an attempt to scare off this cold I made an extra potent batch today in the hopes that the Vitamin C from the peppers, Vitamin A from the sweet potatoes, and heat from the chipotles would nuke the virus out of my system.  Whether or not it has done so remains to be seen, but after a hot bowl of this soup I do feel at least 15% more human.  So, if you've got a bad case of boogers and/or cooties, I recommend that you gather these ingredients and make a pot of this soup for yourself.

What you need:
*2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and roughly chopped into about 1 inch dice (You're going to blend this soup later, so chopping doesn't need to be precise)
*1 yellow onion, chopped
*2 bell peppers (I like red and/or yellow for color contrast), seeded and chopped
*Hot peppers (In the past I've used 2 jalapenos seeded and diced, but here I used 1 chipotle in adobo sauce)
*48 oz of chicken or vegetable stock (give or take)
*About 2 cups of corn kernels (fresh is best, thawed frozen is second-best, drained canned is third-best)
*The juice of about .25 lime
*Salt and pepper to taste
*Olive oil
*Sour cream or plain yogurt, chopped cilantro, chopped green onion (optional, but awesome)

What to do:


*Sautee the peppers and onions in a splash of olive oil with a dash of salt over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes or until the vegetables start to sweat.  They shouldn't brown, but rather begin to melt together and release their juices to make a yummy veggie liquor.

*When the peppers and onions have softened and mingled, add the sweet potatoes and stock.  Bring to a boil and then reduce to low.  Cover and simmer for 25 minutes.

*Remove the pot from the heat and blend the soup.  If using an immersion blender, you can go for it right away.  If you're blending the soup in batches in a conventional blender, let it cool for about 10 minutes before you do so.  If you try to blend the soup while it's still boiling hot you run the risk of hot, steaming soup exploding from your blender carafe onto every surface in the kitchen (ceiling included!) and scalding the living daylights out of your arm.  Or so I hear.  I'm way too fly to have experienced that kind of buffoonery myself.

*When the soup is velvety smooth add your corn, a healthy squeeze of lime, and salt and pepper to taste.

*Serve immediately with sour cream or yogurt, chopped cilantro, and chopped green onion.  Voila!  Delicious!

Health in a bowl, I tell ya.

Sick Days

Livy and I have caught terrible colds and are lying low this week.  This is what that looks like:

It ain't pretty, but it'll do.

Snuggly baby?  Check.  Her favorite book, Mermaids on Parade (a gift from Mrs. Miller that Livy begs for all day long)?  Check.  Bed head?  Check.  Blanket made out of recycled Crown Royal bags (a gift from my miscreant uncle who personally emptied each and every bag)? Check.

And we're off!

Go team!

Sadly, we'll be here all week!

Bought Her That: Mini Marauder Hat

In an effort (and for a notorious grinch like me it truly is an effort) to make merry this holiday season, SLB and I took Livy to the Phinney Neighborhood Association's Winter Festival and Crafts Fair last weekend.  In addition to some quotidian vegetable wax candles and secret gifties we splurged on a fine fleece hat made by my friend Lynn for my friend Livy.

(Leif Erickson > Leif Garrett) < Livy

It's called the Mini Marauder hat, and it is awesome.  Lynn's company, Pingihats, sells at Pike Place Market and at her studio, Absolutely Fabulous, in Queen Anne.  You would be an idiot not to buy one of her designs, even if pillaging isn't on your personal agenda (the fox hat almost came home with us, too).  It is on Livy's, though, and she wears her hat with pride!

Hide yer daughters and yer cheddar bunnies!

In fact, I liked this picture so much that it made our Christmas card shortlist - in sepia, no less.

So old-timey, plus it detracted from the clashing patterns on  her shirt, jacket, and car seat.

We wound up choosing a more seasonally-appropriate photo that implies much less threat of Viking violence.  Maybe if you're lucky you'll be receiving one of these cards in the mail.  And if you don't, maybe you should consider being nicer to us and buying us more presents and fancy coffee drinks.  Just a little something to consider in the new year.  No pressure.

IT'S LIKE THEY KNOW ME!

I was just posting a comment on Auntie Spotter's website for Sarah Potter Photography and this - THIS! - was my secret comment-posting code:

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  Don't mind if I do!

Friends, that secret code says "fartme."  FARTME!  FART!  ME!  It truly is a season of miracles, large and small, and this is proof of that! 

This is going to be a good day.

And because my mom's been after me to post new photos of Livy, here you go!  Now stop nagging me, woman!

Oma giving Livy her first haircut after Thanksgiving dinner.  (If your kitchen doesn't look like this after a holiday meal, then you're not eating well.)

Showing of her bangs at the Portage Bay Cafe

Saying cheese while eating cheese - so meta.

Yardwork in November

I can't think of much clever to say, so why don't you listen to this fine song by an old friend of Uncle Damon's and look at my adorable family frolicking in the autumn leaves before they were covered in snow.

Leaves are fun!

No, Daddy!  Leaf me alone, you rake!

How about you get me instead...

then we practice our stunts...

 

finish up with a celebatory snuggle...

 

and go inside for a hearty serving of Mom's miraculous mac-n-cheese?

I like Actual Tigers.  I like autumn.  I like my family.  I love my mac-n-cheese.  The end!

Abominable Snowbaby!

We here in Sea-town are in the icy grip of what in most cities would be a mild and uninteresting snowfall.  Here, though, in a city filled with hills and generally without any idea what to do with any snow whatsoever it is RUINOUS SNOPOCALYPSE 2010!  Stock up on batteries and canned meats!  Hide your daughters and your jewels!  The end is nigh! 

Aieeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

At least this is what it's like for normal working folks who must drive and function in the stuff.  Livy and I had a great day at home filled with hours of books, blocks, low-speed indoor chases, and 10 minutes of frenzied snow play.  Because Olivia's not walking yet (But she's working on 3-syllable words.  ACT SURPRISED.) and I have no proper cold weather gear for her I expected that she'd hate being out in the snow.  But no!  She is the Shackleton of the toddler set and charged about like a bouncing bumble until her pants soaked through and she started shivering. 

"I seemed to vow to myself that some day I would go to the region of ice and snow and go on and on till I came to one of the poles of the earth, the end of the axis upon which this great round ball turns." - Ernest Shackleton

"Superhuman effort isn't worth a damn unless it achieves results." - E.S.

"We had seen God in His splendors, heard the text that Nature renders. We had reached the naked soul of man. " - E.S.

"If I had not some strength of will I would make a first class drunkard." - E.S.

More Nicks Than Nicks

Oh, Regine Chassagne. 

Come hither?  Don't mind if I do!

Will you always wear sparkly, twirly dresses?  And will they always have matching fingerless gloves?  And will you always, always be mine?



Watch until the end when she outNickses the Nicks.  It takes my breath away.  If I'm not Tippi next year for Halloween I'm getting a curly wig and being Regine.  Shoot, I might just be Regine regardless of the day.  I think we'd all agree that it'd be an improvement, and maybe SLB will grow a foot and become Win Butler.  Win-win Win!

Buy Me That: Tippi Hedren Barbie Doll

Back when I was in graduate school the first time around I fell HARD for film studies and managed to finagle a degree in English by taking mostly film classes and writing about feminist film theory for nearly every paper.  Ever an enormous coward, I surprised myself by finding that I really enjoy the horror genre as long as I approach it from an analytical and academic standpoint (any other standpoint and I just pee my pants and stop sleeping at night) and did some fun work on Psycho and Rosemary's Baby.  But the most fun I had at the place where fun goes to die was in writing one of my master's theses on The Birds.

Tippi's costume and hair + Jessica Tandy's face = weird Oedipal shit from the get-go, yo!  MY GOD, I love this movie. 

As I was working on my The Birds paper, cleverly titled "Rip Her to Shreds" and featuring an introductory quotation from the Blondie song, I became strangely obsessed with the movie and its star, Tippi Hedren.  I went so far as to buy an autographed 8x10 of her as a victory gift once the paper was finished and to drag my friend Jacob to see her speak at a screening of the film at the Siskel Film Center, where Ms. Hedren took umbrage at my questions about the anomalously terrible hilltop scene and berated me in front of the entire audience. It was humilitng!  It was hilarious!  It cemented a fixation that necessitates this purchase:

Accuracy right down to the stilettos...

That, dear readers, is the Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds Barbie doll, and you'd do well to consider it under my name on your Christmas shopping list.  If it makes you feel more comfortable we can pretend that it's for Livy.  Of course, if she ever touches it she'll be grounded for weeks, so she'd better get smart and stick with playing with matches and kitchen knives.

Or, if she really must participate in Mommy's madness, perhaps next year I'll wear a Tippi costume for Halloween and then dress her up in a crow costume to chase me around the neighborhood.

Oh yeah.  Halloween 2011 - LOOK OUT!

ALL HAIL THE ME SHOW!

What a waste of your time.  You ought to be ashamed.

Today marks both the one year anniversary of this blog AND my 200th post!  Hoory for me!  Hooray for you for getting to read so much about me!  Viva!  Viva!

Thanks for reading, friends!  Now, in honor of these two momentous occasions, I invite you to write a comment introducing yourself.  My stats tell me that I've had over 5,000 unique readers this year, and I've often wondered just who the hell you are.  So, tell me!  Who the hell are you?  Be ye friend or foe?  Are you just my parents, the Weavers, and the Morah using thousands of different IP addresses to stroke my ego?  Say hi!

Here, I'll start:  Hi!

he Is Always Lowercase

Ooh La La!  The French - they have a word for everything.

My first real adolescent crush was on Steve Martin, and he has remained in my "Allowable Celebrity Lay" Top 5 ever since I saw him in L.A. Story on HBO when I was about 13.  Not only was he handsome (I am a true sucker for a silver fox [I'm talking to you, Eric Ripert.]) and funny, but I could tell from the writing in that movie that, colonic irrigation jokes aside, he was smart.  It was the first time that it had occurred to me that smart could also mean attractive, a notion that both gave me hope for my own gawky, flat-chested, braniac self and for the prospect of finding my own more age-appropriate Steve Martin one day.

I may be smooching you, SLB, but I'm thinking about The Jerk.

And I suppose that in many ways, I did just that.  But until SLB's flawless mahogany locks salt themselves pepperless, part of my heart will always be Steve's, especially because of this song.  I used to tease my former mouthy student and current mouthy babysitter, who is also a devout Christian, about the dearth of decent Christian music.  She never thought to tease me about the complete lack of any atheist music, and now she can't.  Suck it, babysitter Jenny!  See you next time SLB and I go out!  Thanks, boyfriend Steve!  See you in my dirty, godless dreams!