What a delicious morning! Bill, our resident coffeemaker, is out of town, so I woke knowing I’d have to face the hated Cuisinart Grind N Brew and create something resembling java. Happily, Finn was cooking eggs and bacon and Porter had the coffee started.
His gesture wasn’t selfless. I mentioned earlier that he’s developed quite a love for the stuff, so we’ve limited him to half a cup in the morning. He began using larger and larger cups until we refined our definition to four fluid ounces plus one teaspoon of sugar, max, and reminded him where the measuring cups and spoons reside.
His coffee is just as tasty as Bill’s. I’m a lucky mom.
I’m feeling especially queenly for another reason. Nicole at Tickled Pink has posted an interview she did with me. Go check it out.
I didn’t want to freak her out by coming in just under deadline, so I left something out that I want to emphasize every chance I get. Besides E.B. White, I am obsessed with Dr. Jerome Groopman. I’ve plugged him many times before. His book Second Opinions is mandatory reading for anyone who’ll be dealing with the health care system at any point– THIS MEANS YOU!
I’ve dealt with hospitals, clinics, health care professionals and unprofessionals more times than I can count, and the simple truth is that you must keep up with your own health care, whether that means keeping up with what tests you’ve had or making sure the tubes of your blood get labeled with your name, not the bozo’s in the chair next to you.
Dr. Groopman also writes for the The New Yorker and has an allegedly interesting article in this week’s issue. I wouldn’t know; Finn stole my copy and read it. Infuriating, yet gratifying.
Anyone else hear Brian Williams talk about the new study that says taking birth control pills offers protection against ovarian cancer even after you stop taking them? Whoo hoo! I’d like to get off them and see if my migraines improve. I’ve been taking them only because of the ovarian cancer protection; perhaps I can rid myself of a medicine.
For those of you wondering exactly when it was that I decided that maybe Porter wasn’t as dumb as a stick, it’s a story called Letter Share that took place when he and Drew were in kindergarten. They’re now in third grade. Time doesn’t fly; this seems like eons ago.
Poor geography alert! Bill’s in Nebraska on business. We debated WHERE that state is before checking ourselves on Porter’s wall-size map. I was ashamed to have guessed that it was maybe to the left of Arkansas. I had the correct longitude but it’s actually two states up, just under South Dakota. I bet the folks in that fine state weren’t impressed with our tale of snow at all.
WARNING! This hint for making your house look fresh should NOT be read by interior decorators or perfectionists, as the system I advocate may cause you to retch.
Tools: Can of white latex paint, old newspaper, paint brushes of various sizes, paint stirrer if stirring is important, paper towels, painter’s tape. No ladder! (A small brush for pretending to paint the trim around windows and a sponge brush for quickly running over the baseboards are great).
Don’t worry about second coats, thickness of paint, or even doing an entire door. The theme here is that women will only look at the walls from their eyes down, and men will not look at them at all.
Background:
Our baseboards and trim were sparkling white when we moved into out house in January 1998. Five minutes later Finn had run around the kitchen a thousand times, dizzy with excitement about his new home, falling against the walls in the process. Two days later, after we’d carried the twins in and out of the house in their car seats, clumsily bumping them against the trim, it became apparent that underneath the shiny white surface was dark wood, waiting to be unleashed.
Unleash it we did. Through the years, there’s been wrestling in the kitchen, resulting in the loss of Porter’s two front teeth and lots of paint near the door between the kitchen and the den. There’s been climbing on the walls, resulting in more of the same. And there have been the activities of daily living: lugging in sacks of groceries, carrying laundry to the washer, watching Porter fall off the counter, taking the ant farm with him, and wondering for a split-second whether priority should be given to catching the big-headed ants, mopping up the blood, or heading to the hospital. But you’ve read the stories. You can look at the woodwork for yourself.
This has been cleaned (!)with 409. It just needs to be repainted.
Ditto. Nasty, scuffed. One year I covered all the dark scuff marks with Liquid Paper but that is NOT the method I am advocating here.
Method:
1. Buy some white latex paint and a few paint brushes of assorted sizes. Also grab some painter’s tape to mark off the walls if they are a different color than the trim or your kids will be “helping.”
You could try to match the white of your trim to the white of the paint you’re buying, but that sort of ruins the spirit of this project. It’s much better to do as I did and just have your husband grab a gallon of whatever he sees and bring it home.
2. Stick newspaper on the floor and tape the walls.
3. This is the second most important step– decide ahead of time how you’re going to handle this psychologically with your children. Will they be painting as a punishment? Will they have to observe you painting for five or ten minutes, watching you have all the fun, before you grudgingly let them participate? Will you market painting as a valuable life skill that once perfected, can be performed for money, rain or shine, drought or no drought?
If you have toddlers I don’t recommend this project for you, unless you have some alone time.
4. Start painting. If you’re anal like I am, you might wash the walls first to get the ancient glops of dried applesauce off the molding. Alternatively, save time by skipping this step, paint over it and the food will blend right in.
I chose to sell this as a marketable skill, which inspired Finn to finish the foyer, Drew to participate for thirty minutes, and thrilled Porter, but not enough to keep him away from his pogo stick for more than eight minutes.
5. This is not “real” painting. Start at about eye level and paint lightly down the woodwork, morphing into a semblance of a true paint job at about your waist line or wherever the nicks start.
At the bottom, just paint low enough to get the scuff marks, but don’t worry about getting it all perfectly aligned with the floor. No one looks down there. The less you mess around way down low, the less you’ll spill on the floor and have to clean up.
Wow - it looks like this area just got a professional paint job!
THE BIG REVEAL:
If you look closely, you can see where the bright white and the cream meet up on the woodwork. I’m only showing you. A guest inspecting your molding so intently needs a drink or a job. Send him to carve the turducken. (Click to enlarge)
On this door I painted the bottom, then used the tiny paintbrush to swipe around the knob and lock (grimy there!) and the bottom of the lowest row of panes. Then I sort of blended the paint up into the higher regions of the door and called it a day. It doesn’t look perfect, but that is not what I was going for. (In the photo you see a big white stripe on the left between the hinges, but in real life, with no flash, you don’t notice it much at all.)
If you’re really in a rush, forget the kids, the newspaper and the tape, and just dab white paint on the scuffs. Use dim lights when guests come over if you’re paranoid.
I’ve already illustrated what not to wear in bed (and conversely, what you should wear). Today we’ll move on to “What Not To Wear: Perfume Edition.”
During Finn’s drum lesson Friday, I hustled over to the Galleria to Sephora to try out Gwen Stefani’s new perfume, Lamb. Usually I buy perfume based on scent alone. The fact that Elizabeth Taylor, J. Lo, and Britney hawked perfume didn’t persuade me to run out and try them.
It’s different, however, when a celebrity I truly adore, like Sarah Jessica Parker or Gwen Stefani comes out with a scent. I desperately tried to like SJP’s Lovely, but it smelled like worn soccer cleats on me.
So I was thrilled to hear that Gwen had a new perfume, because I feel as if we have a cosmic connection. We both have hot husbands and small titties and frequently dye our hair and… well, I can’t sing, and I don’t have a band, but when Kingston gets older I can give Gwen tons of useful information about how to teach him to fold his towel after his bath and pick his nose in private and put the lid down on the potty and other life skills.
Anyway, whether you’re a Gwen fan or not, a girl couldn’t help but try the perfume after seeing this ad:
Who wouldn’t want to smell like that?
I was heady with anticipation when I got to Sephora, but when I spritzed the scent on my wrist I wasn’t sure it was jiving with my complex chemical makeup. Of course, you must give anything a chance, so after Finn and I got home from drums I asked Bill to smell it.
He paused from making gin and tonics and gave my wrist a sniff.
“I feel like I’ve smelled that before,” he said thoughtfully.
I doubted he’d already smelled the latest scent from Gwen Stefani. He’s hardly on the cutting edge of pop culture. Remember how long it took him to figure out that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie were dating? But he was holding my wrist and smelling it and looking off into the distance with a furrowed brow. It was confusing.
“I’ve got it,” he said triumphantly, dropping my arm and reaching for the lime. “It smells like a girl I dated in the past.”
Damn. I love you, Gwen, but I won’t be wearing Lamb.
Here’s the premiere of YO MAMA, the first ever Glamore-Us movie.
It does have sound, so be careful at work.
No animals were harmed in the making of this film, although we almost had to kill Porter during filming. He drank a Grapico while waiting for me at Jazzercise the morning of the shoot, and the sugar content damn near turned him into a pogo-stick.
Also, if IMAX bothers you, you may want to take a Dramamine before viewing. It’s not that we were able to replicate IMAX technology, far from it, but the camera was a little shaky and the movie is quite active.
I’m thinking that a “Behind The Movie” will be much in demand after this screening.
Please post your reviews below!
On the plus side, it’s also very short, at about 2.25 minutes including the obligatory Blooper reel.
“We’re eating sardines and making brownies for a lemonade stand,” Bill reported when he called.
I wasn’t surprised by either activity. Summer is only a week old, and profits and penguins have emerged as the major topics of conversation and activity thus far. The boys have set up increasingly complex lemonade stands each day. Their first endeavor, in which they sold Fresh-baked Pound Cake and Ice-Cold pink lemonade with TONS of Cubes (signs and adjectives courtesy of Finn) garnered each boy over five dollars. The next day they got more creative with their offerings– a little too innovative, if customer response is any indication, and failed to sell much Hand-Dyed Brown Lemonade, although the sugar cookies were a modest hit.
Drew has slept with a stuffed penguin named Lewis for years, and he just added another named Osbert (hero of the book My Penguin Osbert)to the menagerie. Osbert eats creamed herring, and when I got to Publix the other day I discovered “creamed herring” written at the bottom of my grocery list in Drew’s deliberate print. I’ve spent ages training the boys to convey their grocery needs by writing directly on the list. I wanted to fulfill Drew’s request, but I couldn’t find ready-made creamed herring and didn’t have a recipe in my head so I had to return home herring-less.
Drew was disappointed, but I missed the tears because I had to leave town. During my absence Bill convinced Drew that sardines were an integral part of penguin nutrition, and that was enough to persuade all three boys to munch sardines and crackers for lunch. In return, Bill made Fresh & Hot Super Chocolatey brownies and spent the afternoon drinking beer and watching golf while the boys manned the lemonade stand. They’re going to need a license and insurance if they keep up this frantic pace.
Meanwhile, I’ve been in New York attending a writers’ conference and the Book Expo. I met many top-notch literary agents, which is exactly what you need if you have a book you want to sell. I’ve gotten lots of encouragement from you guys (”When are you going to write a book so I can quit snorting coffee onto my keyboard?” has been a common refrain). Additionally, I’ve received positive feedback from a man I’ll identify only as “a publishing bigwig” and so I’ve decided it’s time to quit screwing around with the idea of a book and fish or cut bait. The manuscript, a compilation of the columns that have provoked the most laughter and comments, is ready, so I need an agent and a bit of luck.
Two sessions at the conference were worth noting. One keynote speech is nicely summarized here, and stressed the importance of having an internet presence to market yourself and your work these days. My blog originally attracted iVillage’s attention and led to my writing this column for them for a year, which greatly expanded my readership and ability to churn out two columns a week. I’d consider myself proof that the Internet is a fantastic tool for attracting readers.
I was surrounded by attendees who were mystified by the web, and it was reassuring to know that I’ve watched this site grow for two and a half years, and have ended up with a lot of book material and close friends in the process. I have all of you to thank for that.
Another speaker’s talk was directed primarily to novelists. He urged writers to pay attention to their daydreams, as these out of body experiences convey your innermost fears which serve as the linchpin of your ….. yeah, I didn’t follow it either. It sucked that I seemed to be the only person in the room who wasn’t nodding beatifically. I was busy wondering when the hell anyone has time to daydream anymore. Between the kids, the column, the law practice, and the always nutritious dinners, my brain resembles a to-do list scramble.
Oddly, the speaker emphatically rejected the notion that dreams at night could be of any use, and although I doubt his sanity overall, I was glad to get a solid ruling banning the the use of dreams as a creative catalyst. Drew’s heavy emphasis on penguins combined with a few too many ads for Happy Feet has caused me to have penguin nightmares.
Generally Bill and I wander the Arctic naked and famished, wishing for a down jacket and a hot meal, and all we find is a penguin and a soup pot. You would think we’d clean and gut the animal, but in the nightmare we simply lay the Osbert-like creature on his side and slice him into fillets and then make a foul-tasting penguin soup.
It’s the kind of dream that will leave you craving some creamed herring.
To Use the Pickle Player: Click the show you want to hear, press play, sit back and enjoy. To read the show notes click HERE.
In "It's Natural" I will tell your kids about the birds and the bees, but YOU must stay in the room and perform the coital finger movements.
I read this ten years ago and am reading it again. I want to read *Stargirl* but must avoid the library until Porter locates lost books.
The Boys Are Loving
Hooray-- there's a sequel to the original Diary. The guys are snarfing it up.
Porter finished all the Harry Potter books so I started him on A Wrinkle In Time, and he's enjoying it. I bought the whole set so he'd have plenty to read for the next few months.
After finishing the Harry Potters, Drew turned to the Hardy Boys. He can't tell a story "in a nutshell," so I've heard all about the missing jalopy, and the red wig. Solve the mystery already!
)to the menagerie. Osbert eats creamed herring, and when I got to Publix the other day I discovered “creamed herring” written at the bottom of my grocery list in Drew’s deliberate print. I’ve spent ages training the boys to convey their grocery needs by writing directly on the list. I wanted to fulfill Drew’s request, but I couldn’t find ready-made creamed herring and didn’t have a recipe in my head so I had to return home herring-less.
