Bush league

Posted on January 21, 2012 by themoderngal

You know those days where you wake up and you just feel off? You’re tired despite having gotten enough sleep. You spill your coffee. You look in your closet and see nothing you want to wear. You struggle to adequately communicate with someone you’re trying to do business with. You sit down to do work but the thoughts just don’t flow. You drop your phone in some sort of liquid. You make coffee in hopes of combating the aforementioned tiredness and lack of flowy thoughts, only to spill it again. You get thrown under the bus in an e-mail by a colleague who’s copied in every one of your superiors. You’re late to every function you attend.

That was my Friday.

After all of that, I had a date to play bunco at an autism charity event with some girlfriends. They had gone to last year’s event, got drunk and had a grand ole time. I like alcohol. I’ve long wanted to play this female-bonding game called bunco. And Friday night is generally the one night of the week I don’t have to work. I was game.

I was dealing with the aftereffects of the thrown-under-the-bus e-mail the whole drive to the event and while others were mingling before bunco got going. I wanted to shut myself in the bathroom and cry, but I sucked it up, went for the red wine instead of the white (red does me in a little faster than white) and blew my entire week’s effort of eating well/losing weight on brownies and spoonfuls of pimento cheese slathered on thick, crusty bread.

I’d never played bunco, but as it turns out it’s a very brainless game. (I told a male colleague earlier in the day that I was going to be playing bunco, and his observation was, ‘Only women play that game, right?’ I hope brainless and women-only aren’t related in some way). You role three dice, hoping for a particular number to turn up or three of a kind. That’s pretty much it.

I won four out of the first six games. Beginner’s luck! Finally, something was going well for the day.

And then I lost. And lost. And lost. I lost an entire round of six games. Then I lost five more. I warned every new partner I encountered that I was bringing the bad luck. ‘No worries,’ they’d say. ‘I’ve been doing really well.’ And then we would proceed to lose. Badly.

Upon seeing my scorecard marked with Ls, the ladies in my final game informed me that there would be a prize for the biggest loser. I was a shoe-in! Until I won that game. Two other ladies and I tied for the most losses at 13 each. We had a roll off to see who would take home the prize. Lowest total was the biggest loser and, therefore, prize winner.

I rolled something like two 6s and a 5.

I could not even excel at being a loser yesterday.

Still, I had a good time despite the Cleveland Cavs-worthy losing streak. I tweeted my woes after I got home (to a house where the Modern Love Machine was already in bed). An old twitter friend told me it took a special skill to lose at bunco and that she loved me and thought I was brilliant. I don’t know what got into her, unless it was a lot of alcohol.

The prize was some sort of ugly vase, so I suppose it’s better to be loved and smart than to be lucky.

Posted in friendship, life, personal experience | 2 Comments

How karma caught the perp

Posted on January 19, 2012 by themoderngal

So I forgot to mention this, but the cops actually caught the guy who broke into the Modern Love Machine’s car. Color me shocked when we found out. The MLM and our neighbor were summoned to appear in court this morning to play the role witness while I, being off work until later in the day, decided to tag along as local court is one of my, let’s say, hobbies.

An aside: though local courts do not compare at all to Law and Order, they make up for it with the sheer ridiculousness of the people who are being processed there on a daily basis. You won’t get a lot of drama between lawyers, but you WILL get to observe a lot of dumb folks. When paired with an already confusing system, those folks can provide hours of free entertainment.

We showed up at court at 9 a.m., and within two and a half hours, the perp had decided he was going to plead guilty as part of a plea agreement, with the most important condition being he was going to owe the neighbors and us restitution for the broken vehicle windows (and, as the MLM made sure, for the MLM’s sunglasses that were purchased in Ireland). So either we’re going to get paid some cash money or at the very least the perp will be off the street and unavailable to break into our cars for a couple of years.

While we were waiting for the perp’s name to come up on the docket, I finally heard the story of how he got caught, which is a perfectly blogmade story. The perp called the cops to report that his car had been vandalized. When the cops entered the perp’s license plate number into the system, it came up as a match to what our neighbor had reported to the cops the morning he busted our windows. The car description matched too, and our neighbor was able to select the perp out of a lineup. Lock, stock and barrel.

More specifically, the perp had been sleeping with a friend’s girlfriend. That friend found out, got angry and — wait for it — busted the windows on the perp’s own vehicle, which was the crime the perp was reporting when the cops connected him to the crime against our vehicles.

Karma can be such a bitch.

Posted in cars, personal experience | 5 Comments

Ode to the cold

Posted on January 17, 2012 by themoderngal

For the past few days the temperature here in East Tennessee has gotten no higher than about 43 degrees, which is heaven to me. I’ve lived in the South my entire life, only to find myself less and less tolerant of the summer heat and mild winters with every passing year. Though we get occasional snows, it’s never enough and it never sticks long enough. I know my Chicago friends will probably laugh and tell me living in the Midwest would cure me, but I’m really not so sure. I love the way the sky looks when it’s cold, and I love how it feels to breathe the cold air in.

Besides, I know the secret, and the secret is: long underwear (or long johns, as my family has always called them).

Everyone knows to layer up on top — piling sweater over long-sleeved shirt over t-shirt — but does no one layer up on the bottom? I prefer Patagonia’s Capilene 1, so thin and silky that I can and do wear them under my jeggings.

There’s also my ginormous poofy black down coat, which makes me look like a black Michelin Man. (Have you ever wondered why the Michelin Man wasn’t black anyway? I mean he’s promoting tires, which are black. Is the company racist or something?) That coat was a lifesaver during my extended stay in New York a few winters back, and to hell with anyone who wants to mock me for how I look in it. They won’t mock me for long when their lips freeze shut.

To be honest, I’m really waiting for this sweater to come back in fashion in a non-ironic, non-tacky sweater party kind of way. It’s from Gap’s winter line, circa 1993 or 1994.

Cosby SweaterStill hangs in my closet. Because it is awesome.

Posted in fashion, weather | 6 Comments

No losers on this blog

Posted on January 12, 2012 by themoderngal

You guys, resolutions — they work better than I was giving them credit for these past few years. Or at least they’ve worked really well for me for the first 12 days of the year. I have done so many things in the framework of my 2012 goals already this month, which in turns means I’ve been keeping the spirit of doing things. I feel like I’ve already been more productive than I was in all of 2011, and I’ve even managed to relax a bit.

So I said I didn’t have a specific health goal for the year, but in the course of a week I’ve already made myself out to be a liar. I have a goal and a plan, thanks to some timely unintentional intervention by a Christmas gift, my friends and the Modern Love Machine.

I had requested a copy of this gorgeous illustrated version of Michael Pollan’s Food Rules for Christmas because I love pretty coffee table books. Instead I received the paperback copy — not as ideal for display but much more conducive to leaving on your night stand for bedtime reading. It took me about three days last week to blow through all of the book’s bite-sized food proverbs, and that was enough to inspire me. I wanted to eat better again.

Saturday night I had a little Girls Night Out with my galpals, and they mentioned they were planning a 12-week Biggest Losers Contest among our friends and was I interested? Um, considering how uncomfortably snug all my pants have gotten, you betcha. We all splurged on many glasses of wine and some delicious pasta that night for our last hurrah and stepped on our scales in the privacy of our own homes on Sunday morning to mark the first weigh in.

scaleour bathroom floor. isn’t it pretty?

Y’all. It was bad. It was a very bad weigh in. I was so far away from the goal I achieved through Weight Watchers a few years back and so close to my original starting point. I wanted to cry for all the hard work I’ve managed to undo. That was my next prod. I was going to get back into tracking Weight Watchers points, no matter how much a pain in the ass it can be, and make exercise more of a priority.

When I told the MLM of the Biggest Losers competition (there was a $20 buy in to create the winners’ pot of cash), my dear husband asked me what my plan was. ‘Oh, you know, be diligent in tracking my Weight Watchers points and workout more.’ His response: ‘That’s not a plan. There are no losers in this household. Now, what’s your plan?’

I love the MLM so much, despite the fact that my reaction to him at that time was quite the opposite.

After dwelling on a more concrete plan during a long, wet run on Sunday afternoon, I came up with a plan of earning a particular number of Weight Watchers activity points (ie, bonus points for workouts) each week, which has the extra effect of forcing me to login to my WW app more frequently therefore reminding me to track my food as well.

A little piece of me hates how obsessive Weight Watchers can make me when it comes to tracking points, but at the same time I’ve already managed to get rid of about two pounds of bloat and feel so much better already. Plus, I know the more of a routine it becomes the less obsessive it gets. After a few weeks your body adjusts and has a better sense of how much food it really needs. And it’s not like I can’t splurge every so often on decadent things like wine and cookies.

Now I need y’all to hold me accountable. I’d like to lose about 15 pounds from my Sunday weigh in. Minus the two pounds of bloat already gone, I’ve got about 13 to go. Seven or eight of those pounds will be tough.

Blogging about it helped me three years ago, so I’m going to subject y’all to it again. Because there are no losers on this blog.

Posted in books and magazines, food and drink, health and exercise | 10 Comments

North Stars

Posted on January 5, 2012 by themoderngal

Man, posting resolution lists seems like The Thing to do this week. I almost feel silly posting one of my own, but at the same time the public accountability and proof of my goals has always been helpful. I haven’t really made resolutions for a couple of years, opting instead for single words that helped me frame my attitude for the year. But since my word phrase is ‘do things’ this year, I wanted to create a list of goals that I will work toward as I do things. My North Stars for the year, if you will. I probably won’t accomplish all or possibly any of these things this year, but I plan to make progress in each area.

Image:Simon Howden / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Organization. I’m a pretty well organized person to begin with. I can find just about anything that is in our house within a reasonable time frame. I regularly pare down and purge. But there are three projects that have been looming for some time: organize and purge CD collection, organize, display and properly store old photos and organize my recipe collection.

Skills. In about a week I return to (online) school to start studying the ins and outs of web technology. I’ve taught myself HTML and have a pretty good sense for CSS now. I just need to start putting it to work more. I’ve got the domains, I just need to do it. While I’m at it, the MG could stand for a new look. I think it’s been a couple of years.

Health. Eating well and being active are and always will be an ongoing project. I don’t have a target in mind other than feeling good, but that will require a better effort at the aforementioned eating well and being active. Also, I need to find myself a primary care doctor. I haven’t had one in years. They’re important.

Money. I’ve always been obnoxiously good at managing money. The only debt we really have is the new car because the need for it came sooner than expected. We financed about half the cost, and I’m paying about three times the required payment each month. Still, we spend frivolously from time to time, so my goal is to spend money for quality and not quantity and to save a bit more aggressively for future home and life projects. And to get that car paid off as quickly as possible.

Connections. This one is hard. I am a natural and dedicated introvert. My worklife only encourages this by giving me the kind of schedule where I work while everyone else is off and vice versa. With a little bit of effort I can appreciate my time with my family and friends more. I can write more notes, make more phone calls and make the extra effort to visit with someone.

Joy. I’m working on developing my life list, which will be full of things that fill me with joy. But it’s not just for reading, it’s a list for living. I want to start crossing some things off of it. Travel is a big part of it, but travel is already a priority in my life, so that’s a plus. Writing is also a focus, and I think if I don’t start this year on that novel that’s been percolating in my head for five or six years, the Modern Love Machine might kick my ass. I’m ok with that.

Posted in budgeting and finance, family, friendship, health and exercise, life, lists | 12 Comments

Do things

Posted on December 31, 2011 by themoderngal

As everyone’s been posting their year-end recaps and reflections, I’ve tried to wrap my brain around 2011. But even with some prompting questions from my friend Kristin, I really could not sum up this year in any sort of way. I realize after much consideration, it’s because I cannot separate this year from the few years that preceded it.

The past five years have been a period of significant life changes. In that stretch and in chronological order I’ve: bought a house, transferred jobs, moved to a different city, sold a house, had a long-term relationship end, shuffled friends, met my now husband, bought another house, had someone close to me die, had someone close to me give birth and gotten married. All of these things have significantly affected my life over the past five years.

I grew up in a comfortable suburban bubble in which change meant getting new teachers at the start of every school year or at worst a friend moving away. The few years before this period of major change were also relatively static, albeit sort of boring. So as life has hit me like a ton of bricks over and over for the past few years, I didn’t know how to deal with it. I’ve spent these past few years adjusting and reacting while learning to deal with the emotion of it all, for better or for worse. My internal GPS has been stuck saying ‘recalculating’ every couple minutes for five years, it seems.

I guess what I’m feeling for the end of 2011 and beginning of 2012 is a shift in my dynamic. Barring any surprises from the universe, I sense I’m entering a more static stretch of life. There won’t be any relationship changes, we aren’t planning on moving any time soon, we won’t consider any job changes for about two years, we don’t want kids at the moment (or possibly ever). Though there’s still a chance of death or birth of loved ones, the structure to my life should remain mostly the same for a bit.

The difference between what lies ahead and my last relatively quiet period, is I know better than to just sit on my ass to catch my breath and relish the fact that there are fewer curveballs coming my way. Now I’m ready to start working on some more subtle changes — things that are more about the small, gradual steps that lead to bigger things rather than the bigger things themselves. And while the last few years were about learning how to deal with changes, I sense the next few will be lesson after lesson in patience, endurance and fortitude.

Last year, my word of the year was balance. I think I achieved that in unexpected ways this year, and I feel that my life is, in fact, a little more in balance thanks to my ability to better handle change. This year, my word, errr, phrase is ‘do things.’ For the first time in a few years, I’m going to craft a couple of resolutions, though they may not so much be things that have to get done in 2012 as much as things that I must work toward in 2012.

In the mean time, here’s to a present of doing things, a future of big accomplishments and days of auld lang syne. Happy new year!

Posted in life, personal experience | 7 Comments

There was more than one turtle present at the birth of Jesus

Posted on December 24, 2011 by themoderngal

I successfully completed my pre-Christmas staycation this afternoon. I’ve seen two movies since I last posted, got a pedicure and baked some Christmas treats. Doggie Christmas treats, that is. You can find the super-simple recipe here (shout out to Noodles for sharing).

dog treatsthose are Christmas turtles there at the bottom

I just got off work and have nothing work-related planned for the next 102 hours. We won’t be heading to Memphis. Instead, I’ll be spending my first Christmas with the Modern Love Machine’s family in Nashville. I have absolutely no idea what to expect.

Until I post again, may you all have a merry Christmas or holiday of your choice and a nice extra day off work, if you get one.

gifts

Posted in holidays, pets, travel | 3 Comments

Moviecatchupathon 2011

Posted on December 22, 2011 by themoderngal

Part of my Staycation this year has been dedicated to getting caught up on all the movies I’ve been too dang busy to see in 2011. While I take my culture in many different forms, I am most snobbish about movies, ahem film. (Yes, I know movies are rarely done on film anymore, but the word is so much more romantic.) I can thank the Modern Dad for getting me into good movies, especially those that came before my time, and my high school film class for making me a snot about it.

The beauty of not having the time to watch a lot of films until you take a week of staycation at Christmas is that you can wait on all the critics to sort out what to see and not to see (hard to go wrong with A.O. Scott) and by now the list of possible Oscar best picture nominees is starting to shape up. I don’t have to watch any movies that aren’t worth my time or limited disposable income. I’ve been scouring Metacritic and everyone’s year end movie lists and watching At the Movies every week to come up with the perfect lineup.

So far I’ve managed to see four 2011 releases this year: Bridesmaids, The Help, Crazy Stupid Love and Midnight in Paris. I’m contemplating The Tree of Life this afternoon. The Modern Love Machine and I have a date to see The Muppets either tonight or tomorrow afternoon and I’ve got the Descendants on my list for Friday. I’m hoping to talk the MLM and his sisters into Hugo while we’re in Nashville for Christmas. After that, Young Adult and possibly Martha Marcy May Marlene at our indie theater. I’m waiting for the DVD releases of Drive and Moneyball. And good God, someone find me a theater showing the Artist, because that’s the one I want to see more than anything in the world right now.

Wow. That’s kind of exhausting.

So far Midnight in Paris has been my favorite, but I always enjoy Woody Allen, so that was unsurprising. I will share my final judgments once I’ve made it through my list.

One of these years I will have seen all the Best Picture nominees before the Oscars get here. I was pretty proud last year for accomplishing half of the ten — TEN! — pictures before the Academy Awards, but this year I’m shooting for the moon. I realize not all those movies will be up for the award, but several will so I’m feeling good about my chances. I’ve also decided that ‘watch every Best Picture winner‘ is going to be on my Life List, which I’m in the process of compiling and will share on or around my 30th birthday.

Since I spent the first half of the year catching up on 2010 releases, here’s my list of those. The only one of these movies I really did not like was The Town.

1. The King’s Speech
2. Inception
3. The Social Network
4. Toy Story 3
5. Winter’s Bone
6. Easy A
7. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
8. Biutiful
9. Eat, Pray, Love
10. Despicable Me
11. The Kids are All Right
12. Iron Man 2
13. The Town
Still want to watch: Black Swan and True Grit

Posted in lists, movies | 6 Comments

Cornbread and snowflake lights

Posted on December 13, 2011 by themoderngal

Thanks for all your kind words on the last post. It was cathartic to write, and I hope that maybe, just maybe we can spread some extra kindness in the world.

As I mentioned in the last post, I channeled my anger into baking. When I get a spur-of-the-moment urge to cook or bake something, I’m always at the mercy of what’s in stock in our pantry, which is at the mercy of the Modern Love Machine’s whims as he’s the grocery shopper in this marriage.

When I was angry the other day, I knew I had a few sweet potatoes on hand and consulted Epicurous for some sort of sweet potato bread recipe. I found sweet potato cornbread, and with a little substitution** I ended up with this:


It’s warm butteriness was just what I needed that day. It didn’t taste of sweet potatoes at all (which was kind of a shame), more like plain ol’ cornbread — and I am a cornbread fanatic. I dubbed it my Angry at the World Cornbread. I think I ate a fourth of it on my own before the MLM even came home. The recipe is after the jump if you’re interested.

And also as I mentioned in the last post, it’s not all doom and gloom here all the time. Really, this has been an enjoyable Advent season thus far. We’ve managed to squeeze all the decorating in around two busy work schedules. I knocked out about 80 percent of my Christmas shopping today online (Etsy’s Facebook tool and Pinterest are my new shopping BFFs). And because we’ve already done two mass mailings this year with wedding invitations and thank you notes, the Christmas card effort is being kept to a lazy minimum of a photo card sent to all the people whose mailing addresses we had that we knew were correct and anyone who bothers to sends us a card. We’re chasing no addresses this season.

Christmas ornamentThe Modern Dad and I made this on Father-Daughter day at Girl Scout Camp in 1989

In about two days I’ll be entering Staycation mode where I work only when absolutely necessary (like three days in the next two weeks) and blowing my leftover vacation days the rest of the time. With decorating, shopping and card mailing almost done, I’m going to spend that time indulging in trips to the movie theatre (I love a good solo matinee), cashing in on a birthday massage and pedi gift certificate, baking some more and just plain enjoying the twinkle of the Christmas lights.

snowflake lightsOh, we painted the dining room a while back, and I STILL haven’t bothered to order the fabric for the curtains. Maybe I’ll get on that during Staycation. Or maybe I’ll just keep our current window treatment installment.

**Did you know that you don’t ever need to keep buttermilk on hand unless you really, really want to? When a recipe calls for somewhere in the vicinity of a cup of buttermilk, get your measuring cup and throw in a tablespoon of white vinegar or lemon juice and then fill the rest of the amount needed with plain ol’ white milk. The vinegar/lemon juice acts as a souring agent, and buttermilk is like a sour milk.

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Posted in food and drink, holidays | 14 Comments

An antidote for the hurt

Posted on December 9, 2011 by themoderngal

Here I am, emerging from another long radio silence. I haven’t blogged not for lack of things to talk about but because all the posts I considered writing seemed superficial to what’s really been on my mind of late. Today I’m ready to say f*ck it and just write about what’s really been on my mind in spite of the chance it might make anyone who reads it feel heavy too. I hope it doesn’t do that. I hope you’re able to find something good.

My 18-year-old second cousin, whom I’m close enough to to just call my cousin, has been dealing for the past two years with a diagnosis of medulloblastoma, an aggressive type of cancerous brain tumor. Just before Thanksgiving and after a long stretch of thinking things were going well in his battle, he got some pretty bad news about his prognosis. Last week he went through his second serious brain surgery. This week he’s finding happiness in getting to spend Christmas at home before starting another round of chemo.

My cousin is the first young person dear to my heart that I’ve seen suffer with a serious illness. My loved ones have been a fairly healthy bunch, and it is never, ever lost on me that the only people in my life whose deaths I grieve each managed to live a fully and long life before they passed.

For the past few weeks, so many of the thoughts and experiences I’ve had have gone through the filter of what my cousin is going through and how our family is facing it. He has been very open about what he’s going through and has a huge network of family, friends and strangers cheering him and his strength on. Because he’s open about what he’s going through, when the bad news comes in his hurt is known to all. He faces his pain publicly.

For the most part I’ve been able to challenge the pain of watching my cousin face his illness and my family struggle with it into remembering to fully live my life and appreciating each day for what it is. I still hurt about it from time to time about what he’s having to deal with and what me may miss out on, and when I hurt, I usually do it privately. My tears only seem to escape when I’m in my bedroom, alone with my thoughts. When I’m seriously angry, I sulk about it quietly. This is not just in my reaction to my cousin’s illness, though. This is my M.O. for day-to-day struggles, for better or for worse.

A few days ago I was seething about some things. One person mocked me in a tweet directed toward my work Twitter account. Others around me were bitching and obsessing about work-related things that were not in any way important. If I wanted to remain professional, I could not respond the way I really wanted to so I chose to remain silent. Their words hurt. Remaining silent hurt. I sulked about it for a few hours and then channeled my energy into a baking project that finally helped me let it go. I’m sure there are plenty of less-sensitive folks who wouldn’t have been bothered by what upset me. Maybe on a day when everyone in my family is healthy and happy it wouldn’t bother me either.

Now, I’m no saint in this equation. Just as easily as my feelings can be hurt by a simple tweet can I dole out my own judgmental observation or snarky remark toward someone. Even knowing the preschool lesson of being nice to one another is the right thing to do, being unkind is sometimes the far easier thing to do — especially when we might not like someone or even know them. This world is tough, and we see evidence of that every day in job loss, economy woes, political stubbornness, homelessness and hunger. I think I’ve become hardened by the world’s toughness to the point that I make my own contributions through sarcastic comments or laughing at the expense of another.

My cousin suffers but I want to try to make something good out of what I’m learning from hurting with him and for him him. I was given a very small reminder of how easily unkindness can hurt, especially when you don’t know if or how someone is suffering. And in this day and age it’s a safe bet that everyone is suffering in some way.

So in honor of him, I’m working harder on being kind to everyone. I’m trying to withhold judgments, sarcasm and negative gossip. I’m trying to spread smiles and warm wishes. I’m trying to keep in mind that I don’t know what’s going on in someone’s head, and I trying to remember that a little kindness can go a long way sometimes. It may not keep those around us from hurting, but maybe it will keep them from hurting more.

And I’m asking you to do the same. I’m not asking you to be perfect, because that’s impossible. I’m just asking that you try to be a little bit kinder every single day for people like my cousin who are hurting publicly and greatly and for the people around you who might be hurting privately too.

Posted in family, health and exercise, life, personal experience | 22 Comments