I've been meaning to post for a while, so sorry for the monster blog...
First:
1. Go download some TV On The Radio. I dare you to listen to "Wolf Like Me" without wanting to run 10 miles.
2. Go watch Californication, with David Duchovny. Yes, there's lots of cursing and gratuitous nudity. But it's about this writer from New York who gets stuck living in LA and largely hates it for its insipidity, but realizes every once in a while that his personal life, though he has grossly mismanaged it, still affords instances of rare beauty. Yeah...
3. Go grill or pan fry a chicken breast, cut a big pocket into it, and stuff the pocket with mozzarella cheese. After the cheese gets all melty, open up the pocket again and stuff in some basil and a few fresh peach slices. I'm serious. Go do it. Now! There's no time!!
Secondly:
Skinny jeans.
I own some.
I know, I know.
I am not a waifish, straight-up-and-down woman with the figure of a prepubescent boy. I have the average legs of an average woman, and hips that have more than once elicited the epithet "big beautiful birthing." But I also have a pair of cowboy boots that I got on the cheap a little while ago that my regular pants just won't fit into.
This wasn't an easy decision, obviously, and I must at least congratulate myself on my thorough research. Turns out that the question of whether or not un-waify women should wear skinny jeans is a topic that is often (at least on online message boards) more hotly debated than Obama's current economic plan. *(but, admittedly, with more pleasing exhortations to "just luv urself, girl!")
At a loss, I did the only thing I could do: obsessed about it in the presence of every woman I encountered for a few days straight. (Thank you, all, for your patience. And sorry...)
A trip to Old Navy decided the issue...
Slight digression, to elucidate how it usually works with me and Old Navy:
Me: Hi!
Old Navy: Give me your money!
Me: Okay!
...and now I own my own pair of Sweetheart cut, tapered leg, dark blue skinny jeans.
We'll see how often they see the light of day...
Thirdly:
Alone in the Kitchen With an Eggplant: Confessions of Cooking for One and Dining Alone.
Edited by Jenni Ferrari-Adler.
It's a collection of essays written by famous contemporary writers about eating alone-- at restaurants, at home, what have you. Sounds like my kind of book, right? Which is exactly why my friend Sara loaned it to me. In some ways, it is a little too close to home. Take a paragraph like this one, for example, from the book's introduction, where the editor describes the working environment out of which the project was conceived:
I ran on the treadmill at the YMCA, hiked in the arboretum, and drank many solitary cups of coffee. I hauled my laptop and bag from one cafe to another until it started to seem as if the hauling itself were my job. I was seeking, I suppose, some form of company and conversation, even if the majority of conversations were ones I merely overheard.
My God, Jenni Ferrari-Adler! Strum my pain with your fingers, why don't you?!
But then the intro takes a turn to the optimistic. She writes about swapping "eating alone" stories with her friends at grad school, and works towards the uplifting point that being alone is, in fact, a shared human experience that we can all take pleasure in, and look to for mutual comfort...
There's just one thing, though... When I go to bed at night, and I lay my head against the wall-- even if I think to myself that the same wall houses my neighbors next door-
the idea rarely makes me feel any better...
First:
1. Go download some TV On The Radio. I dare you to listen to "Wolf Like Me" without wanting to run 10 miles.
2. Go watch Californication, with David Duchovny. Yes, there's lots of cursing and gratuitous nudity. But it's about this writer from New York who gets stuck living in LA and largely hates it for its insipidity, but realizes every once in a while that his personal life, though he has grossly mismanaged it, still affords instances of rare beauty. Yeah...
3. Go grill or pan fry a chicken breast, cut a big pocket into it, and stuff the pocket with mozzarella cheese. After the cheese gets all melty, open up the pocket again and stuff in some basil and a few fresh peach slices. I'm serious. Go do it. Now! There's no time!!
Secondly:
Skinny jeans.
I own some.
I know, I know.
I am not a waifish, straight-up-and-down woman with the figure of a prepubescent boy. I have the average legs of an average woman, and hips that have more than once elicited the epithet "big beautiful birthing." But I also have a pair of cowboy boots that I got on the cheap a little while ago that my regular pants just won't fit into.
This wasn't an easy decision, obviously, and I must at least congratulate myself on my thorough research. Turns out that the question of whether or not un-waify women should wear skinny jeans is a topic that is often (at least on online message boards) more hotly debated than Obama's current economic plan. *(but, admittedly, with more pleasing exhortations to "just luv urself, girl!")
At a loss, I did the only thing I could do: obsessed about it in the presence of every woman I encountered for a few days straight. (Thank you, all, for your patience. And sorry...)
A trip to Old Navy decided the issue...
Slight digression, to elucidate how it usually works with me and Old Navy:
Me: Hi!
Old Navy: Give me your money!
Me: Okay!
...and now I own my own pair of Sweetheart cut, tapered leg, dark blue skinny jeans.
We'll see how often they see the light of day...
Thirdly:
Alone in the Kitchen With an Eggplant: Confessions of Cooking for One and Dining Alone.
Edited by Jenni Ferrari-Adler.
It's a collection of essays written by famous contemporary writers about eating alone-- at restaurants, at home, what have you. Sounds like my kind of book, right? Which is exactly why my friend Sara loaned it to me. In some ways, it is a little too close to home. Take a paragraph like this one, for example, from the book's introduction, where the editor describes the working environment out of which the project was conceived:
I ran on the treadmill at the YMCA, hiked in the arboretum, and drank many solitary cups of coffee. I hauled my laptop and bag from one cafe to another until it started to seem as if the hauling itself were my job. I was seeking, I suppose, some form of company and conversation, even if the majority of conversations were ones I merely overheard.
My God, Jenni Ferrari-Adler! Strum my pain with your fingers, why don't you?!
But then the intro takes a turn to the optimistic. She writes about swapping "eating alone" stories with her friends at grad school, and works towards the uplifting point that being alone is, in fact, a shared human experience that we can all take pleasure in, and look to for mutual comfort...
There's just one thing, though... When I go to bed at night, and I lay my head against the wall-- even if I think to myself that the same wall houses my neighbors next door-
the idea rarely makes me feel any better...
