Monthly Archives: November 2009

Thanksgiving eccentricities

November 30, 2009

I am convinced that every family has its own particular set of strange traditions, inevitable crises, and other oddities that surface at Thanksgiving. They’re the best part of the holiday, aren’t they? Here, a selected list of ours:

Every year, my mother makes a wild rice dish. Every year she forgets to add raisins. Every year she forgets to set it out on the buffet with the other sides. Every year, she laments that no one ate it. EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear it was a comedy bit. “I forgot to put out the rice!” “No shit, that has never happened before!”
I add salt to the potatoes in secret. I actually post John as a lookout at the kitchen door and do it as fast as possible so no one will see me do it. Because if they saw me, they would not eat the potatoes. Except you know how mashed potatoes taste without salt? LIKE PASTE.
Forty-seven half-filled water glasses all over the house, with at least three people an hour asking “is this one mine?”
Three kinds of cranberry sauce for a family of five.
Similarly, three kinds of potatoes.
Also, three kinds of stuffing.
No, I’m not exaggerating. We are picky.
The once-a-year, only-at-Thanksgiving, musical version of grace before the meal. Sung off key. At different tempos. By two people who know the words, one who kind of does, and two who just blatantly make it up.
Dream Whip. I know. God, I know. If I could change that one, I would.
And finally, my personal favorite because it is SO RIDICULOUS and yet SO US, we have got to be the only family on earth who every year has to make a trip to the grocery store on Thanksgiving day to buy emergency lunch provisions including, I SWEAR TO GOD, sliced turkey for sandwiches. Because, you know, we’re not going to have any of that lying around the house in a few hours or anything.

So yeah, mine was great. How was yours?

Posted in family | 8 Comments

The right move

November 24, 2009

So: work. I can’t, won’t, will not, must not talk about it. Except I have to say this: I leave home earlier every day, get home later, eat lunch at my desk, and pretty routinely feel like an idiot. It’s taken over my life, my free time, my cooking time, my writing time. It has, as of this afternoon, officially taken over Thanksgiving with a project that will take me all weekend that absolutely must be done by next Monday. By all measures, I should be frustrated and miserable.

But I had lunch today with a supervisor from my old job and it was almost impossible to hear what she was saying over the deafening chorus of “thank god this is not my life anymore” running through my head. New job is hard, it’s a little bit greuling right now, and I love it.

That’s pretty cool.

Posted in work | 6 Comments

Little things, big things

November 18, 2009

As I may have mentioned oh, a few dozen times, I recently started a new job. New office is across the street from my absolute favorite coffee shop in the city. Like, it’s less than 50 steps away. This new proximity to such caffeinated bliss is becoming a problem. See, I am powerless in the face of precisely pulled espresso and perfectly steamed milk. Couple that with the fact that new office does not have a coffeemaker (wha? How is that possible, you ask? Beats me!) and I’ve been going to Coffeeshop Heaven probably 3 times a week.

Now, anyone who has ever read a personal finance article will tell you that “those daily lattes really add up,” and “if you just stopped getting your daily Starbucks you’d save hundreds of dollars a year.” I’m sure this is technically true: I’m just having a hard time deciding if I care.

Some days, when I’m buying my third cafe au lait of the week, I feel a tinge of guilt. I should be saving this $2.68! Don’t I want to retire someday? But just as often, I think to myself: if I refrain from buying a new sweater this winter, I have just earned myself 20 coffees! Like, doesn’t it seem supremely inefficient to save for retirement in two dollar and sixty-eight cent increments? Wouldn’t it be better to enjoy your thrice-weekly coffee and save money by making smarter purchases on, or foregoing entirely, bigger-ticket items, like cars, or plane tickets, or elective plastic surgery?

I also rationalize by noting that I save money in many other ways. I pack my lunch virtually every day. We only own one car. I buy the $5 bottles of wine for everyday drinking. But what it comes down to is this: I derive a lot of pleasure from those coffees, and I think small daily comforts and pleasures are worth something. I know I’m not the only one who really enjoys a morning espresso drink. I’d be willing to bet the personal finance advice columnists who scold everyone about drinking coffee probably drink it themselves. Most of us have neither the time nor the equipment to brew coffeeshop-quality lattes at home. And while I am all for curbing mindless, unnecessary spending, I am only going to be working across the street from this coffeeshop for a year, and if I want to go there three times a week, I’m going to do it, goddammit.

Posted in food | 8 Comments

I’m not even going to pretend to be embarrassed

November 16, 2009

Announcement: I have given up hope that the old fashion adage that “everything old is new again” might just…skip my junior-high to high school period. It seems, my friends, that we are doomed to relive the ill-fated fashions of the late 80s and early 90s. There are so many fashion blunders from our collective pasts that I have been distressed to see making a reappearance. Leggings, for example. Jeans with zippers at the ankle. Slouchy, off the shoulder sweatshirts. And let us not even speak of shoulder pads.

But it seems that since the 80s have been back in for long enough now, and we are moving on. And what came after the 80s? Grunge! And so with the new grunge, it appears, flannel is back. And while I whined a lot about the new 80s, I am much less distressed about the reemergence of flannel.

As in: I bought a flannel shirt this weekend. And I’m not sorry. After several seasons of lycra and neon and, god help us, pegged boyfriend jeans, we DESERVE flannel. Flannel is comfortable and cozy and easy to wear. It is soft. It is machine washable. I look outstanding in flannel. In fact, I spent the better part of high school wearing my father’s flannel shirts. (He: 6’4”, maybe 230 pounds. I, at the time: 5’10”, buck thirty. It was a look.)

Now if only I could find a way for people to bring back that whole “wear your flannel pajama pants out in public like it was normal” thing that was briefly trendy in my sophomore year, I would be golden.

Posted in miscellany | 7 Comments

Worth the calories

November 10, 2009

Worth the calories:

extra sharp cheddar cheese and triscuits
english toffee
fresh tortilla chips and guacamole
an entire pan of rice krispie treats
sauvignon blanc
lemon bars
mashed potatoes made with lots of cream and butter
dark chocolate m&ms
a hot dog at a baseball game
warm chocolate chip cookies
gingerbread lattes

Not worth the calories:

cheesecake
white sauces on pasta
Kahlua/Baileys
KitKats
potato chips
sweet and sour chicken
big sweet muffins at the coffeeshop
Italian beef sandwiches
american cheese
mochas

As with the others, I imagine these are highly personalized lists. What are yours?

Posted in food | 8 Comments

Four

November 5, 2009

The internet tells me that traditional gifts for this occasion are fruit and flowers. So John, this is for you:

Kumquats. Kind of an inside joke.

Happy fourth anniversary, my little kumquat. Even though we see each other for about 30 minutes a day these days (if we’re lucky), I still enjoy those 30 minutes more than any other part of my day. I love you.

Posted in family | 4 Comments

sweet home, stars fell on, etc etc.

November 2, 2009

Dear Birmingham, Alabama: you are surprisingly hilly. Substantially hillier than I expected. Also: rainy. Remind me not to sign up for any marathons that take place in your fair city.

But for a wedding, the rolling hilliness of Birmingham is a perfect backdrop. The rain cleared up right before the ceremony, leaving behind a perfect chilly clear fall day. As the bride and we bridesmaids were taking pictures, a group of trick or treaters walked by, and we took a bunch of pictures with little girls dressed as witches and fairies and Hannah Montana. It was hard to tell who was most tickled: the wedding party, the trick or treaters who got to feel special taking pictures with the bride, or their mothers who caught the whole thing on their cameras.

All in all: a lovely, joy-filled, happy wedding. It was my first experience as a bridesmaid, and I think I did a pretty good job. I buttoned difficult wedding dress buttons, I mended hems, I brought Swedish Fish into the bridal preparation suite. Really, what more could I do? Now the happy bride and groom are off in Peru, and the rest of us are back to Chicago, where it is cold and not hilly, thinking fondly of Halloween weddings with costume party rehearsal dinners and bright, bright orange shoes.

Now, as happened the last time I went to a wedding in a non-local place, I have some questions. Specifically, questions about Alabama:

Are vegetables prohibited, or merely discouraged?
The wedding emcee insisted that toasts at the reception aren’t a tradition in the South. I call bullshit. Southerners: is this really true? I mean, no one likes a trainwreck wedding toast, but it doesn’t really feel like a wedding unless there’s SOME talk of the couple, toasting, wishing them well, etc.
What is the average age of a couple getting married in Presbyterian churches in Alabama? Because the church’s wedding coordinator lady insisted on treating us like we were 19, and it was kind of tiresome. Example: “you girls can pray beforehand if you want, but you’ll need to find a responsible older woman to lead you in the prayer.” News flash: bride and all bridesmaids were in their 30s. Really? We can’t pray on our own? I’m not super-churchy, but I thought one of the tenants of Protestantism was that everyone can pray. Right?

Posted in friendship | 6 Comments

pseudostoops