Peanut Butter-Jelly-Fluff Sandwiches
Those that are familiar with the fluffernutter may agree that it is a fantastic treat for your mouth, BUT, it may leave you with that awkward sticky mass in your mouth. Well, the jelly not only helps to cut that, but adds a whole new dimension to the sandwich. It is quite a treat for your mouth, and your mind thinks, how lovely it is that this simple concoction can make you so content.
Packing your books in small boxes
They are easier to lift.
Throwing crap out
Now, I will donate and salvage as much of my junk as I can, but sometimes it just needs to be recycled/thrown out. When I lived in Springfield, I had a penchant for collecting those Snapple elemental bottles. Remember those drinks: Fire, Air, Earth, Lighnting. Some of them were gag worthy – I was a strict Fire gal – but I thought the bottles were pretty. I almost packed them up. And looking back, I think they are much happier recycled. Other things I have thrown out that I thought I was going to do something with: a huge jar full of bottle caps, old clippings from magazines that had great colors in them meant for decoupage, the sides of six packs that I used to send out as postcards.
Brianna’s Asiago Ceasar Dressing
I could eat bowlfuls of grape tomatoes covered in a smattering of this dressing.
Hand and Foot
Card game that involves an insane amount of cards. Can take forever depending on how many people you have playing, but is really satisfying when you complete books and keep on going. Definite card game for power outages or cold weather.
Monday, May 29, 2006
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Poem by Dana Gioia
Beware of Things in Duplicate…
Beware of things in duplicate:
a set of knives, the cufflinks in a drawer,
the dice, the pair of Queens, the eyes
of someone sitting next to you.
Attend that empty minute in the evening
when looking at the clock, you see
its hands fixed on the same hour
you noticed at your morning coffee.
These are the moments to beware
when there is nothing so familiar
or so close that it cannot betray you:
a twin, an extra key, an echo,
your own reflection in the glass.
-Dana Gioia
Beware of things in duplicate:
a set of knives, the cufflinks in a drawer,
the dice, the pair of Queens, the eyes
of someone sitting next to you.
Attend that empty minute in the evening
when looking at the clock, you see
its hands fixed on the same hour
you noticed at your morning coffee.
These are the moments to beware
when there is nothing so familiar
or so close that it cannot betray you:
a twin, an extra key, an echo,
your own reflection in the glass.
-Dana Gioia
Friday, May 12, 2006
Poem by Jim Harrison
Mother Night
When you wake at three AM you don't think
of your age or sex and rarely your name
or the plot of your life which has never
broken itself down into logical pieces.
At three AM you have the gift of incomprehension
wherein the galaxies make more sense
than your job or the government. Jesus at the well
with Mary Magdalene is much more vivid
than your car. You can clearly see the bear
climb to heaven on a golden rope in the children's
story no one ever wrote. Your childhood horse
named June still stomps the ground for an apple.
What is morning and what if it doesn't arrive?
One morning Mother dropped an egg and asked
me if God was the same species as we are?
Smear of light at five AM. Sound of Webber's
sheep flock and sandhill cranes across the road,
burble of irrigation ditch beneath my window.
She said, "Only lunatics save newspapers
and magazines," fried me two eggs, then said,
"If you want to understand mortality look at birds."
Blue moon, two full moons this month,
which I conclude are two full moons. In what
direction do the dead fly off the earth?
Rising sun. A thousand blackbirds pronounce day.
-Jim Harrison
When you wake at three AM you don't think
of your age or sex and rarely your name
or the plot of your life which has never
broken itself down into logical pieces.
At three AM you have the gift of incomprehension
wherein the galaxies make more sense
than your job or the government. Jesus at the well
with Mary Magdalene is much more vivid
than your car. You can clearly see the bear
climb to heaven on a golden rope in the children's
story no one ever wrote. Your childhood horse
named June still stomps the ground for an apple.
What is morning and what if it doesn't arrive?
One morning Mother dropped an egg and asked
me if God was the same species as we are?
Smear of light at five AM. Sound of Webber's
sheep flock and sandhill cranes across the road,
burble of irrigation ditch beneath my window.
She said, "Only lunatics save newspapers
and magazines," fried me two eggs, then said,
"If you want to understand mortality look at birds."
Blue moon, two full moons this month,
which I conclude are two full moons. In what
direction do the dead fly off the earth?
Rising sun. A thousand blackbirds pronounce day.
-Jim Harrison
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
Letters
I am reading this book, Which Brings Me to You by Steve Almond and Julianna Baggott, that is hitting too close to home for me at times. Basic premise -- this man and woman meet at a wedding, and have an instant connection, but decide to write to each other and confess to each other. With each letter there is an unfolding and deeper connection to each other. It is totally voyueristic to read and thrilling.
Some passages that totally get to me:
"My own kind. I am not sure there is a name for us. I suspect we’re born this way: our hearts screwed in tight, already a little broken. We hate sentimentality and yet we are deeply sentimental. Low-grade Romantics. Tough yet susceptible. Afflicted by parking lots, empty courtyards, nostalgic pop music. When we cried for no reason as babies, just hauled off and wailed, our parents seemed to know, instinctively, that it was not diaper rash or colic. It was something deeper that they couldn’t find a comfort for, though the good ones tried mightily, shaking rattles like maniacs and singing “Happy Birthday” a little louder than called for. We weren’t morose little kids. We could really be happy.
Once there may have been an early tribe of us. We’d have done alright at cave wall art, less so at hunting. We’d have only started a war if traumatically bored. (Boredom is our most dangerous mood.) But most likely we broke up and scattered. The number one cause: over-whelming distraction.
A wedding is the worst scenario. We’re usually single—surprising, I know—and least comfortable when socially required to say Awww, about kittens, sure, or greeting cards, and, in the present case, horrible toasts where weepy accountants say things like: To the happy couple. Reach for the stars! Weddings are riddled with enforced awwwing."
And here is a part from a letter:
"I’m not sure what to tell you. This is a weirdo scenario we’ve gotten ourselves into. There’s no present-tense relationship to pad the wreckage of the past, no body language to read, no domestic clues to inspect (for me it goes: CD collection, bookshelf, refrigerator, mattress, not necessarily in that order.) no first awkward meal with friends. No first night together, no first morning, no first fight, or reconciliation. I have no idea how you spend your days, or where you live, and, most important, no clear sense of what you’d order at my favorite taqueria, or whether the menu (a field of faded Polaroids taped to the front window) would enthrall you as it does me.
What’s even weirder: I can’t bring myself to disclose this thing—whatever it is, a written audition, an extended power-flirt—to the appropriate confidants. It feels too intimate and fragile, maybe even desperate. And yet I find myself working on these letters at all hours, skipping brunches and movies. (Already I’m blowing off my friends for you.) The mail has become this major event. I count the days between letters. It’s like I am in prison…… And beneath all this fancy throat-clearing, here’s what I really want to say (as much to myself as to you): Don’t stop. I mean it, Jane. Ever famous case of love boils down to reckless honesty. That’s what’s happening here, I think. We’re both smart enough to know this might not work, probably won’t. But that the chance to tell the truth, the whole truth, the whole truth, doesn’t come along too often."
I have not even finished it, and already its picking away at the places I slapped that band aid on. I have always been a big letter writer -- I have one amazing friendship because of it. Two times other than that it was more. Neither ended well at all, but it was still thrilling. Sending the words and waiting on singing pins and needles for the response. It is the best anticipation I have ever had in my life. The one with the bookstore guy was kind of epic. Well, that is being kind of pretentious there, eh? But it was big. I mean I sent a letter to a stranger and addressed it "To the man in the jaunty cap". And it got to him. It was one of the bravest things I have ever done romantically. I had a few of those customer to cashier small talk chats, but nothing more. He was a complete stranger and would never know me if we passed on the street. Unfortunately, he was in a relationship, but he continuted to write. And it was secret and scary and felt forbidden and maybe a little dangerous. We never met, and he faded away to Rhode Island of all places, and told me we could not write again. The letters, this blind correspondence is a shield I use. I can be thrilling, honest as painfully possible, and maybe even a little beautiful with my words. In person, I fumble, and am seen for my physical presence which can block out anything that my words would have portrayed. Plus I snort when I laugh, and its kinda off putting really. Reading this novel is feeling that all over again, and I wish I had someone to write to again in a way. Be honest and ramble, and just lavish in the words and discoveries that can exist.
Some passages that totally get to me:
"My own kind. I am not sure there is a name for us. I suspect we’re born this way: our hearts screwed in tight, already a little broken. We hate sentimentality and yet we are deeply sentimental. Low-grade Romantics. Tough yet susceptible. Afflicted by parking lots, empty courtyards, nostalgic pop music. When we cried for no reason as babies, just hauled off and wailed, our parents seemed to know, instinctively, that it was not diaper rash or colic. It was something deeper that they couldn’t find a comfort for, though the good ones tried mightily, shaking rattles like maniacs and singing “Happy Birthday” a little louder than called for. We weren’t morose little kids. We could really be happy.
Once there may have been an early tribe of us. We’d have done alright at cave wall art, less so at hunting. We’d have only started a war if traumatically bored. (Boredom is our most dangerous mood.) But most likely we broke up and scattered. The number one cause: over-whelming distraction.
A wedding is the worst scenario. We’re usually single—surprising, I know—and least comfortable when socially required to say Awww, about kittens, sure, or greeting cards, and, in the present case, horrible toasts where weepy accountants say things like: To the happy couple. Reach for the stars! Weddings are riddled with enforced awwwing."
And here is a part from a letter:
"I’m not sure what to tell you. This is a weirdo scenario we’ve gotten ourselves into. There’s no present-tense relationship to pad the wreckage of the past, no body language to read, no domestic clues to inspect (for me it goes: CD collection, bookshelf, refrigerator, mattress, not necessarily in that order.) no first awkward meal with friends. No first night together, no first morning, no first fight, or reconciliation. I have no idea how you spend your days, or where you live, and, most important, no clear sense of what you’d order at my favorite taqueria, or whether the menu (a field of faded Polaroids taped to the front window) would enthrall you as it does me.
What’s even weirder: I can’t bring myself to disclose this thing—whatever it is, a written audition, an extended power-flirt—to the appropriate confidants. It feels too intimate and fragile, maybe even desperate. And yet I find myself working on these letters at all hours, skipping brunches and movies. (Already I’m blowing off my friends for you.) The mail has become this major event. I count the days between letters. It’s like I am in prison…… And beneath all this fancy throat-clearing, here’s what I really want to say (as much to myself as to you): Don’t stop. I mean it, Jane. Ever famous case of love boils down to reckless honesty. That’s what’s happening here, I think. We’re both smart enough to know this might not work, probably won’t. But that the chance to tell the truth, the whole truth, the whole truth, doesn’t come along too often."
I have not even finished it, and already its picking away at the places I slapped that band aid on. I have always been a big letter writer -- I have one amazing friendship because of it. Two times other than that it was more. Neither ended well at all, but it was still thrilling. Sending the words and waiting on singing pins and needles for the response. It is the best anticipation I have ever had in my life. The one with the bookstore guy was kind of epic. Well, that is being kind of pretentious there, eh? But it was big. I mean I sent a letter to a stranger and addressed it "To the man in the jaunty cap". And it got to him. It was one of the bravest things I have ever done romantically. I had a few of those customer to cashier small talk chats, but nothing more. He was a complete stranger and would never know me if we passed on the street. Unfortunately, he was in a relationship, but he continuted to write. And it was secret and scary and felt forbidden and maybe a little dangerous. We never met, and he faded away to Rhode Island of all places, and told me we could not write again. The letters, this blind correspondence is a shield I use. I can be thrilling, honest as painfully possible, and maybe even a little beautiful with my words. In person, I fumble, and am seen for my physical presence which can block out anything that my words would have portrayed. Plus I snort when I laugh, and its kinda off putting really. Reading this novel is feeling that all over again, and I wish I had someone to write to again in a way. Be honest and ramble, and just lavish in the words and discoveries that can exist.
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