Slumber Party

The new push around the communal home is for less swearing. (For those of you keeping track at home, we now have six adults living here, albeit some only temporarily - Mom, Jack, Me, Tony, Levi and Christine, Tony's mom. It's Jersey Shore with a lot less gym and tanning. But more laundry.)

Anyhow, upset with the amount and quality of profanity in the house, Mom issued an edict that we should all try to be a little more...intellectual in our discourse with each other. Keep in mind that my soft-spoken and mostly well-behaved mother used to have a mouth like a trucker, which you can still bring out in her IF she's properly enraged. However, she never swore that much in public and never casually. Just when she was angry. You won't like her when she's angry.

Somewhere along the line, though, things got a little off-course. Instead of sounding more intellectual, we merely sound weird. Perhaps we'll adjust. Perhaps we're just resisting the change. Perhaps it was Mom's choice of substitute for every swear word.

She chose "slumber party."

So now, JUST now, I had to refer to something as a "pain in my slumber party." Tony, five minutes ago, referred to someone he met while showing his mom the sights as a "slumberpartying idiot." Levi kicked open the door to the library last night, shouting "what the slumber party is going on in here?" (Which, as an aside, is not actually necessary, because the library has glass doors. He could see Mom and Jack watching TV. He's just a slumber party.)

To be honest, I'm not sure how long this experiment will last. The novelty will surely wear off soon and it has to be odd to hear a group of adults continually referring to a "slumber party." Outsiders probably think we're some weird pajama cult that sleeps in the high school gym in our Barbie sleeping bags.

Until then, I'm going to keep my slumber partying mouth shut and take this like a man.

Three guys. And two gals

Last night, every adult in my house went out for dinner together. For those of you playing along at home, that would mean that all five of us piled into the big car (which finally has legal Kentucky plates, after several months of trips to the BMV and many faxes) and drove off into the sunset.

What makes this so fun is that it isn't easy to put five full-grown humans in a four-door car, no matter how you slice it. So Levi and Tony get to ride in comfort in the front seat, while Mom, Jack and I squeeze into the back. (Unless Jack is driving and then Levi STILL gets to ride in comfort and Mom, Tony and I squeeze into the back. Seems like Levi's living on easy street here, doesn't it?) Anyhow, Jack likes to make Mom miserable, so he spends the entire ride squishing her into me, until she blows her top. Or he'll squeeze her knee, which inevitably makes her pee her pants. In my car. You know, stuff adults in cars do all the time.

By the time we'd made it to Five Guys, everyone was ready to get out of the car and have a few square feet to themselves. This is how the evening went down:

- Mom and Levi got into a (physical) slap fight trying to get in the door of Five Guys because they both tried to go through together. Not the best first impression on the folks in the restaurant.

- Jack left his change at the register.

- Jack and Mom got into a (verbal) slap fight because Jack, as usual, didn't bring his cell phone with him to dinner and Mom wanted to go to the Verizon store and get a replacement phone for him. (His is dying a slow death.)

- Jack, peeved about the slap fight, swept all of his empty peanut shells into Mom's lap when he went up to get the food from the counter.

- Mom, peeved about the peanut shells, scraped them out of her lap and put them all over Jack's chair.

- He saw them, but sat on them anyhow, earning the new nickname "Peanut Butter."

- I, of course, had to take five phone calls during dinner, prompting Tony to give me the same lecture I used to give him about phone calls and emails while we were out. Note to self: just keep mouth shut in the future.

- After dinner, Jack went to the bar to drink away the pain of the peanut shells in his tush while the rest of us did some window shopping.

- I bought a giant artificial flower arrangement for my entryway. Levi and Tony took it back to the car together and it was only when they returned that we realized they must have looked like quite the happy couple, taking their flower arrangement to the car in their complementary polo shirts and matching shorts.

- Mom, when throwing away her milkshake remains, managed to toss it in the trash can in such a way that she got chocolate ice cream sprayed all over the front of her shirt and in her hair.

- On the ride home, Levi had to hold the flower arrangement in his lap, finally experiencing the type of car ride I usually endure, with Mom peeing on my leg and being squished into me the entire time.

In other words, a typical family night out.

The Big 3-0

Well, folks, as much as I've tried to avoid it, my 30th birthday is right around the corner. In less than six weeks, I'll hit the proverbial wall and have to admit that I've accomplished less than half of what I thought I would by this point in my life. (Unless you count marriages, because I've tripled my expectations there. Small victories, people.)

And honestly, I'm not that upset about it. At this point, it just seems like another day. Most days, I'm so tired and burned out from being a Captain of Industry that I feel 500 years old, so 30 seems like a real bonus. And anyone who knows me understands that I'm not the most introspective type, so I'll probably spend five minutes obsessing about my life's accomplishments and then start reading a fashion magazine. Which will start me obsessing about my fashion sense.

The biggest problem is that I don't know what I want to DO for my birthday. I've been in friend hibernation so long that I would have about three people to invite to a party, and throwing a party for yourself has always seemed a bit...narcissitic. I have a business to run, so I can't take a trip, which is what I thought I'd do. Turns out a spa vacation is a lot less relaxing when you have to take your phone and laptop. Makes the massage really complicated. We're still hauling ourselves out of the giant we're-not-working-but-the-bills-are-piling-up hole we dug over the last 16 months, so extravagent gifts are out of the question. (I bought all of Tony's gifts at the Walgreens this year. He got a ring toss game and a coffee mug. Sixteen dollars total. I know, it was too much.)

As far as food is concerned, I'm the resident birthday dessert maker. Every birthday, I'll bake something for the birthday person, be it chocolate cake, chocolate cupcakes, chocolate pie, whatever they want as long as it's chocolate. I'm generous that way. I don't expect Tony to whip up something fabulous and my poor mother spends half of every day cooking for the ever-growing pack of hungry adults who live in my house. (I live in a reality TV show now, in case you didn't know.) I don't feel right asking her to add to her duties with a cake.

So, I've decided. I'm going to sleep late, eat a Five Guys Burger with all the fixins, see a terrible summer blockbuster movie and buy myself something pretty (that costs less than $20.) And then have a giant sundae from somewhere that serves ice cream. The perfect recession birthday.

Or maybe I'll just drink all day.

A tribute...

For those of you who don't know, tomorrow is my mom's birthday. And for those of you who REALLY haven't been paying attention, she lives with me now, so we get to spend lots and lots and lots of time together.

Which has actually been quite wonderful. She's honestly the best person to have in your corner when, as a Captain of Industry, you work 14 hours a day and have no time to do laundry, take bathroom breaks or feed yourself. I can count on two hot meals and clean underoos every day now that Mom is here. She even stripped my sheets, washed and dried them and made up the bed with hotel corners and shams and stuff last week when I was completely swamped and my sheets were beginning to walk around by themselves. It was the best day ever.

But I digress - I didn't want to share with you today the ways my mom makes my life better - I wanted to share my all-time favorite Mom adventure story. It's a classic from the Starling family album.

Mom likes to do outdoorsy stuff. She likes rafting and hiking and biking and all that. So every year for her birthday or other Mom-centric holidays, she asks to do something like that. Like for her 60th birthday, when she rode a mechanical bull. But that's a WHOLE 'nother story.

For Mother's Day about five years ago, she and I decided to go biking and canoeing on the towpath up the road from where we lived. (The towpath is a remnant of canal days, where the horses towing the barges would walk. Fun facts.) Anyhow, we signed up for the half-day bike-and-float package, where you ride upriver on bikes and then float back downriver in a canoe. Two hours, no muss, no fuss, back in time for a light lunch and a movie.

I should have known how things were going to turn out when we arrived at the bike shop and the only man working had an artificial leg. NOT THAT THERE'S ANYTHING WRONG WITH THAT - it just makes it really hard to test out bikes. Which would prove to be an issue later. He also only had about four teeth, and they all got in the way of his map-reading skills. He got out a grimy little map and showed us the way from his shop, through town, to the towpath. He told us to pick out a bike, ride it around a little, and then we could head off. The guys with the canoes would meet us about five miles up the road for the relaxing post-ride float.

Mom and I set off, intrepid explorers that we were. There weren't any signs at the start of the towpath, but that didn't deter us - we figured we were merely the first ones out that day and we'd enjoy miles of solitude on the bike path while everyone else slept and drank mimosas. We did, in fact, enjoy miles of solitude but only because WE WERE ON THE WRONG PATH. We didn't realize it at first, but when the gravel slowly gave way to a dirt track that was so rough you had to ride standing up for fear of breaking your pelvis, we started to think something might be wrong.

Mom asked me, "Don't you work with people who bring their kids out here to ride? How can they do that on this path?"

She was right - the towpath was supposed to be this glorious bike path that was wide enough for five riders abreast and smooth enough for a tricycle being ridden by a three-year-old. We were on an old washout, it seemed. We confirmed something was amiss when we looked through the woods, ACROSS THE CANAL, and saw riders gliding easily along - families and the elderly and at one point, a barbershop quartet on a pair of tandem bikes. THAT was the towpath. We were on the hellpath.

And then it got worse. Much, much worse. First, the seat fell off my bike, so I could only ride standing up with the fear of sodomizing myself with a rusty bike part, or I could walk next to my bike, carrying my seat. FOR FIVE MILES. Then, we ran into an elderly couple collecting trash along the path who said, kind of cryptically, "Well, it's a beautiful day for a ride, as long as you watch for the trains." TRAINS?

We found out what they meant soon enough. Seems the hellpath was merely a feeder for the deathpath, which was just train tracks. We followed the train tracks, figuring they'd get us to civilization at some point. They did, but not before becoming a trestle bridge that crossed the river. WITH NO WALKING AREA. Nope, just a bridge made of train tracks and a 30-foot fall to your death or certain paralysis below.

Did I mention I'm afraid of heights? Mom had to talk me across that bridge like a hostage negotiator, wheedling, cajoling, tempting me with a Hostess Sno-ball, whatever it took. We carried our bikes across this giant bridge, praying the whole time that a train wasn't coming. I resolved to throw my bike in the river, make my peace with God and hug that train. I wasn't jumping.

We finally ran into a little town called Clinton, Ohio, where we accosted a nice man in his yard who put the seat back on my bike for me and gave us directions back to the towpath. By that point, I'd made several hysterical phone calls to my brother and my boyfriend at the time, both of whom had no idea where we were but thought it was pretty funny that we were so lost. We also called the folks at the bike/canoe shop, who had pretty much the same reaction.

Two miles of riding later, we found the canoe portage. And 30 minutes after calling the bike shop, a father-son team in a pickup showed up, unloaded a canoe and took our bikes. For a minute, we thought they were just stealing our bikes. The one gentleman, though, finally spoke to us, to tell us that we needed to watch out for branches in the water, because, and I quote, "earlier this week I came out to cut some of them branches out of the water but I dropped my chainsaw in the canal and I haven't been able to fish it out yet."

So I went the entire canoe trip visualizing a running chainsaw slicing its way along the bottom of the canal, just waiting for the opportunity to remove one of my limbs. Makes for a relaxing trip.

By this point, Mom and I had turned a 45-minute bike ride into a three-hour epic journey and we were starving, so we paddled down that canal as fast as we could, giving the whistling, cheerful bicyclists the finger every chance we got and scarfing down Hostess Sno-balls like they were Powerbars. By the time we got to the end point, we leapt from the canoe, ran to our cars, and I honestly don't think I've ridden a bike since. Or celebrated Mother's Day.

Mom thinks that was the best trip she's ever taken. Which is why she's such an awesome mom. Happy Birthday, Skippito.

Fairy Ann, Wheeler-Dealer

My mom is a wheeler-dealer. Put her on the phone with a salesman, and she'll get the best deal they've ever given anyone. Throw a stack of coupons and an office-supply catalog at her feet and the doorbell will ring 20 minutes later with a guy delivering your free paper and a bonus box of kittens.

I share none of my mom's special abilities. It embarrasses me to use a coupon anywhere but at the grocery and even then, I sometimes feel bad holding up the line with my fist-fulls of money savers. This is why, now that she lives with us, Mom does all the negotiating. Just today, she battered the woman from Scott's into some sort of crazy discount by threatening to go back to TruGreen. And she got the TruGreen lady to give up some serious ground herself, by threatening to go with Scott's.

It's an art, really. She sits down at the phone with her legal pad at the ready and her loins girded, cracks her knuckles and goes to work. Twenty minutes later, the Schwan's man is paying her to take his food.

Now this can go the other way, too. Lots of people have made money off my mother by sending her coupons. DSW, for one, can send every employee to college off the interest on Mom's "Special Birthday Discount" coupon purchases alone. Tony has razor blades to last until his beard stops growing. We have enough Tylenol to stock a hospital. And her car smells like freshly-baked sugar cookies because the Manager's Special at the car wash wasn't a good enough deal alone - it needed the additional air freshener and chassis wax. (Come to think of it, we could all use a good chassis wax.)

So the next time you click a coupon link in your email or accept the senior citizen parent of a military service member discount at the movie theater, think of my mom. She's probably in line behind you, waiting to combine her offers to get in for free.

Breathing....

I find it impossible to meditate. I really want to, I really need to, but I find it utterly impossible.

It's bad enough that I can't quiet my own mind - two seconds of "Breathing in, I know I am breathing in" and my mind is thinking about what color to paint the meditation room (we turned Tony's old office into a meditation room) or what I'm going to eat for dinner or why my customer just emailed me at 10:30 at night. I've never been good at quieting my mind. In yoga class, it is much the same. Sometimes I hit that sweet spot of not wondering what my butt looks like in these pants or if I'm showing too much cleavage because I swore this tank covered more when I left the house and did I leave the iron on but I couldn't because I haven't ironed anything in over a year and surely the house would have burned down by now and how much insurance do we have and could we just take the money and forget about rebuilding the house that is slowly bankrupting us and oh, god what if we do go bankrupt, where will Mom and Jack live and so on. That's your little peek into my mind. Never quits.

But sometimes, every once in a great while, I'll be breathing and softly gazing at my candle and my mind will go white and it is a beautiful thing.

And that's usually when Sarge barks or someone calls my name. See, I tell everyone in the house when I'm headed to meditate. I want them to know that for the next half hour or so I will be unavailable to answer phones or questions or watch American Idol or whatever else is going on at the time. I'm conscious of the fact that I'm needed a lot in my house and that everyone needs to know when I'm going off the grid.

Doesn't matter. I swear that somewhere in the house there is a light that goes on about five to seven minutes into my meditation that alerts Sarge or Tony or Mom that I need to be interrupted IMMEDIATELY! The first time, Mom needed me to clean up a Sarge accident. The second, Tony forgot I was meditating and needed me to fix the remote control in the basement. The third, Sarge needed my attention because I hadn't given him any in five to seven minutes. It has become a big joke in the house that as soon as I go in that room, I become the most popular person in the house. Tony could go the entire day without talking to me but the minute my butt hits that cushion and I light that candle, we have ISSUES to discuss.

Tonight, I had a combination of distractions. Before going in the meditation room, I announced that unless the house was burning down or someone was headed to the hospital, I was not to be disturbed. Or I would make sure that the house did burn down and one of them went to the hospital. But, Sarge was barking, the neighbors were having a party and Mom and Jack were two rooms over in the library watching some movie that involved police sirens, chainsaws, screaming and loud rock music. I think it's the latest Miley Cyrus vehicle. Plus, Tony was watching something in the basement that had so much bass in the soundtrack that the floor was vibrating. It was the perfect storm of meditation killers.

So, I did what any good student of meditation does. I fumed. But I was breathing deeply the whole time, so I think that counts.

Double Down!

It isn't news to anyone that I love fried chicken. I've written before about my love for everything Kentucky Fried, and I may have even mentioned that I'll eat until I have to roll around the floor in a big greasy pile, stomach distended from scarfing too many drummies and wings. It might even qualify as an addiction. An obsession, at least.

Last night, I took that obsession to a new level. I ate a KFC Double Down sandwich.

Frankly, what surprises me most was that I survived the experience and lived to type about it. But, we'll start at the beginning.

Yesterday was a bit stressful. Most days are a bit stressful now that I'm a Captain of Industry, but yesterday had its own unique complications and I needed greasy food salve for my wounds. Tony suggested the KFC, and you know as well I do that nothing trumps the siren song of Extra Crispy. Then Mom kicked it up a notch and said that in addition to the bucket we always get, she wanted to try the Double Down.

(Keep in mind that my mom has become one of those senior citizens who eats a dollop of potato salad and calls that dinner. I didn't think she'd be able to handle the double downage. So I offered to share it with her. Aren't I generous?)

And so, at 5:45, we drove off into the sunset, in search of crispy, salty meat products. The KFC here in Florence is about 20 minutes from the house, so the drive there is filled with anticipation, and the drive back is filled with the smell of fried chicken. At the drive-up, I told mom that the guys in the window were probably wondering what two hot ladies like ourselves were going to do with a whole bucket of chicken AND a Double Down, but they were probably just wondering why the entire country hasn't died of a heart attack already. Or what the change from $21 would be since the total was $20.50. Yes, one bucket of chicken with no sides and a Double Down costs $20.50. Mom is not a cheap date.

Once we arrived home, I knew we had approximately 30 seconds before the destroyer of chicken showed up. Tony can reduce a bucket to a few scraps of skin and a pile of bones in three minutes flat, so you have to get in, get what you want, and get out, perhaps with your fingers intact, perhaps not. Mom has a habit of dithering around the kitchen after we get take-out, gathering drinks, getting silverware, checking on the dogs, knitting a sweater, etc. She doesn't understand the Chicken Imperative. I grabbed the Double Down, hid it in a cabinet and called for Jack to Loose the Hounds (let Tony out of the attic so he can eat.)

As Tony was devouring his third piece of Kentucky Fried, Mom finally landed at the table to start eating. We cut the DD in half (actually thirds - Mom got 2/3 and I got the scrappins - she's not good at sharing) and braced ourselves for the chicken-y, bacon-y, cheesy goodness.

The verdict? Meh.

I'll admit, it was tasty. But was it more tasty than a piece of extra-crispy KFC? Not really. The box they put it in kinda steams out the crispiness and the bacon adds another (unnecessary) layer of salt to an already salty product. I enjoyed it, but I don't think I'll be purchasing another.

I did eat two drummies, though, and those were fantastic. That's right, people. I ate a third of a Double Down AND two drumsticks. And some potato salad. Save your judgements for someone who cares that it's swimsuit season.

This morning, however, I felt like I'd been doing salt shooters all night. I've had almost a gallon of water today and my body still feels like the Sahara.

So, my Double Down recommendations:

1. Eat a Double Down at least once in your life. It's a cultural experience.
2. Drink lots of water with the DD.
3. Eat it as soon as you order it so the packaging can't steam it to death.
4. Tell no one.

Stripping isn't what it used to be.

I used to be an expert stripper. Just ask my mom. I could take any piece of furniture, strip off all the paint, varnish, dirt and age and turn it into something beautiful and light that you'd be happy to have in your house.

Oh, you thought I was talking about something else.

Anyhow, that was when I was a younger woman, with more tolerance for caustic chemicals, more agile fingers and knees that didn't blow out if I tried to crouch too long. Today I undertook a project that showed my age in more ways than one, but proved that I can still have a tantrum worthy of a two-year-old if properly motivated.

First, though, I have to explain Starling woman projects. Some people are happy having as a project a little scrap booking weekend, or planting a flowerbed in fluffy moist soil. Not Starling women. We believe that a project should crush your will to live, should challenge all your physical and mental capabilities and should, if possible, send someone to the hospital with a bizarre (but non-life-threatening) injury.

My mother was always taking on this kind of project when we were younger. She'd wake up Saturday morning with a bolt, thinking to herself, "Today is the day we rip out the kitchen and reposition it on the roof! We should totally be able to finish that in two days!" or "I feel the urge to build a full-scale medieval trebuchet out of nothing but lawn clippings and guano! Go to it, kids!"

Of course, I exaggerate. Mom would never touch guano. But whatever the urge, it seems genetic. Yesterday morning, I woke with a bolt, thinking, "I'm going to strip and re-paint that chest in my bedroom! Surely I'll be finished by Sunday afternoon and can bask in the glow of my handiness while filling the beautiful chest with crisp bed linens!" (Where I was going to find crisp bed linens, I don't know. Mine are all kind of limp and pilly. I probably thought I'd have time left over to starch and iron mine.)

I thought I could crank this out because in my younger years (when I was recovering from a minor nervous breakdown) I refinished a couple of pieces that are still part of my furniture collection, even after 22 moves in the intervening years. So mom and I set out to buy all the supplies and after a few hours of shopping (turns out some of the supplies were clothes from Ann Taylor Loft), I was home and ready to go.

And that's when it all fell apart. This chest had three layers of intense oil paint on it, each nastier and more stubborn than the last. I spent hours on Saturday spreading, scraping and cursing the paint stripper, breathing in deadly toxic fumes and burning holes in myself. At one point, the stripper was eating through my gloves, so I had to make a choice which hand I liked least. (Take that sentence out of context and this gets weird again.) After a second run to the hardware store for better gloves, mineral spirits and more stripper, I went back to work. (I've got a fever and the only cure is...more stripper!)

This morning I woke up at 6:45, what I consider to be an unseemly hour for a Sunday, so I could bolt back into my bedroom and get back to work. (We slept in the guest room last night so as to survive. Those fumes are not kidding around.) Three hours later, I had to admit defeat. The top layer of paint turned into a substance not unlike toxic marshmallow fluff, while the bottom two layers stubbornly clung to the wood of the chest. I chipped the veneer in several places trying to scrape the paint away and every time I sat down to give my poor ancient knees a rest, I burned my leg or butt or foot or arm with paint stripper. Not to mention the brain cells I killed in the pursuit of bare wood. I need help brushing my teeth now.

The most demoralizing part is that the chest looks worse now than it did when I started. It has a few bare spots, but most of it looks like it's been crusted in, well, toxic half-melted paint. So I did what any sane adult woman would do. I threw a fit. I cried, I stormed around looking for a vacuum cleaner and I yelled at both my husband and my mother. All my work toward a calm, centered self went right out the window, which is nearly where I threw the vacuum cleaner in a fit of rage. Not my best moment.

But, now that I've had time to consider the ill-fated project, I've realized one thing. I'm not as young as I used to be. Oh, and some things you should leave to professionals, like stripping. Both furniture and the other kind.

(Oh, did you miss me? Because I missed you....)

Swiss cheese brain

I'm embarrassed to admit that my brain is made of Swiss cheese. I've forgotten more things in the past week than I remember about my entire life. And as a result of that, I've spent hours on the phone to no less than five different customer service departments, trying to get passwords reset so I can log into the myriad web sites I use to keep our business going. At last count, I have to log on to about 350,000different web sites to track account balances, issue payments, receive payments, input invoices, shop for office supplies, book Tony's facials, and the list goes on.

Over the past five business days, I've had to call for passwords from the bank, my student loan provider, a third-party payment site and Office Depot. In fact, I just got off the phone with a lovely young lady who is in the customer service department for our credit card processing company who informed me that not only was I entering the wrong information, but I was ON THE WRONG WEB SITE. I could hear her gesticulating wildly for her fellow call-center employees to click over and listen to the nutter who just called in and didn't even know which web site she was supposed to use. Awesome.

I have no idea at what point in my life my brain died, but I know it was recently. Part of the problem is that I have a lot to do every day now for the first time in nearly a year. I suppose there is some mental muscle atrophy after an extensive period of disuse. Watching Tabatha's Salon Takeover all day can only use so many brain cells, and it probably kills about three times that many. Working back up to full mental capacity must take some time. I'm guessing that by the time I retire, I'll have my faculties back.

The other problem is that every site has different password requirements. Here you have to enter a password with letters and numbers. Over here, a password has to have capital AND lowercase letters and numbers. At this third place, capital, lowercase, numbers AND be longer than 12 characters. Another place, capital, lowercase, numbers, umlauts, Cyrillic characters, punctuation and a hat. It becomes impossible to come up with something that anyone could remember. Let alone a woman with mush for a brain.

So, I make embarrassing phone calls to bored CSRs in foreign countries and throw myself on their mercy. Only one has had the bad form to laugh at me, and he laughed for what seemed like 15 minutes at my admission of being unable to log into a web site I hadn't used in three months. (He was from the South, so at least his laughing had a pleasing, gentle accent.) Everyone else has just seemed mildly irritated with my ineptitude.

But I've started solving the problem. I'm using miniature Post-It notes (Hey, I thought they were adult-sized when I ordered them from Office Depot. How was I supposed to know they were Lilliputian?) and sticking them in a secret place on my desk with all my user names and passwords written down.

The only problem now is finding a secret place in my desk large enough for 450 tiny Post-its.

Spinning Class

Yesterday, Tony and I took our first Spinning class together. I'm a veteran of Spinning (not to look at me, but I swear I've gone to Spinning before) but Tony was a rookie. I managed to talk him into it with promises of burning more than 1,000 calories in an hour and that there would be other men in this class, unlike Zumba. (Don't worry, I've never tried to talk Tony into Zumba. I understand and respect the limits of our relationship.)

Everything was going great, too. We woke up on time, ate our breakfast and were to the gym in plenty of time to claim a bike and start warming up. Then, our instructor arrived. Let's call her Chesty LaRue. (Keep in mind, I've only ever had male instructors for my Spinning classes. Cleavage wasn't really an issue.)

Chesty was dressed modestly enough when she arrived (late). Long-sleeved shirt, cropped sweatpants (a trend I'll never understand - if it is cold enough for sweatpants, don't you want your shins warm, too?), Ugg boots. I was willing to forgive her for the Uggs if she was a good instructor. Then, moments before we started riding in earnest, she whipped off the outer layer to reveal hotpants and a bikini top. I've never seen a sports bra that small. For a moment, I thought we'd wandered into Stripperobics instead of Group Cycle.

Tony looked at me with bug eyes. I'm sure he was thinking this was the best fitness class he would ever attend. I didn't have the heart to tell him they were going to shut the lights off in a minute and unless Busty McGee's breast implants glowed under the black lights, he wouldn't get the show he was anticipating. His disappointment was palpable.

However, like many women who wear bikini tops and hot pants indoors, Boobs McClanahan's personality didn't improve when the lights were off. (I realize that makes me sound like I've been in the dark with a lot of scantily clad women. I'm not above pandering to increase my readership, people.) For the next hour, we were subjected to her shouting motivational-poster aphorisms:

"It's up to you to decide what your personal best is!" (Mine is not falling off the bike and yarfing on myself.)

"Everyone's feeling alive now!" (If by alive, you mean half dead, I've never felt this alive!)

"What if I told you that you were stronger now than when you walked in here? Scientific fact!" (I'm just wondering where she got her biology degree? Hooters U?)

And my personal favorite, "Dance on that bike - everything's a dance party to me!" Shocking.

Somewhat worse than the shouting was the flat, off-key singing. Every time a new song would come on the sound system, Tatas O'Shea would pick out several key phrases to shout-sing along with. It was kind of like being at a church service where the choir sings and the pastor shouts out their lines about a half-beat too late. "Knockers McGillicutty's 9:15 Bon Jovi Worship service!"

All that being said, she put together a good workout. I fell off that bike at the end of the hour with wobbly legs, a red face and sheets of sweat running off me. Tony crawled off to the locker room in even worse shape. Hours later, I asked if he would ever come back to another class and he said he would.

I'm just not sure if it would be for the workout or the boobs.

Carrots....

I hate carrots. Really despise them. They make me want to scrub my tongue with a washcloth after I eat them.

Why am I telling you this? Frankly, I'm out of good ideas for blogs this week. I've spent the entire week glued to my computer, working, and not that many funny stories arise out of that. Aside from the fact that I've had to blockade my desk with empty boxes and trash cans to keep Big Smelly Dog from wiping his wet beard on my back, there hasn't been a lot of breaking news in here.

I haven't even been to the gym this week because of, in this order, a stomach bug, a fax toner cartridge emergency (it's a long story) and the sheer exhaustion that results from adjusting to a lower-calorie diet. (I'm barely keeping my eyes open while I type this. If I doze off, don't take it personally.)

Which brings us back to the carrots. I really like the food I'm eating right now - it's tasty and the portions aren't even too controlled. I filled a whole plate with lunch today. And last night I got a chocolate square. (I really know how to live it up!) However, the chefs who create these meals LOVE carrots. I've had to eat the orange horsemen of the apocalypse in every non-breakfast meal I've had so far. Raw, cooked, cooked and cold, in slaw, baby ones for crunch, you name it. And I've hated every weirdly bittersweet bite. I don't like the texture, the taste, or even the look of them.

Upon reflection, I think carrots are the only vegetable I really hate. (I'm not a huge artichoke fan, but I'm not even sure that's a serious vegetable.) I eat peas and broccoli and even brussels sprouts. But if I could go the rest of my life without eating carrots, I'd be a happy woman. (And Mom, I know if Tony and I have kids, I'm going to have to eat everything and not complain because I want them to eat everything and not complain. Right now I don't have to be mature about it because I'm the only person who cares what I eat.)

However, if I'm going to keep eating my delivery food, I need to just suck it up and learn to deal with the disgusting little things. No matter how they make the inside of my mouth feel. (Like I've been eating shampoo-flavored sandpaper.) It will all be worth it when I'm as thin as (and, because of the carrots, the same color as) Victoria Beckham.

TV Dinners

Tony and I are, as usual, trying to watch what we eat. We're trying something new this month, though - eating meals from a delivery service. The food is all-natural, never frozen, has no preservatives or artificial flavors and lasts for a week in the fridge. All the portions are strictly controlled and we get three meals and two snacks a day, five days a week. (We like to leave the house occasionally, so we chose to have some days off the plan to allow for that.)

It has made life much easier in that I don't have to plan, shop and cook for meals during the week when my workday starts at 8 in the morning and ends at about 7:30 in the evening. I can just hop into the kitchen, plate some food, heat it up and blam! we have a meal. And the food is super tasty, so that makes it easier. (It certainly doesn't taste like a Lean Cuisine, thank God.) The only thing that remains to be seen is how many pounds I'm going to lose. Tony and I were laughing this morning that the weight was going to just drop off. We'll get on the scale in the morning (because we like to torture ourselves and weigh in every day.) and 10 pounds will be magically gone from our bodies. My clothes will start fitting and his will stop. It will be magical. Kind of like a unicorn who knows karate.

The biggest problem with this system is that with portion control, you sometimes get hungry. (Like, four times a day, max.) And that typically happens late at night, especially if you get hungry and eat dinner at 5 and bedtime isn't until 11. Adding to that is the glut (pun intended) of food commercials on TV, most pointedly during my favorite shows, which all revolve around food. (Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares, Last Restaurant Standing, Biggest Loser, Top Chef, etc.) Last night, with my tummy grumbling, I had to sit through at least 4,000 commercials for Red Lobster, Taco Bell (Who's taking on that Drive-Thru Diet?), Kentucky Fried Chicken (and you know how I feel about that), and every other kind of restaurant you can imagine. The entire time, I was salivating.

It gets better when you DVR something (I like to watch the two-hour Biggest Loser in super-fast-forward, stopping only when someone falls down or they get on the big scale. I can only watch so many sweaty people cry before I become immune to their issues. And I want to swat Jillian Michaels like the tiny gnat she is.) but you still have to deal with the pictures of clam chowder, cake and fried chicken flashing on the screen, tempting you.

I think the only solution is to stop watching TV. Which would also benefit me in the long run. However, the two warmest (read: tolerably warm) rooms in the house both have TVs in them. The rest of the house is an icebox of death. You could hang meat in here, all part of our bill-reduction program. After the December gas bill, we had to turn the thermostat down another five degrees and put on yet another layer of socks and scarves. We both look like that little kid in "A Christmas Story." I'm typing with fingerless gloves right now.

The moral of this story? Don't diet and watch TV. And don't diet, stop watching TV and hang out in an ice-cold house. Go to the gym and sit in the dry sauna for 15 minutes. You'll sweat out the fat AND be warm for a little while. The 55-degree living room will feel refreshing after that. And you'll be so hot you won't want to eat for at least 15 minutes.

Exclamatory sentences

I use too many exclamation points. This came to my attention last week when I was sending out an invoice for some air freight that we'd sent to Jakarta. Here's the actual body of that email:

"Hi Frank!

Hope all is well with you and the family! We're buried under some serious snow here, but I'm sure you are too!

I'm attaching the invoice for your Jakarta load. It finally delivered this morning. (Yay!) Please let me know if you have any questions."


That's four exclamation points in two paragraphs and a salutation. IN A BUSINESS EMAIL. I've run amok. I'm out of control. Everything I say in emails or on Facebook or IM is said with breathless excitement, according to my punctuation. I think I have an addiction. TO EXCLAMATION!

The root of the problem is that in an email, there is no context. You have no idea if the person is happy, sad, excited, etc. Beyond using the dreaded emoticon, how can you convey that you are in fact, cheerfully anticipating payment on an invoice or really happy to hear about someone's children? (I won't put smiley faces in my emails. That's just unprofessional.)

Another issue is that, in general, I'm a pretty over-the-top person. I like hyperbole, I am easily excited, I gesticulate wildly and I laugh way too much and too loudly. Basically, I'm a walking, talking exclamation point. With an unusual hourglass shape.

But I realize that some people regard the exclamation point as childish or unprofessional. So I can take one of two stances - either bend to their will and stop using them, or try to break new ground in the world of corporate communication where exclamation points are not only accepted, but embraced. Soon masters of industry like Bill Gates and Kim Kardashian will be using exclamation points in all their memos, emails and presentations. (Come to think of it, Kim Kardashian probably already does. Replace her with Donald Trump and you'll get my point.) The world will be rife with exclamatory statements. Annual reports will suddenly be filled with a joy and urgency they currently lack. (Earnings down 3%! Corporate bonuses increased by 10% year over year!) PowerPoint presentations will be jazzy, packed start to finish with joie de vivre and je ne sais quoi!

Or, I'll just continue along my lonely (but excited!) path, dropping exclama-bombs like so much napalm over my emails and online communication. No one ever accused me of being the consummate professional, anyhow. (As I type this, I'm on company time, wearing giant fuzzy slippers and trying to figure out how to shop online without Tony seeing my computer screen.) I suppose my punctuation is the least of my sins.

Coutsoftides out!!!!!

Tonglish

Communication is a big issue in any relationship. Even if both people speak the same language, there can still be miscommunication, hurt feelings, etc. In my marriage, that is multiplied by 300 because I speak English and Tony speaks his own language. Let's call it Tonglish.

To meet him, you'd never guess that he was born outside the United States. He has no accent, his English is (ostensibly) perfect and most people assume he was born and raised here. (Actually, he was born in Cyprus and raised in Saudi Arabia and Singapore before moving to the States when he was 17. Fun facts for everyone!) The only time he has a little bit of an accent is when he talks to his family and he picks up on theirs and that's more of a speech syncopation than an actual accent.

However, there are still times when I have to rifle through my mental Rolodex to understand what the heck he's talking about. For the most part, it isn't because he's using words improperly, it's because he's not using words AT ALL. Or the words that he's using are so imprecise, he could be talking about anything. For instance, here is a conversation we have daily in the office:

Tony: Did you get that guy the stuff he needed?

Me: What guy? What stuff?

Tony: *Silence because he's working on an email or something else on his computer.*

Me: What guy? What stuff?

Tony: *More silence* The guy. Who needed the stuff.

Me: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? WHAT FRIGGING GUY? WHAT FRIGGING STUFF?

Tony: I told you. Todd. He needed the credit app.

Me: *Head explodes*

Another great example is when Tony has been having a 20 minute conversation with himself about something and then brings me in for the big finish:

Tony: So, what do you think about getting that stuff done? I think it really needs to be done if we are going to be profitable.

Me: What stuff?

Tony: *Silence while he types on the computer*

Me: Tony, use your words. What stuff? (At this point, I'm wracking my brain to think if he's mentioned anything in the last five hours that could apply to our business. The phones? New toner cartridges? Another salesperson? WHAT IS IT?)

Tony: Oh, you know, getting a new phone system. I didn't say that?

Me: *Head explodes*

I will admit that 85% of the time, I can figure out what he's talking about, because we are together 20000 hours a day and we've reached some kind of eerie symbiosis (That doesn't go both ways, trust me. He never has any idea what I'm talking about, even if I draw a chart and show him pictures.) that allows me to know what he's talking about even if he doesn't. Which happens more than I care to admit.

But the other 15% of the time is killing me. I can't just automatically assume I know, because I've agreed to some really expensive and stupid things in the last two months thinking I was agreeing to something else. Sometimes I think he does it on purpose so he can get away with spending money he knows I wouldn't give him under normal circumstances.

So, until further notice, I'm making him fill out requests in writing for anything financial. And to stop, think, and use his full vocabulary when he's talking to me. Because I can't deal with this stuff any more.

Lean "Cuisine"

Throughout my middle 20's - around the time I met Tony - I ate a lot of Lean Cuisine frozen meals. A typical trip to the grocery store for me would consist of a box of Eggo waffles, a 12-pack of Diet Coke with lime and 10 Lean Cuisines. I lived alone, I worked a lot of hours and I didn't really have the utensils to cook much beyond scrambled eggs or grilled cheese (basically, a spatula and a frying pan).

Life lesson: This is what happens when you give up all your worldly goods in back-to-back divorces. You end up living in a two-bedroom apartment with no furniture, no television and no way to cook food. And the legal fees leave you unable to purchase new things for yourself. I spent six months sitting on the floor, listening to my radio. Not kidding.

When I moved in with Tony, I started cooking all the time and only ate frozen meals at lunch sometimes at work. Then, when I quit my job, I stopped eating them altogether. And now I remember why.

As things have gotten busier at work, the time for me to create a three-course lunch has disappeared. And though I broke down last week and had Dominos deliver lunch, we can't afford to do that more than once a month. (From both a budgetary and a dietary perspective.) So at the grocery store yesterday, Tony and I selected a variety of Lean Cuisines to have at lunchtime every day. This way, we can dine at different times, cleanup is a breeze and the portions are controlled.

The only problem is that they taste terrible. Honestly, today I would have rather eaten the cardboard box my Chicken Enchiladas Suiza came in than choke down the bizarrely flavored cat food-filled "enchiladas." That's not Suiza, people. And the rice had enough sodium to spike my blood pressure 100 points. Tony's Salisbury Steak and Macaroni and Cheese was a little better, but still nothing I'd eat again. (Honestly, I wouldn't have chosen Salisbury Steak in the first place, but he was in the Army, so he eats all sorts of stuff I wouldn't touch.)

What happened? Have they changed the formula? Did I get a bad batch? Were they on super-sale at Kroger because they were laced with inedible compounds? Am I going to die of food poisoning? Because I honestly used to eat at least five of these things a week and thought they were just fine. I never thought they were a culinary revelation, but they didn't make me want to yarf as soon as I smelled one, which was the reaction I had today. I'm furiously chewing a piece of Big Red right now to get rid of the taste and it's not working. The suiza won't go away.

Maybe I'm just too old to eat this way. I've always thought of the Lean Cuisine as a young woman's dish. Food for the single life. Something you eat when you have better things to do than cook, like go to the gym non-stop and fit into your clothes (That's what I did when I was dating Tony. I ate Lean Cuisines, worked and went to the gym. I cooked once every other week, on Friday, when he came rolling in to town.) I think that cooking for three straight years (because that's how long I've been in Cincy now, if you can believe it) has ruined my palate for frozen diet dinners. I can still put down some Stouffers mac'n'cheese, but the Lean Cuisine stuff tastes like rubber bands in yellow Elmer's glue.

You'd think with all the advances they've made in flash-freezing food that they could create a frozen meal that doesn't taste like astronaut food. Instead, I think they have just brainwashed all of us to believe that diet food is supposed to be punishment and that we should just pinch our noses and consume our 300 calorie meals in silence.

Well I for one refuse to go silently. I'll eat my Lean Cuisines, but I'll do it with a maximum of gagging and tongue-scrubbing. Because I'm not going to let the 15 in my freezer go to waste, no matter how awful they taste. My budget is stronger than my taste buds in this case.

Ode to chicken, Kentucky Fried

Last night, on our way home from the gym (Yes, we joined a gym last weekend. They made us an offer we couldn't refuse. They have a dry sauna AND free tanning. I'll look like a raisin in no time.) Tony and I realized we were really, really hungry. And that the only food at home was frozen vegetables and spaghetti noodles, which didn't sound great alone or together. We had what you might call a situation.

We drive past every imaginable fast-food joint on the way home from the gym. Everything from gyros to tacos to burgers. Lots of burgers. But nothing quite hits the spot the same way a giant bucket of fried chicken does. Tony and I are huge Kentucky Fried Chicken fans. We can kill most of an eight piece extra-crispy bucket in about 10 minutes and then roll around on the floor in greasy ecstasy, licking our fingers and clutching our distended bellies.

I think part of the appeal is that we can tell ourselves that it isn't as bad as other fast food because you can easily identify the part of the animal you are eating. With a McNugget, there is a great deal of ambivalence. Same with a Whopper. With KFC, though, you have easily labeled parts - breasts, wings, drummies, etc. And there is no way they chopped up other parts of the bird and re-formed them into some sort of drummette or breastie. (This is getting weird, isn't it?)

The other part of the appeal is that it tastes so frickin' awesome. I mean, is there any other fast food that tastes equally good hot OR cold? I just ate a leftover wing for lunch, straight from the fridge (and over the sink like a bachelor) and it tasted just as good as last night, but in a wonderfully different way. Can you imagine reaching into the fridge to grab last night's Big Mac and munching away over the sink? I can imagine grabbing it and then yarfing over the sink, but that's something entirely different.

Tony and I can also divide and conquer with KFC. When we order pizza, he likes different toppings than I do, but eats more of the pie. If we split the pizza in half by toppings, he'll have to eat at least one piece that he hates. But, with chicken, he likes white meat and I like my KFC like I like my men - dark and crunchy. (Just look at Tony and you'll know what I mean.) So he eats the wings and breasts and I eat the drumsticks and thighs. No arguing, and no elbowing in the nose over the bucket.

In fact, I don't know why we don't eat more KFC. I think we've honestly eaten it about three times in the past year, whereas we've eaten Taco Bell at least once a week (they have dairy-free chicken tacos now for the T-man). I mean, my cardiologist is glad we don't eat there more often, but my taste buds are sad.

I don't think we'll make a habit of it, though. I have a feeling eating KFC at nine at night will be bad for my weight-loss plan. And my sleep patterns. I had such bad nightmares last night I aggravated my groin pull trying to get away from the bad man standing on my bed. (I still suspect it might have been Tony, but he denies any involvement in my dream.) In any case, there was a lot of screaming.

The leftovers today made up for that, though. Sweet, sweet leftover chicken. I shall miss you.

Eye of the Tiger

According to the Chinese Zodiac, it's the year of the Tiger.

I know, very exciting. Normally, I don't care about these things, but Tony found out and because he was born in the year of the Tiger, this is big news. He's decided that 2010 is going to be his year. Which is a real downer, because I was hoping 2010 would finally be MY year. But I guess I'll have to wait until 2011.

In his enthusiasm for this wonderful news, he's taken to shouting - at random intervals and at the top of his lungs - "IT'S MY YEAR, BABY!"

It's like working at a spa here. So relaxing.

He's also changed the screen saver on his Blackberry to a picture of a tiger, played "Eye of the Tiger" 42,000 times on the sound system and started growling at odd times. I'm beginning to think he's taking this a little too seriously.

But, I have to admit I was bored this weekend and decided to look up MY Chinese zodiac symbol, so I don't miss when it's MY year. And I found out I'm a metal monkey. Awesome. I hate monkeys.

Even better, Monkeys are least compatible with....TIGERS! In fact, the one site said that Monkeys have "turbulent relationships" with Tigers and Snakes. You have no idea, sister.

And Metal Monkeys were described as "sturdy," which I find both true and insulting at this stage in my life. The worst news is that the next year of the Monkey isn't until 2016. I missed the last one in 2004 because I was too busy getting divorced and starting a job I hated. Obviously, it was totally MY YEAR!

On the plus side, I found out that the year of the Tiger technically starts on February 14th, so I've declared my house a Tiger-free zone until then. It's the small victories that make up an awesome year, people. THIS IS MY MONTH, BABY!

New Description!

My first act of 2010 (Well, my first blogging act of 2010. My REAL first act of 2010 was showering, but that's not interesting. Most days.) is to re-write the description of this blog. Really, I'm just putting off another act of 2010 that is waiting for me - organizing the office closet.

Right now, the blog description is still the one I came up with in March, when as an unemployed former cosmetics maven, I started blogging as a way to fill my day that didn't involve lunching or shopping. Here it is, in case you haven't read it lately:

"Tales from the day-to-day life of that dying breed, the American House Wife. Not a stay-at-home mom, not someone who works from home or has a part time job, just a woman with the sole responsibility of taking care of house and home. Oh, and her husband. "

Yeah, even then it sounded kind of smarmy or facetious. I guess I was trying to push some buttons. I WAS a house wife for about six months, but that came to an abrupt end when Tony and I opened our business. He was a house husband with me for four of those months, and let me tell you that nothing tries a marriage like constant togetherness. There are actually books being written about "companionate" marriages, where the husband and wife live and work together. Sometimes it is awesome. Sometimes you want to murder each other. Often within the same five minute period.

Anyhow, now that I'm a high-rolling (powerless) President of a major (tiny) company, I thought I needed a new description for my blog, but I'm stumped as to what to say. I mean, the title of my blog doesn't even mean that much anymore, other than that I'm a wife who lives in a house, but we all kind of do that, don't we? I guess I could be The Tent Wife or The Bunker Wife, but the meaning is the same. And the intention of the blog is different, too. It was meant to be hilarious anecdotes about my life of leisure. Now it's mildly amusing or downright depressing anecdotes about my life of companionate marriage or my dogs or my weight loss struggles. So how does one describe that? What genre of blog is this? And how do I explain my neuroses to the casual reader, one who just pops on from time to time for a laugh or to feel better about herself in comparison to me?

I guess I'll have to keep it simple, like my company's mission statement. I honestly write this blog because writing and cooking are the only two creative outlets in my life and I can do this at my desk while pretending to work. I write because I feel compelled to get some of the thoughts rattling around in my head on paper (or screen) because otherwise, I lie awake at night composing blogs instead of getting my beauty sleep. I write because I believe that I am good at it. Because I think some of you are amused by my ramblings. Because I am sometimes amused by my ramblings. I write about what happens to me day-to-day because I don't know enough about anything else to write about it. And I can't do fiction. I write because I want so badly to be a published author, even if that means self-publishing the same way Lindsay Lohan does. And this is the result. Seventy-four entries, and counting, from the bowels of my brain and the detritus of my life.

I guess that's as good a description as anyone will get out of me today. That closet isn't going to clean itself.