i have finally been vindicated by mass.gov. i was spending some time checking out the new citizen information pages, just to see what kind of face massachusetts was putting forwards to new folks. i would hate to think that people would come to the state and think that we spend all of our time debating the various merits of fluff. and at first, i was skeptical. for example, under the "practical guide to living in the state", there is a section for helpful hints. this has four hints -- how to find a doctor, how to find a dentist, how to find a licensed day care provider, and where you can get a nickel for your empty soda bottle. one of these things isn't like the other.
but i kept on, figuring there must be some wisdom in these pages, and there was. i am relieved to know that embalmers need to be licensed in this state. this could one day be useful. but the real kernel of wisdom was tucked deep in the list on the page of Unincorporated and Unofficial Names. there, about two thirds of the way down, right below Pocket and right above Point Independence, there it was!
PODUNK.
i have been telling people for years that the mythical Podunk, who's name is synonymous with East Bum Fuck Nowhere, was actually an unincorporated township in Worcester. and now Mass.gov has validated this.
okay, actually nobody is totally sure where the first and original Podunk came from. maybe it was massachusetts, maybe it was near Ulysses NY, Hartford CT, or Wadsboro VT (all worthy contenders). and maybe the truth doesn't matter. maybe Pudunk is just a small, unimportant, tiny place within all of us. mine just happens to say "wicked" a lot, bitch about Mitt Romney, and drive around in an old beaten car that has a bumper-sticker slapped on it's ass that reads "Don't Blame Me. I'm from Massachusetts".
so shayne and i both had the day off on friday (thank you bunker hill day, or breed's hill day, or whatever you want to call it) and we decided to head out to the beach. while this might conjure up images of long white beaches and vistas of endless sand dunes, we decided to be city kids and go to a city beach -- so we headed off to revere beach. we spent the day counting gold chains roped around overly-tanned old men's waddles. we saw a girl who was eight months pregnant in a thong bikini (and much to our dismay she looked far better than either shayne or i in our non-pregnant state). we got cheese fries at kelly's. and we played like children in the ocean.
the cats are recuperating nicely. boo is back to his old self, and trixie is learning to keep her tongue in her mouth without the aid of any teeth. i am simply amazed at their resiliency, and i am much relieved.
last night it was drinks at bones with the foundation, needs more meat, and the lower-half of the casa. we tried to get together with vontrapperkeeper, but for some reason our messages weren't getting through to his blackberry... there were endless movie quotes being thrown around. a lot of $2.00 beers were guzzled. and much to my dismay everybody kept singing that james blunt song "you're beautiful". that song makes me want to gouge my eyes out with a dull butter knife. however, i confess i like it a little more now that i have heard the parody "my cubicle" (which you can listen to here). good times.
boo and trixie went in this morning for their dental appointments.
boo, who has genetically bad teeth, lost another three molars. i am not sure how many this leaves him with, but i think the answer is "precious few".
trixie, as i have mentioned, is allergic to her own teeth. while i was hoping for the best, sometimes it is unclear exactly what the best is. she had twelve teeth removed. this will, in the long term, make her much more comfortable, and she will adjust just fine.
i, on the other hand, am a wreck. there is something so overwhelming about seeing your own pets in pain. i can't explain to them why they hurt. or why i put them through this. i can't tell them that they will feel better soon. i mean, i do. but they don't exactly understand me, although i use my best baby-speaking voice. the best i can do is just know, in my own heart, that i am caretaking the best i can and that i am making the right choices for them.
sometimes being a grown up sucks.
le jour de gloire est arrive!!
why am i singing La Marseillaise, you might ask (if you know the french national anthem in its native language, which i happen to know all the words to for some completely unknown reason... i'm sure those brain cells could be used for something much more worthwhile)? because for the first (and probably only) time in my life, i'll be cheering on the french national football team tomorrow at noon. i don't feel good about it - i've been making a concentrated effort to support countries that have been victimized by imperial powers. this sometimes means that i have to deny my own heritage (actually, it pretty much always means that... apologies to the US and english teams but c'mon now, you guys are representing some serious assholes) and it often means that i'm supporting african countries that i'm only vaguely aware of their geographic location (i found togo the other day - turns out it's right next to ghana, who knew?), but i think i'm a better person for it. however, sometimes personal feelings take precedence over idealist impulses. so allez francais!!
allons-y, les bleus!
if technology advanced, and scoutie and i ever had a love child together, it would look a little like this.
creepy, right?
just so we're all clear: i told kate a month ago that we had critters in the walls. she thought i was insane.
i hope they find their way into her bedroom and scare the bejesus out of her.
i was lobbing lemon wedges up into the gutter trying to dislodge the pigeon squatters that had moved into my gutter. after taking out a generation of pigeons-to-be with a broom, they finally began viewing me as their natural predator, and they wisely moved on.
their damn cooing was driving me insane.
and now i have found something evening more annoying than the maniacal sighing of a nesting bird -- squirrels. in particular, clumsy squirrels, tripping and falling and generallry galumphing through the walls. it sounds like we are under attack.
now, i am a pro at getting rid of pesty varmints. i got out my trusty broom, and started whacking the walls.
so far, all i managed to do is disrupt some dust bunnies.
BECAUSE SHE IS ALLERGIC TO HER OWN GOD DAMN TEETH!!
okay, technically that isn't true. apparently she has lymphocytic-plasmacytic gingivitis stomatitis (LPGS), which means she is allergic to her own plaque.
since you can't really have teeth without plaque, it's basically the same thing in my eyes.
at least now we know why she smells so bad.
sorry trixie.
it's killing me. who knows what this truck does?!?!?
seriously. i know... i can be obsessive. it's true. i perseverate. and i ponder. and certain things get caught in my head. and then the more i think about them, the more they begin to nag...
so help me out folks. i saw the truck in the somerville parade. i know it's part of Somerville Works. but that's all i know. and now i can't stop thinking about it. it looks a little like one of those crap vacuums that they have in european cities, that do nothing but drive around and suck up dog poo. but it has that fancy winch in front, as if it will be rescuing small children from the bottom of wells. yet those tubes on the sides look like they could launch rockets. and it's oh so very shiny, like a toy. what does the DPW need with a crap-sucking-timmy-fell-down-the-well-scud-missile-launching-tonka-truck?
and i mean it -- a dozen homemade cookies to the first person who can tell me what the heck this thing does!!
so kathryn came home from her college reunion yesterday all tired and possibly (heck, probably!) hung over. she was just in time to watch the parade go by. the arts council had made a special float, which she helped put together. i was of the mistaken idea that she would actually be *in* the parade, but apparently this was not to be.
until shayne and i started instigating.
and nagging.
and cajoling.
and *inspiring*.
so up the street she ran, where she hopped on the float, and rode it down. throwing out old expired art beat dog tags to the adoring crowd. making art for freedom.
i like my job. in theory, i derive pleasure from increasing other peoples’ happiness quotients (giving people ice cream makes them happy!). however, the reality of my job is that it's filled with the tedium of answering the question, “what is cow tracks?” roughly 139 times every shift (it's a sweet cream base with a fudge swirl, mini peanut butter cups and chocolate chips, in case you're wondering), calling the cops on the bum who’s peed all over himself in front of the store, and getting yelled at for the high price of homemade ice cream (like i'm personally profiting… i’m not exactly moneybags mcgee over here, people).
a few days ago when some guy asked me how thick our frappes are (milkshakes for you non-new england natives). i answered him in my driest tone, ‘they’re about an 8 on the viscosity scale.’ he smiled and said sincerely, ‘that sounds great!’ i guess stupid questions deserve stupid answers that involve fabricated measuring systems.
then there are the questions that completely dumbfound me. ‘what does your black raspberry taste like?’ uh, it tastes a lot like black raspberries. hence the name. 'what's coffee oreo?' we're not exactly ben & jerry's - no lyrical and obtuse names like the gobfather, vermonty python or phish food here. if it's called 'coffee oreo', chances are good that it is in fact coffee ice cream with oreos in it.
the other day some girl asked me what the hardest ice cream to scoop is, then promptly ordered it. great, now the customers are intent on making me work even harder for my just-above minimum wage hourly rate. carrying 6 buckets (roughly 90 lbs) of ice cream up the stairs at the same time clearly means that I’m slacking and I need to be working harder. why doesn't everyone just get whatever’s hardest to scoop so shayne’s right bicep becomes even more freakish! hey, at least I know that if this ice cream gig doesn’t work out, I can join the circus freakshow as the amazing lopsided woman.
however, my favorite of all the weird questions/feedback at the ice cream store has to be the customer comment card that was filled out last year complaining that our ice cream tastes too much like what it's supposed to be. the example this astute customer used was the oreo ice cream - it tastes just like actual oreos, not enough like vanilla ice cream with oreos in it. they should definitely stay away from the chocolate ice cream, then. it tastes suspiciously chocolately.
one of the joys of living on the main drag in somerville is that all of the parades go right by the house. i can wander out in my bare feet, sit on the stoop, and enjoy the wonder that is somerville. this place, while being the most densely populated city in MA (and in the top ten of the entire U.S.), still struggles to rest somewhere between modern metropolis and small town. nothing highlights this better than an olde tyme parade.
for two hours, shayne and i watched a long slow trek of people celebrating the holiday. there were marching bands, cheerleaders, armed forces (and not so armed forces, such as the transit police), bagpipers, clowns, nuns, flag girls, weird cars and trucks, little league teams, clydesdales, civil servants, shriners, shriners, and more shriners. if it weren't for the shriners, i would guess that the whole thing would have taken 45 minutes tops.
which left me to wonder about the shriners. they have appeared in most parades and celebrations that i have seen in the U.S. and yet i was left scratching my head, wondering "who are these men, and what the heck do they do??". so i pulled out my trusty "international encyclopedia of secret societies & fraternal orders" and did a little research.
the shriners full name is The Imperial Council of the Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. no wonder they thought to shorten that. and they are an offshoot of the Masons (Ancient, Free, & Accepted). any master mason of the 32nd degree, or a Knights Templar, can get in. they are the wacky side of the usually very serious Masons.
according to lore, it was started because the Masons were teetotalers, and these men wanted to drink booze. they almost got kicked out of the Masons for being boisterous drunks, until they started turning some of their extra energy to good works. the shriners hospital kept them in the good graces of the Masons, and generally kept them from getting arrested for all of their wild shenanigans. it has not, however, kept them in the good graces of people who are followers of Islam. the shriners have ripped off and bedazzled a lot of their rituals and apparently generally piss them off.
and, as i suspected... ladies can't be shriners. if you are the wife, mother, daughter, or sister of a shriner, you can join the auxiliary Ladies Oriental Shrine of North America, but you can't get the sparkly fez or drive in the tiny cars or get elected to Most Illustrious Grand Potentate.
basically what i learned is that the shriners are even weirder than i initially thought.
many of my friends and family have heard me brag about my mad culinary skillz. i will talk your ear off about the importance of cream of tartar in making the perfect snickerdoodles, or how a little bit of lemon juice really just brightens up any meal. while i might not be able to pick a decent table wine, i can find a ripe melon, or a juicy lime, or generally tell if pork has been infused with water and salt prior to packaging. i own more specialty kitchen gadgets than a kitchen of my size should have. a zester. a ginger grater. a marble mortal and pestle. a freakin' cake fork for christ's sake. i have a hand cranked bread maker from the 50's, and an electric one from the nineties. i own more cookbooks than i own dictionaries.
and while my tastes tend to run to the comfort food, it's always just a little fancy. meatloaf wrapped in bacon. macaroni and cheese made with gruyere and gorgonzola. toasted pine nuts in everything.
and yet... i do confess... i have a love of junk food. and i don't mean junk food in the "twinkie" sense (although i did once make the loved and feared twinkie casserole for shayne), but in the convenience food, there's-no-real-food-in-my-food, sort of way.
i am terribly embarrassed about this.
so, to purge my guilty conscience, i do hereby avow my deepest love for the following:
bacos
bisquik
suddenly salad mix in a box
magic shell
cake mix
peperidge farms frozen garlic bread
any kind of doughnut, the crappier the better
cheese wiz
coffemate creamer
pilsbury crescent rolls
gourmayo
any mini sausages, preferably with tasty dippin' sauce
whew. i feel better now.
friday night shayne and i went out with peter and brenda to catch a night of amateur porn. it was the seventh annual "You Oughta Be in Pictures" show, sponsored by local women-friendly sex shops Grand Openings and Good Vibrations. people spend all year sending in submissions for the event, which is run three times. three master dvd's are made, and at the end of the night, each is ritualistically destroyed.
the clips are all shorts, which run from the funny to the dirty to the down-right kinky. but really the whole thing is just a celebration of sexuality. the actors appear to be having a good time, the audience is enthusiastic, and Kim Airs, the curator of the fesitval has a good sense of what plays well to a mixed crowd.
it seems like it's a great chance for everybody to get their preferences validated. there was an homage to men in thongs, a sneak peek at the sexual life of doughnuts, some intense gender-bending, and a deep respect for the sexuality of the older generation, the younger generation, and everybody in between. gay, straight, plushie or s/m. it was all there. and the audience loved it.
perhaps the funniest clip of the night was the last, which involved an erect penis and a lamb chop puppet. since we had already seen so much debauchery, we were expecting it and resigned, except for the young man behind me who blurted out "FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! NO, LAMB CHOP! DON'T DO IT!!". but she did, and now we are all educated as to where baby lamb chop puppets come from. i think Shari Lewis might be turning over in her grave.
shayne and i just did our annual volunteering for the Walk for Hunger. she and i have done this together most years for the past six years or so. our old company used to organize troops to help marshall crowds and direct walkers through busy intersections. while most of us no longer work for the company (and in fact, tend to call ourselves "survivors" of the place), we still show up year after year, to hold the same signs, and stand on the same corners, to help out.
and eat snacks.
one of the great ironies of this gig is that they pack up snack bags. free chips and drinks and coffee and doughnuts and candy bars. so while other people are trudging 20 miles to stamp out hunger, we lollygag, smoke cigarettes, eat free snacks. i felt a little guilty about the whole thing.
do i still feel like what i did contributed? sure. in that old lady sort of way. i dread becoming one of those people who no longer gives their time or energy, just their money. although that's valid, too.
helping out comes in many forms, and i was raised to raise my voice for what i believe in. when i was younger, i donated blood and marched on washington. i went to peace vigils and took back the night. i once even went so far as to lash myself to a trident nuclear submarine. i spent four years donating my time as a rape counselor, being on call for the hospitals for victims of sexual assault. i saw the worst that the world had to offer. and yes, when i was a teenager i even actually walked the Walk for Hunger.
and i just realized that i trudged those 20 miles, back in 1987, eating snacks, drinking coffee, and smoking cigarettes.
maybe i really haven't changed that much at all.
and the lord apparently taketh away my magical blizzard toaster.
it's gone.
as quickly as it appeared on the roof of the car, it vanished from the casa porch. who wanders around the homes of somerville, desperately searching for a free small kitchen appliance?
i dunno.
maybe it gets more at the redemption center than the bounty of diet coke and seltzer bottles we leave in the recycling. maybe some tufts kid, all hopped up on goofballs, had the munchies and desperately needed a pop-tart.
and maybe i imagined the whole thing.
but i swear it was there.
ride me sexy.
there is something slightly magical about the casa. i don't know if it's our magnetic pull... or the junky look of the outside of the house... but it seems to be the repository of other people's unwanted crap. and i am not talking about the detritus of the inhabitants. nope. people just leave their trash here.
this weekend somebody left us an old stairmaster. we don't know where it came from. but there is appeared in front of the casa. a few hours later, somebody added the "ride me sexy" sign. and a few hours after that, it was gone.
this isn't the first time stuff has just shown up here. during this winter's blizzard, a toaster automagically appeared on the roof of one of the cars. it's cord was laid out straight behind it, trailing down the back window. and the snow drifted around it. who carries around a toaster in the middle of a blizzard. and why?
earlier this year it was a copy of the book "Schnozzola: The Story of Jimmy Durante". it appeared on the roof of the grannymobile, open to a winsome picture of the big-nosed man himself.
why us? why here? and what the heck is going to appear next??
so it's time for a new bulletted list, which has it's genesis in the personal shame i feel for having let the casa blog lapse. what can i say? i fell victim to too much hilarity.
* kathryn had a nasty accident on her bike, which resulted in a casa family field trip to the ER. shayne and i went along, since any chance to play doctor is a good one in our book. pics from the visit (yes, i brought my camera just so i could blog about it) can be found here.
* shayne and i discovered a new way to amuse ourselves a few weekends ago. i decided that it was my mission to find shayne a new boyfriend. so i posted a personal ad for her on CL. i thought it was a witty ad, and apparently many men agreed with me. shayne got me back by writing a personal ad for me. over 50 responses in 24 hours poured into my new email account datemyroomie@gmail.com. we spent the weekend fielding emails for each other and corresponding with some great men. no dates came out of it, but it was probably a step in the right direction for both of us. if you care to read the ad that i posted for her, please check the comments section.
* and finally we celebrated easter in high style with a pub crawl that started at the thirsty scholar and ended in a hot tub on the cape. i am not sure how these things happen.
too much hilarity has resulted in both shayne and i being sick and lying around the living room moaning "i don't feel so good" to each other. it's the casa family motto, and we wear our coat of arms proudly.
may your life be long and happy and filled with love and laughter and beauty... i'm sure it will with such wonderful parents (and aunties and uncles and grandparents!! :)
