“What ever happened to that Virginia person?” asked Reader 1 of 6
“Gosh, it definitely can’t be that she fell into a hole composed almost entirely of back episodes of Supernatural,” answered Reader 4 of 6.
Oh Reader 4. You just don’t know me as well as you think you do.
I have been busy busy for past months getting a new job, which so far keeps me far busier than I have been in a long time. Job hunting is balls! I’m glad it’s over. I’m glad to be running at top speed on a gajillion projects at once. It makes the day go by quickly. I do like organizing things.
Another new thing: book! It feels very fancy to have my name on Amazon. It is a good book, filled with excellent stories and poems! Editing an anthology is no slouch.
My friend Sweet Pea said to me not to long ago, “Why does every call for submissions say to send your best work? What kind of moron would send something otherwise?”
I could only howl with laughter.
Long ago and far away I read at a women’s poetry open-mic in Chicago. My sister was in town, and a bunch of my friends showed up. I was as nervous as a cat when The Carrier is in the room. Mostly sissa and I remember it for the lady who read part of a story about “COSta Rrrrrrrriiiiiiiiica!” but there was also a woman who stood up and said, “So like I wrote this at work today when I was bored and what the hell, I hope you like it.”
I about had a stroke on her behalf.
Anyhow, I’m very proud of As You Wish, and very proud of our excellent writers and artists.
I am an annotator of cookbooks. An example:
That cake is currently baking in my oven.
Originally I started making notes just to remember which recipes I like in cookbooks, then to note changes that were both successful and un-.
Since my grandmothers died, my annotations are a way for me to project myself into the future. I know how much it means to me to have recipe cards in the handwriting of beloveds no longer around. I remember how much I loved pulling out the old, raggedy pieces of paper every Christmas with the recipes for fondue sauces and birds-nest candies.
I hope some child in my life grows up to love to cook and will want all of my notes, the stained pages that mark a recipe used over and over.
I tell you, this daylight savings thing is messing me up. I like to eat my dinner very early, so I have Sufficient Digestion Time before sleeping.
I keep getting home from work and getting distracted by all the sunlight into doing thinks like CHORES, which are clearly inappropriate after work when I should be (a) eating dinner and then (b) falling to the floor until my (c) elementary school–appropriate bedtime.
Dinner at 7! What do I think I am, European?
The sign referenced in this post is with its proper owner.
My sister.
One morning in Denver last month, two of my dearest friends and I found ourselves stranded outside a poetry bookstore that was supposed to be open, wondering what to do with ourselves. As we sat and pondered our cruel separation from poetry, the door of Aion Cafe kept opening and throwing out delicious smells.
Finally we could resist no longer and went to breakfast. Among us we had baked eggs, quinoa with greens and merguez sausage, and soft polenta topped with tomato ragu and an egg.
Check me out:
Isn’t that nice? I can’t eat many tomatoes, because I am a hideously delicate flower (hate), so I tossed a bunch of peppers, leeks, and garlic in some olive oil and cooked them into submission.
I ate plenty of this over the polenta with a bit of goat cheese on top, and that is no slouch. But that soft-fried egg, oozing into all the crevices. Recommend x20.
Do you know the old rhyme behind Groundhog Day?
“If Candlemas Day be fair and bright, winter will have another flight. But if it be dark with clouds and rain, winter is gone and will not come again.”
“I hope the rhyme is true,” I said then, “because it it HOT. Gross.”
Spring tried to come around here:
(See the tender little plants growing in our neighbor’s gutter? I love those things. Also, it makes me feel better about our indifferent gutter work.)
But now all that heat is over. All the Yoostonyuns who pulled out their shorts will have to wear socks again. We are having rain and rain — even a bit of hail earlier — and what passes around here for cold (but was miniskirt weather when I lived in Chicago).
I am not sad. February is not sundress season in the northern hemisphere. Also, I am currently knitting a beautiful sweater that I would Ike to wear within 8 months.
I wish I were a dedicated enough runner to run in the rain. I bet I will be someday, but I’m not yet.
Misophonia! It is a thing, and I have it.
Eating noises, man. They make me want to scream words unbecoming of a lady. Or leave the room. Or possibly stab myself in the ear.
Chewing is SO BAD. Gulping is pretty awful too.
Worst of all is teeth meeting utensil. Why do people chew their forks? Stainless steel has no nutritional value!
WHY DO PEOPLE CHEW THEIR FORKS?
This is one reason why I like restaurants: they are loud enough to drown out the horrible and gross sounds of mastication. (Also: no dishes to wash.)
(Thanks, extinction, for making sure I never have to hear a mastodon masticate.)
On the other hand, I like crunchy snacks.
This is my current to-be-read pile:
I’m not complaining, but this may have a negative effect on my knitting output for a while.
“If you want to do ‘Virginia in a nutshell,’ it would have to be a pretty big nut. Maybe a coo-coo nut.”
