BOO!

Happy Halloween!
House is all ready for Kara's arrival! I wonder if I'd ever clean if I didn't have house guests?

Not that I enjoy living in squalor, I just need a good swift kick in the butt to tidy up, and the desire to make visitors cozy and comfy is exactly that.

As for the rest of the time...poor Boyfriend, he thinks that my addiction to books and my hoarding of every scrap of paper I ever write upon/receive means I'm unorganized. It doesn't help that every morning the bedroom has signs of my first, second, and third outfit tries (usually reverting back to the first) strewn about the floor.

I dropped some cash at the Publick House Provisions and my eyes were bigger than my biceps...I ended up waddling back home with a six pack and goodies (Chouffe! Unibroue! and CHEEEEESE I can't remember the name of but is oooo so tasty!) plus the groceries I'd already picked up.

I'm almost done with We Were the Mulvaneys and oy is this a heartbreaking story. Can't believe it's taken me so long to get through it but I've been pretty busy and a lot of my down time has been spent knitting (and tearing apart and REknitting) for a coworker's baby shower gift. And I started writing a bit on my own this week and remembered how much I miss my workshops and late afternoon storytime at Tufts...

For now I'll settle for some ghost stories. I can't wait to dress up as Marilyn (Boyfriend is Andy Warhol, get it?!) and get Kara Jessica Rabbit-ed up...

I'll take Pumpkins for 600, Alec.

PumpkinFest was AMAZING. Pics posted on FB for the curious.

And we made cider Sunday which was equally amazing - our freezer now holds 8 quarts of the delicious stuff. We picked the apples, chucked the rotten ones, washed them, ground them up, and pressed them. About two and a half hours later (from trees to the pressing process in the driveway) we'd make nearly 6 gallons, only about 3 of which were really drinkable from sweet apples - the rest was just too tart and will go toward cooking cider or vinegar.

We also now have a leg of lamb in our freezer, which I will periodically think about and vow to learn to cook, but mostly I'll just take it out and look at it, and pray to Shari Lewis to forgive me.

My hand still hurts from cranking the grinder.

Last night Mr. Man and I went to trivia and even though his coworkers crashed and are idiots, it was exciting to *gasp!* go out on a weeknight!

Tomorrow will be the best Friday ever...field trip to the museum at work, and Halloween, and...KARA'S COMING!


more animals

Cheese and vodka. And then some more.

The Great Pumpkin

So last night I threw a temper tantrum. The general gist was "but I don't wanna go to work in the morning" - not for any job satisfaction reason, in fact, I quite love my job.

But I just hate my morning routine - up at 6:15 and to the gym, showered and ready and out the door by 8:20, 8:30 at the latest. The obvious solution is to get to the gym AFTER work but then I have all day to talk myself out of going instead of a few bleary moments before I wrestle with my sports bra. Once I'm inside that thing, I HAVE to go to the gym. It's like hand cuffs, or like I'm Frodo with that darned ring. Spandex will make you do crazy things.

Some good news...I'm headed to Keene this weekend with Mr. Boyfriend and our friend Tony the Tiger for the Pumpkin Festival! It will be AWESOME and I want to carve a killer jack-o-lantern. I found a pattern for a Roy Lichtenstein-esque damsel, and maybe I'll carve something about the election on a partner pumpkin so she looks all fretful about Republicans. Heh. I also found an Obama print for Mr. Man, but Tony will have to provide his own McCain pattern, I ain't supportin' that one. Find them here.

I'm always super psyched for Pumpkin Fest and to see the ridiculous lengths people go to for the sake of gourd decoration. The organizers set up all the lit jack-o-lanterns on three or four story risers and it's even better than fireworks since it lasts all evening. Plus, there is ALWAYS at least one marriage proposal spelled out in the pumpkins somewhere, and someday I hope to spy the lucky proposal recipient flip out. But it would be kind of tough to hide 15+ pumpkins.

Ah, the promise of all the cider and pumpkin themed treats, plus the donuts and beer...keeping me going until Friday!

the agony and the irony

Argh, I have schlepped to the copy place thrice in two days. I don't like it. It gave me an excuse to go to Au Bon Pain though...which I got a little too excited about and now I have Wrap-Consumption Remorse and will probably break my roll-y chair. Hm. I will just pretend I ate a salad. There, I feel much better.

The T ride today did give me a bit of time to do so some interesting people watching, I saw a middle aged overweight man wearing a wizard hat and reading - Harry Potter? No, Run Rabbit Run. Of course Harry Potter, Prisoner of Azkaban.

But there was a little baby staring at me the WHOLE RIDE from Arlington. It's like this hostile thing - the baby is staring at you and everyone is all cooing "Awwwww little Caleb/Ethan/Gavin finds you fascinating!" but you HAVE to look back and smile the entire time or else the whole train thinks you're a baby hating monster. His giant extended family (taking the baby for a Tuesday T ride with ma, pop, gramma, and grandpa? woo-ee!) thought it was a hoot but in my head I was all Mark Wahlberg-like "Why you gotta stare at me baby? I'm not kiddin around this is serious."

Argh. Say hi to your mother for me.

virginia IS for lovers!

Wooo-ee! What a weekend - Andrea picked me up from the Richmond airport around 8 on Friday and off to Charlottesville we went!

We had plenty of wine (hooray) and cheese (also hooray-worthy) and in general it was fabulous to get my Andrea-fix. Also really cool to see UVA, which is kind of the complete polar opposite of Tufts; and by that I mean they care about sports and science.

We did not find law school students, but we did find that wine and cheese and a mountain named in honor of my boyfriend. I shall be very happy to visit again, but when I find the obsessed crazy who named the mountain after my man, I'll have to kick some butt.

Traveling sometimes messes with my mind: all of the technology involved but relatively little fuss (well, ideally anyway - this is of course discounting the Great Airport Debacle of Summer '07 and The Vacation to Georgia That Never Happened). Sometimes I can't believe that only the day before I was four states away and it didn't take three weeks and a team of horses, not to mention we never had to deal with any "Tom has died of dysentery" or the like.

When I returned I saw our new sofa bed was in place, and it looks great! Also, Mr. Man had cleaned the house (apparently even parts of the bathroom!) and rearranged the living room space. Our home ROCKS.

for roast beef fans

I didn't ask for much: It needed to be soft, and not ugly. But not unpretty. And not $2000.

A sofa bed. A pullout couch. A "sleeper," if you will. Easy enough, right?

But the universe thought that sounds too simple. So let's throw some geometry in the mix. It needs to go up a half flight of stairs and then turn a corner in a narrow hallway and fit through a door no wider than 28".

Craigslist, which was oh-so-helpful for finding our couch and chair-and-a-half (a furniture invention so comfortable if I ever become homeless I will strap wheels onto it and push it to Harvard Square to squat in front of Maggie Moo's) was not coming through with a sofa bed. Additionally, no matter what kind of bargain we found on a perfect couch, we would have had to get a UHaul for an afternoon and wasted a full Saturday in rental Hell.

Enter Jordan's Furniture.

Jordan's Furniture is surreal: one part Disney, one part WalMart, one part your creepy Uncle Jake twice removed on your mom's cousin-in-law's side.

But unfortunately...it was convenient. Earlier in the day, we trekked out to Bolton, MA for apple picking and wine tasting at the Nashoba Valley Winery - the whole experience (resulting in half a peck of apples and no less than six bottles of wine) was perfect in every way except the batteries on my camera were dead. My laziness has made me sad. Autumn is my favorite season, I wish it could be autumn all year round, I'd like to deck the entire world out in gold and orange and crimson...

So thank goodness we were in a good mood when we stepped into the alternate universe of the Natick Jordan's Furniture, complete with a Kelly's Restaurant (for roast beef fans), an IMAX theater (for fans of family matinee screenings of All Dogs Go to Heaven II), and a Bourbon St Mardi Gras New Orleans theme hall (for fans of...disturbing animatronics?).

In the end, we picked out a loveseat with a full-size mattress. We were hoping for a sofa with a queen size mattress, but in order to get up the stairs and around the corner (damn you geometry!!!!) it would've had to be sleek and modern and ugly. I much prefer traditional sofas with padding and cushions and comfort.

So it will hopefully be delivered Saturday while I'm in Virginia, and then we can get started on cozying up the room that has so far been delegated Mr Man's Walk in Closet/Place for Pile of Things I Have to Bring to Goodwill.

Next on the List'o'Projects: Soundproofing the exterior walls to block out the late night Klezmer music coming from the Orthodox congregation next door...

But what if you're not one of their citizens?

"A Great Place to Live for All of Our Citizens." That's the motto of Charlottesville, VA...

Where I shall visit Andrea this weekend!

The good doctor will wine and dine me and take me up Afton Mountain. I'm exceedingly excited to play wing-woman. Perhaps I shall allow one of her gentleman callers to purchase me an alcoholic beverage. Or perhaps we shall just lounge around Andrea's estate, Monticello, and discuss the evolutionary defenses of invasive plant species. She does need a break from all of her courting.

I mean studies.

or just cutting through jello with a very sharp knife

Sorry, I think I was drooling a little bit.

I can NOT get up in the mornings. Maybe it's the later sunrises, or maybe it's a 9-5 rut I've just fallen into - but it's like I have to pull a pile of bricks off of my skull before I can wake up. Caffeine kinda sorta helps, but how to I inject that directly into my face when my alarm goes off?

I blame our bed. It is giant (a queen) and even with the low stance box spring it feels very high. We have a brushed brass headboard attached to the frame, which isn't really my preference (I'd love something in dark stained wood or - to dream! - upholstered in chocolate silk dupioni). But it was cheap - we already had the mattress which I got free from a friend who moved to Texas, and thanks to Mattress Discounters, the frame was under 100, the box spring was 100, and the headboard was 100. Add in the Martha Stewart Bedding on sale at Macy's (plus two euro pillows), and the whole thing was around 400. Very good for furnishing a bedroom from scratch.

So although not up to my design standards due to cost issues (a general theme of the apartment) it's damn cozy and I never want to get out. And I can always get a duvet cover for the bed and change things up. I also want to paint one wall this color.

But back to why I'm sleepy. I used to be a morning person. Back in sophomore year I could wake up at 7 every day, for no good reason other than to quietly creep off campus and go sit in Davis Sq for some coffee and to catch up on lit assignments. Can I have that morning person-ness back please?

PS

If I post that Kara is coming to visit Halloween weekend, does that make it absolutely true?!

compliments of the chef

Last Thursday I enjoyed a much needed after work happy hour with my coworker, J, and we dashed to a lovely cozy distinctly-not-a-sports bar near Fenway. One drink turned into two, and then of course hunger set in. We decided to split two appetizers and enjoy our primo center bar spot amidst the after work crowd.

Shortly after we ordered, two plates arrived laden with food we had not picked out, nor even seen on the menu. When we asked the bartender, she said the chef was sending out small plates to the whole bar, and sure enough, everyone around was receiving the same plates. When our own food arrived, we had a little feast in front of us and had quite a lovely time.

Well, J's roommate happens to work at this bar, and has it on confidence that the chef that evening saw two young ladies, a blonde and a brunette, and felt compelled to send out complimentary dishes...including the whole lounge so as not to create any embarrassment. Coincidence? We got our dishes first.

This week, we're breaking out our Thursday best...

How's the weather?

Mom came to Boston this weekend - sans Dad, predictably. We did the usual dinners and hotel lounging and she helped set up our apartment a little more. I hope she had a nice time.

Andrea's mom was also here, albeit briefly, and she got a museum tour, too.
Here's a cyber, half-hearted apology to Andrea, her mom, and mine, for babbling on and on about everything from the floor tiles to the elevator and everything in between. I'll pare down my schtick soon - I swear.

I'm beginning to wish I'd buckled down on Latin and Greek, ignored Tufts insufferably stodgy Classics department, and gone on to a life in academia pursuing English word derivation. I love Anu Garg's Word-a-Day emails - etymology absolutely fascinates me and even the daily doses from the newsletters aren't enough. I long for the moments when the weekly round-up of reader feedback is posted and people submit their own interpretations and personal connections with the featured words.

Last week featured unusual insults, perfectly in tune with the budding cynicism I've been cultivating, as has recently been pointed out to me. "Policaster," a petty politician, employs the suffix "aster" and can create an insulting diminuitive for just about any word. Poetaster, philosophaster, et cetera... I'm just aiming not to be considered a bloggaster. One reader pointed out the Yiddish way of insulting someone's trade by inserting an "n" into a word: paintner and quiltner were her examples. So many ways to sneer at people, so little time...