Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Friday Feels

On a Tuesday.  Because I make the rules around here.

Cape May.  Memorial Day Weekend 2011.


Hey, here's some stuff I looked at on the internet when I wasn't shoving things in boxes or crouched in the fetal position, rocking back and forth in a corner!

This week's theme appears to be 'quirky actresses I admire' with some random home-state nostalgia thrown in for good measure.

Aubrey Plaza is my Spirit Animal.

Speaking of Aubrey Plaza - There really is no better person to star in a live-action Daria movie.  Except me, maybe.  Please, can this be a real thing and not a joke?  Also, how perfect is the guy playing Mr. DeMartino?  

Miranda July interviews Lena Dunham.  I love them both.

I had no idea Gaby Hoffman had such an interesting life.  I always wondered what happened to her after Now and Then, but the really naive part of my brain just assumed she grew up to be Demi Moore.  I probably identified most closely with the Sam character in that movie, as a slightly frumpy, introverted child of divorce.  I thought Roberta was the coolest and totally badass, but I didn't actually want to be her.  The writing was on the wall, and no prepubescent girl pictures herself growing up to be Rosie O'Donnell.  In reality, my closest parallel in that movie was the Chrissy character.  Chubby and incredibly sheltered.  And let's not even talk about Teeny.  Hot mess.  Even as a 10 year old, I knew her future involved sugar daddies, coke, and lots of plastic surgery.  I guess 10-year-old me didn't actually know that.

I'll tell you what 13-year old me figured out, though!  If you pause your VCR at just the right moment during the lake skinny-dipping scene where the semi-naked boys are chasing the girls who have ridden off with their clothes, you can use your imagination to believe you are looking at Devon Sawa's blurry junk.  How many sleepovers did Morgan and I spend in a clandestine attempt (after the adults have gone to be, obvs) to pause the movie at just that perfect moment?  Thirteen year old me was slightly less sheltered, but still naive enough not to realize that he was technically a minor and almost certainly not actually naked.

Just for kicks, a photo collection of Asbury Park in the late 70s.  I miss the shore in all its tacky glory!  And I would kill for hair like the chick on the left in the second picture.


Friday, July 26, 2013

699, 698, 697, 696

Monday through Thursday.  Catching up.  Slacking off.

Monday

Cat-meleon.   
The cats have been trying to blend into various elevated surfaces to evade Charlie's detection.

Sunset in a puddle.  That's water from the sprinklers, because it does. not. rain here.

Tuesday

Free shoes!  Spotted in the break room at work.  These were gone by Thursday.



Giving up on life.  Just wait until you have to spend three solid days in the car with me, my fat little friend.  Then you're really going to be sick of it all.

Wednesday

Interspecies staring contest


Free scoop.  Don't mind if I do.

Thursday

This is how I spent Thursday night, while packing up a room full of outdoor gear I bet we probably won't get to use in South Carolina.  Also, full disclosure, I didn't take any pictures on Thursday!  I'm bad and actually took this screen shot on my phone on Friday (today).  Womp womp.  Already slipping in the daily photo department.

Thursday, July 25, 2013

700

Still chugging along, one month into this thing.  Which means there are only 23 months left!  That sounds like such a long time, but I know if I wasn't doing a project like this that forces me to think about and (try to) enjoy some aspect of each day, I would just wake up one day and be 30 years old and have no idea where my twenties went.  I already kind of feel that way, like I act like a crotchety octogenarian Jewish man more often than not.  Maybe I've read too many Peanuts comic strips, and internalized the mindset of the tiny little person with cynical, existential tendencies.  I'm hoping this project will give me a little kick in the ass to chill out and stop being so high strung and anal all the time.  Ain't nobody got time for that!  Life's too short!

Except when your flight is delayed.  Then the pace of life slows to a complete standstill.  Those moments are forever.  Time suspends itself, just like those time-outs that Zack Morris used to call on Saved By The Bell.  Super useful when used judiciously, like when you need to gaze dreamily into the camera and speak as the omniscient narrator of melodramatic teenage antics.  Not super useful when you have a tight connection that you are totally going to miss if a mechanic doesn't get his ass in gear, literally and figuratively, so that your plane can take off on time.

Sunday

The day started off with promise.  A late morning stroll around Greenville before our 4:30 flight.



Yes, about that.


It gon' rain.

Boarding, round one.  Then they kicked us off the plane for two hours so they could change the oil or some garbage like that.  

Back through the love tunnel.

The inside of a pb&j sandwich does not photograph well, but this was bonkers.  Who would think to put a custom pb&j stand in an airport?  A GENIUS, that's who.  Further proof:  apple slices inside.  This is like Nobel Peace Prize level up in here, because I was about to (totally metaphorically) stab someone (a lot of someones) before I got a hold of this sammich for dinner at 8 PM. 

Hedge funds, I never thought of you that way before.

And then we got home at 1:30 in the morning.  It's Thursday and I'm still tired.   But we're living!  Living the life!  Shopping for real estate, applying for mortgages, negotiating!  Yea, I'm trying here, but that exclamation point really does nothing except underscore how out of touch I am with 'fun' at this juncture.  I'm all business.  All work and no play.  Even when I'm doing something that technically counts as recreating, I'm making lists in my head.  I can't sit down on the couch and vegetate at the end of the day without growing a little ulcer for every box of stuff I think I should be packing.  

But time flies, and I'm going to wake up one morning in South Carolina and feel like that friggin' Talking Heads song.  I'll be all, 'how did I get here?' and, 'this is not my beautiful house.'  But I'll have these photos to remind me how I got there.  

707-701

Sunday to Saturday.  One week.  Overdue.

Sunday

Charlie experienced a lot of firsts on this day.  First time getting a yogurt container stuck on his snout.  First time romping around in a pile of Legos.


First (and probably only) trip to Porcupine Reservoir.



Not pictured:  Charlie putting on his big-boy panties and actually getting IN the water for his first swim.  It took about an hour of coaxing, but he finally jumped in and spent about 3 minutes thrashing at the surface and biting the splashing water before he realized he was totally fine and knew exactly what to do.


If you could zoom in further, you'd see the pile of boards with rusty nails poking out at all angles, just daring you to stomp on them and get a nice strong case of tetanus.  This is just like the beaches I grew up on at the Jersey shore, but with piles of rusty nails instead of hypodermic needles and condoms.  And with muddy dogs stepping all over your towel begging you to throw sticks instead of seagulls swooping down to crap on you and/or steal your sammich.  And with rednecks and pit bulls on the loose instead of fist-pumping guidos and screaming children.  They're practically the same thing, right?


Monday

Lurkin'

I hardly ever notice this little hand-painted triptych we bought in Peru because it's hanging in an odd spot.  We were super proud of ourselves for haggling in Spanish.  That feeling lasted for about 2 minutes, and then we realized we were complete holes for trying to get a 'deal' on this little piece of art that constitutes a 3rd world person's ability to put food on his family's table.
Tuesday 

I made another batch of Super Power Chia Bread from Oh She Glows so I could have a healthy snack on Thursday's plane ride.

This looks like a pile of hot garbage, but Andy was pretty pleased with this tuna melt.  I'm slowly accepting that all Andy really ever wants to eat is the flesh of a once-living animal, smothered in cheese. 
Wednesday



Habitual lurker

This is what happens at 9:30 at night, when you find out at 5:30 that your house is going to be appraised the next day, but you have to get up at 4 am for an early flight and you haven't packed yet.  My toilet is so clean you could eat off the seat, if you're into that sort of thing.  
 Thursday

First peep of daylight over the mountains

Kombucha (and about a gallon of coffee) make a 4 am wakeup call tolerable.



Sprinting through a psychedelic love tunnel in the Detroit airport 



A Jersey Mike's Subs in Clemson?  I'm skeptical, but willing to try it.  Also, I cannot in good conscience call it a sub.  Would they let me order a hoagie?

A liquor PITCHER?  Exsqueeze me, Garth?  We're not in Utah anymore.  Clearly.  Pinch me.

Living things!  Lush greenery!  Not a desert!  Humid subtropical!

We went in the bar with the liquor pitches.  Yuengling on draft!  Yes please!  Also, this is totes a college town.  Aside from a few local drunks, we were the oldest people in the joint.

Rats.  I was feeling under the weather, so I thought I'd save myself the copay and head over to wing night for the chicken AND antiobiotics.  What am I going to do now?
 Friday

I'm not a superstitious person.  Yes I am.  I don't put any credence in 'signs'.  I totally do.  We were house hunting on Friday and walked into this immaculately-kept 1980s Colonial style house.  I was pretty impressed from the get-go because the first few houses we saw were terrifying.  Water damage, mold, strange smells, creepy "family portraits" of an elaborately-coiffed woman and her Dobermans...So this house was pretty much a miracle.  But then I turned the corner and walked into the living room and saw this framed cross-stitching and kind of knew this was going to be our house.  My grandmom  has the very same thing in her house, but stitched and signed by a relative.  I just assumed it was a design that person made up, and I have never seen this in anyone else's house, ever.  It's probably not even that huge of a coincidence, but to me it's something really distinct that I would recognize anywhere.  

So we put an offer on the house, and we are under contract!  Knock on wood (totally not superstitious).


Strom Thurmond Institute?  Coming from a place with lots of Romney/Huntsman connections, I'm only moderately bemused about this.

I think a reflecting pool with fountains in front of the library should be mandatory on all college campuses.

Saturday

I am the most tolerant wife of all time.  This was Saturday's lunch stop.  I have learned to never travel without a Clif bar and a banana because of situations like this.

Lizard buddy