Monday Monday (cue The Mamas & The Papas).

think we can all agree that Mondays, as a general rule, SUCK. Mondays are proof that the weekend is no more, proof that another freakishly long week has mindlessly begun to putz along, proof that I need serious caffeine and/or Peanut M&Ms to get through the first half of the day (let alone the second)… Yep, Mondays kind of blow. And it seems like “every other day (every other day), every other day of the week is fine, but whenever Monday comes (but whenever Monday comes), you can find me cryin’ all of the time.” And that’s not so nice, Monday. Not so nice at all.  

But this Monday (as in, today) was very different. Granted, I still scarfed down a bag of M&Ms at approximately 2:15 pm, but I’d venture that I would have managed OK had I not. And that’s saying a lot. Please trust me. 

So… here’s why The Mamas & The Papas proved irrelevant aujourd’hui:

1. We found out that my baby niece gets to say “later, dudes!” to the hospital staff tomorrow, where she will snuggle herself into a heavily padded car seat and head home to meet her doggy sibling and greet her new sleeping and playing quarters! Her twin baby brother has to stay in the hospital just a little while longer, but we’re all sure he’ll be hittin’ his own car seat really soon. I mean, duh, he has a dog to meet.

2. Speaking of baby nephew’s awesomeness… the inaugural whizz occurred today. And by “the inaugural whizz,” I mean that I had my first victim-of-an-out-of-control-peepisode during a diaper changing. It. Was. Awesome! Like a renegade missile attack, yet streamlined directly across my wool sweatered chest. That is, before he whizzed on his own head. Still trying to figure that one out. Impressive. I’m also still trying to figure out why I’m so thrilled to have been peed on by my nephew… Rather than any freaky-deaky urophilia tendencies, I prefer to assume that I merely feel as though he has “marked his territory” and, therefore, he thinks I’m a keeper. Not that I equate him with a dog peeing on a fire hydrant, but… whatever. I’m just a proud aunt who’s ecstatic when a “first” anything occurs, OK?

3. I have a handful of ESL students in my writing course this semester, which I love, but which also proves an interesting dynamic within the class… and after class, during my office hours. Today, one of my adorable ESL students (let’s call him Ed), came to my office hours to discuss his comprehension of an assigned article (for which they must then write an analytical summary). Ed is a wide-eyed first-year student, somewhat soft-spoken and completely anxious to learn… he’s basically a dream student. And, as a longtime student of a foreign language myself, I can completely empathize with the difficulties he’s facing, his curiosities, etc. etc.. Anyway… it was a pleasure to meet with him and to discuss the text and the course in general. And then, toward the end of our discussion, he looked me in the eye and said, “You are a much better writing teacher than my last one.” And, OK, I realize that this is probably completely selfish/childish/lame/whatever of me, but… I wanted to freakin’ HUG the boy when he said that! I mean, I of course played it off professionally (and somewhat evasively) and simply asked him what course he had taken last semester, how he felt the course improved his writing, etc. etc…. of course I did not ask about the professor he had… but, meanwhile, a lavish party was unfolding in my mind. And this was the first “compliment” I’ve really received about my teaching in a writing course, so… I relished it.

4. Oh, so remember back when I rambled about Revolutionary Road, and I mentioned a dude who played a supporting role, and I was completely blown away by him? “Him” is Michael Shannon, and he was nothing short of extraordinary. I immediately did the IMDB thing to find out what other films he’s been in (which I then promptly added to my Netflix queue), and to read his bio, find out if he’s married or destined for me, etc. etc.. Anyway, as it turns out: my future husband was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role in RR! So that’s pretty awesome. Awesome for him, of course, but also awesome for me because the news of the Oscar nod oddly legitimizes my film/acting reviews and, in my mind, brings me one step closer to getting into red carpet premieres and schmoozing with the likes of Ebert & Roeper. Speaking of: god, poor Ebert and his non-existent voice, huh? I mean, he’s kicking cancer’s A, which is phenomenal, but… I can’t help but want to hug the little guy whenever I see him and his wrapped throat.

5. I weighed myself at my sister’s for the first time since early last fall (I don’t own a scale and generally tend to ignore their existence). After passing out, I promptly high-tailed it to the gym. I made it four times last week, and even though I got home late tonight and wanted to watch The Bachelor at 8pm (priorities), I still busted a move to the gym to get in 45 mins of cardio and 25 mins of weights tonight. And then I watched that psycho-”do what I tell you to do”-dominatrix Lauren get the axe. Nice work, Bachelor. 

6. Speaking of reality TV… Olivia on The City is a slightly less diabolical Blair Waldorf.

7. The freakin’ Paper Source 2009 Wall Art calendar is finally on freakin’ sale!!!! I’ve been waiting for weeks! Once January 1st hit, I figured, “Awesome, Paper Source will hack the hell out of the calendar prices.” But no. They tried some “buy one, get one half off” bullshiz, which is ludicrous because, come on, who wants two of the same calendar?! Anyway, I kept revisiting their site (and their shops) to see if, perchance, they had come to their senses and knocked some bucks off of their calendar prices. But no. Until… now. Way to hold out, Paper Source. You almost got me. But now… your calendar is ALL. FREAKIN’. MINE.

Another Monday, another List in homage to Anna at:

How I celebrate MLK Day.

artin Luther King, Jr., probably didn’t think that his monumental, historic fight for civil liberties would result in a holiday that spawns huge clothing sales and a free day for students to go gorge on buttery popcorn and Sour Patch Kids at the local multiplex. 

Kevin Mazur/Courtesy of HBO via image.net

This year is, of course, a hallmark year for MLK, Jr., appreciation. One word: inauguration. I’m so ridiculously ecstatic that Americans have chosen to reinstate intelligence (among other positive — and greatly missed — qualities) in the White House. Obama represents progress, hope, change… the list goes on. And it’s wonderful to feel that energy and see it displayed across the country through the various celebrations, posters, etc.. But… I don’t know… something about the several-day-long inauguration celebrations seem a bit, kind of, overkill? Not that I don’t think President-Elect Obama (or America) deserves it — of course he/we do/es. But… I don’t know… considering the financial/economic state of the union right now, it strikes me as a bit bizarre to hear of all the lavish parties and top-notch concerts and opulent balls. Celebrities have invaded Washington, and suddenly the presidential inauguration has become a pop culture phenomenon, the hot ticket, the “it” place to be. I mean, socialite-infested inauguration parties probably offer swag and are sponsored by Nintendo Wii or Ugg or something. I don’t know. Something about it kind of makes me cringe. I’m excited about Inauguration Day tomorrow, of course. OF COURSE. But… I just feel as though it’s all become rather circus-like (Britney?). Thousand-dollar tickets, people trying to make a buck (or a few thousand) off of it… How disconcerting when one of the brightest moments of our/our nation’s life gets transformed into a Super Bowl before our very eyes. A Super Bowl with an endless supply of halftime shows.

Anyway. 

I’ve been occasionally checking in with CNN and various Twitter birds so that I can be sure not to miss any all-important updates. But, other than that, here’s how I’ve spent my MLK, Jr., Day off from teaching:

1. I ate Grape Nuts

2. I checked my kitchen ceiling, which began leaking last night when my upstairs neighbor drew a bath. I was on the phone with a dear friend when, suddenly, I heard what sounded like water sloshing down through my kitchen walls. I was pretty sure the Deluge was coming. But it hasn’t come. Yet.

3. I read the latest issue of Time and felt conflicted about Pope Benedict XVI’s comment about Jesus and putting patches on an old suit.

4. I greeted Maintenance Man, who came in to investigate aforementioned leaky ceiling. Maintenance Man’s investigation involved: a. me directing him to leaky culprit, b. Maintenance Man looking directly at leaky culprit, c. Maintenance Man deciding to go knock on upstair neighbor’s door to check out her leaky pipes (Perv.), d. Maintenance Man driving away.

5. I chatted online with another dear friend. For, like, 45 minutes.

6. I watched some cheese-infested Lifetime movie about a bad girl-of-divorce-gone-good (standard plot of 98.7% of Lifetime movies) while filling up some pages of my Creative Journal, which felt lovely.

7. I watched as a dude in a truck snowplowed our driveway, and then proceeded right on through to our backyard and plowed the grass? No clue.

8. I took pictures of Nor’easter loveliness. And plowed backyard.

9. I ate leftover pizza. I actually reheated it in the oven rather than in the microwave. I am becoming more and more domestic. I make me proud.

10. I looked back (several times) at pictures of my baby niece and nephew and, more specifically, me feeding baby nephew and wanting to run away with him. It could have been so easy! Sh*t.

 

Another Listless Monday:

Blue and Pink and Gender-Specific Baby Clothing

irst, I just wanted to say that my poggy silence for the past several days directly represents both my internalized and my externalized celebration of our new President-Elect (which, by the way, YAY!), but the silence has also resulted from the preparations being made for my sister’s upcoming baby shower, which is now less than a week away. But who’s counting. 

Although I have quite a few friends with babies, I have never attended a baby shower, nor have I spent much time in the “Infant” department of retail stores. And I’ve certainly never patronized an all-baby-all-the-time store such as Babies ‘R Us. Now, I’m well aware of the gender-specific binaries that run rampant throughout Western culture, for their flame has had centuries of fueling. Girl = pink, Boy = blue, blah blah blah. 

(*Sidenote: There’s a fabulous French movie called Ma vie en rose (1997), which craftily employs the pink/blue binary through set design and clothing in order to illustrate various characters’ evolving relationships with this type of dualistic thinking as they relate –or DON’T relate– to the main character, who is a little girl born in a little boy’s body. Umm…was that just a major run-on? Yeah, I’m a writing instructor. Sheesh.)

Media packaging of the pink/blue binary through television and advertising is one thing; however, the attempted reenforcement of this binary by parents proves doubly alarming for me. Example: When I was nine or ten years-old, all I wanted for my birthday was a 10-speed bicycle. But not just any 10-speed bicycle: I desperately wanted a RED 10-speed bicycle. And my mother knew this. So, once it came time for my birthday party and my presents were to be festively filtered into our living room, I was pretty much dancing in my pants, aching with anticipation for the big red reveal. Finally, my mom wheeled in my new 10-speed………..gasps from the audience……….rather than purchasing me my desired red, regal wonder, all I saw was…PINK. Pink, seemingly everywhere: from the seat to the handlebars to the wheels to the freakin’ pedals. PINK. And not just any pink, either: PEPTO-BISMOL PINK (which I suppose was somewhat fitting considering the indigestion I felt upon seeing this barftastic contraption on wheels). GAG. It was like Paris Hilton barfed a bike.

And, I mean, yes, OK, pink is a derivative of red. Fine. But… if that was my mom’s line of thinking, she was taking some major creative license there. How was I ever supposed to be taken seriously on such a thing?!? 

For whatever reason, my mom refused to exchange the Pepto-speed for the color I had actually desired. I was not particularly well-versed in expressing my distaste/disapproval of certain things when I was a child (umm…I’m still not), but I’m pretty sure that the pink Huffy inspired some pretty vehement, objectionable words. But still, my mom wouldn’t budge. And that pink Huffy became the bane of my existence, from elementary school right through junior high.

God, I’m still embarrassed for myself just thinking about it.

Anyway, my point with all this is: despite the progress that has been made with gender and sexual stereotypes for the past couple of decades, my recent trips to various retail outlets’ children’s departments (both online and not) have proven that much progress still remains. MUCH progress. I think I’ve mentioned that my sister’s having twins, right? One boy, one girl. I have been chomping at the freakin’ bit to rampage around baby clothes and pick out super cute outfits for my future niece and nephew… but when I finally got to Target, I was ready to throw a temper tantrum. Growing up, I always felt like boys had it made when it came to clothing — they always had more comfortable, versatile stuff, as far as I was concerned. And then I’d go to the girls’ section and there’d be a bunch of pastel garbage that was closer fitting to the body (and, therefore, WAY uncomfortable as far as I was concerned). It sucked. But I had just assumed that things had changed, and that my future niece would have way cooler options to stand out in a comfortable, non-frilly way alongside her brother. But instead, what I found was a bunch of pink bullsh*t, generally with some floral pattern and/or a reference to princesses. COME ON!!! Haven’t we advanced past this woe-is-me, save-me-I’m-dainty-and-helpless type of gender restriction?!? Ugh. It drives me nuts. Meanwhile, all the boy clothing has super cool animals and modern technological references… I mean, why can’t “girl clothing” have some doggies or something? Rather than cats? Since when did girls = cats and boys = dogs?!? I despise cats. I am therefore a boy.

I could go on and on forever about this, but I’ll stop. I would love to tell you the items that I ended up purchasing for my sister/the twins, but my sister might read this, so… maybe I’ll clue you in after the shower on Saturday. Because I’m sure you’ll all be white-knucklin’ it until then, dying from suspense.

Hope you’ve all enjoyed your weekend.

Inappropriate Baby Attire, version 2.0

ore freaky-deaky clothing that appears to be created more for certain adults’ sick sense of humor than for innocent, little baby minds that can’t even pronounce the word “gross” and voice their discontent. I mean, yes, OK, I’ll admit: a couple of the onesie designs I’m about to show you did make me chuckle a bit; however, that’s precisely the point: they’re intended for adults. Wait — did I just call myself an “adult”?! That’s a gross exaggeration in itself. But anyway, my point is that we shouldn’t use our kids as our own humoristic-verging-on-sick-and-perverted marketing ploys.

So then, allow me to introduce my second inaugural

INAPPROPRIATE BABY ATTIRE 

pog, this time courtesy of TShirtHell.com:

Now that’s just inappropriate…

 think I’ve already mentioned somewhere on here that my sister’s pregnant with twins (one boy, one girl!)… those little monkeys will be comin’ ’round the mountain in the next couple of months, and I don’t think I’m alone when I say that I CAN’T FREAKIN’ WAIT!!!!!!!!!! I‘ve always wanted to be an aunt, almost as much as I’ve always wanted to be a parent. Or maybe more, because an aunt doesn’t really need to take charge of the whole discipline thing. Or the whole buying diapers thing. But I will definitely be partaking in the whole buying cute baby/kid clothes thing! Oh, yeah. Make no mistake about it, my friends…!     (<-McCainism)

But here’s the thing: there are some scary-@ss baby fashion disasters waiting to happen out there. Now, if you’ve ever even winked at my blog, you know that I’m not exactly a conservative. That being said, a line has to be drawn somewhere when it comes to the images we are projecting onto the future of this world (*cue Whitney Houston, because the children are her future, too). I would never be able to live with myself, or take my niece & nephew out in public, if they were clothed in any of the onesies and bibs that I am about to present to you.

Without further ado, I offer you today’s
INAPPROPRIATE BABY ATTIRE
(maybe I’ll even make it a weekly thing, because trust me, there are a gazillion more where these came from):

(These lovely little gems *gag* are all courtesy of CafePress.com)

7 Things I… cr@p, I forgot what I was going to say.

So I’ll just make it up as I go along. I’m my blog creator and, as such, not unlike He-Man, I…HAVE…THE POWERRRR!

1. I am so freaking sick of hearing all the economists and financial experts and Max Headroom-esque talking heads discussing Wall Street and Main Street, Main Street and Wall Street, MainWallWallMainSHUT-THE-F-UP! I mean, as if there are no other streets sweeping the nation. And yes, I fully realize that “Main Street” is meant figuratively to represent the typical American town. I know. I get it. All I’m saying is, it seems rather reductive and dismissive of the pluralistic nature of our society/country/economic system. Plus, I mean, HELLO, what about all the boulevards and avenues and drives and lanes and circles and terraces and…?!?! Not nice to discriminate and force our country into a simplistic, crappy binary of one street versus another street, Max Headroom. Not nice at all. Oh, and furthermore, check this: my town doesn’t even have a stinkin’ Main Street!!!! We do, however (unfortunately?), have a Wall Street. Go figure. 

2. I can’t believe my plants aren’t dead yet. I have six. They are ALL thriving. It’s like they’re mocking me. They’re just sitting there, all passive and needy, soaking up sunlight and air and nutrients in the soil and stuff. Meanwhile, here I am rapidly deteriorating, skin getting scalier by the millisecond, and water and my nutrients-meds seem to help about as much as Russia’s proximity to Alaska aids SP’s foreign policy experience. I wanna just hang out in the sun all day too, but noooooooooooo…! Stupid plants.

3. What’s wrong with Rumer Willis’s face? Too much Bruce, not enough Demi. She must seriously hate life.

4. I totally have a crush on my writing dude. Is “writing dude” vague? OK, I’ll clarify: so, all the first-time writing fellows (such as myself) were required to register for a weekly “class” (which I like to refer to as our “support group”) so that we can air out our concerns, ask for suggestions, and generally pat each other on the back on a weekly basis. We also receive methodology and pedagogical help from our new Writing Program Director, whom I shall call… Aloysius (just go with it). So anyway, Aloysius comes to us from IvyLeagueSchool’s English Department. And he’s nothing if not highly brilliant and highly affable, which are generally two adjectives that are not said in the same breath. Which only intensifies the crush quotient. Also, he has this really cool leather messenger bag+briefcase hybrid, and who can’t appreciate THAT?! Also, he’s (prematurely) bald. And I’m pretty sure that if I ran my hand over his smooth cranium, it would appropriately squeak with cleanliness. Oh, Aloysius, why must you tease me so, with your stellar academic gear and head hygiene? Did I mention he taught a course on the Victorians at IvyLeagueSchool? Yeah. Like I’m ALMOST supposed to be able to handle that.

5. I obsess over the Paper Source and pretty much any other card/stationery store I come across. If you’ve ever checked out my other blog, Words&Eggs, you’re already familiar with this. It’s a disease, really. But not one I ever care to cure. Anyway, yesterday at my Paper Source Church, I bought this awesome leather-bound journal (no lines, please — I am not a fan of lines) which I have since labeled my “Creative Journal.” I have decided to take Paper Source’s tagline “Do Something Creative Everyday” quite literally. Therefore, everyday, I will write and/or draw and/or post found images or mementos or photos, etc. in my lovely little journal. Whatever the heck I want. No holds-barred, baby. Because… I miss my creative self. I miss it more and more as I get sucked into the Limitless Abyss that is Academia. ps) Paper Source has already stocked their collection of holiday cards, which almost resulted in cardiac arrest. MINE.

6. My sister’s pregnant with twins. It’s her first pregnancy. I’m going to be a first-time Auntie!!!! She’s a little over five months along now. And, as her devoted, dutiful sister, I am organizing a baby shower for her. Only, I’ve never attended a baby shower, let alone throw one. Let alone cook anything other than grilled cheese and mac & cheese and soup. Also, what’s up with those lame-and-freaky “baby shower games”?? Just the mention of it leads my mind ‘a reelin’, ultimately spewing out the words “DOES. NOT. COMPUTE.” So, if any of you have any suggestions for low-impact food ideas and/or pseudo-”games” (aka, ACTIVITIES. I definitely prefer the word ACTIVITIES), holla atcha girl. (umm, me)

7. Is it VP Debate night yet? Because I’m throwing a party, so I want to be sure I’m sufficiently prepared. I’m making Pistol-Packin’ Palin (pistol-shaped) Peanut-Butter Cookies. OK, so if you just read #6, then you know I don’t/can’t cook. I didn’t lie. My cookies consist of Pillsbury’s pre-made dough, which I then sculpt and mold into desirable objects… which inevitably end up looking like glorified chicken drumsticks. This is all assuming, of course, that I didn’t hoss all the cookie-dough prior to baking. And fall into a Salmonella coma.

Umm… I think I’m done.

Oh, but I did want to mention that this pointless list has been inspired by the lovely Anna at “abdpbt.”