Second Blooming

Looking Good - Just Do It!

I used to be a well-kempt woman.

I really was. All primped and polished. All the time. I had an actual "beauty routine".

Every morning -

• Shower
• Wash/Condition hair (Bumble & Bumble Seaweed)
• Wash face (Clarins Cleansing Milk)
• Shave my legs/armpits
• Toner (Clarins Toning Lotion)
• Moisturize face (Annemarie Borlind LL Regeneration Day Cream)

• Lotion entire body (L'Occitane Body Cream with Shea Butter)
• Blow hair straight
• Put on makeup
• Put on perfume

Every night -

• Take a bath
• Moisturize face (Annemarie Borlind LL Regeneration Night Cream)
• Lotion entire body (L'Occitane)
• Apply cream to hands and feet at bedtime (L'Occitane Hand Cream)
• Apply Vaseline to lips and laugh lines at bedtime

Once a week -

• Exfoliate body with a scrub (mixed it up, but loved Fresh Brown Sugar Body Polish)
• Exfoliate face (Lancome Exfoliance Clarte)

Once a month -

• Manicure/Pedicure

Regularly every few months -

• Bikini wax
• Eyebrow shaping/wax
• Haircut
• Massage
• Facial
• Spa treatment (scrub or such thing)

5 days a week -

• Workout

I was fabulous.

But over the last 8 years, since Jude was born, this routine has...devolved. Drastically.

My current beauty routine is as such:

Every day at some point -

• Shower
• Wash face (whatever is within reach - soap, my shampoo, my kid's shampoo, whatever)
• Moisturize face (whatever's on sale at the grocery store)

When it starts looking kind of skanky -

• Wash/Condition hair (whatever's on sale at the grocery store)

When I remember -

• Exfoliate face (by rubbing it with a washrag)
• Moisturize entire body
• Put on perfume.

When somebody's gonna be looking -

• Shave legs/armpits
• Put on makeup

When I get around to it -

• Haircut
• Bikini wax
• Workout

Seldom to Never -

• Manicure/pedicure
• Blowdry hair
• Exfoliate body with a scrub
• Massage
• Eyebrow shape/wax
• Spa treatment
• Facial

It's a pretty sad state of affairs.

This drastic drop in my personal hygiene and upkeep is due to a combination of circumstances, mainly a lack of time and our dwindled finances. But also because of my general apathy.

Often, I just don't feel like anybody cares what I look like. This is particularly sad because I am an actress, and technically, people DO care what I look like. But I guess that very often I don't care what I look like.

There. That would be the problem. I don't care what I look like. If I really cared, I would make the time. I would find the money, or find ways to do it on a budget.

How did this happen? When did this happen? Is it just because I'm older? I'm no longer the woman who all the men turn to look at when I enter a room, so I've just given up?

Or maybe I'm just smarter and more evolved? I'm more focused on what's inside rather than what's outside? Nah.

I think this probably happens to most women after they've had a child. Unless you are wealthy enough to pay someone to do the pampering to you, you just stop making the effort, and the money ends up going for things for your kids. Your priorities shift. Taking care of yourself seems like so much trouble. And the truth is, we just don't consider ourselves and our needs a priority like we used to.

I remember looking at my girlfriends who had kids long before me, shaking my head sadly and thinking "She could still be pretty. She should really do a little something something about herself!"

And now, that is ME!

And so... I have decided to attempt a beauty comeback. I have been making the effort to do a little something something about myself. My new motto is "Just Do It".

I have been shaving every morning whether I'm wearing a skirt or not. I have been moisturizing my entire body every time I get out of the shower. I have been putting on makeup and perfume every morning, whether I'm seeing anybody I deem important or not.

And I'm thinking that if I'm smart, I can figure out which things I should spend a little money on, and where I can cut back.

I have invested a little bit of cash which we don't have in some of my old products that I LOVE. The products that I really believe make a difference. I found my Annemarie Borlind creams for a better price on Amazon. I can't express how happy it makes me to have my good creams back. Annemarie Borlind products really are special. I'll slather that precious fluid on my face and I can just feel my skin soaking it up and saying "Aaaaahhh".

I've learned that I can buy an inexpensive shampoo/conditioner (I've been using a Trader Joe's shampoo, and it's great) if I spend a little bit on good styling products (Aveda's Be Curly is outrageous for making my frizzies go away).

Good ole Cetaphil Facial Cleanser is every bit as good as all that Clarins stuff I used to buy. Neutrogena makes a delicious Sugar Scrub for a third of the price of the Fresh scrub.

Oil of Olay makes a Skin Smoothing Cream Scrub that works really well, and is a quarter of the price of the Lancome. And even though L'Occitane Body Cream with Shea Butter is a little bit of heaven in a jar, plain old Vaseline Intensive Care lotion does the job just as well. Maybe better.

Groupon offers outrageous deals on spa and pampering services. I just bought a Paraffin Treatment Manicure and Pedicure for $29, which is less than half price. They always offer deals on massages and facials. I have a girlfriend who has been doing laser hair removal to her whole body one Groupon half-price deal at a time!

And one thing that REALLY makes my face look more "together" is taking care of my eyebrows. I think it's a great idea for every woman to get her eyebrows professionally shaped at least once. And then you can keep them that way by yourself just following the arch created by the professional. I do, however, suggest investing in a Tweezerman, the best tweezers ever. It makes ALL the difference in the world.

So, do I think all this "doing a little something" has helped? Well, while I still don't think anybody is looking at me, and I'm sure nobody has noticed... I do feel prettier. More like myself. Cared for. You know?

And I like to think that in the words of Billy Crystal's Fernando character "To look good is to feel good." And if this doesn't work, I guess there's always that wacky "focusing on what's inside" thing.

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...in response to the question "What are your beauty resolutions this year? How do you plan to shake up and streamline your routine? What are the good habits you are committing to developing?"

PLEASE, PLEASE visit their main post on BlogHer.com. 

And while you're there, please visit the Life Well Lived Sweepstakes and enter for a chance to win a Kindle Fire and a $50 Amazon Gift Card!

Spin Cycle: Aspirations

HELLO WORLD!! Are you listening? Is this mic on? (tap, tap, tap)

I could really use a good job! Really. And so, since we're spinning on the topic "The Perfect Job", I'm just gonna throw out some ideas to you, and if you like, maybe you could throw them back my way.

I should preface this by mentioning that my idea of the "perfect" job has changed drastically over the last...oh...8 years. Basically, since Jude was born. While at one time, I would have loved to be a movie star, travelling to exotic locations and working with exotic leading men, I now think that this would be really very difficult. Unless somebody drags their kids around with them back and forth across the world a la the Jolie-Pitt clan, your average movie star spends very little time with their kids. Leaving these kids pretty screwed up. I would never be able to leave Jude consistently for any extended time.

That said, I believe that the following jobs would be totally doable - great hours, and plenty of time for my life as mother/wife. So here's what I'd like to be...

1. An actress on a successful sitcom.

The biggest problem with being an actor, aside from the constant, daily judgments made against you, is the insecurity, the lack of steady employment. You never EVER know when the next paycheck is coming, or where it's coming from. It's all one big crapshoot. 

The only really steady employment for an actor is to become a regular on a tv show. And while work on an hour-long drama would be a damned nice gig, the best gig hourwise is hands down, the sitcom.

Sitcom actors work a 5 day week. For 4 of these days you rehearse the show, working from 10:00 am to about 3:00 pm. Then on the 5th day, you shoot it in front of a live audience, like doing a little play. The hours on shoot day are a little longer, usually about 10:00 am to 8:00 pm. Every 3 weeks or so, you get a week off. You shoot for a total of 24 episodes a season, and have the entire summer off. These are hours I could live with! Oh, and the starting pay is about $25,000 a week.

 2. A game show hostess.

Vanna White has the greatest job.

Wheel of Fortune tapes 5 to 6  episodes a day for a week, then takes THREE weeks off. At this rate, it takes about 8 months to tape a season, and then you get 4 more MONTHS off. That's a lot of OFF. Which is how Vanna has time to do all that crocheting and selling of weird stuff on HSN. And according to the trusty internet, she makes about $5000 an episode, so that's $125,000 to $150,000 a month for eight months = a buttload of cash. And all she does is turn letters and joke with Pat!

I could do that!! I know the alphabet!! I'd look good in the gowns! Really.

3) A published/produced writer with my own writer's shed.

It doesn't really matter if I'm a successfully published novelist or a successfully produced screenwriter. What really matters is the shed.

A while back, my friend Elizabeth of a moon, worn as if it had been a shell wrote a piece about writer's sheds, and I've been fairly obsessed with the notion ever since.

A writer's shed, or hut if you like, is a tiny building where a writer retires to write. A little space just for me. All alone. No interruptions. No distractions. Just thinking about it makes me slightly weak and tingly.

Here is Virginia Woolf's shed, the original "room of one's own"...

Aaaahhh.

Roald Dahl had one too...

Isn't that just the sweetest thing?

Now, of course, I don't live in Wales. So my shed wouldn't be quite so quaint. But I could at least come up with something as spare and simple as good old George Bernard Shaw...

Here's the inside...

I even looked at little buildings once at the Home Depot. They sell them ready made for about a grand...

Stick that baby in the backyard, wire it with electricity and a little WiFi and I'd be living pretty.

Just imagine. A little refrigerator. An electric kettle to make tea. A comfy chair. My laptop. No one asking me stupid questions. No one making me listen to them talk about their stupid day. No one talking to me on and on about some stupid video game...

Sigh.

So there you go World. Get to work on that, will you? I'd really appreciate it.

But before I leave, I can't resist sharing with you my Fantasy Dream Job of all time, for which I was born about 15 years too late.

If I could turn back time, I would want to be...

A backup singer on Joe Cocker's Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour.

Yep, a member of the original Space Choir, who toured with Joe Cocker and Leon Russell on their legendary 1970 Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour which spawned the great live album of the same name. It was a crazy hippie commune road show, no doubt enhanced with a tremendous amount of recreational drug usage.

Here's With a Little Help From My Friends, which I do believe is a) the best cover song ever recorded. and b) the best backup part ever written. These women are WAILING. And notice that the beautiful brunette is Rita Coolidge, the original Delta Lady.

I know this is a long clip, but PLEASE watch the whole thing - the end is like a musical mutual orgasm!

  

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Please click around and visit all of this weeks Spin Cycle participants!

Kendra from Life in the Slow Lane

Vandy J from The Testosterone Three and Me

Claire from incognitus scriptor

Jan from Jan's Sushi Bar

Jen from Sprite's Keeper

Peg from Square Peg in a Round Hole - NEW on FRIDAY!!

Patty at Pancakes Gone Awry - NEW on FRIDAY!!

Sarah at 32 Flavors - NEW on FRIDAY!!

Ginny at Lemon Drop Pie - NEW ON FRIDAY!!

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Next week on The Spin Cycle...

Okay, remember how I told you the story of the nightmare that I had about Jen giving the Spin Cycle to a blogger who only wanted us to post recipes and craft ideas? Well, just to spite myself, this week...

Every Recipe Tells a Story

A while back, I saw some ladies on one of the morning talk shows who wrote this cookbook...

"Sugar, Sugar: Every Recipe Tells a Story" by Kimberly "Momma" Reiner and Jenna Sanz-Agero. That picture's an Amazon linky if you're interested. While I have not read this cookbook, and therefore can't endorse it, I really love the concept - that "a recipe is like a family snapshot, capturing memories of a time and place, and the people that made it special".

So...this week, share a recipe and the story that goes with it. While these ladies only include desserts, feel free to dish up any kind of recipe you want, as long as you also share the story behind it or around it. The first thing you ever cooked for your spouse? Grandma's pot roast that your family came together around every Sunday? That comfort food you cook for yourself when you're feeling down and out? We want to hear all about it!

Let's all serve it up and dish about it!

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Nemesis

My childhood nemesis was a girl named June.

Okay, she wasn't really named June, that's a pseudonym, chosen in order to protect the mean.

But she was my childhood nemesis. Not a nemesis of the Professor Moriarty/Dr. Doofenshmirtz type, but of the true definition - "an opponent or rival whom a person cannot best or overcome".

June was my friend. In fact, she was one of my best friends. We played together all the time, from the time we were in Tiny Tots preschool together through junior high.

But June had a mean streak. She could be cruel. She could also be a lot of fun, and had a strong personality. She was an instigator and leader of girls. I'm afraid that early on, she figured out that I was extremely gullible, and easily led by the nose. I became her...yes man.

June's parents got a divorce when she was just 4 or 5 years old. Which was a little shocking and exotic at the time- none of my other friends' parents were divorced. But June's parents had married young, and had her when they were just 19.

This was Austin in the '60's, so there was a whole lotta experimentation/spreading your wings/letting your freak flag fly going on. June's mom became a full-fledged hippie. While my mother wore a French-twist updo, bright red Revlon Fire and Ice lipstick and her good pearls, June's mom wore long, flowing hair, peasant skirts and halter tops with no bra. She was cool and artsy. She macramed and threw pots. She even had a kiln in the garage. She had boyfriends and smoked pot and listened to Joni Mitchell really loudly.

June's dad, in what I now know was probably an attempt to buy her love and make her forgive him for leaving his family, built her amazingly cool stuff. She had a tepee. A REAL tepee. She also had a log cabin! The cabin was in the backyard, and was fitted with four bunks, air conditioning and a telephone - perfect for a slumber party.

June had every thing I wanted. Blond hair, blue eyes, freckles, glasses, braces. All the cool stuff. Her mom got her shirts with Nehru collars and peace sign necklaces. She got to pierce her ears! And when we were in junior high she got...a waterbed. I can still remember the smell of it. I desperately loved playing at her house, and envied everything she had.

But looking back on our long friendship, I'm a little shocked by how many "Mean June" incidents I can remember.

In 2nd Grade, we were playing some kind of chase game on the playground, and June shoved me from behind, making me slam my face into the monkey bars and chip one of my brand new front teeth. It took about 20 years for that tooth to even off and look normal.

She had this game she made me play with her. It was called "Little Bat". June got to drape herself in a long black cape and be Little Bat, a poor orphan bat, who had lost her way and needed to be returned to her cave in the wild. I never, ever got to be Little Bat, but was forced to play the far less interesting role of the kind lady who helped her. I would have to pick her up and give her food and liquids and wrap her in a blanket and help her find her mommy. June, as Little Bat, revelled in her pain and sadness. She was the flying mammal Camille. You have to understand how difficult it was for me, a performer at heart, to always be stuck in the stupid, boring supporting role. I would have been a FABULOUS Little Bat, but, alas, was never allowed.

In about 3rd Grade, June convinced me that I should eat the cat food, because it tasted just like chicken. It did not.

And then came...dum, dum, dum, dum...4th Grade. The year of misery. I must have been going through an awkward phase or something, because my two most traumatic elementary school incidents happened that year. And both were instigated by June.

The first was a time when my best friend Kaysie (who was also under June's evil spell) had invited a bunch of girls for a sleepover at her house. As Mama drove me up the hill to Kaysie's house, all of the other girls jumped out from behind a bush on the side of the road and screamed "YOU'RE LATE!". Apparently, Mama had gotten the time of the party wrong, and we showed up an hour late. The girls continued to taunt me for the rest of the party. I was deeply shamed.

The other was what Kaysie and I have come to call the Dreaded Bean Dip Incident. It was a terrible and scarring experience that involved my being pelted with bean dip at a slumber party in June's log cabin by an out of control gang of 10 year old girls - a hideous event which haunts me to this day.  Kaysie won't even let me mention it in her presence, she is still so filled with shame over the incident. But such was June's power of persuasion.

Which brings me to one of the most shameful experiences of my life. Something I look back upon with such shame and guilt that I would prefer to think it didn't happen. But it did.

Around 6th Grade, a girl named Karen came to our school. I liked Karen. She was sweet and fun and smart, and we played together often. We both had guitars and I remember us learning how to play Leaving on a Jet Plane together. I guess Karen was kind of dorky, but...so was I.

At some point in Junior High, probably 7th Grade, June decided that Karen was not cool enough to be our friend. She decided that everyone in our little gang of girlfriends needed to...snub her. June laid out the plan for us all - that day, every time Karen came up to us, we were to completely ignore her, and pretend she wasn't there. And being the June sycophants that we were...we did.

I'll never forget how Karen reacted. The look of hurt and injury on her face. Of disappointment and betrayal.  Over and over that day, every time she came near us, we ignored her and she walked away quietly.

Karen was a smart girl, and took the hint. The next day, instead of sitting with us in the cafeteria at lunch, she walked across the room and sat with the other outcast girls. A group of girls who were all deemed "uncool", but managed to forge their own little subculture, their own little clique. A group of girls who I am now friends with on Facebook. We play dorky games together, and have a great time. But at age 13, I was too worried about my own public image to admit that I had a lot in common with those girls. Certainly more than I had with June.

I've looked for Karen on Facebook, but haven't found her. I'd like to tell her how sorry I am.

Soon after this incident, Kaysie and I pretty much stopped being friends with June, and not long after, she changed schools, and we never saw her any more. It was such a relief. But I still wish that this friendship had ended because I'd stood up to her and done the right thing instead of just following the herd.

I've looked for June on Facebook too, but haven't found her either. I'm kind of interested in finding out how she turned out. What life gave to her, and what she made out of it. She was so smart, so creative and such a natural leader. But the last thing I heard of her was a few years ago, when Kaysie ran into her brother, who said she wasn't doing very well. I think her demons were too much for her.

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This post was inspired by...

#4 -  Describe a time you saw someone getting picked on.

My Brilliant Career

The Spin Cycle this week is all about The Perfect Job - how would you envision the perfect working environment? Would you be a lady of leisure or the leader of the free world? Would you be Mother Teresa working for the greater good or would you wanna make a lotta cash?

Dream up your ideal employment opportunities and link up!

Here are our spinners...

Kendra from Life in the Slow Lane

Vandy J from The Testosterone Three and Me

Claire from incognitus scriptor

Jan from Jan's Sushi Bar

Jen from Sprite's Keeper

Peg from Square Peg in a Round Hole - NEW on FRIDAY!!

Patty at Pancakes Gone Awry - NEW on FRIDAY!!

Sarah at 32 Flavors - NEW on FRIDAY!!

Ginny at Lemon Drop Pie - NEW on FRIDAY!!

 

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Kitchen Myths Debunked! Part Two

About a year ago I wrote THIS POST in which I debunked 10 popular kitchen myths. But I think one can never have too much debunking, so I'm going to debunk some MORE, y'all. I still just love that word...debunked. Makes me giggle. Don't know why.

So here we go again...

1. The eye of the potato is poisonous.

Not reeeeaaallly. But they are kinda poisonous.

I'm afraid that my dear Mama, though a brilliant homemaker, was a somewhat poor housekeeper. She often kept what I always thought of as "science projects" in her kitchen. Opening Tupperware containers that had been shoved to the back of the fridge was often a frightening and sometimes traumatizing experience. She always kept her potatoes in a bag under the sink, and being sent under there to fetch a potato for her was often a scary task - potatoes would have crazy roots growing out of them, little buds sprouting out of their eyes and sometimes they were sort of green and mushy. Mama would then make me peel the dang things, and cut out the eyes, but I'm afraid that we weren't particularly careful about this, and we ate them anyway.

The truth is, that potatoes are, in fact, part of the nightshade, also known as belladonna, family. Which is, of course, what the evil Locusta used to kill the Emperor Claudius. And all nightshades contain a bit of a naturally occurring chemical called solanine, which is toxic. And the eye contains a higher concentration of this solanine stuff. If potatoes age and/or are exposed to too much light, they turn all green and mushy and the amount of solamine they contain increases.

But apparently, a 200-lb person would have to eat 2 pounds of potato eyes/roots/green bits in a single day to receive a toxic dose. Which would be not only gross, but possibly psychotic. And I feel that my very existence, after a childhood of eating Mama's green and eye-ridden potatoes proves my point.

Bottom line - You should cut the eyes out because they're nasty and taste bitter, but if you leave one in, you won't kill anybody.

2. If you soak the chicken in a little lemon juice it kills the bacteria.

This is a...Mommyism. You know, I should probably write another post and title it "Mommy Debunked", because my precious mother-in-law Mommy has some wacky notions. She is also, as I have mentioned many times before, a germ freak. I suspect that if she thought it would taste okay, she would soak the chicken in Lysol. But since that's insane, she always insists on soaking chicken in a bowl of cold water and a little lemon juice.

Now, while lemon juice is, in fact, a great disinfectant, and will kill some bacteria, something called COOKING is an even better disinfectant, and will kill even more bacteria. So the soak is a bit...redundant. And lemon juice isn't a powerful enough disinfectant to kill salmonella.

On the other hand, lemon does work as a tenderizer, and it tastes damned good so...what the hell. I'll let Mommy continue with her soaking.

And while I'm talking Mommyisms...

3. Garlic lasts longer if you store it in the refrigerator.

While this is, technically, true, the cold temperature also spoils the taste and the texture of the garlic. It also makes it about 100 times harder to peel, which I tell Mommy every time I have to cook at her house, but she never listens to me. Even though the woman goes through garlic so quickly, there's no way in hell it would ever rot before she got to it no matter where she kept it. And even though the head of garlic costs all of about $.28, and God forbid she would ever have throw 3 cents of garlic away...I'm sorry, was I ranting?

The best place to store garlic is in a cool, dry place. Like the pantry.

4. You should crack an egg on the edge of a bowl or countertop.

This was Cooking 101 in my house growing up. Mama cracked every egg she ever cracked in her life against the edge of her bowl.

But apparently, if you crack them on a flat surface, your chances for a clean break are much better, and you'll be less likely to get little bits of shell in the bowl. I have been experimenting with this life-changing theory for the last couple of days and I believe it to be true.

I know! The axis of my world has shifted slightly. Live and learn.

5. The only alcohol that is good for your heart is red wine.

Oh my, this one makes me so happy I could spit.

Red wine, white wine, pink wine, beer and hard liquor all have the SAME health benefits!

Apparently, this confusion was brought about by something called the French Paradox - researchers believed that it was the antioxidants in red wine which protected all those butter and cheese loving French people from heart disease.

But more recent research has shown that antioxidants aren't the reason at all. It's the alcohol itself - ethanol - that raises the levels of HDL (good cholesterol), which helps protect arteries from plaque buildup which leads to heart attacks and strokes. So any alcohol will do the trick.

 

Unfortunately, researchers qualify this brilliant notion with the phrase "in moderation", which really takes all the fun out of it.

6. The microwave will give you cancer.

Okay, here's the deal. The radio waves produced by a microwave, which are absorbed by the food, do produce a type of radiation.  But there are two main types of radiation - ionizing and non-ionizing.

Ionizing radiation is the kind of radiation that's used in...oh...nuclear power plants. This type of radiation can be dangerous if you receive large doses of it because it has the ability to change your DNA and cause cancer. Which is bad.

But microwaves produce non-ionizing radiation. It can't change your DNA or give you cancer.

That's not to say you shouldn't be careful with microwaves. You don't want to be sticking your face in there when it's going. And you don't want to be using an old, leaky microwave either. And you especially don't want your kids messing with the microwave, since their bodies absorb radiation more easily than adults’.

So...don't microwave your head, do microwave your potato.

7. You should add a little olive oil to the water when you boil pasta so the pasta won't stick together.

I must admit, I did this for about the first half of my life. But all of my many years surrounded by Jimmy's Italian-American family have taught me that this is a poor idea. A little oil in the pot will probably keep the pot from boiling over. And tossing some oil on the pasta after you've drained it will keep the strands from sticking. But it also keeps everything else from sticking to the pasta - things like...sauce.

Every Italian cook I've met just tosses a spoonful or two of sauce into the pasta (or the "macaroni" as Mommy calls it) and stirs it up - that's all you need to keep it from sticking.

And while I'm defending Mommy...

8. If you boil your vegetables too long they lose all their nutrients.

Please, PLEASE don't tell Mommy this. This has been my argument with her for years in my attempt to keep her from boiling the vegetables until they dissolve into mush and lose all resemblance to their original selves.

But the truth is that yes, the broccoli boiled until it dissolves into a puree may have lost many of it's nutrients - mostly vitamins, which are water soluble. But important minerals like iron and potassium don’t break down that easily in water. So...DON'T TELL MOMMY!

9. Eating turkey makes you drowsy.

While tryptophan, an amino acid present in turkey, is a mild sedative, tryptophan doesn't act on the brain unless it is taken on an empty stomach and no protein is present. And since turkey is a source of protein, and most of us believe this to be true on Thanksgiving ...

 

That sleepy, lethargic feeling one feels after eating Thanksgiving dinner is more likely due to overeating a massive amount of carbohydrates and drinking a bunch of booze. That, and the fact that a tremendous amount of your blood has rushed away from your brain and into your abdomen to aid with digestion.

Bring on that football game.

10.  A watched pot never boils.

 As hard believe as it is, this is not true. The pot will eventually boil, though if you watch it long enough, your time perception may skew, and it will seem to be a very, very long time.

Okay, this one is just silly, but I couldn't think of a tenth myth and I like nice even numbers.

Well there you have it. Lots more debunking. Don't ever say I never taught you anything.

 

Check out Works-for-Me-WEDNESDAY at We Are THAT Family!

RTT: Control Freak, Sleepwalking and SAG Swag

Man oh man, have I been lazy lately. My brain is totally fried. I just don't seem to have anything interesting to say.

Okay, I realize that this statement isn't really selling you on the idea of reading the rest of this post, is it? Anyway, I don't know if it's just that my sinuses have been totally wiggy (I'm pretty sure that wiggy is, in fact, a legitimate medical term) or if maybe my intellectual biorhythms are down. Does anybody remember biorhythms? Ha! I think I just seriously dated myself.

If you noticed, last week, I did a blog carnival thingy every single day. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But I did it because I couldn't think of ANYTHING to write about on my own and needed outside inspiration. Well, I guess that technically one of the blog carnival thingies was MY blog carnival thingy. Which makes it even more pathetic. And I fear that this week's Spin Cycle isn't as inspiring as I would like it to be. Please check it out HERE and get your spin in. Could be fun?!

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My friend Rachel sent this to me. She read my Thanksgiving According to Me post, and thought I might enjoy it. While I am not nearly as...shall we say...particular?...no...controlling?...yes, but...batshit crazy?...THAT'S IT!...as this woman, I do admire her specificity, even though she does misspell Haagen-Dazs. I must admit that one time I sent out an invitation to a potluck in which I iterated numerous times that everyone must bring the food in "an attractive serving dish". They do say that God is in the details.

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Sunday night at about 10:00 pm, I was sitting on the sofa in the living room watching my Downton Abbey, when I suddenly heard somebody rooting around in the freezer in the kitchen. "Jimmy?" I called out. No answer. Then out of the darkness stepped Jude, wearing his little footie jammies and carrying a frozen loaf of pumpkin bread. "Hey buddy" I said "What's up?" He padded over to me, handed me the pumpkin bread, and said "Hi Mom. I'm thirsty. I want something to drink." "Well, what's the pumpkin bread for?" "I'm thirsty. I want something to drink." He had a very odd and slightly stoned expression on his face, and I realized he was SLEEPWALKING! I walked him gently back to his room, depositing the pumpkin bread back in the freezer on the way, gave him his glass of water, which he guzzled down and then immediately crashed back to sleep. FREAKED ME OUT.  Jimmy says that he used to do it when he was little. Mommy claims that one time, he walked all the way downstairs, and they found him standing in front of the dining room window staring out into the nightscape in the backyard and he said "It's a great day to play baseball." Has anybody else's kid done this? Should I be concerned?

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Okay, this might be a case of too-much-time-on-ones-hands, but I kind of love it...9 Masterpiece Sandwiches. I especially like the Mondrian...

and the Rothko...

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We are currently enjoying one of the major perks of belonging to the Screen Actors Guild, our acting union (hurray labor!). Every year, during the lead up to our voting on the Screen Actors Guild Awards, we get sent all the big movies on DVD - the studios' attempt to snag our votes for their peeps.  And since Jimmy and I are a two actor household, we keep getting sent doubles. So far, we've received two of The Artist, The Descendants, Bridesmaids, The Help, Moneyball and The Iron Lady. Nice, right? I had originally thought that I might have a giveaway, and handout all of our duplicate DVDs, but then I read the SAG fine print a little more carefully and realized that that was sort of... illegal. Probably nobody would catch me, but really, it's probably not a cool thing to send out over the internet, you know? But...if anybody happens to live nearby and wants to...borrow any of these DVDs from me...let me know, and we'll work it out.

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I think my Claritin-D has finally kicked in. I'm still feeling wiggy, but at least my head is no longer throbbing. Please drop by Stacy's place and check out all of the other randomness.

 

Verified

Do y'all remember a couple of years ago, when everybody was writing funny posts in which they made up definitions to those wacky Word Verification words? It was all the craze. No really, it was.

Well, embarrassingly, I've been collecting verification words ever since then, but never got around to actually writing a post about them until now. I'm hoping that this activity is so completely out of style that it's actually become retro. Maybe I'll bring the craze back.

These are real, true Word Verification words, which I was made to use when reading all of your blogs. The definitions are mine.

(NOTE OF EXPLANATION FOR YOU NON-BLOGGERS/NON-COMMENTERS: In order to post a comment on most blogs, you have to type in a randomly generated "Word Verification" to prove you're not a spammer. The verification word is sometimes just random letters (i.e. jrp5wkq - it's like this on my blog) but is usually a nonsense word such as the following...)

Acking  - verb - act of clearing one's Eustachian tubes. The sound of the old man's acking made me want to throw up.

Condoper - noun, slang-  a drug addict who holes up in his condominium. Due to the current recession, incidents of middle-class condopers are on the rise.

Dentski – noun - a Polish dentist. How many dentskis does it take to change a light bulb?

Digical - noun - a digital musical. The winner of  Best Digical of the Year is given a Virtual Tony Award..

Dizzed - adjective - having been made dizzy. Riding that crazy rollercoaster left me completely dizzed.

Efing - adjective, adverb - euphemism for another more vulgar popular slang word. Downton Abbey is so efing good that I can't efing stand it!

Expapi – noun - father of one's ex-husband. My expapi was such a crazed Dallas Cowboys fan that once, when the Cowboys lost, he heaved a beer bottle at the screen and smashed it.

Hortort – noun - the sound a car clicker makes when unlocking a car. I walked around and around the parking lot at the mall, listening for the hortort.

Insulity - noun - the quality one has after having been insulted. I sat and stewed, filled with insulity.

Mantrepi – noun -  a small, furry Australian marsupial, known for it's abnormally large genitals. The mantrepi cage at the zoo is always quite embarrassing.

Mersha – proper noun - 1980's situation comedy series. Oh my God! Mersha was the most totally awesome show when I was in high school!

Oying – verb - the act of saying “oy”. Grandma Cohen wouldn't stop oying.

Poondadi - proper name - the latest stage name of American rapper Sean Combs. In an attempt to combat those nasty gay rumors, P Diddy has changed his name yet again, this time to Poondadi.

Spapurge – verb - the accidental release of  bodily functions in a Jacuzzi. The hot tub had to be evacuated after a woman's fit of laughter caused her to suffer an embarrassing incidence of spapurge.

Suprogen – proper noun - a hormone replacement drug. Damn these efing hot flashes, I gotta get me some of that Suprogen!

Wineye – noun - the look one gets when one has had one too many glasses of wine. Oh no, Mama has the wineye! Everybody watch out!

Witard –  slang noun - an extremely clever person. Oscar Wilde was such a witard.

Okay, the silliness is hereby over. Feel free to use these words as you see fit.

Spin Cycle: The Cause

I am not, generally, a particularly political person.

I'm a registered Democrat, and tend to define myself as a liberal, but really? I'm pretty moderate. I have always had a peculiar ability to see and respect all sides of an issue. Maybe it's genetic, since both of my grandfathers were judges. Or maybe I'm just wishy-washy, and basically hate to argue.

I've done volunteer work for various candidates over the years, and have been known to slap on a bumper sticker or hammer in a yard sign. But...that's about it.

But during the 2008 election, I took up a cause.

I not only took up a cause, I started an organization, created a website and sent out newsletters.

On the ballot in California during that election was something called Proposition 8. In early 2008, the California Supreme Court had issued a ruling giving gay and lesbian couples a constitutional right to equality under the state marriage laws. Proposition 8 was intended to overturn the Supreme Court ruling, and actually change the California State Constitution to state that only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in California. In other words, voting "Yes" on Proposition 8 would have made gay marriage in California illegal again. A "No" vote meant that you were FOR gay marriage. I know. It confused everyone.

I am in favor of gay marriage. And as the campaign heated up, I quickly noticed that all of the "No on Prop 8" ads were filled with super-liberal celebrities. I felt that this was preaching to the choir. In order for Proposition 8 to be defeated, I believed that moderate Californians needed to be convinced. The "Yes on 8" campaign promoted themselves as the side of wholesome, family values, and the "No on 8" campaign as a bunch of liberal, anti-family, anti-children sinners.

And so, California Mothers for Marriage was born. It was meant to put a friendly, wholesome face to the No on Prop 8 campaign.  To quote my own press release - "Please join us in protecting the rights and defending the freedom of our children by voting NO on Proposition 8. Our nation was founded on the principle that all people should be treated equally. We believe that it's time to stand up and take action to protect this principle for our children and their generation. Regardless of how anyone feels about same-sex marriage, no one should be singled out for unfair treatment under the laws of our state."

My dear old friend David created a website for me, and I set to work. I recruited members, I sent out newsletters, I started a Facebook page. By the time of the election, we had several hundred members.

Please indulge me a bit of my own propaganda...

Proponents of Proposition 8 claim they are protecting California's children. We find this offensive and manipulative and we question their intention and motives. Are the supporters of Proposition 8 really trying to protect marriage? Or are they simply trying to take away the civil rights of a group of people whose lifestyle they don't understand? We don't agree that marriage between two people of the same sex somehow diminishes the institution of marriage between a man and a woman. Why would anyone determine the value of their own marriage based on who else has taken vows? On the contrary, we believe that recognizing same-sex marriage strengthens the sanctity of marriage by making it available to all who are willing to make a lifetime commitment to love each other .

As mothers, we love all of our children equally, and want them all to have equal rights and an equal opportunity for happiness. We hope that by taking a stand we can show our children the difference between right and wrong. That human rights need to be fought for and protected. We hope that they will be able to look back on our fight with pride and respect, the same way we look back on our mothers' fight for civil rights and our grandmothers' fight for suffrage.

People kept asking me why on earth I became so passionate about this issue. I'm not gay. I don't have a sibling/child/parent who is gay. I do have many gay friends. But why did this issue touch me so deeply?

I have defined my reasoning as the "Horton Hears a Who Syndrome".

Jude is not easily frightened by movies/books. He is absolutely fine with watching violence or scary/intense situations. Aside from the occasional "Voldemort's in the closet" dreams, he wasn't scared or freaked out by any of the Harry Potter stuff. What makes Jude lose it is what I have come to define as "issues of social justice".

When Jude was 4, I took him to see "Horton Hears a Who". Toward the end of the movie, there's a scene when the mean kangaroo and her minions have tied up Horton, and are trying to make him drop the clover on which he claims the Who's are living into a vat of boiling oil, or some such thing. At this point in the movie, Jude started sobbing uncontrollably. The child couldn't be consoled. On and on he cried. He cried through the rest of the movie, all the way to the car, and all the way home. He kept saying over and over "But Mama, they were so mean to Horton, he just was what he was. He didn't do anything wrong! They just don't understand him!"

And that, in a nutshell, is the way I feel about gay marriage. They just are what they are. They haven't done anything wrong. People just don't understand them. And for someone to be unable to marry the person they love just because some people don't understand them absolutely breaks my heart.

So I guess I truly am a "bleeding heart" liberal. If it touches my heart, it's got me. I don't so much vote over issues like the debt ceiling, the size of government or tax breaks for the wealthy. But if somebody's mean to somebody - I'm gonna try to do something about it.

Of course, anybody who keeps up with this kind of stuff knows that my cause did NOT win. Proposition 8 was voted into effect, and same-sex marriage is no longer legal in California. I was heartbroken. But far less heartbroken than I would have been if I had done nothing, and failed to take a stand. At some point over the next few years, California will, no doubt, once again try to make gay marriage legal, and I will, no doubt, once again take up the cause.

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Please EVERYBODY check out all the spinners who stepped up on their soapboxes and spoke out for something they believe in!

Patty at Pancakes Gone Awry

Peg at Square Peg in a Round Hole

Aimee at Aimee Writes

Jan at Jan's Sushi Bar

Sarah at 32 Flavors

Kendra at Life in the Slow Lane

Vandy J at The Testosterone Three and Me

Jan at Jan's Sushi Bar - AGAIN on FRIDAY!! (Jan has much to say!)

Michele Renee at Must Be a Full Moon - NEw on FRIDAY!!

Ginny Marie at Lemon Drop Pie - New on FRIDAY!!

Claire at incognitus scriptor - NEW, NEW, NEW!!

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NEXT WEEK on The Spin Cycle...

The Perfect Job

It's January. The start of  a new year, and the perfect time to set some work goals. So I'm thinking we should try going all "The Secret" and think about that perfect job that has somehow eluded us thusfar. Maybe if we think on it hard enough we will achieve perfect by December!

What job do you believe would fulfill your every dream? Want to be your own boss? Start your own company? Work from home? Travel? Or maybe it's a dream job for your spouse? Or your kid?

Maybe you had the perfect job and lost it. Yikes. Maybe your friend has the perfect job and you'd like to snag it from them.

Or maybe you already have to perfect job and want to tell us all about it.

And btw, SAHM is a job. Just saying.

It doesn't have to be practical or reasonable. Reach for the unattainable! Astronaut? Rock Star? Generalissimo of your own small country? Why not?

New to The Spin Cycle? Check out the guidelines by clicking on that little Spin Cycle tab up there. And don't forget to include the stylish and trendy button created by the brilliant Keely.

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The Reason My Child Eats Too Much Junk

FADE IN:

7:00 am. The alarm rings. Gretchen reaches out and punches it off, shakes the dream out of her head, throws back the covers and gets out of bed. She walks into the bathroom and pees, then heads into the kitchen. She adds water to the Keurig and turns it on, then proceeds to pull a number of food items out of the refrigerator and arrange them on the counter.

She then walks into Jude's room. Jude lies face down spread-eagle on the bed. Gretchen turns on the light.

GRETCHEN

Dude. It's time to get up.

JUDE

Uuuuuggh.

Gretchen heads back to the kitchen. She proceeds to cut a slice of wheat bread in half and arrange some turkey on it, then puts it into a sandwich bag and then Jude's lunchbox. She returns to Jude's room.

GRETCHEN

Little boy! It's time to get up.

JUDE

Uuuurrrgg.

GRETCHEN

Really. You gotta get up now. We don't want to be late.

She walks back into the kitchen. She makes herself a coffee. She then takes two baby carrots, places them in a snack bag, and puts them in Jude's lunchbox. She returns to Jude's room. She gets his school uniform out of his drawer and throws it at his head.

GRETCHEN

(loud)

Jude Antonio! It is time to get up!

JUDE

(covering head with pillow)

I don't wanna!

GRETCHEN

Mister!

(she sits on the bed next to him)

It's time. You gotta get ready for school. Come on.

JUDE

I hate school!

GRETCHEN

You do not.

JUDE

 Dude! I do!

GRETCHEN

Do not call me Dude.

JUDE

But you call me Dude!

GRETCHEN

Jude. I am losing patience. What do you want for breakfast?

JUDE

(finally sitting up)

Bacon.

GRETCHEN

No, you can't have bacon.

JUDE

Why?

GRETCHEN

You eat too much bacon. How about a scrambled egg?

JUDE

I hate eggs.

GRETCHEN

No you don't.

JUDE

Yes I do.

GRETCHEN

No you don't.

JUDE

Yes I do.

GRETCHEN

You are stubborn.

JUDE

You are stubborn.

They stare at each other for a beat.

GRETCHEN

How about cereal?

JUDE

Yeah, okay.

GRETCHEN

Okay. Get dressed.

She heads back to the kitchen. She pours Cheerios in a bowl. She then pulls out a plastic container of homemade apple sauce, spoons some into another bowl, then places both bowls on the dining room table. She heads back into Jude's bedroom.

GRETCHEN

Okay, breakfast's on the table. I gave you cereal and some of that applesauce

I made yesterday.

JUDE

I hate applesauce.

GRETCHEN

You do not.

JUDE

I do.

GRETCHEN

You ate a big bowl yesterday.

JUDE

But I didn't like it.

GRETCHEN

You did.

JUDE

I didn't. I don't like fruit.

GRETCHEN

You have to eat fruit. You must eat fruit. It's good for you.

This is good applesauce, dang it, I made it myself.

JUDE

I don't want to eat it.

GRETCHEN

You are very stubborn.

JUDE

You are very stubborn.

(beat)

I will eat the applesauce if I can also have bacon.

A long pause, while they size each other up.

GRETCHEN

All right.

She heads back into the kitchen and makes the bacon. While it's cooking, she proceeds to cut up a pear, put it in a little plastic bag, then adds it to Jude's lunchbox. She thinks for a moment, then adds a mozzarella stick. When the bacon is ready, she sticks it on a plate and puts it on the table with the cereal and applesauce. Jude, now finally dressed for school, sits down and starts his breakfast.

GRETCHEN

Okay, for lunch, I've packed a half a turkey sandwich, a cheese

stick, some carrots and some pear slices.

JUDE

(making a face)

I don't like any of that.

GRETCHEN

Yes you do.

JUDE

No I don't.

GRETCHEN

You love cheese!

JUDE

Yeah, but I don't like any of the rest of it.

GRETCHEN

You ate a turkey sandwich the day before yesterday.

JUDE

I just ate the turkey part. Not the bread.

GRETCHEN

Well okay, then, just eat the turkey part. That's good protein.

JUDE

I don't want pears. I'm eating apples now! That's TWO fruits.

GRETCHEN

Yes it is. It's two fruits. That's very good for you.

JUDE

I don't like it.

GRETCHEN

Will you eat the pears if I give you...potato chips?

JUDE

(quickly)

Yes.

GRETCHEN

Okay. But you have to eat the pears FIRST. Do NOT eat

those chips until after you've eaten those pears.

JUDE

Okay.

Gretchen goes back into the kitchen and adds a small bag of potato chips to the lunch box.

JUDE

(from the other room)

But I don't want those carrots!

Gretchen walks back into the dining room and stares at her child.

GRETCHEN

What's it gonna take to get you to eat those carrots?

JUDE

Homemade chocolate chip cookies.

GRETCHEN

Dang.

JUDE

Two.

Shaking her head, Gretchen heads back into the kitchen, puts two cookies in a little bag and adds it to the lunch box, zips it up, then puts it in Jude's backpack. Jude enjoys his bacon.

FADE OUT.

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This post was inspired by...

Writing Prompt #4 - Describe the scene at breakfast.

WWTK Wednesday - Skynyrd

1. Which of the following phrases characterizes how you live your life?
    a. You only live once 
    b. test the water before jumping in  
    c. stability is the key to life

Hmmm, let's see. I think I'll go with b. test the water before jumping in. While I like to think of myself as spontaneous and free-spirited, this is not the truth. I hem and haw and ask about 60 people for their opinions and then I'll suddenly just go with the first thing that comes to me and foolishly dive in.

2.  What were you doing the last time you had a really good laugh?

Jimmy, Jude, Fancy (the dog) and I were all sleeping together in our king-sized bed. Right after we said good night and turned the light out, we suddenly became aware that somebody had...farted. We all accused each other, and finally realized that it had been the DOG. We all giggled our heads off for about 30 minutes.

3.  Who is the last person you hugged?

Duh. Jude.

4.  What song always makes you happy when you hear it?

Duh. "Hey Jude". Okay, I guess that was the obvious choice. And only one of MANY, MANY songs that make me happy. A few things that immediately come to mind off the top of my head...all of Elton John's Madman Across the Water - Side One, the soundtrack to Rocky Horror Picture Show, almost everything by Van the Man Morrison, Carole King's Tapestry,  everything off Gram Parson's Grievous Angel, most of Joe Cocker Live, Sinatra's That's Life, The Stones Sympathy for the Devil, most everything by George Frideric Handel, Dylan's Simple Twist of Fate, early Billy Joel, Blondie's One Way or Another and of course...turn it up...

 

...just to name a few.

5.  What's the first thing you thought about this morning?

DON'T TAKE THE DOG CAMPING! I seemed to have had a disturbing dream that I had taken Fancy camping, and it hadn't gone well - something about a skunk and a creek. I woke up in something of a panic. 

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This week was once again brought to you by...

Please visit our lovely hostesses Mamarazzi, Queso and Crazymama.