The Vegetarian Pendulum

I'm chasing my best running time. Even after incorporating sprinting, I still can't beat it. Today I managed my third best time. My best time was achieved last spring when I was in the height of IPA abuse and averaging 6 hours of sleep a night, so I'm at a loss as to how I scrounged up the energy to roadrunner through my neighborhood.

Monday I met my husband for lunch at Indian buffet. I hadn't eaten Indian buffet in ages, and it was nice to be in a restaurant with just as many vegetarian options as meat. I'm not vegetarian, although I probably should be because when I chew food and start thinking about the meat, and how it got to be in my mouth, well, my mouth fills up with saliva and my throat closes.

I only really like to eat hamburgers and hotdogs. Someone once told me these are the most common meats vegetarians eat when they decide to get back on meat because they don't resemble flesh. It seems stewed meats, like curries, would be desirable too since they don't really resemble body parts, and this is the case, if I were cooking it myself, but I find budget all-you-can-eat buffets too questionable in their quality of meat to dig in with gusto.

My husband asked, "Are you going to try the goat?"and I looked at him like do you know me at all, shook my head, and piled a second scoop of curry broccoli. Goat is something I can't get on board with because all I can think of is their psychotic looking eyeballs. Lambs have the same daemon eyes, so I pass on lamb too.

We ordered take out last week and Kiki took a piece of the lamb kebab. She kept asking questions,
"How do they get the fur off the lamb?" "Why is this lamb brown" "Would we turn brown if we were cooked." That is a very good question, I've wondered myself. Is human flesh red meat or white meat. I'm too scared Googling it could come back and haunt me. I'd get put on a watch list or it'd be brought up at any trail I might be a part of.

You see Alicia did commit the crime because she once Googled how to cook human flesh.
But I was only curious, I don't even like to eat meat! I'm innocent, dammit!!

Maybe were like chicken, and we have a bit of both. Anyways, she went on asking about the lamb, and I remained bipartisan on her meat questions, so she can figure it out for herself, and I didn't say, "Kiki, people don't talk about how the animal was slaughtered while they're eating it because it reminds them of the animal being alive, and possibly living in inhumane conditions, and with industrial farming and slaughtering, the images are so horrific it can be soul crushing.

I answered her questions, swallowing my last bite of chicken, and deciding pita and hummus would be enough for the night. I then ate a stack of pita that looked like a Denny's LumberJack breakfast as we talked some more about food, steering our conversation toward hummus and garbanzo beans.

After Indian buffet, I dropped my husband back off at work, went to the gym and ran four miles. Surprising to me, since I expected the two plates of food to slow me down, and that I'd spend the time power walking while watching the TV screens. It must have been the carbs, rice and bread covered in all the different sauces.
The IPA carbs last spring were probably what gave me the added juice for my best run time. After I finally decide to just be vegetarian, and spare myself the questionable meal times, I'll probably be ingesting carbs like I work a farm all day, putting me right where I want to be to beat this Best Time. It's haunting me, like sheep's eyes.

Tough, Like A Camel's Toe

A real tough guy

Way to go Fu Yuanhui for dropping the news that flow came to town the day before diving into the pool for the Olympics 100m. Periods never seem to fit nicely into people's schedules, putting a damper on tropical vacations, a really unfortunate pin in consummation, and depleting pro-athletes of stored energy.

The couple days at the start are often exhausting, and it takes its tool in other ways than physical strength. And I'm not talking run-of-the-mill PMS mood swings, what I refer to as my time of clarity, but I mean mind rattling anxiety. The day before I submitted summer grades, I was plagued by a student's ridiculous email after poor attendance and failing the final, that "we could work something out" so she could pass and fulfill her scholarship requirements to keep playing her beloved sport. I knew the email was like a cut and paste con game from an African Prince looking to quadruple my money, but I felt so troubled by the exchange that I wasn't able to think of much else. When my anxiety was peaking, and I began to think maybe I can't deal with some personalities in this teaching game, my period came, and with that so did peace of mind that this student didn't pass the class because she chose not to.

Two weeks after starting is the yin to the yang, balancing out for the wear of PMS, and there is a two or three day stretch where I'm the finest form of myself. Again, this is not just physically, although it's likely the day supermodels book their photo shoots, but mentally, and it projects as a powerful confidence. So when I'm walking around in the world, I feel like I'm a lady in a commercial everyone stops to look at as she goes by and the background music plays Oh Baby She's Got It. At least in my head that's how it plays out, and that's all I see, so that's all that matters!

This is the day I call Egg-Droppin Day, and it would be exceptional if I could put every important meeting of my life on this day of the cycle. I'd always be considered a great match/candidate/performer/all-around-go-getter/personality-plus/people-person/queen-bee.

I watched the movie Weather Man a hundred years ago, and I didn't remember anything about the story except for one teeny bit, but that teeny bit is tattooed on my brain because I think it's the most delightful line in a movie. Nick Cage's daughter is being teased at school for having a camel's toe, and when her grandfather talks to her about it she was oblivious to being bullied for her pants being crammed too far up her vag, rather she thought her classmates were complimenting her for being tough, like a camel's toe. I sort of adopted the line as a personal slogan. When I like to brag about being a bad ass, I casually say, "It's cus I'm tough, like a camel's toe," in an Italian accent. I drop the mic, and strut out of the room like Danny Zuko.

I start my fall term this Saturday. Happily, I'm not running into Fu's luck for my first day. I'm going to be in top form on the second week of the term, and that's my chance to really capture the crowd. In the past I talked about how I like to drag it up for class, and dress to unimpress as a way to maintain a wall between my students, but I've decided I'm going to quit dressing like I got lost in men's wear at Salvation Army and just be myself. Germaine Greer might think of my dressing like a butch mad scientist as a defense mechanism, a way to draw myself out of the gaze, so I can be taken seriously rather than mind fucked, and I would most likely agree with her.

My sister gave me a bunch of clothes when I was leaving Philly. She was going to give me some really nice shit, but I told her to keep it because I can't wear them to work. I laughed my ass off after she gave me an all-knowing nod and said, "Oh, the too pretty problem." A problem anyone faces who gets all dressed up, and then walks into a grocery store and feels like everyone is staring at her, and unless it's Egg-Droppin time of the cycle I am not equipped with the confidence for that kind of attention.

I know that clothing doesn't matter because attractiveness really does radiate from within, but when people initially see me and I look like a brain dead valley girl, then I have a bit of an upward battle with trying to make them take me seriously as I explain to them that I don't fall for email schemes where a semester of absences and failed exams can be fixed by completing a packet of miscellaneous handouts the last week of class. I'd be inundated with them.

This is all perception though, and it isn't really tough to think about what people think about me. But then again, how else does one become a tough guy without making people think she's tough and therefore caring what people think. Holy crap, where am I going with this? Goodnight, from a Camel's toe, a reluctantly pretty one.

It Is What It Is

The beginning of our two hours at a museum (with a lunch break in between)

I've heard this saying a lot lately, "It is what it it." Usually I hear it after someone describes a sad state of affairs or being, and then in an expression of acceptance of the undesirable they utter, "It is what it is." Even though it's not meant to be sad, but rather, bleak optimism.
I heard it from my mom a couple times last week, my sister this week, and even the lady who sat next to me on the plane when I flew to Philadelphia for the beginning of our family vacation.
We kicked off our trip by eating a Philly Cheesesteak at 1:00am after getting picked up at the airport. A decision that took four Evolution Green Juices to get me right again. After a couple days in Philly we went to New York City and spent two nights which I realized is hardly enough time to give my relatives a hug before having to leave town, so next time, we'll make it a week.
New York is the best. I'm not sure my kids would agree since they acted like they were lost in the Sahara, desperately seeking shelter and air conditioning, minutes after we'd start on our ten mile days.
Compared to their cousins, who everyday walk five miles on the Highline, obediently holding the sides of their baby sister's stroller, admiring the greenery and tourists without a peep of indignation, my kids looked like a couple of softies.
I see why no one is fat in New York, fucking walk your ass off all day. Waiting in a 30 minute line at Starbucks, something that would cause toe tapping annoyance elsewhere, is actually relaxing.

This is our first true "family vacation" since the kids were born and aside from the nonstop complaints about walking, there hasn't been chaotic meltdowns that cause my head to explode in public, where I end the day cleaning my brains off the wall, ashamed for loosing my cool. Things are only getting better from here, next year perhaps we can venture to the Italian coast, and the year after, Mount Fuji. I will shed tears of joy when we can roam though a museum spending four straight hours admiring the halls.

Tomorrow is our last day on the East Coast and were heading to Lancaster to gawk at the Amish.  My sister, who has taken us on a culinary expedition of the city, says we should save ourselves for Amish butter as well as their version of root beer, birch beer. We've eaten everything in Philadelphia with four or more stars on Yelp, and tonight I am so uncomfortably full, falling asleep seems like it might be a difficult task. I did a bad job "saving myself" for fresh churned butter.

Ten years ago a trip like this, Philly to NYC, would have ended with me on an airplane hungover with a bag of souvenirs I bought after spending those "museum hours" at a beer garden chain smoking and glowing in conviviality. I'd have read three mystery novels, slept in till noon everyday and made 17 new Facebook friends I would look at in my timeline ten years later and think, Who the hell is that dude. Instead, I'm leaving with a more sophisticated palate, further enlightened to the added health benefits of living in a walkable city, and I was able to squeeze in two hours at a museum, with a lunch break in between and four trips to the bathroom.

So family vacations get me closer to my goal of meaningful museum visits because were committed to doing cultural activities rather than self indulgent. Its for the better, and even if it isn't, it is what it is.

My Diamond Straps Are Pinching

Today I'm packing a suitcase with 14 days worth of clothes for me and the two little ones. George only has four pairs of shorts he will even consider wearing, where an elastic waistband is a must, and Kingsley has enough clothes for a couple four year olds.
I remember when she was a baby and I complained that I wasn't able to buy her clothes because we received so many clothes as gifts. I know. The audacity.
She was the first grandchild out of 11 kids, so when everyone heard she was coming they did what most excited people do, they went shopping.
When my little sister had her daughter, and I gave her Kiki's baby clothes, four enormous moving boxes, she was in shock as she pulled out clothes still with tags on them. We received much more clothes than she could even wear.
So I felt I didn't get the opportunity to represent my personal style with my kid because we were given all her clothes. Now that she's not the only grandkid, we've started buying her clothes, and I realized how stupid it was to complain about all the free clothes we got.
I also figured out that even if my kid let me project my fashion sense onto her, it would lack flair since I am too committed to the K.I.S.S. principle and her entire wardrobe would be $5 H&M little girls sundresses.
She starts school in the fall, and we bought her school uniforms last night. She became so excited in the store, she threw the biggest baby fit I'd seen her throw in a year, while trying to take her pants off because "it was too hot for pants" so she could put on the new school dress.

I've been thinking about how were going to handle this cross country flight, especially with George because he is a juggernaut and 6 hours in a seat will have its challenges. Luckily there is TV, and I bought fruit snacks, a fuck ton of fruit snacks, and not even the organic kind. Straight baby crack I can use during a moment of hysteria.
We are going to Philadelphia to see my sister, and then to Manhattan to see my brother, and ride the fish carousel. It's going to be so much fun. So complaining about George maybe acting like a monster is not necessary. It's like when someone complains how they have to pick up their house before the cleaning lady shows up, so the woman doesn't need to tiptoe over their dirty chonies before she scrubs the doodoo out of their potty.

It's an adventure, and on a micro level there will be some ups and downs, but on a macro level its heading in a positive direction, so it's all good, and I'll try not to complain as the diamond straps on my sandals are pinching, or when George does George on an airplane. Maybe there is a German word for complaints from the ebbs and flows of an awesome upswing, like how the humidity in the Caribbean makes my hair look like The Predators, or when I'm up three or four times a night taking kids to the bathroom. These are such great problems to have, they shouldn't even be considered problems.

George's insistence on elastic waistband pants reflects his positive outlook. He always wants to be prepared when life throws him a feast to get fat on, or fruit snacks.

Cockamamie

Put the phone down

Last night I was laying in bed next to Kiki. We finished reading her books, and although I'm supposed to be sleep training her, I figured I'd just go to sleep too, so I started to read my phone.
I began my nighttime online reading circuit where I usually do, Dlisted. Afternoon Crumbs is a compiled list of links to more articles about celeb culture. I clicked the link to a Jezebel article where the journalist gives a bitchy, but funny, rant after going to a RHONY party, and wasn't allowed to get a gift bag that was supposedly better than the gift bags at the Oscars.
As I read this article, in my head, Kiki rolled over to me and said, "Where are the gift bags?"
I was astounded, to be honest. What the fuck, is this kid reading my damn mind?
Then she rolled back over and started talking about Mimi, that's my Mom, and where she put her gift bags.
Was it a huge coincidence, or is my kid some kind of mind reader? I'm not too sure. But I'm going to be paying much more attention to my thoughts, and her words.

Kiki eventually fell asleep, and I read further as Michael K hilariously analyzed celebrity culture. If Jonathan Gold can get a Pulitzer for writing about Pho, then Michael K should get one for writing about celebrities.
There was a post about Jen Aniston talking to a bunch of kids in France because she won a lifetime achievement award. They asked her how do we get more female representation in film. And her answer was, "Women need to put their phones down and start writing screenplays!"
It was good advice, for me, at least. Since I'm constantly giving myself a stern talking to about getting the fuck off Facebook, and working on something important.
Honestly, I can't help myself. I get a second of mindlessness, and I unwillingly click open a tab, and start scrolling through Facebook. I had to stop Facebook for two years because it was such a drain of my time, but I needed to get back on for my blog, and it's been nice to see everyone again. I've never been good with moderation though, so I have to police myself to be sure I don't let an hour go by as I'm liking everyone's pictures.

I'm in the midst of a two week stint of personal time. My summer school courses ended, and my kids are in preschool till the end of July, so I've been able to dedicate myself to finishing my screenplay. It's awesome, and really, the first time in four years I've been able to spend daytime hours working on a writing project.
Of course, some people don't see how uncommon this is, and act like I'm being a prissy bitch who puts her kids in daycare so I can sit at home painting my finger nails and taking Pinterest selfies.

I talked to my sister yesterday who said, "Are the kids still in preschool?"
My response to this question I've faced ten times over the last week, "Yes, they have school till Thursday, then we are going on our big summer vacation."
"Oh, they are going to like that. They probably want to spend time with their mommy."
The undercut. I didn't reply in a sarcastic tone, "Oh you mean they don't hate me. I was just looking into toddler boarding school for them."
Instead I replied, "Yep, and I really like hanging out with them too. Thats why we hang out so much. Anyways its been nice chatting with you."
It's always great to have people tell me I'm being selfish when I'm doing something that is important to me. NOT. Isn't it more selfish to not act on goals, and then live as a pathetic martyr, a victim, someone who couldn't achieve their dreams because they were too busy enslaved to their family? I wouldn't know because I'm not going that route.
I don't think my sister realized how unsupportive her comment was. In fact, I know she didn't. She was tired, having just finished work, and probably hungry, and just felt like saying something rude to me. But there is the lack. How can we bolster each other, and support our goals, if there is always this guilt being shoved down our throat that we aren't doing enough for our family.

The thing is, there is never enough. There can always be more, and higher expectations. So, live like a man. They don't feel bad for going to work. In fact, they celebrate it. They acknowledge, my working is making my family prosper. It's a beautiful feeling to know that what you do is helping people you love, instead of being told the opposite.

There is the double standard. I can thank Ms. Jennifer Anniston for helping me see the light, and put the damn phone down so I can get to work. And I have to adjust my own thoughts, and my frame of mind because someone important, someone who I tell can do anything she wants, just might be listening, and I don't want her to ever stop going for what she wants because of some cockamamie bullshit, a false sense of guilt that her aspirations are damaging her family.

Snapshot of the "Gift Bags" post

Big Piñata's House

Mac Compatible, unless it's before a nap

George lately mentions someone called Big Piñata. Big Piñata is a monster, I think, who George talks about when he gets frustrated or pissed off about something. If he can't get the straw in his juice box, he says something like, "this is Big Piñata's," and then throws it on the floor. This afternoon we drove to Tahoe. It was a bit past his nap time, so I wasn't surprised to turn back and see him conked out a couple minutes after he told me he hated the song I was playing, and that I need to go to Big Piñata's house.

Kiki rode up with my dad, and they chatted the entire ride. I'm sure she had three hundred questions for him. She is in the textbook "why" stage. Anyone she talks with, she starts in on the questions. When we left the gym the other week, she walked up to an interesting looking guy. He was a big man on a motorized scooter, smiling broadly, radiating happiness. His scooter had an umbrella on it, and I knew Kiki would be compelled to talk with this man. She ran ahead of me, and started in on the umbrella; where did he get it, why does it have palm trees on it, what does he need an umbrella for. She moved onto talk about his scooter, and I just stood behind awkwardly smiling, as George was unraveling into a 5pm get-me-home-now meltdown. 

The man was just as happy to talk with Kiki as she was to talk with him. Eventually, I had to tell her we need to go because the two of them could have easily carried on talking, oblivious to the rest of the world. As we walked away, the man told me she is an "Indigo Child" and to look it up. He said she's very special, and he was just like her as a child.

I went home and Googled Indigo Children, of course, and it did sound a lot like her, however, the description of Indigo Children is criticized as having a Forer Effect, like astrological signs, where descriptions can fit anyone. So, I'm not too sure if "Indigo Child" is just a nice way of saying, you're kid acts a little weird and it's cool. 

The description says they have innate spirituality. Since last year, she has been very concerned with death. She likes to talk about when people die and how they die. She is very interested in my grandparents, and their parents. I almost started to cry the other night when I was laying with her at bedtime, and she told me, "I have dreams Grandma Dee hugs me." Kiki never met my Grandma Dee, but they'd have gotten on like a house on fire.

Last week her dad was reading her Bambi, and I heard her crying hysterically. I walked to her room, and she looked at me, sobbing, and said, "Bambi's mom is shot, and dead!"

Again, I wanted to cry. I gave her a hug, and agreed it was very sad. After she calmed down, she had many questions about guns, and if Bambi's mom had a hole in her fur, if his dad took care of him. Such bad bedtime conversation, although I don't know how much better it'd be over breakfast. I hadn't seen Bambi since I was her age, so when I read this story to her, I was surprised to find out Bambi was a boy, I thought all the characters were girls my entire life.

It's scary that Kiki is so outgoing, and I always have to watch her. The other day the dog ran across the street to see a neighbor's dog, and she followed the dog right into their house. Her dad walked in and got her, and then we had to talk to her for fifteen minutes about how she can't go into people's houses, go up to people's cars, or walk off from us. She seemed to understand, but it's hard to tell because when she is listening hard to something she tends to stare off, over in the distance. 

We don't "know" any of our neighbors, so I would never let her go over to their house without me. The house she went over to is a nice family, where the older kids are early twenty somethings who party a lot, but they helped my mom out one time when she was watching the kids, so I am pretty sure they're not murderers.

Last month, one of these hard partying twenty-somethings walked to his truck parked in front of our house. He was talking with his friend, and said, "I met the hottest black girl."

My daughter ran up to him immediately, completely astonished, and she asked, "You met a black bear?"

This made the two guys laugh and they said, "yes," and then got in their car as she shouted warnings to them about bears, and how baby bears are so cute.

It seemed her preschool spent six months talking about how people are different but the same. At her end-of-year concert I finally understood why she kept asking me if she was Chinese and South African because they sang a song called "Under One Sky" where the chorus is, We're American, were Russian, we're Israeli, we're Egyptian, too. We're Mexican, South African, we're Irish and we're Chinese.

They talked a lot about skin color, and how some people are black, brown, pink and orange. She'd ask what's my skin color, and how about other people's. Then George would start in on it, and I'd get a tinge worried we'd be out and the kids would start loudly pointing out all the different races. They never did, and the times they've asked, it was muffled by the excitement. A great safety mechanism about what young kids say, is that often times people don't know what they say the first time around.

I could just let them be heard, and then say something inline with their preschool curriculum, like, "Were all together under one sun," or "Just like you and me, were all different, and were all the same." Or I could not let them say it the second, clarifying, time and just point off into the distance and scream "Big Piñata!" George will scream and climb up my body like a bear climbing a tree, and Kiki's jaw will drop. 

Tomorrow I'm going to get more information on Big Piñata. If there is going to be the looming threat that I have to go to his house, I need to learn a lot more about him first.

Five Days of Buffets

Reunited and recovering

I'm home from a five day conference in San Francisco. I had expectations of making up for the lack of personal time in my life, and envisioned sleeping in, long runs along the bay, and going on a culinary journey through North Beach and China Town. After getting my registration packet, and going over the schedule, it was obvious I'd have hardly anytime to get fresh air, with most days packed from 7am to 7:30pm.
The conference made up for the all day speakers, round tables and networking, at meal time when a buffet stretched along the entire wall. Every meal, I mountained food on my plate, and then made my way to a table where I made seven new friends.
By Sunday, I gained forty friends and five pounds. All the socializing left me the most drained, and felt the need to get back home where I don't get much personal time, but I can manage to squeeze it in sometimes. The last five days put into perspective that, although I can't pound out a short story when an idea pops in my brain because I'm parenting, there are little moments when I turn on Dora The Explorer and do a 20 minute yoga video, that amount to me-time.

I'm back home. My summer course now ended and I have to wrap things up by grading their finals and submitting grades. My goals for today were to do that, and clean my disastrous house, but after I dropped the kids off at preschool I've caught up on 5 episodes of Real Housewives of New York and made PopTarts.
Dorinda is still my favorite, and Sonja is much funnier when she isn't getting trashed and throwing herself at every dick she sees. I used to think Bethany was a bitch because she's a loud mouth bully, but I'm warming up to her. Especially after her vagina troubles. She is like a grownup Orphan Annie, she doesn't seem to have any family, not even a second cousin, to call on.
If I were Bethany, I'd go adopt a dog and a kid, she needs love in her life. All these Real Housewives's tears highlight that you can have all the money in the world but if you don't have real deep connections with people, then life is hardly lived. More evidence to the old adage, "Money can't buy love."

Even Jules, with all her problems, is really happy from being a mom. Jules' eating disorder is still a major storyline. And she ran into more trouble, literally, when she impaled her vagina. I missed the details of the accident because I was in the kitchen buttering a fresh PopTart, but I gathered her recovering Vag looks like it has elephantiasis. Skinny Jules got a fat pussy. Now she is finally getting recognition for not being so small. I thought of a great nickname, Big Pussy Jules. Too bad for her tiny husband, as he moves out, Jules finally got thick, and where it counts, in her vag.

I think Bethany and Carole's shit talking could be like my buffet. They binge shit-talk to fill the void for family and deep friends. The forty friends I made this weekend were cool, but not as cool as my dog or family. My dog follows me around the house, and falls asleep wherever I end up. I feel guilty to get off the couch to get a snack because he'll wake up and follow me to the kitchen, then sleep at my feet while I start up another toasting session, and then wake up to walk back to the couch with me. But he doesn't understand when I say, "Bentley, stay here. I'm coming right back."
After 5 hours of reality TV, I'm heading out to pick my kids up. We'll take the dog to the park and maybe get ice cream. Anything, but watch TV. I'm not sure what void I just filled by binge watching RHONY, but I'm ready to take on the world, which is most likely the result of stored energy from five days of buffets.

My culinary tour even came across Sacramento Street