Thursday, June 23, 2011

Facebookin'

Thing on Facebook that is incredibly weird: a profile photo of you, in your wedding dress, standing next to your dad. Putting that on Facebook is fine. Having it as your profile is creepy. I am unsure if that's groom or parent.

Thing on Facebook that is terribly good: all you people who have not set up your privacy settings! I love to see a person from high school who tortured me and is now fat and living in Idaho! I am terribly mean, it's true, but it's also true that you should set up privacy settings if you do not want to be on the receiving end of such schadenfreude. Privacy settings are good even if you were nice in high school, and no matter how thin you may be or far from Idaho may you live now.

Thing on Facebook that is terribly bad: the people who I am friends with that prompt a reaction in me of utter negativity. Whether it is an ex or an acquaintance that I can't seem to de-friend or someone who uses it solely for self-promotion and never, ever, has a dialogue, I manage to seek them out when I am feeling blue and trolling their profile just immediately turns my azure into navy. Boo. When will I learn to stay away?

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Lazy summer.

The pre-summer (and now, officially-summer) laze has hit me. (Laze is too a noun! Such as: the laze, it hit me.) And this blog is bearing the brunt.

I do have things to write about - funny things John said, a fantastic and boozy dinner party we went to, more tales From The Bus (the #6 even, just like Jenny from the Block rode), work tidbits both profound and inane - but I'm too distracted. No matter how old we get, we want to spend all morning in our pj's in the summer.

Remember that feeling? It's warm and sunshiney outside, and the lovely hours out in it are longer than you even have enough energy for. You have to go to bed before the sun fully sets - too tired out from playing Pickle or swimming or catching fireflies. (No, they don't have fireflies in Montana. But they have them in Cape Cod and the best laze can only be had in an Old Cape Cod sort of summer.)

So I'll get back to it. The days will stop feeling so heady, tempting and deeply beautiful. I'll get back to the grind and update thoughtfully - soon - I promise!

(And in the meantime, c'mon, listen to the whole song. It's vintage and adorable and Cape-y!)

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

In brief: 2 Tuesday observations.

#1: Just when I thought we got rid of the circular saw to the left of our house, now we have one behind us! I don't know what they are building, but they were freaking building it when I left for the bus-that-has-shown-up-14-minutes-late two days in a row now at 7:50 this morning, and they are freaking building it right now. It's been two weeks. Work smarter, people!

#2: Waiting at said bus stop, I had a nice conversation (OK, I listened kindly but contributed very little to her monologue) with a woman who was carrying a lot of cans to recycle, talked about all the gang activity in recent weeks in NE Portland, then let me know she was waiting for the teenagers at the Urban Educational Center on the corner to leave before she did "this" - which was smoking a joint at 8:05 AM - on the way to her babysitting gig.

Monday, June 13, 2011

In brief: 2 Monday observations.

#1: A large crumb (or a small chunk?) of chocolate chip cookie on top of the toilet paper holder in the public bathroom of my office building. You have to make up a good back story, am I right?

#2: Woman X in pilates class says, "What did you do today?" and Woman Z replies, "Oh, you know, made more yogurt." Long pause. "And I spent a long time in the yard." Stretching resumed...

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Title?

At the New York Times' website and in articles, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, JD, and former presidential candidate is referred to as Mrs. Clinton. At the same site, citizen, former Governor and former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is referred to as Ms. Palin.

Why is Clinton a Mrs.? And Palin is a Ms.? Both took the name of their husband when they married, and both are still married to same husband. So, is Ms. now reserved for women who'd rather their marital status not be on display AND women who are more well-known than their husbands? If I were more creative I might have an answer. Instead, it's Sunday night, and I'm just pissed.

Maybe you can explain this to me?

Monday, June 6, 2011

Weinergate.

In a world filled with goldfish-length attention spans and 140 character tweets, I do get a kick out of our very, very first reactions to things - to news items, to gossip tidbits (and in this case, the latter pretending to be the former).

Gleefully full of schadenfreude and tuned into today's Anthony Weiner press conference, I was still shocked, however, when two people in the room, awaiting the good Congressman's turn at the podium, repeatedly said, "His wife is so beautiful, though," as if that had something to do with it!

As for my first reaction? A little shock, I admit, last week - he's Jon Stewart's friend after all! And then laughter today, and then a Wikipedia visit to find out he has been married for NEARLY ELEVEN MONTHS. Time for a vow renewal, I suppose?

Friday, June 3, 2011

Theft.

I would like to be smart enough to have said this, but I am not, so I must give credit to N where credit is due.

We saw Meek's Cutoff the other day, which I recommend highly - she liked it, I liked it AND John liked it! It's by a NW filmmaker, who made Old Joy and Wendy and Lucy and it has a similar feel to it, while being a grand Western like you've never seen before.

N said of the film, and the filmmaker, "If her movies were in French, she would be hailed as a master of existentialism and as an auteur of grand scope... a cinematic genius! But since her movies are in English, people think eww, they're boring." Nail. On. The. Head.

Go see Meek's Cutoff! Give Kelly Reichardt some of your intellectual love!

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Oh, dear.

I was browsing healthy eating and exercising tips online the other night, divided into "Your Stage of Life!" What do we have?
  • New to College?
  • Bride to Be!
  • New Mommy
  • 40+
Well, there ya go. Easy as pie - pun intended.

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

In the spirit of factuality:

Please allow me a geographic correction to the previous post. My husband set me straight: the portion of water we were in was, in fact, the Wind River. Paradise Creek flowed into it nearby, but we were on the River itself, despite the name of the campground. Thank you for allowing this brief interruption.