Crossover

There was a big crossover moment in our family last night.

The Girl, 11, is now a young woman.

It's not what you think it is.

It revolves around this Dress.*

I returned this dress to Target last night, after deciding that all the alterations in the world won't make it work on my body. (The only saving grace was that I was trying to make an L a M+)

The Girl is looking for a dress to wear to a teacher's wedding next week.

We picked over the leftover L and XL sundresses (the S's got the goods early).

We skipped the bursting racks of maxi-dresses (ugh - please make it go away!) and resigned ourselves to looking elsewhere for an inexpensive, going to be worn once, dress.

Then we stumbled on a secondary rack of Tracy Feith for Target.

The Dress was there, in an XS.

The only piece in a ragtag assortment that no one in The Heights is going to wear.

I pulled it out and asked The Girl if she wanted to try it on, assuming she'd say "no."

She said "sure."

She tried it on and she looked beautiful.

She said "I love it!"

It was twice what we had budgeted, but it will work for a cousin's fall wedding too.

We bought it.

In the parking lot she marveled, "Mom, this is a designer dress!"

On the way home we laughed at the serendipity of this dress.



*modeled, as she suppresses gas, by Ally from The Hills.

Today's Daily Double

"Gotta share.....gotta share!"*

I read an interesting article on a parent's search for a kindergarten that did not assign homework and let kindergarteners play (because that is their work - thank you, Montessori.)

This was my favorite paragraph:

"I came late to motherhood, so I had plenty of time to ponder friends’ mania for souped-up childhood learning. How was it that the same couples who piously proclaimed that 3½-year-old Junior was not “developmentally ready” to use the potty were drilling him on flashcards? What was the rush? Did that better prepare kids to learn? How did 5 become the new 7, anyway?"

Now that we're in the thick of the ridiculousness that is "my kid is taking more high school AP courses than your kid," it seems that Grade 9 is the new Grade 11 with lots of $80 a pop AP testing going on to discern what's in a 14.5 year old's mind that might qualify as college credit.

So we've gone from Doogie Howser's to faux-college-credit earners?

After watching friends and family take 4.5 - 5 years to complete their state university educations, because classes were so full that they had to go in the summer or an extra semester here and there, I've decided that it's all a bit of a sham and that AP credits are only useful when you are going to a state university and the credit gets you out of a basic requirement class that is always full when you try to get into it.

The Boy, who did not test into freshman AP courses, but aced the regular curriculum this year so he's going the AP route next year, is starting to feel a bit of sting from his friends that are off taking the $80 tests this spring. I witnessed a joking, but slightly stinging exchange between him and a friend in the 'high' math class. After the friend was out of the car, The Boy vented a bit about it and his vent contained the phrase "I engage in higher-level thinking" and he went on to share how well he did on an impromptu in-class essay assignment earlier in the week.

I was smug mama the rest of the ride home - he gets it and he's going to be just fine.

In the same article (here's the double) I clicked on the photo credit and discovered the photography of Julie Blackmon and I love it! I hope you'll enjoy it too.

*Singin' In The Rain is in my head

Toto, We Are In The White House

One of the blogs that I read regularly is say la vee and she highlighted the official White House Flickr photostream in one of her recent posts and as I scrolled through the images I felt like I was living a mini history lesson right there.

Yes, the pics are all part of the 'we the people - you the people - this house is our house - this house is your house' message that the Obama administration is pushing out. Oh, and the message? It matches the campaign rhetoric - they are pulling the curtain back and we do see the Wizard and Wizardress in there.

But we also get to see much more.

Crowded meeting rooms full of important people - and not always the image of that meeting that you'll see in Time magazine.

The art that he has chosen to hang in his office.

The comments that accompany the pictures, written by 'we the people.' Some are insightful, some are juvenile. Commenters begin to then comment on each other's comments and so goes the viralness of the web.

The White House PR and Tech plans mesh at this point. It's another chapter in the Axelrod/Obama guide to the Internet and the common web-connected (wo)man.

I'm going to (try) add it to my list of sites that I drop into.

It's my homework.

Who's Afraid of the Muffin Man?

I knew that this post would come. The ubiquitous body issue post. However, this one involves physics.

Let me digress a bit.

I have a cookbook called "Off The Beaten Path" by Bob Blumer, aka (his nomenclature) the surreal gourmet. I bought it after having some delicious grilled asparagus that he prepared in his Airstream kitchen which was situated in the Whole Foods parking lot as part of a series of appearances in the area to promote said book.

There is a chapter in the book called Extreme Cuisine and Bob says: "My dinner guests tend to arrive with impossibly high expectations. Instead of trying to compete with their fantasies, I counter with culinary theatrics from my Surreal bag of tricks. The ruse started at a dinner in Vienna where I poached salmon fillets in a dishwasher."

You get the picture.
Lemongrass Shrimp 'grilled' on a car engine after the car had been driven for 20 miles. Foods prepared with your iron.

And this brings me back to physics and the muffin (top).

As I've been doing a lot of driving lately, I'm acutely aware of how much force my stomach exerts on the seatbelt. After the initial disgust about how I need to lose a few pounds ebbs away, I then start to think more about the force (help me, Luke) and how I can harness it and get something positive accomplished with it.

That reminded me of Bob and his salmon in the dishwasher and the shrimp on the car engine.

Maybe a grilled cheese when it's hot enough outside?

Goat cheese pressed panini?

Pull over and sell them roadside and make a little gas money?

I am afraid of the muffin man and what he does to my head.

From First (Black) Lady to First Lady Anchor

No, I’m not caught up in the mishigas surrounding Mrs. O’s toned and displayed biceps, nor am I interested in which G-20 spouse looks the best. Although NYMag was spot-on...

You are well aware of my concern about Mrs. O’s ( now referred to by some fashionistas as Mobama) eyebrows, but we’ll get to that later.

However, this coat reminds me of something that either Carol Burnett or Tracy Ullman would wear for one of their characters. And Mrs. post-Jagger-Sarkozy isn't doing her runway model self any favors either.

And on both ladies, the floppy bow ties have got to go. I can handle the recycling of 80’s ‘strong shoulders at this past set of Fashion Weeks, but I say NO to the BOW.

Now, back to the brows….even though her make-up artist decided that too many people were telling her to bring the arch down, and she was supposedly working on that….we are still not seeing any progress. And, it contributes to Mrs. O’s wonky left eye in some pictures, which you can see here.

On a related "people taking shots at women" note, I enjoyed reading this article on Katie Couric, in this month's Elle magazine. She has put up with a lot of criticism since becoming the anchor of the CBS Evening News and I watched her debut out of 'you go girl' loyalty and decided that I liked Brian Williams' newscast better. I've always watched the NBC national news, the rare times that I'm home at 5:30pm.

I admire Katie for plugging away and knowing that by being one of the few women to sit in that particular chair, she was making a difference and she was going to to be true to herself in the process.

Mrs. O. is plugging away too - navigating the role of the First Lady conundrum, and she is also being true to herself. Whiplash brows and all.

The New Vacation Car Game: Spot The Botox

You know your days of car bingo are over when you are out to dinner, on vacation, and your 11 yr old daughter says "Mom, turn around, the lady in the red, behind you, has had massive botox."

The Boy said "What are you talking about?"

The Grrl proceeded to put her hands on either side of her face and pulled back her already taut and perfect skin to demonstrate. However, there is no before and after when an 11 yr old pulls her face skin back----it's more like a bad Miley Cyrus-I'm-pretending-to-be-asian moment.

So I took a look at the lady in red, out with her married sons/daughters and the Grrl was right. And there was something going on with her lips too. Not massive like Lisa Rinna (who I have the total scoop on through her make-up artist) and not slightly plumped-up like Nicole Kidman either. I think her mouth was pulled wide due to botox in the wrinkles at the sides of your mouth.

I told the Grrl not to stare and she said "Whaaat? I just glanced!!"

I decided the woman looked like a cross between Dina Merrill and Zsa Zsa Gabor.

Then I had a midwest matchy-matchy flashback moment.

Not only was her top red, but also her watch band and blazer (on the back of the chair). I had to check out the shoes. I pretended to drop something on the floor (lame I know, but the tables were really close together) and the ankle boots were in the red/burgundy family. I knew I'd be really going too far if I tried to confirm if the belt was red too.

When I was in middle school/high school, in the SW corner of WI, I matched my socks to my belt and my hair accessory. And my watchband.

It's more of the wackness.

The midwest kind.

Like A Dog With A (brow) Bone

Here is an artistic take on the First Lady.....and of course the brows that jumped over the moon.

Is That Really Your Neck Exploding Or Are You Just Happy To See Me?

New York Times editor flunks association test when calling the following images a 'Celebration of the Chin':

oh yeah, I'm celebrating....

What do you think?

I think there's a bit of a masochistic vibe going on here.

Or a sprinkle of misogyny?

Or something "m"?

Like hot mess?

Clothing The Cougars

Maybe I've been watching too many episodes of "The Real Housewives" lately and I'm seeing things through breast implanted glasses.....but as I cruised through Nordstrom's the other day, (on my way to Aveda) I looked over the women's spring clothing options and decided that it was all cougar clothing.

JennaVickyGretchenLauri-ish babydoll tops abound, paired with jeans, over-sized and over-priced ($400) bags, and bug-eyed sunglasses. The only things missing were the stripper platform sandals. Short jackets with youthful (sez the Nordstrom buyer to his/her boss) styling that your daughters would say are lame, but a cougar would call fun.

Browsing the sale shoe racks (for The Grrrl, not me) I see the Coach high-top sneakers that she wanted this past winter. The sale price: $87. Reduced from $150. Really? $100 (with our 10% sales tax) for brown, fluffy, fake fur-lined high-tops to wear in the spring and summer?

Recession my ass.

Don't even get me started on how food producers have maintained or raised prices and shrunk their products....

I can now hold 2 "large" containers of Moose Tracks ice cream in 1 hand.

I wonder how many containers of the new Moose Tracks ice cream would fit into a cougar top?

Pissed @ Purse + Bitchin re: Bag*

I'm having purse problems.

My bags are either too big or too small.

Too much structure, or not enough.

Too casual for work; too serious for My Other Life.

Not in season - I have to wait until spring.

This vexes me. I'm very vexed.**

They fall off my shoulder in the winter-of-bulky-coats and dangle like a knotted-up tether ball.

The slouches pool on the floor in my office and I run over them.

The stiff soldiers topple over in my front passenger seat and deposit their contents between the seat and the door and under the seat, never to be retrieved.

The little guys don't accommodate my current wallet + sunglasses.

The big guys look like Pamela Anderson's chest after the implants are removed. I don't have enough big stuff to stuff in there. I don't carry my make-up drawer around with me in my purse. (see above for the lone lipstick that is lost under the passenger-side seat). My wallet isn't bulging with the kids' last report cards and coupons for the nearest waterpark.

I'm a purse and wallet minimalist. Just the bare essentials. If I had the guts to dress like Fran Lebowitz, problem solved. Man-up.

I'm waiting to break out the baby-blue perfect-size bag.

Spring will have sprung and I won't be pissed anymore.


* Twitterized for the hip ones
** Big points for knowing this worst of the worst quote from a movie

High-Low, Suburban Style

grocery-store equivalent of mixing Burberry and The Gap:



Mimmolette Cheese - France


kiddie quarter-barrel of Sunny-D


organic wheatberries


4-pack ("fwack") of toilet bowl cleaner

Not Fixed Yet

Oh Mrs. O...

Put down the tweezers!

Get those brows back down on your brow BONE, girl!


http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/usa/features/article_1457417.php/In_photos_President_Obama_and_First_Lady_Read_to_School_Children

Inheriting The Wackness

The remember-this-for-the-blog-note was written on the back of a "shoe-a-day" mini calendar page (February 2nd, purple pump that even a drag queen wouldn't wear) that is 2 x 2.5 inches.

This is one of the quirks that I inherited from my mom.

It's the why-use-a-pristine-piece-of-paper-when-there-is-some-sort-of-reusable-piece-of-paper-around-here....quirk.

She was green before Al Gore and Bono told us to be green.

She types her notes that accompany magazine/newspaper clippings and comics for the kids on random pieces of paper. The bottom third of a nice piece of paper that someone sent her a letter on. A note pad page from a hotel in Italy or a page-a-day calendar depicting places in Italy that she's been to, with a written or typed note, on the back, indicating the significance of the place on that calendar page.

Grocery lists are written on backs of envelopes and junk mail fliers with enough white space.

I do the same thing.

I wonder if The Boy or The Grrl will inherit this wackness?

I was reminded of another childhood quirk when The Grrl and I played Monopoly last night. When I was her age, I hoarded the money that was distributed at the beginning of the game. I wouldn't buy a property until other people bought up quite a few. I was afraid I would run out of cash. The Grrl bought every property that she landed on until she was down to about $120.

I bought property on every roll until I got to the green ones. The ones before Park Place and the other hoity-toity address. She still had 2x what I had, but I had 3 utilities and made some nice $ when she landed on one.

Maybe she'll get the paper quirk, because she clearly didn't get the Monopoly chicken-shit quirk.

Best Take On The Inauguration

I love Maira Kalman. And she's back with her occasional works for the New York Times, here:
http://kalman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/the-inauguration-at-last/

In one of the frames, she illustrates the Lincoln Bible that Obama used for his swearing-in and references a woman near her who asks, "Why on the Bible? Why not on the Constitution?"

Maira says that it's a very good question.

The Boy posed the same question - well, the first half of it.

Now I have the answer.

One of the first books we bought for him after he was born was "Stay Up Late", which illustrates the Talking Heads song of the same name.

I like the re-connection of him to her.

What We're Leaving For Them

I come from a family of letter writers - mainly on my mom's side.

Even though my mom's first reaction to bloggers (based on the snippets I emailed her - she has limited web access) was that they were being self-absorbed, it occurred to me that blogs may, if they are archived/preserved through the future iterations of technology, be the primary documents that historians will examine to learn about these generations.

I went to college (1980) an hour away from my parents and we wrote letters to each other - phoning was used only in an emergency. My mom saved the letters and postcards that I wrote to them in college, and the letters and postcards from high school and college trips to Europe. She has given them back to me and I'm saving them for my kids and their kids.

I have the letters from my first serious boyfriend and from my second serious boyfriend (that would be "Mr. Savage"). They will be shared with The Boy and The Grrl when they start asking more questions about "the olden days" as they call them.

Eventually the archive will be implanted in the body - some sort of microchip with everything you need to know.

It's the iMe.

In the beginning, there were the eyebrows

My friend said I should start a blog.

I marinated on it.

My mom, when learning about what blogs were, wondered how people can be so self-centered to blather on about their lives. I decided that someone needed to write about her eyebrows.

Mrs. O's eyebrows. The ones straight out of a caricature on the walls of Sardi's and made me think of Snidley Whiplash's moustache.

But I've read that Mrs. O's Chicago-based make-up artist liked the high, fly-ball to the left field brows, but people had been talking....so they needed to come down a bit and she was working on that. Based on I-Day pictures, they are starting a downward trend...maybe.

I found this site today:
http://www.mrs-o.org/
It follows what and who Mrs. O is wearing. It might be fun.