Squid Pro Quo

private school liquid speed

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeey bitches,

Know what I'm thinking about?  We’re all addicts of some kind.  I sure as hell am.  I’m not referring to my boring half-assed career as a cigarette smoker.  I’m not referring to my borderline acceptable rate of consuming marijuana.  I’m not EVEN referring to the withdrawal effects of anti-depressants whose makers I believe conspire against us in a bunker dug deep into the earth’s layers.  I feel like I could willfully give up all of my vices but one: diet coke. 

Everyday I wake up with what feels like a mild hangover even though I’ve had no alcohol the night before.  My mouth is dry.  SO DRY.  All I can think about is crisp brown bubbles dancing on my tongue.  Don’t roll your eyes at me from up there on your tower handing out pity to those of us who are so weak at will.  We’re no different from the coffee addicts.  In fact, I DEMAND diet cokeheads be elevated to the status of coffee addicts.  You see!  I just gave another example of society’s prejudice.  Soda enthusiasts get grouped together with people who turn tricks for cocaine but any perky mom in a minivan can roll up late to soccer practice and blame it on her one and only vice- fat free mocha soy latte, and no one is alarmed.  Am I making sense? 

ANYWHO, I’ve had it up to here with you coffee people.  You’re not better than me.  Coffee doesn’t lightly fizz with poured in a tall glass of ice.  Coffee doesn’t give you that wicked sting in your throat when you drink it to fast.  You guys get to dash around town with green and white to-go cups in pastel colored trench coats and heels while I have to slink down to the Armenian grocery store at the bottom of the hill every day and purchase a liter JUG of diet coke and then IMMEDIATELY start pounding on the street corner in my pajama pants.  It’s not glamorous, people, and I’m not proud.  I feel like I have to be honest so you know the dark side of addiction.   It’s my version of Intervention for you.  (side note: did y’all catch the Intervention with the anorexic twins?  It’s messed up.)

My friend Meaghan’s boyfriend gave her a case of Mexican diet coke that comes in the glass bottles.  It tastes like what experiencing magic through a child’s eyes would taste like.  She rationed one out to me not too long ago.  We took great care to store them in the fridge until the proper crispiness was achieved.  We then gently sipped at them as if we were sampling a very rare port. 

I guess I will conclude in a plea to raise awareness.  Everyone knows someone who is “that diet coke person”.   Take some time to PONDER ON THAT.   I guess until diet coke comes up with some sexier packaging, we’ll have to live in shame. 

copy cat cooking- salmon and butternut squash

Edited to remove a picture of me blatantly smoking pot.  Prob too ballsy.

*****

So Darby and I could not be more on two different sides of the country.  Of the world even.  And despite the numerous differences in life choices we've made, I feel a definite homey connection to her and her sister's blogs because where they're coming from is so similar to where I came from it's eerie. 

When I read this recipe posted by Darb-a-tron my heart ached with homesickness.  This is something we would make in Nashville while the kids swam until the lightning bugs came out and the mothers drank white wine and fluttered about in linen and the fathers drank beers out of long neck bottles and snuck away one by one to smoke their cigarettes in secret.  Summer is far more tangible in the South.  It's all sunburned legs and mosquito bites.

So I decided to not either skip eating or ordering take out for one damn night and make it.  However, my style of doing this is just going to be a little different so while the recipe is almost the same you have to make the execution your own.  Here's what I did:

First you have to go to the F-ING GROCERY STORE.  If you're like me this sends a wave of absolute terror through your body.  The prospect of going to the grocery makes me want to get in the prone position and have a temper tantrum but I'm 25 now and that is simply not an option.

If you live outside of the South you are going to want to ask the 16 year old working at the grocery if they have Krazy Salt.  The conversation will go like this:

"Do you carry Krazy Salt?"

"Crazy Salt?"

"It's a seasoning blend...with salt"

"Crazy Salt?"

"With a K"

presents Emeril seasoning blend product

"no.  This isn't Krazy"

"crazy?"

"with a K.  It's salt."

"Well we don't have that but this should be similar"

Then when you get home you realize you spent FIVE FREAKING DOLLARS on a product that ISN'T KRAZY and then you notice the label:

I almost fainted when I saw the words "salt free".  Must write strongly worded letter to grocer.  No time for that now.  Gotta make squash.  First you'll need some cheap wine (bonus points for screw top) and an anti-depressant:

Cut a butternut squash in half and scoop out the seeds:

Then I took this picture and sent it to my big gay roommate with the words "what does this remind you of! TEE HEE"

It's the only mature thing to do.

Next you place them gooey side down in a baking pan with half an inch of agua.  Oven to 350 degrees and slam those puppies in there for 45 minutes.

When you pull them out they MIGHT deflate a little making a little farting noise that startles you.  DON'T FREAK OUT. 

While that shit is cooking you should make your fish marinade like SO:

2 parts olive oil
1 part lemon juice
1/2 tsp minced garlic
a dash of pepper
BLEND, BABY, BLEND!

About 20 minutes before the squash is done, start the rice:

I used brown and wild rice in the rice cooker.  If you don't have a rice cooker you are dead to me.  It's the most important appliance EVAR.

Now you're gonna wanna get the salmon ready.  Did I mention there was salmon involved in this?  You'll need that.  If the cashier accidentally rings you up for one fillet instead of two, look sweetly innocent and say nothing.

now season your fish liberally with your fake non-salt salt blend and slop your marinade onto your fish and wrap into an aluminum foil pouch

Darby used fresh dill from her garden but when I approached the herb section of my grocery I realized I couldn't pick dill out of a line-up of other greens and became ashamed and bought organic rosemary (turned out delish)  If you're me you'll want to give your grocery employee a brief lecture on how you should have pictures of each vegetable and herb like whole foods to avoid shaming the customers.  I don't think he spoke english. 

I don't have an outside grill so I heated the oven to 400 after the squash was done and tossed my foil pouches in for 10 minutes flipping at five minutes.

While that is happening use those 10 minutes to smear butter and brown sugar all over your cooked butternut squash

When your fish and rice are ready its PARTY TIME.  Enjoy with your best friend and some delicious wine:

I must give credit where credit is due.  I repeat: this is not my recipe.  I completely prepared this meal as inspired by Darby, who makes me want to be a better human being.

It wasn't the perfect way but it was the San Francisco way.  And it was delicious.

a few days in photos

Since I am now the High Priestess of Liberty of London, I've been walking the walk.  I whipped out Bernina for a mini-project.  I know it's pretty uncreative to name your Bernina sewing machine "Bernina" but I feel like it's the perfect blend of femininity and domesticity for a sewing machine.  Like Mamie.  Is that racist?  DO YOU SEE WHAT THE LIBERALS HAVE DONE TO ME?!  Can't stop worrying about being racist.

I digress.  I used a scrap of my red paisley Liberty to make a man's bow tie:

  Naturally you have to be a certain caliber of man to pull off something this bitchin'.  Clearly Brandon will sass your face CLEAN OFF in his dapper new tie: 

Then I snapped a few off here and there:

Iran is not the only society with problems:

 

lib of lo update

I'm in the process of listing tons of new Liberty of London fabric.  I've also set up a new blog to mirror the happenings at The Top Drawer there isn't much content there as of yet, but my mom is writing and drawing some tutorials for me to post.  She comes with over 40 years of technique and experience so it should be fun.  No one can just whip something up like that woman. 

Also, I want to spare the non-crafty people who read this blog from the girly stuff.  You're welcome.

Anyways, I'm so happy spending my days raking in the benefits of Funemployment (thanks state of California!) and wallowing in Liberty of London fabric.  It's soothing, nothing is euthanized, and no humorless doctors made me feel like an asshole so...WIN!

Go go go see the new fabric!  I've searched the ENTIRE internet and discovered that no one has a stash of LoL that can even come close to what I have happening in here.  Very rare hard-to-find stuff, people.

two geniuses discuss politics over gchat

me:  god damn north koreans

Brandon:  we're all going to DIE

especially us, as SF is way closer to N. Korea and easily accessible to missiles

we need to flee to Nashville NOW

me:  OH NO!  BAD KIM JONG-IL

NO KIM JONG-IL!!!

 

Brandon:  What a BAD Great Saint Who Rules with Extensive Magnanimity!

 

me:  hahahaha

too bad he looks like such a vagina

it doesnt help the cult of personality

 
Brandon:  oooooh great leader we woooorship youuuuu

 me:  you make sun and moooon in the sky

fact

Someone (and I'm not going to say who) has been spotted with fleas.

dresses!

Greetings my Breeder Readers!

This is a quick message for those of you with children, nieces, god children, etc.  As for the rest of you bitches- Take a five.  Smoke 'em if you got 'em. 

The first round of ready to wear dresses are up at The Top Drawer!  Here is a taste:

Becca Dress (back)


 

Meaghan Two-Piece with hand embroidered pockets



Madeleine Dress



Leslie Dress



Charlotte Dress



Alice Dress



Eva Dress

And because boys do exist:

Brandon Shorts

More fabric (Liberty of London and more) and notions coming this week.

Go check it out! The Top Drawer

father's day

I could write something sappy for Father’s Day.  I could write something so beautiful it would make the angels weep fucking diamonds down from the heavens.  I’m sure you’ve already read a dozen or so Father’s Day posts like that in the blag-o-tron so I’ll try something different.

I love stories that get told so many times you forget that you weren’t even born yet when it happened.  In a way, because they happened to your parents, they happened to you to.  I’m not unrealistic.  I was a late in life oops baby and my older children will probably not be able to know their grandparents, but I’ve spent my entire life absorbing their stories to share with the next generation.  We really are a collection of anecdotes and their transmission is the great familial art.  I’d rather have my parents life stories than their genes.  Amazingly I got both.  Often the tales are seemingly minor, but you remember them because at some point something about it made you giggle or cry or see your parents as humans with lives and not just those idiots who do things for me.  

Not to name names but my Dad attended a beautiful Episcopalian university on top of a mountain in Tennessee.  He transferred in from Clairmont-McKenna when he realized all of his high school buddies from Nashville were up there drinking and playing golf all day while he was studying his ass off.  Like all small rural college towns, alcohol is the lifeblood of the campus.  Well my Dad could not be prouder of his time spend on the mountain.  Oh he never graduated from there, of course.  He enlisted to serve his country in Vietnam but ended up not being cut out for such a task and was stationed randomly in Italy where he developed an amphetamine addiction courtesy of the United States Navy who were providing them to stay awake.  That is neither here nor there.  After his Italian rave days, he grew up, married my mom, and finished at Vanderbilt. 

The mountain stories are by far my favorites.  He relishes talking about local legend Abbott Cotton Martin, professor of English and endlessly brilliant Shakespeare expert.  He was one of those eccentric genius types, and certainly didn’t take any shit.  My dad begged him before class one day to not fail him.  How my dad ended up in a Shakespeare course I’ll never know.  In response,  “Abbo”, as he was known, stood up on his desk and declared in front of the class, “KING!!!!  I MUST FAIL YOU!  JUSTICE DEMANDS IT!” I like to work the phrase, "Justice demands it" into my everyday life.  For example:

"May I ask why you are returning your purchase?"

"Justice demands it!"

I love this story.  I thought this punch line was immeasurably hilarious when I was little.  I was a grade grubbing little bitch that cried over B’s and this story allowed me to realize that even someone perfect, like Dad was to me, can fail something and the world wouldn’t explode or collapse on itself or the grade police wouldn’t pick me up and put toothpicks under my fingernails for not making a 100 on my multiplication tables, which I was certain would happen by the way I stressed myself out.  Not only that but failing can be funny.  Is that not the exact theme of my past year? 

Even though I’ve been in and out of the dreamless sleep of depression recently, I look forward to the day when I can tell a son or daughter, “your mother got fired from UCSF for having a dirty bitch mouth she can’t control,” and then we’ll cackle wildly because it all turned out okay in the end because it was just one small step  on the road to having each other.

Dad will never read this, but he knows I adore him madly.  I hope every woman who didn’t celebrate yesterday for whatever reason meets a man that rectifies that reason for your next generation.

lib of lo

Crafty Bitches,

It has recently come to my attention that my mother has neither the time nor the willingness to sell all of the massive amount of extra clothes, fabric, notions, antique lace, etc. that has been stock-piled like between the three women of my family like some swilly bourgeois crafty Waco. 

I've taken it upon myself to pop this stuff up on etsy because I'm kidding myself if I think I'm going to ever use even a fraction of this gorgeous, impossibly soft fabric. 

Now a while back I was in the process of giving away some of my extra Liberty of London fabric.  After a computer crash and a move I lost both the fabric and the names and addresses of the people I was supposed to send it to.  Apologies all around.  I have since located the fabric and some of it is included in the listings to fill out the store.  If you are one of the people who won fabric, please email me.  I am not going to make you buy it if you still want it. 

In the next week my etsy store will be exploding with the cutest ready to wear items for children ages 0-6.  I'm also going to be receiving tons more fabric patterns from the mother ship in Tennessee. 

For those of you who aren't familiar, Liberty is a line of timeless printed fabrics sold from a glorious department store in London (if you've never been you must go your next trip)  About 80% of the fabrics I have listed have been discontinued and are basically impossible to find.  Even if you don't have any mini-monsters the prints are ideal for purses, pillow cases, skirts, jacket lining, quilting, everything!  Here's a taste:

The Strawberry Thief- Designed by William Morris in 1883, this blue color is no longer available ANYWHERE.  I've looked.

Pink Chinese Lanterns

Red Paisley

Black Floral

Red and Blue floral

 

Barnham Print

Once I get my act together, I want to give discounts on future purchases for anyone who takes pictures of their creations/children in my clothes.  I'm looking at you, Darb-a-larb-a-ding dong.  Go check out the fabric!  Check back soon for ready to wear!  Tell your friends!  Or Don't!  What am I supposed to say?  I love you guys like the bitch daughters who never call that I don't have.

My etsy shop:  The Top Drawer

reader mail

A little while ago I received the following email:

I'm wondering your use on your blog of the phrase "middle aged mongoloid from Memphis".  I heard that in a 1950's movie I recently watched ("the Bad Seed"), and having a sister with Down's Syndrome and having spend my whole life doing volunteer work for the developmentally disabled, I was mortified to hear such a phrase in a movie.  I understand that things were different in the '50's for many things, but the phrase still amazed me.  I googled it to see where it might of came from and your blog was one of three references to it.  I understand the "mongoloid" part, as Down's Syndrome people used to be referred to as mongoloids because some doctors felt they looked like Mongolians, which is beyond stupid.  I guessing at the "middle age" part, thinking that the life expantacy of people with Down's Syndrome was thought to be late 20's, ergo a middle aged mongoloid I guess would be thought even "dumber".  This life expentancy was later proven to be the result of institutionalzation, rather than having Down's Syndrome (so sad).  The Memphis part throws me completely.  Since it's used in your blog, do you have any insight on the origins of such a demeeaning and hateful phrase?

Oh there are so many things I need to respond to here.  A retort!  Let me break this down for you:

First of all, you didn't just watch some "1950's movie".  You watched The Bad Seed, the 1956 masterpiece that I've seen at least 25 times.  This delectable gem of glorious cinema features one of my top five female villians and arguably my favorite child villain. (Erika, I hear you're expecting a girl...you should check this out)  That was one bad baby bitch. Please respect the twisted films that played an enormous part in forming the demented woman you see before you.

I did use the phrase "well I'll be a middle-aged mongoloid from memphis!" and I did get it from the movie.

Other than being a prime example of alliteration, I know nothing about the phrase or its origins. 

While I'm sympathetic to your family situation.  You should be commended for your work with Down Syndrome patients and for your commitment to their defense.  I think maybe its your proximity clouding your judgment but I suggest taking one giant step back and analyze what you're saying. 

 In anthropology there are three types of skulls used to categorize the three "great races" of humans: mongoloid, caucasiod, and negroid.  These three broad categories explain the proto-populations of human evolution.  The words "negroid" and "mongoloid" might make you wince as they sound harsh but that is a result of human history.  The word negroid isn't offensive because black people have demonstrated different anthropological differences than those from european or east asian descent, it's offensive because a bunch of a-holes made if offensive through their use of it.

Now I can only imagine back in the day when the great minds of medicine were trying to come up with an explanation for the cases of trisomy 21 they saw.  Is it not true that without anything else to go on, it isn't completely insane to notice the features of Downs Syndrome babies are somewhat similar to asian-like features?  How else would you expect someone to articulate the appearance of Downs with nothing to go on?  Oh and by the way, Mongolia is a real country, by the way.  It's not like comparing Downs patients with mythical beasts.  It's right here:

So what you're saying is by comparing sufferer's of Downs Syndrome to Mongolians is not only "beyond stupid" (awful choice of words, by the way) but hateful and demeaning?  Now I respect your plight or whathaveyou, but I'm going to go out on a limb to say that the comparison of disabled individuals to Mongolians of average intelligence and genetics is more offensive to the Mongolians.  I do realize that the offense of a word is all in the intent.  I could call you a picnic basket, but if I want you to know I don't like you I'll say it in a way that is like, "YOU'RE A GOD DAMN PICNIC BASKET AND YOU'VE SECURED YOUR PLACE IN HELL" 

Now as for the last part of your ramble, let me just throw something down and see if you pick it up:  This song ain't about you.  The fact that you can't make sense of the phrase is because it doesn't make any.  The line was obviously not meant to be about either Downs Syndrome or Mongolians.  It is just a funny thing to say and was used in the same way one would say, "aww shucks! or "well I'll be a monkey's uncle"  You are not LITERALLY saying that your brother had a monkey child and you are the uncle.  If I were saying that I don't think it would be necessarily offensive to either monkeys or uncles.  I enjoy both.  In fact my uncle IS a monkey after about five Christmas eve gin and tonnies.

Finally,  can't we all just lighten up a little bit?  After Sarah Palin going ape bananas on David Letterman I think we all need to just take a huge step back and stop assuming everyone is a pedophile, a racist, a homophobe, or prejudice against the handicapped.  If not, I'll REALLY give you something to be offended about, bitches