kdiddy.org

Obviously, I’m very happy that the Patriots loss. Do not like that team at all. As we watched the last minute or so, I said that the only way this victory could be sweeter is if it was the Steelers doing the defeating. Then the husband said that the Steelers could never beat the Patriots in a Super Bowl and I said that that wasn’t the point, it would still be sweeter, and he said that I had no point because it’s not possible and then I stabbed him in the neck. At least he’s quiet now.

What I thought was the most telling moment was when Bill Bellichick walked off of the field before the game was technically over. Real coaches go down with their ship, Billy. To the bitter end. Punks walk off with their heads down.

And it was pretty cool to see Plaxico Burress getting a big win. I like that guy, even if things didn’t work out with him when he was here.

ANYWAY, the other big victory tonight were these:

Green tea cupcakes with pomegranate frosting. Motherfuckers.

Hmm, I’m not sure why her frosting is off-white and ours is rosy pink, but whatever. It tastes good as hell. Bolt found that recipe the other day and today I declared that we had to make them. Bolt had the unfortunate task of procuring matcha powder. Obviously, she could have found it in an Asian market in the Strip but we had no idea what the hours were for those, so Bolt battled crowds and less-than-knowledgeable staff at Giant Eagle and Whole Foods, before recruiting the help of a friend at Starbucks.

One note about those. The recipe is for mini cupcakes and we made full size ones. The 12-minute baking time in the recipe isn’t enough, but I can tell you that 17 minutes is entirely too long. I think about 14 was the right amount of time for these. Go forth. Bake.

It’s mad frozen here.

The baby has a two-hour delay and when we walked outside this morning to take me to school, the husband gave a hearty, “Aw, hell naw.” So, we’re chilling in the house for a little bit. I am out of coffee. Go ahead and ask me how excited I am about that.

I’m not real sure when the school bus is supposed to get here. When there was a delay on Wednesday, the bus came at 9:30, but who knows because the driver’s kinda…I don’t know. I think he wants to fight me. Which is fine. We can throw down whenever, dude.

Anyway, check out my kid doing his breathing treatment.

Cute, no? Thankfully, the cough and congestion and the runny nose finally seem to be going away. As an added bonus, the prednisone gave him an actual appetite. He’s eating like a normal human being now and not like…Amy Winehouse.

Aside from my culinary misadventures on Friday evening, about 6,000 other ridiculous things happened in those 24+ hours.

In the morning

The husband and I set out toward work/school and soon discovered that there was massive traffic jams on Pioneer and West Liberty due to a fire in the Fort Pitt tunnels. Our alternate route was also clogged with traffic and we sat in the same spot for about 45 minutes. The driver of the car in front of us had left his keys on his back bumper, so we alerted him to that, and I spotted a yinzer with a really fantastic handlebar mustache. When the traffic finally let up, we saw that a car had rammed into a school bus and the car behind that one swerved to avoid the wreck and ran into a guardrail. I got to my lab class 30 minutes late and sat down at a computer to discover that some jackass had switched all of the keys around on the keyboard. I discovered something interesting about myself: I know the QWERTY row and the home row, but that bottom row is all murky for me.

After dinner

We took the baby to the mother-in-law’s house so he could hang out there because the husband was playing records at a club downtown as part of a gallery crawl. My sister-in-law and I apparently become violent once we cross the threshold into downtown, because our plans for future visits to the cultural district involved machine guns. Just sayin’.

The husband started playing records and was in some kind of mood. Artsy types in Pittsburgh don’t do much dancing, but prefer standing around, sipping $13 “martinis,” and arguing.

Jwan was there, smelling his heavenly beer.

The sister-in-law and I made our way to the bar and made friends with this fabulous boy tending the bar who poured with a heavy hand. While waiting for my drink, a guy leaned over to me, jerked his thumb toward the husband and slurred, “What do you think of this DJ?” Bolt guffawed and walked away and I said, “Oh, I think he’s awesome.” If I were quicker on my feet I would have said something clever like, “I think I’m going to sleep with him tonight,” or “I think I want to have his baby!” I asked the guy what he thought and he replied, “I have my doubts.” Fair enough. I grabbed my drink and spent the majority of the evening bobbing my head and talking to various people that I haven’t seen in a couple of years.

I commented that the worm at the end of the event’s logo kind of looked like an “nj” and snotted that we weren’t in New Jersey.

I had four of these. One could argue that this picture was taken from my perspective at this point, in which my head was resting on the bar. You’d be half-wrong.

I went to the bathroom as things were winding down and was in a stall next to a girl who was working at the event, who couldn’t have been more than 19 years old. I realized that I didn’t have any toilet paper, so I reached my hand underneath the stall divider and said, “Hey, could you spare a square?” A moment of startled silence followed before she finally replied, “Uh, I’m sorry. I don’t do drugs.”

I nearly died laughing and explained that I needed toilet paper. When we exited the stalls, I asked her if she ever watched much Seinfeld…you know, when she was a baby. She hadn’t but we parted on good terms. After washing my hands, I looked to my left and discovered a drink that someone had abandoned on the sink. Score!

I sauntered out to the main area and found Bolt. “Look! I found a drink!”

“Awesome! I found a Blackberry! Someone left it here. It’s mine now!” Awesome! Bolt, undeterred that the Blackberry was password-protected, stuffed it in her purse (Edit: we returned the Blackberry to the bar the next day) and we split the drink, rationalizing that if it had rufies in it, we were with the husband so we should be cool.

On our way home, we realized that there was an important stop that we needed to make:

The O has hoagies.

The O has Runts.

But that’s about it for candy.

We feasted on fries at home and I passed out on the couch. I woke up in bed the next “morning” (read: 12:30 p.m.) and wondered why I was so sweaty and why my chest felt so constricted. I don’t remember much about actually going to bed, but I managed to remove my bra. But instead of removing the shelf-lined camisole I was wearing, I just put another one on top of it.

Dang. Belly is full. I made Apricot-Stuffed Pork for dinner. One fatal flaw of this recipe as it is: roasting the potatoes and brussels sprouts for 15 minutes before plopping the pork in the middle for 30 minutes results in burnt potatoes and brussels sprouts. At least that was my experience. I also tend to blame my culinary fuck-ups on my electric oven/stove.

I also need to clean my oven. Dig if you will, the picture of me frantically flapping my oven mitt at the billow of smoke while trying to get the fucking ceiling fan on and shouting, “Everything’s fine! Really!”

I rock at all things domestic.

This is what I saw when I woke up this morning:

Know what that is? Here’s a closer look:

Yes. Yes, indeed. I’m at the beach with some dudes. Let me tell you, being able to hear the ocean as you fall asleep is definitely how life should be.

The kids are playing Godzilla: Unleashed on the Wii and that is several kinds of awesome.

Hearing them develop their little trash talkin’ tactics is simultaneously adorable and annoying, since it still involves a healthy dose of whining.

Everyone else is like:

Of course, I have a headache because I wore my glasses most of this morning and I bent the shit out of them the other day. After I took them off I got all dizzy from being too used to the crookedness. They are 9 years old. I should maybe consider investing in some new spectacles before I go completely blind.

I just remembered that I had promised a picture of the totally rad garage door that was across the street from the church in Akron where we attended a wedding. Check it:

Nice, huh? In my opinion there aren’t nearly enough garage door murals in the world. I’m going to commission an artist to paint these pictures on our garage doors (that we don’t ever use): (more…)

Our neighborhood had a Halloween parade on Saturday. A bunch of kids came out in their costumes and paraded down the main drag, cheered on by parents, grandparents, shopkeepers, and whatever patrons managed to stumble out of the bars. The baby is going as Godzilla this year, but we couldn’t find a Godzilla specific costume and I am not yet up to the job of constructing costumes, so we borrowed a dinosaur costume from my mom’s friend. It serves the purpose, kinda, but the baby was increasingly irritated with people assuming that he was some chump dinosaur. “I’m GODZILLA!” he would whine. Duh. Trampled Tokyo multiple times…ring any bells?

The baby actually once told me that Godzilla protects humanity from the tyranny of all monsters. Those were the words he used. Who is he?

Anyway, the parade was alright. I took a few pictures of the baby but mostly spent my time snapping shots of the boulevard, which is a good way to see how…odd the neighborhood is. It’s equal parts old world Pittsburgh and honestly-we-don’t-give-a-shit.

For instance:

There’s a drive-thru beer distributor. This is not unique to us, of course, but I think any place that has establishments that combine two things that aren’t supposed to go together (ie, drinking and driving) has a certain je ne sais quoi.

There were some miscreants about. These kids watched the parade with a certain amount of wistfulness in their eyes. I could tell they really wanted to still take part in all of the pageantry, but felt that they were too old now.

Or maybe they were just high.

Firehouse. Mediterranean grocery store containing the bomb pita, hummus, tabouleh, and grape leaves.

Luke Ravenstahl, Mayor of Pittsburgh, looking very…mayoral. I emailed this pic to the mayor’s office but have not yet heard back from Luke saying, “OMG thanks! I’m making it my default pic on MySpace right now.”

Me and Godzilla, who looks pretty gentle. Also, there is not a cheerleader growing out of his head, even though it looks that way. And, yes, I’m wearing a Sean John hoodie. My dad gave all three of us hoodies last year for Christmas and they were all brands that he had seen on drug dealers on The Wire. My dad’s weird. But that hoodie is huge and warm and I love it.

Anyway, speaking of Halloween, I’ve posted a very useful scary movie guide on MamaPop which you should peruse at your earliest convenience. To sum it up for you: Suspiria owns.

Maybe the lack of wholesome cinema in my diet can explain my attitude as of late, which is rather poor. I’ve definitely hit a slump and am viewing all of my duties with contempt. I did not do the readings for any of my classes over the weekend, I did not do laundry, I did not scrub poopy toilets (can’t imagine why not, I’ve been looking forward to it so), and am cranky at work. This morning, I realized, to my great annoyance, that I still needed to pack a lunch for the baby. As I told Angela, I have a very, “You need fed AGAIN? I just fed you yesterday!” approach to parenting at the moment and all this needs to stop because I need to make a living, get my master’s and keep my kid alive. God, adulthood is such a drag.

I guess I need to watch some Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood or something.

Yes, it’s been a minute since I posted last. I’ve been busy and I feel like I say that waaaaaay too much. But, tis the truth.

The dudes* and I made our annual jaunt to Trax Farms on Sunday. It was a gorgeous day, though a little too warm and while we had the brilliant idea to go on that particular Sunday since the Steelers game didn’t start til 8, so did everyone else in the tri-county area.

I ran into a PhD student from my department there. We managed to chat for a full five minutes while we stood in line for the ladies’ room. During that time the dudes were in and out of the mens’ room and already standing outside getting irritated with me about the fact that women are built in such a way that it takes longer to go to the bathroom and that’s all my fault.

Anyway, I ran into the PhD student right after we had left the petting zoo and I had a fine coating of goat slobber all over me.

Yesterday I talked to her for a few minutes and she told me that two suburban moms got into it later in the afternoon. Something about a place in line. The velour sweatsuits were on fire and phrases like, “Bring it on, bitch!” ricocheted off the SUVs. The police showed up. I’m so bummed we missed it. Even though I’m pretty sure I fall squarely into the “city folk” category, I’m still so amused when urban and suburban people take a trip to the country and forget how to act. We think we’re so civilized and sophisticated compared to people in rural areas, but we’re so not.

Anyway, there are some pictures after ye olde jumpe…

(more…)

My weekend kind of failed. I had grand plans to do all of my homework and reading for the week since I am way behind, do all of the laundry, go grocery shopping, watch the Steelers game, and eat some yummy dinner.

None of that happened. We went out on Friday. Our friends Curt and Amanda are moving to Atlanta on Wednesday and were having a going away party at Remedy in Lawrenceville. I had a good time. I got some drinking done and then a big group of us went to Eat n Park for late night noshing with plastic cups and no silverware. It was awesome. I felt…well, probably like how normal 28-year-olds feel.

My mom came over on Saturday. She and I are not really getting along at the moment and I was in a bad mood because I got a letter from our insurance company stating that since someone jimmied my front window open while I asleep and took a bunch of my shit, my premium is going up. Thanks, dudes! My mom wanted to, like, do stuff besides lie on the couch and nap, so that took up most of Saturday. I did get a big chunk of reading done, though.

But see, Sunday…the baby woke up kind of early and did his usual nagging to get me out of bed before 8 a.m. I don’t know. That kid must really like hearing the words, “Hell,” and “No.” Everything was normal. When I finally came downstairs, I gave him some cereal. He ate a few bites and then curled up on the couch. I asked him what was wrong and he said he wasn’t feeling good…and then all hell broke loose, intestinally speaking. There was puke. There was watery poop. There was even a nosebleed in the midst of all of that. He took a long nap while I washed soiled underwear and tried not to gag. He felt better when he woke up, like it never happened. I don’t understand how kids do that. When I throw up I’m out of commission for the rest of the day. But I’m also a pussy.

I started making some dinner and then worked on an essay when the Steelers came on. The husband spent the next three hours screaming at the TV while I typed away and checked the turkey, which was not cooking. See, I had a frozen turkey breast and didn’t defrost it and oh, I’m an idiot. I did some supplementary cooking of that, so we have dinner for tonight already, but last night we feasted on leftover mashed potatoes, ramen, and pita.

I never did get around to the laundry, really. I washed and dried two loads but they’re sitting in a pile in the laundry room, wrinkling away. We have some food, but I’m really low on WW-friendly stuff.

Ugh. Too much. I’m really hating myself for taking this particular combination of courses. The work load is insane. I keep thinking maybe I should drop one, but I would probably just be prolonging some future hellish fall semester. I’m so cranky nowadays, though.

But the weekend wasn’t total shite. Besides Friday’s tomfoolery, some nice pictures were taken. I snapped this one on Friday night:

Every now and then, I let the baby use the digital camera. He normally takes pictures like this:

You know…still lifes with Godzilla, toilet paper, and remote controls. But on Saturday he managed to snap this very nice picture of our cat:

Bonus: fingerprint dusting from CSI. I guess I should wipe that off. But maybe I’ll leave it so I can point to it and go, “That’s right, bitch,” and impress guests. Isn’t that a nice picture, though? I want to get him a camera for his birthday or xmas. I could get him one of those Fisher-Price joints, but it would be nice if he could make little movies with it, too. Like he told Jamie, “I’ve started making my own Godzilla movies.” You know, branching out from astute observer to director.

Oh, that reminds me. In recounting some of the details of the break-in to a friend, the baby lamented the theft of his piggy bank, sighed, and very seriously said, “Now I ain’t got no cash.”