The admin in the English Department thinks I am too hard on my students, I can tell by the look on her face. I posted a note on mailbox that it is “Closed for portfolio submissions.” This implies, of course, that I haven’t received all of them, and that some of the students (the ones…
Category: The Details
In which the smallest particles bring meaning to the universe.
Making Snickerdoodles
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We volunteered to make snacks for our friend’s free concert and I enlisted the very enthusiastic help of three eager assistants. I love to bake– pretty much in inverse proportion to how much I do not like cooking. I think it has something to do with the outcome. I see food on the table as…
Bye-Bye Fit!
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Or, The Saddest Day Thus Far Colin just drove away with our Honda Fit. Honestly, I had NO idea how attached I’d gotten to that car. I truly felt like crying. It was cute, and peppy, with five on the floor, and the most no-frills, no-nonsense style of any car I’d ever met. Yes, it…
Stories Told
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Why I Love The Moth When I was about seven or eight years old, I got fixated on the idea of creating a neighborhood newspaper. I would gather stories, write them, publish them using my parent’s typewriter, and deliver them to my neighbors’ mailboxes. So I did. I went around interviewing my family, and Mr.…
Taking Care of Scraped Knees
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Or, The Case of My Dad and Neosporin I’d like to say, for the record, that I always thought it was weird that Neosporin had the word “spore” in the middle of it. That might have been, partly, why I always liked it. I also know that I liked it because my Dad was totally…
Garrison Keillor’s Voice
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“You can’t imagine how much a dead man weighs.” – What the grandfather of Gabriel Garcia Marquez often told him. Quoted from “A Writer’s Almanac”, March 6, 2009. I’ve gotten quite taken with the sound of Garrison Keillor’s voice on my Honda Fit speakers. His Lake Wobegone days are too sentimental for me most of…
It’s No Secret…
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… that Colin and I are NOT YET with children. I mean, you can look everywhere around our house for kids and all you will find is one very strange cat who will not, for any reason, allow you to pick her up. The curious thing about being married in the suburbs in Connecticut and…
Spring, in Wings
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By this time of year in London, I’d be stir crazy and ready for the end of winter’s short grey days. One big difference between Connecticut and London, in winter most especially, is LATITUDE. Stratford is on the 41 degree parallel and London is at 51 degrees. In terms of quantity of sunlight, that makes…
Host Hugh Jackman Wins Me Over
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…And Other Highlights of Oscars 2009 The reviews of those “dastardly-long” and “always self-serving” Academy Awards shows are here, and as usual the preeminently cranky Alessandra Stanley from the New York Times managed to pass on the her “kind of fun” review. Sigh… I continue to wonder why someone with no joie de vivre is…
A Glutton for Facebook-ishment
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In the latest round of Facebook madness, I am starting to come to terms with my own problem with these waves of social networking sites. I’m investing quite a bit of time there and I am wondering if that time might be better invested typing on the Royal Futura and riding my bike. Background: I…
But No One Got Me a Snuggie
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My 39th Birthday, Condensed As most of you know by now, I LOVE birthday month. I am having a great birthday this year. Here are some of the highlights! My parents called me at 6 a.m. and sang “happy birthday” in unison. They also (I am sure this wasn’t planned) both said “Happy birthday dear…
Planning Oscar
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Well, it is that time of year again. The Nominations are out and I have, as of this moment, 23 days to get two big things done. 1. Come up with a quirky theme/invite for the annual Oscar party. 2. See about 9,000 films in an effort to, this year, FINALLY, win my own ballot…
Why We Gave Up
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So Colin and I were going to do The Master Cleanse. Which is a great way to lose weight, but not the reason why one should do it. It’s a cleanse, after all, designed for clearing out toxins and getting you healthy. Day one was yesterday and as mentioned in yesterday’s post “Hungryland”, I spent…
Three Questions for the New Year: Part One
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I am curious about a few things, most especially considering the monumentally bizarre and historical year that we have just left behind us. So in the quest for deeper conversation, more direct and useful contact with my brilliant readers (that’s you!), and topics of future rants, I have Three Questions for the New Year that…
When Friends Disappear
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Or, the Christmas Card That Ate My Friends It’s that time of year again– the time when I start fuming about Christmas cards. I love sending Christmas cards. Sure it’s time-consuming and tedious, but there is just something about putting together a good card with some fun photos and remembering your friends and family at…






