Christmas in July

In exactly five months it will be Christmas. And, while the sweltering heat doesn't bring me any closer to imagining this day, I do have one thing one my mind as I reflect on this time of year. Yep, you guessed it - cookies!

Don't get me wrong, I love Christmas. I love the food, the family, the decorations, the tree and the rituals. What doesn't excite me as much now as it did when I was younger is the gift giving part. I enjoy the giving much more now than the getting -- carefully choosing a thoughtful (yet moderately thrifty) gift. I come from a big family, so shopping for 9+ people just in the immediate family can be quite the chore.  I am not going to think about that today though -- that's still a good four months away.

I want to get back to what I am been dreaming about all day --- cookies. This year the hubs and I will be entertaining the in-laws. This is exciting in the fact that for the first year ever we get to buy a Christmas tree. For other reasons, this will also be a very new and exciting holiday season for us. More on that to come at a later date. Since we'll be hosts for a few weeks, we are going to have to do more than just decorate a Christmas tree and make coffee filter snowflakes. And, baking is the perfect way to fill the time.

The in-laws are from Spain, so I have been thinking about the most traditional Christmas cookies to make. I am open for suggestions (so please leave me some love), but here is my short list of "must-have" sweets:

• Ginger snaps
• Festive sugar cookies with colorful icing
• Pizzelles
• Gingerbread House
• Fudge
• Cocoa cookies with peppermint

Quick, Filling Meal - Bring on the Pasta

Pasta is my oasis. Don't know what to cook - make a pasta. Extreme hunger - make a pasta. Have leftover vegetables and half-used tomato sauces in fridge - make a pasta. Don't know how to cook - make a pasta!

Maybe pasta won me over by growing up in a large family. The easiest (and in some cases, most nutritious) meal my mom could prepare for five hungry mouths was pasta. And, she was good at it. My mouth still waters when I think of her homemade spaghetti, fettuccine and mostacholli. I now realize that some of our pasta consumption probably stemmed from the fact that it is also a very affordable meal to make. If you omit the meat - which I find to be a real shame - it's even more affordable.

Over the years, my tastes have evolved. I have stepped away from a majority menu listing of pasta. This was for a few reasons: (1) I started get sick of it, (2) My waistline told me to stop and (3) I wanted to be more adventurous and healthy with my food choices. All that said, at the end of the day if I don't know what to make (or if I am craving something) it is usually pasta. Must be the Italian in me. :)

One of the best recent discoveries I've stumbled upon has revamped my pasta repertoire. A few months back my brother rocked our world with what he's loving coined "White Trash Risotto." And, what is this? Well, it's a risotto made with pasta. It's the blue collar man's risotto. Fear not, there will be photos, recipes and conversation to be had on this topic. If you can't wait that long (and trust me, I don't know that I could), you basically prepare a risotto dish using orzo pasta instead of the risotto.)

Anyway, before I digress too much on pasta types, I want to go back to the growing up in a large family bit. Being part of a big family could often present problems at the dinner table. Lucky for us (mostly for my parents) none of us were very  picky eaters. While there were certainly times when it would be hard for all of us kids to agree on a dish, there was one pasta dish my mom was constantly asked to prepare: pizza hot dish. This meal made it's way to our dinner table at least once every couple of weeks. (Sometimes, it was every week). It was always requested by a different kid and since we all loved it, there weren't any complaints from the chef.

A pizza hot dish? First off, if you're not from the Midwest you may be wondering what the hell a hot dish is. Well, it is exactly that -- it's a hot dish. A dish that you prepare and then put in the oven to bake. The dish comes out hot. Get it - hot dish? Other popular hot dishes include ones using tater tots (of which we rarely had, le sigh) or vegetables. In my opinion, pizza hot dish is the best of them. It's essentially baked spaghetti, only it has a lot more cheese. And, growing up in the Dairy State, cheese was always on the table.

Oh, pasta.... Can you guess what I'll be eating for dinner?

The recipe for the famous "pizza hot dish":

• Brown ground beef
• Onion, diced
• Garlic (2-3 cloves)brown these all.  Some people add bacon to his for a bit of flavor. 
• 1 jar of tomato sauce (homemade is best)
• Noodles

Brown the first three ingredients. Add bacon for additional flavor, if desired. Boil noodles. Mix all ingredients. Add parmesan cheese. Heat the oven and cover dish with mozzarella cheese. Bake for 30 minutes.

Revenge Hot Dish.

I was a finicky eater when I was little. I had this “thing” about meat, and that thing was that it made me literally sick to my stomach to look at it. Aversion to meat and poultry was a tiny bit problematic because we lived on a farm. Beef, chicken, and venison were “free”, you see, and my parents were young parents living on a shoe string budget. Unforch for me, just because their eldest daughter didn’t like the look, smell, or taste of animal flesh didn’t mean we didn’t eat it often.

 Even when I was around 5 or 6, I remember being bothered that my parents insisted I eat meat. My dad, a hunter and fisher type, especially seemed aggressive in his demands I “eat what’s on my plate”. I wondered why they seemed to enjoy torturing me by forcing me to eat things I didn’t like. I mean, really, what had I ever done to them? I mean aside from the time I tried to flush an entire hamburger down the toilet…and the time I vomited liver back onto my plate. Besides that, what?

 I distinctly remember the one occasion when dad made me “try” liver. It was indeed scene from the Dinner of Revenge. However, instead of being left at the table long after everyone else was finished until I finally caved in and took a bite, I had a different approach.

 “One bite”, he demanded, and so I lifted up the fork, bit off a piece of liver, swallowed without biting it, and then immediately barfed it back up onto my plate. That was my first and last bite of liver. In later years, dad and I would battle it out over hamburgers (me: “can’t you just make them flat like McDonald’s does?!?!” True quote.), venison, and pork chops.

 Eventually, my mom got tricky on me: she started making hot dishes. If you’ve never tried picking each tiny hamburger chunk out of Hamburger Helper, then I’m here to tell you it isn’t worth it. Fortunately, hot dishes did make it easier to get meat down, as it is hard to taste much of anything that is mixed with a can of Cream of Mushroom soup. Some hot dish meals I loathed were tuna casserole and all Hamburger Helper meals. Warmed tuna sets off my gag reflex to this day, and like Hamburger Helper, it’s extremely difficult to separate out flakes of tuna from the other things in there because they all stick together. Despite my repeated protests that I absolutely, positively, do not like eating Hamburger Helper, Mommy!!!!!, it still continued to appeared on the dinner table without fail.

 Yet there was one hot dish I didn’t mind eating. It was a little delicacy my mom would often cook up called “Booger Hot dish”. It was a hot dish that not just my mom made, but all my aunts had on rotation too. If I went to one of my aunt’s house and told her I wanted Booger Hot dish for lunch, she wouldn’t think I was being a disgusting little smart ass, she would know what I meant, and probably already have leftovers of it stockpiled in the fridge. Booger hot dish was this: cooked hamburger, rice, cream of mushroom, and soy sauce, mixed and baked. I never thought to ask why it was called Booger Hot dish. It’s one of those memories you can have that is so embedded in your very being that you don’t even question the oddness of it. Booger Hot dish simply was Booger Hot dish. So, maybe I liked it because it had a funny name? Or maybe I liked it because I couldn’t actually see the hamburger in it and it just tasted like salt. So with Booger hot dish, my mom and aunts had found a winner. Everyone loved it. My sisters, my cousins, we were all willing to eat it and plus, it was cheap.

 As I got older and my parents started making a little more money, hot dishes became less common. By the time I was in high school, I really don’t remember eating hot dishes at all, aside from the odd Tator-Tot hot dish that might appear in the Church basement.

 One summer when I was in college, I was browsing through one of my mom’s cookbooks and I spotted the worn and stained recipe for Booger Hot dish.

 “MOM!” I yelled all excitedly, “Booger Hot dish! You haven’t made this in SUCH a long time!"

 “I haven’t been angry at your dad in a long time”, she replied, “He hated that hot dish”.

*see how my Mom spelled it "Buger"? HA! 

Can I please just sit with the ADULTS?

Oh family holidays. Love them or hate them - they happen every year at the same time. Family doesn't change, and in my case - neither did the food or the questions.

Don't get me wrong, I did always enjoy making the 6 hour trip up the Cities to visit family for the holidays. The main reason was because of my cousin. After the questioning about boyfriends we did or did not have - or were or were not happy with - we at least could escape together and digress from the Spanish Inquisition.

See, the problem of being a 'tweener' cousin is that I was too young to hang out with the 4 cousins outside of my age group, and way too old to be caught dead with the youngsters. This is where Jess and Ang enters the equation. You could also refer to our immediate connection as "cousin sanity." Basically outside of our own siblings, of whom we saw enough of already, we had no one but each other to chill with. This means we went through the awkward aunt sex talk when we were 15 and knew full well all about the damn flowers and the bees, talked everyone's ear off about how school was, how lame being in the band was together... you get the drift. Clearly, it wasn't time for the others to have these conversations. We were the next in line. And it sure felt like every holiday it was the same record. (This was good actually - little prep was necessary). :)

This 'tweener' classification led to unfortunate circumstances at holidays. There was enough room at the adult table for holidays for us to sit. Having more than 20 aunts and uncles, not to mention the 35 some cousins we have - made that graduation nearly impossible. Instead - it was the kids table for us. This meant watching cousins eat way too much marshmallow jello, blowing soda pop out of their noses and my personal favorite - starting the table on fire with the candles.

We just wanted to sit at the goddamn adult table. They clearly were having way more fun (we later discovered allchie helps!) and were talking about more important things than the Teenage Mutant Turtles and their boogers. If not with the adults - then come on - how about the actual teenager table? Even if they scared us with their wisdom, or so we thought... we were mature and hip at 12 too. Come on!

The other main problem of being a tweener was having to WAIT in the congo line for food. Yes, it was always buffet style. So after all the little urchins touched everything, licked everything and cleaned the place out. Well, not really - but it felt that way. At least there were always the staples - green bean casserole, marshmallow veggie jello, olives, buns. Sometimes I feel like that is all we ever ate. It was amazing how fast the sides and meat would fly away from the buffet line. Don't even get me started on the dessert. (Okay - fine. I remember one year for Thanksgiving for the 50+ people eating there were 4 pies. 4 fricking pies! They were not even homemade. *s*. We opted for spiking our koolaid that year. I think that was a fine option).

For having so many cousins and aunts/uncles- the house was always crowded. In fact, once you entered the line for the buffet (of which could take 15 minutes to move) there was no turning back. Get your plate and then scoot. Once you either sat in the many card tables arranged around the first floor, the kitchen "kids" table, or the frosty porch there was no moving. Forgot butter - tough shit. It was impossible to move around in that house when it was feeding time at the zoo - impossible. Seconds, what were seconds? Naturally jello and marshmallow mush. Other than that - good luck.

Not that this post makes much sense - and if anything it is only bringing to mind even more crazy memories. Nonetheless, holidays were always a good time. Thank the stars above that I did not have to face them alone.

There's No More Room for Jello

It's basically a fact of life that food defines the holidays. However, when you grow up in an extraordinarily big family, scrap food kind of defines the holidays. I can remember the first holiday gathering I brought up the caboose of the buffet line. Not a smart move when 32 cousins have already passed ahead of you. Aunts and Uncles, yes, them too. But they don’t matter quite as much, as adults and children have completely different palettes, you see. The adults grazing the Thanksgiving buffet table tend to gravitate towards plates the kids could care less about. No more of Grandma’s green bean casserole, which she only makes on this sole day every year, with green beans and onions from Grandpa’s garden which have been picked and stored with care until this very day? Meh, no biggie. No more pickles or after dinner mints left? Now we have a problem.

As I brought up the back of the line, passing up silver platters with mere crumbs left on them and china bowls scraped clean, I spotted a beacon of red gelatin splendor: “A Jell-o mold! I love Jell-o! How did those fools pass this up!”, I thought to myself, giggling with delight. I added it to my plate of pickles and after dinner mints, and picked up a bun for good measure.

Ah, now, where to sit to enjoy this fine spread? Seating also is a complicated process. The grown ups sit in the dining room with the china and wine and having, what I imagined at the time, amazing adult conversation about the good old days, and maybe about sophisticated things such as Aristotle (he was the one who invented T.V., right?) or The Beatles (i loved The Beatles). Or perhaps, gasp!, they were already planning where we would all have our summer vacation together! (That’s what I really liked to imagine.)

Being 11 or so at the time, I clearly didn’t fit into the adult table. The next option was the kids table. Again, somewhere that I didn’t feel as though I belonged, and I certainly didn’t have as many romantic notions about what took place there. I knew what took place there. I had sat there for 11 years, babysitting my 5 year old sister and cousins because “I was the older one”. It was a bit like an unsatisfying job: you hate being there, and just when you are about to pull a “fuck you, fuck you, I’m out” to the boss, he will come over and sing his praises about how “responsible” and “great” you are to be” helping out”. How utterly unsatisfying, but it keeps you there until the next breakdown.

There was a bit of a purgatory, but it was a place you had no option to visit: the Teenager’s Table. A cardboard table set up in the entry way, where they dined together and talked about tantalizing topics such as “high school” and “dating”….that’s what I imagined, anyway. And, now that I’m older, it was a place where I’m sure they pulled out their hip flasks out to give Aunt Alice’s Holiday Punch a little more “spirit”, if you will. How do I know this? Because it’s exactly what I did where I was finally old enough to sit at the cardboard table.

Back to the Jell-o: I went in line expecting Glorified Rice, and I ended up with Jell-o! Hallelujah! The first bite was heavenly; there isn’t much to say because it was Jell-o…it really only has one taste. But I will say the maraschino cherry I scored in the first bite did add a little something special. As I slurped the second spoonful into my mouth, I hit something. As in, I hit something that couldn’t just be sucked down -- it needed to be chewed. “What the…..?” I thought to myself, and took the bite. Celery?! I spit it out and examined my slice of the Jell-o mold: cherries, yes. All that other canned cocktail fruit, yes. But, wait….what was this? What was this green stuff? Why in hell was there celery in my Jell-o?

I consulted with my mom.
“Uh, mom…why is there celery in the jell-o?”
“Oh, your grandma made that!”
“So…why did she put celery in the jell-o?”
“It’s just her recipe”
“So….she, like, did that on purpose….or….?”
“Yeah, it’s just the way she makes it”
“Oh. Ummm…why?”

I took a moment to reflect. Apparently my grandmother was senile and she actually thought celery in Jell-o made sense or something. That made me feel kind of bit depressed, because everyone knows the first stage of death is losing your mind. I sighed a tragic sigh if ever there was a thing, and got back in line. Maybe there was some Glorified Rice left.


A couple Thanksgivings later with Celery Jell-o still making an appearance, I realized the celery in the Jell-o was no mistake; it was just part of the recipe. And now it’s become the Thanksgiving staple that I never eat.

Grandma Marcella’s Fruit Cocktail and Celery Jell-o:

2 package cherry flavored Jell-o
1 bunt cake mold
2 cans fruit cocktail
1-2 celery stalks, coarsely chopped

Prepare Jell-o according to directions. Add cocktail fruit, drained. Add celery pieces. Stir. Chill in refrigerator until set. Flip mold onto serving platter. Serve to unsuspecting relatives.

First is the Worst.

Some things never change. My love life as I know it began with regret and embarrassment, and it’s really only been downhill since then.

I sometimes think there must be something terribly wrong with me, that everyone else seemed to blossom normally from adolescence into adulthood, making and breaking hearts along the way, and I always seemed to have a hitch in my giddy up when it came to those things. I seem to have gotten off the beaten path when it comes to relationships, and I don’t know where I took the wrong turn, but “since the very beginning” seems to be a good guess.

My first kiss though, like many of our first kisses, is probably the one I would most like to forget ever happened. Why, you ask? Was it because it was such a terrible, sloppy kiss, that I was traumatized for years by the thought of a tongue? Because it was with a boy who broke my heart to smithereens at a tender age? Oh, no. Nothing as simple as that.

My first kiss was with a carnie.

A carnival worker.

*sigh*

Let me just put this all in context real quick:

Anna was my best friend. Anna got boobs that summer of 5th grade. No, seriously. I remember getting on the bus the first day of 6th grade and immediately knowing there was a problem. The problem being I had no boobs. Was I supposed to? I didn’t know. I didn’t even shave my legs at this point. But, in a matter of seconds, I understood my chest was not worthy of a 6th grade boys attention.

Anna was, and is, blonde. I had a mousy, light brown color with a *slight* gray tint to it. Anna weighed like 80 pounds, and at least 6 of those were now in her chest. I had gained roughly 20 pounds between 1st and 2nd grade, and never lost any of it. I had signs of Grandma Corty’s midsection in the 6th grade (you shouldn’t be comparing yourself to your Grandma in the 6th grade). Anna had 20/20 vision. I wore humongous purple – framed glasses. So, as you can see, the next couple of years did quite a number on my self – esteem.

The middle of 6th grade, I decided to take up the razor, and started shaving my legs and pits. 7th grade puberty was good to me and I started to lose in places I need to lose in, and grow in places I needed to grow in. By the end of 8th grade, my transformation was nearly complete: I dyed my hair (with Anna – hers turned out a nice golden blonde; mine came out a more of a strawberry, of course) and got contacts. I still had no boobs. Anna still did. She also had a boyfriend. Bitch.

However, none of this changed the fact that ever boy in our grade I had probably taken a bath with or ran around naked in their yards at some point in my life. It’s a small town. So, you see, there were just no options. It wasn’t me --- it was them. Or lack of “them”.

Anna and I spend a lot of time together that summer. Specifically, we spent a lot of time being boy crazy 14 year olds. In August, the annual Burnett County Fair was taking place. These kind of events are horny teenagers wet dreams. Boys from other schools! From other towns! From other counties! (no, not countries --- that came much later --- other counties…)

(On a side note, I have no clue how my parents tolerated me when I was 14, or how they found it in their hearts not to send me away/murder me. If I have children, I will be truly frightened if it comes out a girl….)

Anyway, so we spend every waking and non-waking hours strutting around the animal barns, concession stands, and over priced, rigged games of what was the Burnett County Fair. It’s basically a rule that you need to buy cheese curds at a fair. Being a teenage girl slightly paranoid about her weight is no exception. And, oh, would you look at that! Look at these 2 cute, slightly older boys running the cheese curd stand….

I have no idea how we got ourselves involved with the cheese curd stand guys, but I totally blame it on Anna. The most confusing part for me at the time was that one of them was actually interested in me. *sigh* I was so ignorant of the male mind at this point, it truly depresses me. Anyway, to cut to the chase, after like 48 hours of ridiculous pseudo flirting, which I can only imagine was him trying to flirt with me, and me giggling uncontrollably because I am/was a completely moron when it comes to men, he offered to let me ride with him to the gas station to buy cigarettes.

(GOD, this story gets just more and more redneck with every sentence!!!! I disgust myself. I swear I am going to finish writing this story, and invent a new story about my first kiss)

We ride to the gas station, and I am sitting as closely as possible to the passenger side door as physics will allow. He suggests that, hey, maybe I should sit in the middle. Ummm, sure….(you fool!) and I move over, knowing exactly what is coming next.

The kiss.

Which was stupid.

He smelled like an ashtray.

First kisses are stupid, because like everything, you only get better at kissing with practice. And I can vouch that they are particularly stupid when they are will chain smoking carnies whom you will never see again (thankfully). The good news: There was absolutely nowhere to go but up, up, UP from there. And, 12 years later, it has most definitely went UP!

Pucker Up.

You never forget your first; even if, sometimes you wish you could.

Time to wind back the hands of time to freshman year. Oh!, the horror, the agony, the immaturity.

This was the year I had my first official boyfriend and got my first official kiss. Being that I was one of the first girl to get a boyfriend out of my friends, I had very few options to go to for advice seeking. I wanted to ask - how should I position my face? What flavor chapstick should I wear? What should I expect? What do I do with my tongue? Well, turns out I was flying solo on this one.

I remember thinking having a boyfriend wouldn't be a big deal. It's not like I was dating the varsity quarterback, so the whole "relationship" thing could go over pretty much on the D-L. Yeah, that was until J.H. decided to announce to my entire Spanish class that me and said boyfriend were a hot item. I didn't even know what a hot item was, and we definitely weren't that, but whatever... It was from that day forward that I felt like I was being watched - everyone knew were were dating, so we had to act like that.

Well, at age 15 - the problem is you don't really know how to act. You're at a very awkward phase. Your body is changing, you get pimples, skipping swimming in gym because you have your period is no longer an excuse...etc. Not to mention, when you are the youngest in the high school there is a lot to live up to. You see that "A-list" seniors macking in the hallway during breaks; you see those same "A-listers" dry humping at school dances. You wonder when you get to be that cool. (Okay, no you don't. Most of the normal kids never wanted to be that cool. You only did if you were an A-list froshie; of which, I definitely was not.)

So it all began at a school dance. Just happened to be on -gag- Valentine's Day. That marked the start of our relationship. Slow dancing and group photos included. (I despise the fact that my first 'will you be my girlfriend, I like you' happened on the most pathetic day for saps of the year. I have never liked the day, and never found this coincidence to be all that romantic. I'm a realist, not a dreamer.)

Things were good. We had fun hanging out with friends, talking on the phone until way too late, and just being normal confused 15 year olds. Well, this "puppy love" continued for about 3 months. Then the second phase of our relationship began. This was the "I think we should take it to the next level, but I'm too dip-shit scared to start" phase. A lot - I repeat, a lot, of sweaty hand holding took place at this phase. The Great Salt Lakes and "kiss tension." [I say "kiss tension" because sexual tension was too far out of reach].

Phase 2 continued on for about a month.

Then we hit the 4.5 month mark. Still, no smooching. It was getting uncomfortable. He'd walk (Yes, walk because neither one of us drove!) me home, we'd stand there in silence looking at our feet. I'd always get super impatience (and insecure) so I'd run inside and slam the door in his face. To hell if I was going to be making the first move - he was the boy!

We crept to month 5 - and that was it. We were going to lock lips. No more of this pussy footing around it - it was going to happen. I distinctly remember going out that day and knowing I was not leaving until it happened. I was determined. It didn't help that the week before he flat out said to my face that we had never kissed. Just as he puckered up, I fled. My first kiss was not going to be so forced, damn it. However, with him being so blunt I knew I had to "put out" or hit the high way. I did still like the kid, so breaking up was out of the question.

That next weekend we went for a ride - he was on his bike, I was on my roller blades. It was swell. We were cruising around the 'burb on a spring/summer day and it was all good. As we started to head back home, I started to get really nervous, even if I was not backing down. We stopped at what would become our "infamous" corner and did the usual - talked, awkward stares, uncomfortable giggles, talked...etc. This continued on for about 10 minutes. [Editor's note: I am still on my roller blades at this point and balance is not my strong suit.] Then it came. I think we both knew it was now or never. We leaned in and ....

whooooooooosh. It was over. It hadn't even started and it was over.

What the fuck? I waited my whole adult life for this - a 1/2 second kiss?

I was so unsatisfied with the lack of kiss that I bladed home. The whole way home I remember thinking how my parents, relatives...etc. had kissed me on the lips for longer than that stupid, lame-ass kiss. What a frickin' waste of dream!

We did improve, and in writing this I realize that I should write about my second kiss. [That one instead of being the shortest kiss ever, could be classified as one of the sloppiest messes of a kisses I'd ever received. That is, however, besides the point. This is about firsts. ;))].

Wonder if the feeling was mutual? Guess the world may never know. :P

Miss Honey

Her name was Honey, and it only took one glance to scare the shit out of me.

Let me formally introduce you to Honey; Miss Honey my Driver's Ed Road Tester. She was not my first. Not my second either, but who's counting?

Anyway, back to Miss Honey. Instead of Honey, her name just as well could have been Tank. Imagine a huge woman, the largest woman you can imagine. Well, now add on another 50 pounds and that would have been Honey. There must have been a sweetness to her that I never saw; certainly parents wouldn't name their kid Honey for no good reason.for Regardless, I surely did not get any "sweetness" from her starting from the time I shook her hand to the time I rode back into the station with tears streaming down my face.

It surely was an eventful morning test ride with Miss Honey.

We walked out of the station and I specifically remember looking at my mom like it may be the last time I would ever see her. We approached my dad's Chevy Caviler. I got in and unlocked her door (no manual lock system - we sure were ballers :P). Miss Honey sits down. The car immediately drops to the ground. We were going to be low riders for this test.

I am sweating like a pig. I fasten my seat belt, check the mirrors and start the car. Is she wearing her seat belt? I glance over. She is not wearing her seat belt. In fact, she is still trying to reach around her belly to grab the belt. I do the unthinkable.

"Can I help you with your seatbelt, " I ask.

"That is so kind of you, yes, please," she replies.

I reach around her belly, grap the belt, reach back around her "tire" (if you will) and fasten it. During this process I realize that her gut is touching the dashboard. Yes, belly on the board. I may as well be with a beached whale. My heart is racing and I haven't even actually gotten out of the lot yet. This was not going to be good.

And, true to my instincts it was not going to be good. I just didn't know how bad it was going to be.

We started off with the easy stuff. Turn left. Turn right. Do a "Y" turn. Turn right again. Stop at the stop sign. Check your mirrors. Ya de ya da. It was nearing the time I loathed. Time to parallel park. I never understood why parallel parking mattered so much that they had to test you on it. I lived in the 'burbs. There was no need to parallel park ever. You either had a driveway or there was plenty of empty parking spots available on the street.

So I approach the "victim" (aka the car). I pull up aside it, put my turn signal on, check all my mirrors and I am ready to perfect the park. The only problem is this is the first time during the test where I actually have to see who is sitting next to me again. My nerves strike up again. I start backing up. Miss Honey says nothing. I must be doing all right. Let's keep going. Slowly, slowly...

"Stop, stop, stop! You're too close, too close," she shrills.

*Thud

Cue crying. I hit the damn car while parallel parking. Shit, fuck, damn. If Miss Honey had warned me BEFORE I was already hitting the car it would have been fine.

Now here is the worst part. We have to get out of the car to "access the damage and the situation." Remember how I had to click her belt on. Yeah..... now I have to undo the seatbelt and frickin' help her out of the car. I would rather die, truthfully. Eat my own shit, and die.

How the hell am I going to get through this. I still have to drive back to the station and then tell my mom. Oh my frickin' god. Plus - AUTOMATIC FAILURE. Who gets their license after hitting a car anyway? That's the golden rule - hit car = you suck at driving no matter how intimidating the tester is.

Turns out the damage was nothing. I left a note anyway.

I now had to endure what perhaps was the longest and most uncomfortable drive of my life. (After clicking her in and touching her belly again, of course). I rolled through stops, but other than that was a perfect driver. There was no conversation during that drive. In fact, I think I even stopped breathing to be even more quiet.

We got into the station and I gave my mom the look of death. She knew immediately that something went terribly, oh so terribly wrong during my test. Miss Honey filled her in on all the details. I was happy to have my mom drive me off so I could let the river flow.

I never wanted to drive again. Or at least never wanted a morbily obese person to be in the car with me spouting out directions.

It was my most memorable driving test. And it was a good thing she had such a good name - and one I will certainly never forget - Miss Honey.

---

**I did get a call from the owner's of the hit car. They told me not to sweat it. It was the third time their car was hit by a test driver in two months. They needed to go to the DMV and put their car on the "do not parallel park by this car" list. I have since gotten better at parallel parking, even if I still avoid it at all costs.

Hit it.

“Never go on trips with anyone you do not love” – Hemingway A Moveable Feast


I've always loved road trips. There have been a couple of select awesome ones in the past…The winter my sister and I were driving home for Christmas from Boston, and we ran out of gas. In Buffalo. In a snow storm. Cruising along in the ol’ White Rabbit (Gio Metro) listening to my “Boston Blues” mix tape that had “If Winter Ends” on it by Bright Eyes over and over again. Both of us chain smoking bidis, or cigarillos, or cigars to stay awake -- because she refused to smoke cigarettes, but cigars and far eastern hand rolled cloves were ok. Staying at the skankiest motel ever (aside from Villa Verde in San Juan: “I’m scared these sheets will get me pregnant”) and the air conditioner was turned full blast and there was no knob to turn it down/off.

*sigh* Good Times.

But seriously, you do have to travel with people you love. You need to take a trip with a best bud who knows you well enough to email you first thing in the morning and ask if your going to leave your apartment today, because she knows otherwise you probably won’t; or a sister that will let you cling to her back like a spider monkey when you wake up at 3 A.M. with an air conditioner that you can’t turn off blasting on you. These are the people you travel with.

With that being said, there is just nothing quite like setting the cruise control and driving with the windows down in the summer, blasting some Queen. Or, blasting a particularly awesome mix CD your BFF made for you when you busted up with your boyfriend. Especially awesome if said BFF is riding shotgun.

A couple of summers ago, I picked up Chellber at roughly 9 AM on a Saturday in July. It was the third weekend in July, to be exact, because it was Watercross weekend and we were going to embark on the 120 miles journey from Minneapolis, MN to Grantsburg, WI. An easy 2 hour trip north and east on Highway 35. "Watercross" is perhaps the most ridiculous event ever created, and quite frankly I’m embarrassed at how excited I get for it. But, then again, it’s a weekend of World Class Drinking and Dancing (and usually at least one party at Huff’s). And, it’s a weekend of World Class Snowmobile Racing. How do people snowmobile race in the summer, you ask?

I have no idea. But they do it. I know it involves changing around some things on snowmobile so it can run better on water. But anyhoo, that’s beside the point. This story is not about snowmobiles. This story is about two people with A.D.D. who should not be told they need to get from point A to Z in X amount of time, because it just is never gonna happen.

Our first stop on this grand adventure was as we floated past a Best Buy. “HEY, you know what would be awesome???, I ask, “if I got a new camera today!” Um, sure. Okay. No time like the present, afterall. We shuffle around Best Buy for about 45 minutes taking pictures of our boobs with the tester cameras, and I eventually buy one. About 30 miles and 50 random pictures later, we decide, HEY, you know what would be awesome? it would be AWESOME if we made our own Tshirts! We should totally stop at Walmart and buy iron on thingys and some white shirts!

We stop at Walmart. And because I have a new camera, we decide that HEY, you know what would be awesome?? To dress up in muumuus (those huge granny dresses), and scarves, and sunglasses! And purses, and shoes, and umbrellas! And then take pictures! So, for about 2 hours we patter around Wal mart, grabbing any and all fluorescent, floral, and leather items we see, and put them on and take pictures of each other. Because that’s awesome. I end up buying a straw hat which to this day I have never wore. We also get our supplies for this T-Shirt project that apparently we are going to do sometime this weekend between being drunk and…being drunker? It was as we are leaving Walmart Bekah’s phone rings (mine was already dead as i had forgotten my charger, as usual). She picks up:

Jenn: So, where are you guysssss?
Chellber: *looking at me fearfully* Um…Walmart?
Jenn: ....In Pine City?
Chellber: No,no…in Forest Lake…
Jenn: WHAT? But you guys are supposed to be hereeee! You said you’d be here between 10 and11! (it’s already around Noon and we've travelled roughly 45 miles)
Chellber: We are on our way!

We hop back in the Fuckus (or, the "Focus") and Hit. That. Shit.

We were supposed to meet Jenn between 10 or 11 AM. Oopsie. We’ve been listening to Queen for about 3 hours now, so we decide to switch it up. Bekah digs through my CD case and finds the obligatory “break up mix” that every car must have, and that she has made for me, and pops it in. We listen to a couple tracks, and then on comes “Du”, by David Hasselhoff. Umm…ok. Sure. Never really thought to put on a "Break Up" mix CD, but it seems appropriate. But then again it’s in German and I have no fucking clue what he is saying. But, no matter. We “sing along” for a couple of verses in our fake German, and it goes a little something like this:

“Duuuuu…died in an alley, this is Nietzsche feeling Zaza….Duuuuu with the otter, we will feeelllll….DUUUU….do I like Nichteze when he standsssss….Duuuuu do you steal hair from the man...Du, yes my name is Don Shaun….”

And so on and so forth, until we are laughing so hard that I have to stop so we can pee. I pull off at the next exit and stop the car. But wait. What is this place? Why is it so familiar? Is the same town where we got our first tattoos, back in our days of being young and impressionable and the kind of kids who got tattoos without telling their parents! Remember that??? That was awesome. HEY, you know what would be awesome? If we got another tattoo!!!! Let’s go get a tattoo!

To be continued....gotta go buy some brown sugar now.

Okay, back. 4 days later....no, it didn't take me that long to buy friggin brown sugar. Though...if you want to get specific about it, I did get some brown sugar of another kind, What! (insert Barney Stintson voice here).

Anyway. So, we decide that we absoutely, positively, MUST get a tattoo immediately. It is imparative. This trip will not be completely without a new permanent marking on our bodies to commemorate this trip. So, now we are roughly 1/2 way to our destination and it's about 3PM. we said we would be there at 10 or 11AM.

We pull into the tat parlor and starting browsing around, debating what would be wise to get inked on us. I am debating between a black spade and Chellber is thinking about a little mushroom to go next to her ladybug or something. We talk prices with Mr. Tattoo Dude, who happens to be an apprentice so the work will be HALF OFF. "That is amazing!" we say! Hey, you know what would be totally awesome to get??? We should totally get a matching tattoo!!!! Like 2 peas in a pod!!!! Hey, Mr. Tattoo Dude, can you draw us a little something like that????

He sure can! He grabs some pencils and goes to work, and about 30 minutes later shows us what he has. The first draft looked a little like a vagina, so we asked him to refine the shape slightly so it didn't look so much like a Georiga O'Keefe painting. He does, and then it looks sooooooo cute! Oh my God Mr. Tattoo Dude, you are totally amazing!!! Can we get them done now this minute? Do you have the time? Sure he does. But, wait. Bekah thinks that *maybe* she should consult Mr. Chellber first. I mean, she did promise him the next tattoo she got would be with him....
Don't be foolish! I say. What kind of woman are you???

"But I promised him...." she replies

"well, I've had lots of people promise me lots of things" I say.

"Lauer...I can't just get a tattoo without asking my husband"

"SURE you can!!!! And if you do it now, you can do it for 1/2 price with this dude!!!"

Well, we end up leaving without the tattoos, but we keep the picture of 2 peas in a pod and totally promise Mr. Tattoo Dude we are coming back to get it next week (which we never do).

*sigh* Some day, some day....

So, we say our goodbyes and shower Mr. Tattoo Dude with thanks for wasting a good 90 minutes with us, and then we end up not getting anything tattooed. We didn't even get anything pierced. LAME. We pull out of the tattoo parlor and get back on the freeway.

It is approximately 5PM now. We begin to accept that we aren't going to make it to JeNN's in time to go on the lake and do a little sunbathing before the demolition derby at 7PM. Speaking of which, jeNN has probably called Bekah about 3 times in the past 90 minutes. Opps.

Finally, 45 minutes later, at 5:45PM, we make it to the state line. But we ain't home free just yet. We need to stop and purchase booze for the weekend. We pop into "Stop a Sec" AKA "Stop for Sex". Selecting booze is never an easy task, especially in the summer because so many things are palatable. Then you always have the wild cards to consider, too. In our case, today it was "HEY do you know what would be awesome??? Buying 1 of every flavor of Boone's Farm in stock. Such a *great* idea. You know, because Boone's Farm doesn't give you total gut rot after like 5 sips...I also take a box of wine. We get a 24 pack of Miller Lite. And, just because we don't like to kid ourselves, a bottle of JD. That should hold us over for a night, we decide. We check out.

It's about 6:30PM now. We can go meet jeNN at her house. OR....we can pop over to Tiff and Damon's who only live right over there, and have a quick brew and then head on over to the Demo Derby. Then, we'll just call JeNN can meet us there. If isn't livid and still decides to be friend with us still, that is.

We will take the risk.

Hit it and Screw Me.

There's the expression "Out with a bang." That was how 2008 concluded; and it most definitely made that "bang" sound, even if I did not officially hear it myself.

Let's just let it all hang out within the first couple paragraphs. This is how it all went down.
1) We go to Chicago for a weekend and parked the car on our street. (Our quiet, rather residential street). We come home to find out that the front end of our car was hit. It was a neighbor hit and run.
2) Civic LX gets hit again (while backing out) in the parking lot at Trader Joe's. No damage. It does, however, surface the anger from stupid neighbor hitting car and not confessing....[Watch face turn dark shade of pink]
3) The final incident: Car is parked outside of friend's home well away from the curb. (Friends live in a very residential area - so residential in fact that if you do not know someone who lives there or live there yourself you do not go there.) Civic is side swiped and totaled by a 17-year old who is 4 points away from losing his license.

Talk about bad car karma. Not to mention this happens just before the holidays, leaving us out of car and needing to get to Milwaukee. Ironic that when someone hits you and it is clearly their fault you suffer more.

And why do you suffer more, one may ask. Well, here is why.

I happen to be one who believe, much like Anne Frank once said, that all people are good at heart. For this very reason, I did not take insurance information from the driver, write down his license plate number or call the cops. No, instead I simply took his cell phone number. Very, very fortunately for me, the driver is a neighbor of our friends and daddy (with son in tow) came by to "access" damage and talk about next steps. They seemed like decent, fair people. No problem, right? A simple estimate and we'd have the check in hand. Hahaha

It was very clear they did NOT want to go through insurance. No big deal. (We did not know at this time of the kid's already tainted driving record). Avoiding insurance seemed like the best for the both of us. I have been brainwashed to think that all insurance companies want to do is steal your money and make a profit...oh wait... nevermind... (this may be a topic for another post ;))

So come Monday morning we bring the car in to get a couple of quotes. Each of these quotes nearly wiped me clean off my rocker. The estimates were for well over the value of the car. So it was deemed a "total loss." The real loss though was that the kiddo was no longer taking my phone calls and the parents didn't seem to think they'd have to cough up 3k.

To make a very long story short - we went through their insurance. I made a $250 profit (yes, profit) on the car. Bought it for $250 less than what insurance gave me three year ago. Sweet deal. As it turns out after all the going back and forth, being pulled through the mud with this family and their crap-driver son - we did end up ahead of everything.

However, that is the last time I assume everyone is good at heart. I have learned that there are plenty of people, that even after knowing what they did was wrong will still try to cheat you out of a buck. The whole, "Angela, we have tuition to pay. We need to reach an agreement that is fair for each of us" or the "You want 3k?! You want to rip me off? I'll give you 1500" or "Fine, we'll give you 3k and we keep the car." or my personal favorite "You'll have to talk to his mother. She will be dealing with this and her son."

I could go on, but it's really beside the point. It was an unfortunate thing that happened, but we got rid of a car that was starting to cause us problems and cost us money, and we got a good lump on money to get us a newer and better car. Happy Holidays from Progressive. :)

Lordly lordly lord. What a wonderful world we live in.


----


Side note: These are the following steps to make if ever in an accident.
1) Get all their information. (Insurance, license, address, cell phone, full name, SSN, birthday, sign... :))
2) Call your insurance and file a claim immediately.
3) Call the cops and file a report. (If they seem angered by this, do it from your car so they don't know the cops are a coming.)
4) If there are witnesses, get their names.

I would never want a friend (or enemy for that matter) to have to go through this process. It's a bear, plus being out a car makes for an uneventful life in these USofAs.

Ice Ice Baby

Since I told you last time I've only been in one major car accident, I should just clear something up right away before you read any further: the story i'm about to tell you doesn't constitute as a "major" car accident in my world. I mean, my first accident was when I ran my parent's car into a forest of trees, for Christsake. It's hard to top that one. So, with that being said, let me tell you of how I was in a car accident this January and broke a rib.

I hate driving when I go home. You know how your parents always used to tell you "I trust you, honey, but I don't trust the other drivers on the road..."? Well, I trust everyone else just fine. But I do not trust myself. Particularly when any forces of nature happen to be working against me and the giant aluminum and rubber death trap I'm driving -- i.e. snow, hail, sleet, ice, rain, sun in my eyes, etc etc...

But, as I said before, I always seem to find myself behind the wheel. In the case of this January the 2nd, it was because I was driving my brother whose license has been revoked for approximately the next 3 - 30 years to see my dying grandmother in the hospital. Another funny thing about me being "the bad driver": I'm the only one who will drive in cities, aside from my dad (but he grew up in one so he doesn't count). Everyone else in my family is scared shitless to do it, and I can't figure out why. The key to driving in cities is to remember this: no one actually wants to hit you, so they will stop. Have no fear on the road, my friends, because were all just trying to stay alive out there. Also, I am my own worst enemy and can do enough damage alone, I thank you.

So, half way to the hospital (which would be roughly 45 minutes from my parents house), we get word to abort mission and turn around; Granny has already said goodbye.

We turn around, and about 10 minutes into the ride...cue meltdown. I must say, I am a bit of a Drama Queen when it comes right down to it, and love myself a good tragedy. My brother looks at me and sighs. "Well...we may as well stop for a drink."

Couldn't have said it better myself, bro.

We actually stop at a liquor store first to gather some rations, and then go to a bar. I decide to order a Hurricane -- I don't know what it is, exactly, but it sounds just like what I need. It turns out a good old Jack and Coke would have been a little easier on the palette. After a couple sips I decide I don't need a Hurricane, but still finish half of it anyway. My brother is on his 3rd beer.
We proceed on the long journey home, me gripping the wheel with one hand and my tissues with another.

We near home, and I can't wait to get there so I can open the bottle of wine I bought. Instinctively, I take the backroads. Taking the "backroads" in northern Wisconsin in the winter is just about the stupidest things you could possibly do. You can ice skate down them until about March, which means you should try and avoid driving on them. Sometimes i forget these little nuances about the Midwest, unfortunately. I was going a brisk 30mph when suddenly I felt a *slight* pull on the back wheel. My brother picked up on it immediately:

Nick: "Jess, do NOT step on the breaks..."
Me: I'm not going to step on the breaks.
Nick: Jess...do NOT put my car in the ditch. (did i mention i was driving his car....? I was.)
Me: I'm not going to put yourcar in the ditch!
*sliding towards to ditch*
Nick: do NOT oversteer! do NOT oversteer! DO NOT OVERSTEER!
Me: AHHHHH I CAN"T STOP IT!!!!!
Nick: Shit.FUCK. Shit. Shit.

Now, out of the corner of my eye, I see a electrical pole. It's getting closer. And closer.

Nick: DO NOT HIT THE POLE!!
Me: I WILL NOT HIT THE POLE!!!!

I do not hit the pole. I slide sideways into the ditch and we thud to a halt, and briefly rock for the single most terrifying second of my life before the wall of snow that reaches the window of drivers side of the car stops us and pushes us on all 4 wheels.

Nick: (deep breath out) Okay, so, we didn't roll.
Jess: Thank.God.
*3 second lull of silence while our hearts start beating again*
Nick: Now...GRAB ALL MY BEER!!!

If you know my brother, he has been here before. I have not, but I know well enough that cars, beer, and police do not mix well. I start grabbing beer cans and hurling them into the field, into my pockets, and into the trunk. I wasn't sure which place was best, so i decide to do all three at the same time. 20 seconds later, we see car lights. The neighbors! They've come to help! Or have they....

I play it cool and tell the lady I've called someone to tow us out (which i have at that point...my friend's dad...). My friends dad arrives, and I run up out of the ditch to meet him. And I hit the ice. And then I hit the ground. And I land on a beer can in my pocket.
I lay in silence for a moment, trying to figure out if the day really just got worse for me, and listening to the hiss of a beer can that has been cracked open. With my very own ribs.

Moral of the story: Apparently God loves irony just as much as the rest of us, because I came out of the car accident unscathed, but whadda know, I can't seem to walk out of a ditch...

Driver's Ed: The Pain. The Agony.

To get our license on your birthday; that is every sixteen year old’s dream. The best is when your parents call you out of school for the morning so you can take the test. Then you can return at lunch and show off your shiny piece of plastic.

That is if you actually pass the test.

My story wasn’t so romantic. I did not get my license when I was sixteen. I also would not have had the option to show off the plastic at the lunch table. Nope, I have a summer birthday. Instead when I was sixteen I got to watch all my friends come to the table with their new licenses. (Amazingly they all seemed to pass on the first go-around). I also had to have all my friends pick me up when we went out. That part was cool. The lame part was that my curfew was a good hour earlier than all of theirs so my parents always had to come get me. It was like I was the ‘uncool’ kid who had to be home by 10:30p.m.

The worst was – it wasn’t my fault.

The Drivers’ Education classes were offered in the fall – I swam; then offered in the winter – I had indoor soccer; then offered in the spring – I had softball; and then offered in the summer – I worked. So the pattern continued this way for what seemed like forever. Yes, I watched my sixteenth year come and go – no license. I then watched what felt like my whole seventeenth year go by. Okay, only half of it, but still.

I enrolled in the class that winter. Our indoor soccer team must have fizzled out so I could. One of my other friends was in the class with me. We were the only SENIORS in a class with sophomores. (You could actually take the class at fifteen, just couldn’t get your license until you were sixteen.) It was an embarrassment to my name to be in that class with kids in my brother’s grade. A truly mortifying teenage experience.

The class was all right. Mr. Diet Mountain Dew and Licorice ropes (I kid you not) was kind of a tool, but whatever. It was the behind-the-wheel classes that sucked. [This is where the part of being the oldest of five kids comes into play… My parents never had time to actually take me out to practice driving until I started the class. And even when I was in the class, I still didn’t get enough practice as I should have.] Mr. Mountain Dew constantly reminded me about the importance of practicing. Naturally he did this while slamming on the emergency brake.

My first “spin” with the car was winding around through the ‘burb. That was actually kind of fun. Why go 20mph around the curve, 35-40mph was so much more fun! Yeah, that day was a blast. I thought I was already ready for the test. I realized very quickly that I was not. The next session involved driving downtown Milwaukee. I am surprised I did not have a heart attack, or for that case the kid in the backseat and the driver didn’t. It was horrible! So many one way streets. So many people. And so many frickin’ cars! Those classes eventually got better. And, we never drove around downtown again – just around safely in the ‘burbs. Ah – that was easy as pie!

Well, the class eventually ended – I passed. I got “poor/fair” marks for my driving. I wasn’t honestly all that bad. Mr. Mt. Dew just made me nervous; understandable considering he was always juiced up on sugar. I actually remember being sore about those marks. If he could see how I parallel park now, he’d surely change it to ‘superb/excellent’ driver.

Fast forward to, after significant practice, the drivers test. Gasp! I remember feeling as nervous as I would for final exams or right before my relay at a swim meet. It was as if I had forgotten what side was the brake and what side was the gas. (Well, not quite so bad – but nerve-racking it definitely was.).

So nerve racking, I’ll have to continue shortly….

Beep Beep

Ah, the Flintstones...owners of the original hybrid. Oddly, it also closely resembles my first car, except mine was slightly more boxy. That's right: my first car was a station wagon, wood paneling included.

I can only imagine the terrible paradox a parent experiences before a child is about to get their drivers license. You've spent 16 years carting their asses around, and now here is your light at the end of the tunnel. Oh, how nice it would be to spend a night at home watching ABC's Monday night lineup with a glass of wine rather than freezing your bum off waiting for your kid to finish hockey practice. But do you really trust them...? Really trust them with your car?

If you are smart, no, you do not. Borrowing your child your car will most surely end in disaster and destruction -- it's really just a matter of when it will end in disaster and destruction. In my case, it took exactly 30 days, a slurpee, and a couple trees.

I was riding with my sister that fateful night, and before I go into detail on what happened and how it could have been avoided, a brief history of the relationship between my sister and I from ages birth - present: we fought a lot, yet insisted on hanging out together all the time. It would be safe to say we are both relatively extremely stubborn, and are not to keen on losing anything --- especially arguments.

Well, mid-driving, the slurpee hits the floor, and thus the inciting incident:

Liz: you IDIOT!!!! it's all over!!!!

Me: it's not my fault!!! don't blame me!!! There was a malfunction with the cup holder, obviously!!!

Liz: You are a clumsy buffoon.

Me: *grasping for the cup on the ground* Don't help me pick it up or anything!

Liz: I didn't drop it!!!!

Me: *head under the steeling wheel trying to retrieve slurpee* I am NEVER driving you ANYWHERE ever AGAIN!!! You are useless!!!

Both in unison: OH. MY. GOD!!!! Aggghhhh!!!!
*crash into trees*

So, it turns out I won that argument -- I didn't get to drive her anywhere for quite some time. Because I had just totaled my parents car.

No, they were not pleased with me, and to my horror, my next car ended up being another station wagon, except with more rust on it than the last one. I would have to say the worst part about it though is that this single incident established my reputation as the "bad driver" in my family/circle of friends. My brother has totalled approximately 3 cars (one of them the aforementioned 2nd station wagon) and rolled several others in his 5 years of having his license (and for 2 of those years, his license was suspended), yet I remain the bad driver. Another interesting tidbit is that though I was the "bad driver", I always somehow ended up being the driver. If a group of friends went out, though all of us had cars, I ended up driving while they heckled me from the back seat for being a "bad driver". Why didn't I ever tell them to shut their pie holes and that they can drive their owns cars if they hated my driving so much, I will never know....

However, though I have never been in another major accident since the fateful forest expunge of '99, to rid myself of my reputation is a battle that I don't think I will ever win.

Roomies Part II: The Chronicles of Sitting Ducks*

First of all, due to a sequence of events, this is an update to the roomie post. I thought it would be appropriate for me to have my stab before P gets to it ;). (Ya hay que esperar la edicion espanola :o))

BAM BAM!

As if there was any other more unpleasant way to be disturbed during a weekend away than by receiving a call from the management. Given the fact that the nature of the call was left in a message so vague that I decided that the return call could wait, unless of course our apartment had gone up in flames, but then I would expect a call every hour on the hour. The fews days following "the call" we played phone tag. I am a black-belt master in that game, no matter what the situation.

After dodging calls for a couple of days I finally decided to have P make the call and see what the hell was going on. Another leaky ceiling, parking space quibble... who knows after all the adventures we've had thus far. Alas, no. This incident was going take the cake of all incidents.

Apparently sometime during broad daylight on Saturday, Albonguilla had the bright idea of going around the building shooting a BB gun. No big deal. Only that it is broad daylight and to top it off there are kids playing around outside. Granted, she is not completed out of whack, we do have very loud and often times quite obnoxious ducks around the area. (These, by the way, are the most ugly ducklings I have ever laid eyes upon -- red warts and all). It is still unconfirmed what exactly she was doing. I will give her props if she was trying to cap a few of these ducks and save all us from the early morning squawking wake up calls. However, there are times and places for everything. This apartment is not the place, nor was the time right. More than the following reason, someone in her mental (and maturity) state should not be allowed to handle a gun of any sort, not even a squirt gun.

Thank our lucky stars that we were out of town, because I would not have wanted to deal with disgruntled neighbors or a crazy BB gun madwoman going around the apartment block. Apparently the management received a handful of complaints on Saturday, hence the call to us. It was confirmed and decided upon that we are not, under any circumstance, to renew her contract. (No problem, thank god!) nor was she going to be offered to move into the vacant apartment opening up next month. We have since learned that the management is not as blood-sucking, money grunges as we thought they were; in fact, it seems that are genuinely concerned about the welfare of their tenants. Best stated, their tenants and ducks.

I do have to comment on the fact that in my opinion is sick to torture such innocent animals. There is no way that these ducks can move or run faster than a human walks. I don't think they are even capable of flying away. The are literally sitting ducks, same as the one you shoot at when you go to the county fair. Only the satisfaction of shooting one of these things down does not come with tokens or a prized stuffed animal for the sig other. Nope, instead it just frightens the neighbors and gives their children nightmares. Yes, without a doubt these ducks are ugly. Uglier though than these ducks is the one who tries to be a hero and kill them off. If we could eliminate everything that bothered us, well, let's just say we'd be slowly diminishing the human race. *same roomie as the first post; this again was written a while back and I am now sharing my trauma with the public :)

Roomie or No Roomie*

There comes a time in every "adult-minded" person's life, when living in the basement of your parent's home no longer has the same sex appeal as it did when you were younger. Granted the free meals, laundry service and very limited responsibilities has its charm, there comes a point when one has to venture out on his or her own - to face the great outdoors of corporate america and independence.

It is at this precise moment when one must seriously consider his financial situation and make a decision based on location, amenities and affordability. Often times this decision forces one to consider having a roommate. There are multiple ways one may stumble upon a roommate. There are three specific ways:
1) You room with a friend / acquaintance
2) You live with a significant other
3) You decide to live with a complete stranger

1) FRIENDFor some the decision is easy, as you may already have a group of friends who are embarking on the same situation. This is the easy way out - you live with a friend. Of course, it is not to say that living with a friend versus a complete stranger is more advantageous, but at least you know what you may be getting yourself into. You've at least cut through some of the bullshit of knowing who the other person is. You will either come to like the person more by living with them or slowly begin to realize all the little crazy things you never knew about them that drive you absolutely nuts.

2) SIGNIFICANT OTHERYou live with a significant other. Dependent on the stage of the relationship this can be a real trip. You don't ever have to worry about being disturbed or interrupted, but on the other hand, you can become very limited to your fair share of personal time and space. For many couples the "move-in" can be the make or break of a relationship.

3) STRANGER You choose a complete stranger to you. Much like posting a personal ad you take a chance. Someone likes what you are offering, you like how they come across. Mind you, first impressions tell you a great lot about someone, but they are just that -- first impressions. Sometimes a complete stranger is the best way to go about living with someone. You have absolutely nothing to sacrifice, as the person is not your friend or significant other. If a friendship comes of the live-in situation, great and if not, it's not like you ever had to expect it.

This blog is designed to cover to good, bad and ugly about roommates. We've all had our moments and it's time to share. *This post is remembering an OLD roommate, several years ago.

Cafe con CRAZZZZY*

Everyone needs someone in their life who is just *slightly* crazier than they are. Judging from my own life experiences thus far, statistically speaking, 90% of the time this person will be Italian.

Enter Crazy Italian Roomie*. CIR has packed up 70 lbs. of her life and shoved it into a 4x4 suitcase, flown across the Atlantic, and joined us here in the land of Uncle Sam--where freedom reigns and no one really gives a shit about soccer. So why exactly did she make the move? Was she seeking a freedom from her 7th consecutive year of "studying abroad" in Vienna that could only be found in our great nation? Perhaps looking to escape the suffocating clutches of a country where languishing throughout the entirity of your 20's is socially acceptable? Guess again, friends: She moved here to live with her 40 year- old balding boyfriend who, when all was said and done, wasn't cute, rich, or interesting...and he didn't treat her all that great to boot. Um, and did I mention he is totally balding and old...? Because he is. Ew.

When things turned sour with Baldy, CIR decided to put everything back into that suitcase of hers and take it a couple of blocks over to Casa de Jessica (Which was totally fine- I needed the rent money). During the honeymoon stages of living in Roommatesville with CIR, we had some good times. The majority of them involving dangerous amounts of Chianti and singing Italian karaoke (I'm kind of awesome at "Que Sera, Sera"... And by "kind of", I mean that I'm freaking amazing!!). She was also the perfect wing-woman for me when we went out, as she added a bit of foreign flavor to otherwise ho-hum Midwest bars, but she still had "CRAZY LADY" written all over her, so no guy dared to get too close. Therefore, she would attract the prey with her "Vvvattt ess uur naame??" pick up line (the accent works every time!), and I then I would move in with my endearing charms and all around fabulousness. *sigh* Those were simpler times. Happy times. Everyone just seems more interesting when they have a foreigner with them, I guess...

Sadly, no amount of Kinder Buenos (they are my favorite and her parents mail them to her) or pasta dinners (she is a good cook, i'll give her that) can make up for the day I came home from work and walked into the kitchen to find one of the stove burners on. We have a gas stove, by the by. That means there were actually FLAMES involved, mmmk? Flames actually coming out of my stove. And just so we are all clear here, I'll spell it out: Bitch left the motherf*cking GAS STOVE ON!!! Uh, WHO DOES THAT?!? WHo forgets to TURN THE FLAME OFF??

CIR forgets to turn the flame off. She also forgets to turn the oven off (twice). And she doesn't think it's all that necessary to ever do her dishes, take out the trash, or purchase communal TP. I don't know why, but buying toilet paper seriously pisses me off. Well, wait, I DO know why. BECAUSE I PROBABLY COULD HAVE PURCHASED A SMALL ISLAND WITH ALL THE MONEY I"VE SUNK INTO TP THIS PAST YEAR. At the very least I should have bought some stock in Charmin, that is for sure.

And since I've started with the cleaning thing, I'll enlighten you about this little mini coffee thingy she has. Every morning, CIR wakes up and makes a coffee for herself using this gadget that i'm not even sure is legal in the U.S. to be honest, as i've never even seen anything like it in stores before. BUT I can tell you that it involves coffee grounds and boiling the coffee on the stove (which, as I mentioned above, she isn't so stellar at operating). And every morning, the coffee boils over onto the stove, leaving this skanky little pool of black coffee. Then CIR takes it off the stove (once it has boiled over for a minute or two) and dumps the grounds into the sink, dropping some on the floor on her way over. Never mind the fact there is a garbage roughly 3 inches from the stove. So, to re-cap: Coffee pool on stove; grounds on floor, in sink. And that is where they remain, for all of eternity.

Or at least until I get sick of living in filth and clean them up. Seriously, the last time i checked (i just did), it's wasn't my responsibility to clean up after this chick. But alas. Here we are.

Have I mentioned that I hate coffee? Because I do now.




*names have been changed, obvsly. Also, this an old story I wrote!

Family Dinners: Dessert and Pigs included

I have both fond and not so fond memories of family dinners. Don't we all?

As a preface, dinner at home were never boring. I quickly learned this at a young age when asked to eat over at friends' houses. Considering none of my friends had 4 younger siblings - the entertainment value for dinner at their houses was par for the course. On a given night at the Barcelona ranch you could hit 18 straight eagles.

Of this I will not complain. We always ate healthy, well balanced meals. We said Grace before each meal. We talked. Yes, we had actual human conversation at the table. (And now that we are all adults, we actually have discussions from time to time - that is, when we are all now in town to eat together). The best part of the meal was once you finished your plate you got dessert. It is because of this ritual that every evening now after cleaning my plate I long for something more- something sweet. Perhaps the occasional diet would actually be successful if this hadn't turned out to be sure a personal vice - that damn ice cream - it gets me every time.

On the sweet note of dessert lies one of the worst parts of dinner. When we were younger (and by younger, I refer to myself and two brothers) if you misbehaved not only did you get the "sting" and "tongue rolled between the teeth," but you also got something far more painful - No Treat Week. This was like the electric chair of punishments at the B. House.

Mom is an artist, even if she would never admit it. No Treat Weeks meant she would cleverly and very artfully create a mini-calendar of the week in which you would have no treats. That puppy got slapped on the fridge to remind you no sugar would touch your lips that week, and also so that the person who actually got you in trouble could rub it in your face all week. Although the mockery and the fridge art were not the worst of the punishment. The worst was knowing that you finished your plate and deserved to be rewarded in ounces of ice cream. Instead - you had to sit at the table and watch everyone else thoroughly enjoying their dessert. This is naturally when the bastard that got you in trouble would ham it up. "MMM this ice cream is so good - so rich- so creamy. It's a shame you hit me over the head with a baseball bat and you can't enjoy it... MMM." I have memories of being reduced to tears by this torture. To my parents credit, this punishment was genius. I don't remember having No Treat Weeks that often and when I did I regretted not getting away with the crime and just getting spanked.

Another very fond memory I have of the family dinner was the 'Pig Award.' This little 'game' was either invented for one of two reason (1) A younger sibling brought one of the farm animals - the pig - from her toy farm to the table on random dinner or (2) the rents were sick of our piggish behavior at the table. (Piggish behavior could, but was not limited to the following behavior: chewing with one's mouth open, wiping dirty face on sleeve, burping, putting elbows on the table, using fork like a shovel, eating with one's hands...etc.). Essentially the "Pig Award" was given out each dinner after everyone had eaten at least half of their meal. The award was given to the person with the most piggish manners. No lies - this was almost always one of my brothers. Almost always. At first the award was an insult. No one wanted the pig placed in front of his/her place. After a couple of weeks or so though it was no longer an insult, it became the "Pig Award Competition." Who could eat the most repulsively and get the award. We fought for that fat piece of plastic. The Pig Award was quickly retired by my parents and I am pretty sure there were No Treat Weeks issued to all under the age of 12. (That was all of us.)

Really when it comes down to it - dinner was always a good time. We all always ate together. We waited until Dad came home from work. The table would already be set and we'd eat. If we were in sports and Dad coached - (which was each of us at one point) then we waited then too. I think it for all these family dinners that I think all of my siblings and I actually like each other. We all also have a great appreciation for food. Amazing was some family QT can do to one's life.

On that note - I need some ice cream. I cleaned my plate Mommy, I promise.

Eat the Meat.

Most people are blessed with learning table manners early in life. Phrases such as: “Please pass the bread” or “May I have some more, spaghetti, please?” are considered courtesy phrases for most families, however, they are not at the Lauer table. You do not ask, you take. You do not wait, you act. Ideally as soon and swiftly as possible. Not that there wasn’t ever enough food to go around, but for some reason that threat always hung over your head. It’s a lot like riding the Chinatown bus from Boston – New York; there will always be a seat for you, but since there is a crowd swarming the door, you swarm too, just because maybe there won’t be a seat this one time. Or worse, you will get stuck sitting by the guy who is taking back 3 bags of (mostly) dead poultry. Ew.

But I digress.

Let me just state for the record I was born disgusted by meat. No joke. I eat it now, and ground meat and chicken on the bone still makes me a little queasy, but one of my earliest table memories is escaping the table with a napkin full of hamburger stuffed in my pocket so I could flush it down the toilet. Otherwise, I would face the penalty of sitting at the table in front of that damn hamburger “until I finished it”. Meat just disgusted me from the get go, and I have no idea why. Another fave method of disposing of meat was requesting to wear a bib at dinner, and slipping the meat into the pockets of it. I seriously must have been 3 years old, and I would like to think my parents were on to me. But who knows. At any rate, I can tell you that when you ask for a bib at the age of 7, the parents start to get suspicious.

Not eating meat in Wisconsin is simply unacceptable. End of story. So, despite my rejection of it every time it was served at the dinner table, it kept showing up on my plate. It makes so much sense to me as to why this happened when I think about it now as an adult: growing up more or less on the poverty line in rural Wisconsin meant that meat was in fact the most accessible and therefore affordable food. People hunt, and not only for themselves. People will hunt for their neighbors, too. And it isn’t for sport; it’s to get them through the winter. As in, they don’t have the money to purchase food sometimes, so they rely on the freezer of meat. It seems unbelievable, but every time I go home I am reminded that it in fact exists. This is a rather sensitive issue for me, and it is basically the main reason I want to punch those smug podium vegetarians/vegans in the face. Clearly I don’t care if someone chooses to not eat meat, I myself have just told you I couldn’t eat it before I could even comprehend issues such as “animal rights” or “standing up against mass production of foods” or “momentary food fads”. “Smug” and “Podium” are the key words in my distaste.

Again, I digress.

When I was still young and impressionable, whenever I would pick at the edge of gristle surrounding my meat, my dad would patiently remind me that that slimy white stuff actually “tasted like candy”. Um, really Dad? Candy? Because I’ve never seen candy that has looked like this before….

If you want to know the strangest thing about this whole meat debacle, it’s that I always asked for McDonald’s. I don’t even know how old I was before I ate at McDonald’s, or any other fast food place. They just weren’t around where we lived. However, my grandparents lived in the great metropolis of St. Paul, and every time we drove there, the 2 hours road trip included at least a 15 minute opening statement made my the kids (Me, Liz, Sarah, Nick…the early days, still…only 4 of us) on why we should -- no, why we NEED, to stop at McDonald’s. I imagine it was like how most kids beg to go to DisneyWorld. We just wanted to visit Micky D’s, for Christ sake. And every time, my Dad would say “but I can smell grandma’s cooking from here!” That was meant as a reassurance that food was on its way, but we didn’t take it as such (for obvious reasons….see last blog about jello…).

Anyway, I think it’s funny I craved a burger from Mc D’s, but would go to extreme lengths to not eat meat at home (I once barfed up a venison steak at the table). Now, of course, it’s all so clear to me: it wasn’t even craving meat, per say, but more the idea of that tiny burger. Once we finally got to go to McDonald’s I was probably like 11 years old, and every time after that when my Dad made burgers on the grill at home, I would request mine “McDonald’s style”: flat as fuck, and with all the flavor burnt out of them. As he is a bit of a meat connoisseur of German heritage who likes to make and smoke his own sausages and jerky, I can only look back on those days and say: Sorry about that, Dad….

Well, I’m off topic again.

The point about family meals is this: You take what you can get. And God help you if you ask for anything more.

Welcome to Today.

Yeah, so we've taken a short sabbatical (yeah, yeah... a couple of years....) to get our acts together. By "getting our acts" together, I mean we grew up. We traveled, we started paying more bills, we bought properties, we settled down.

We will be bantering back and forth about topics we both hold dear to our hearts. We are focusing on two of the things we love most in the world: food and talk. Though if there is one thing we know how to do, it is deviate from the topic. Sorry in advance.

We hope this blog will be a space for story-telling, but we want to primary focus on food, recipes, and our culinary - and other - (mis)adventures. After all, what can't food be connected to?? Even stories of our first kisses call to memory the smell of cheese curds and flavored Chapstick. GROSS, amiright??? We hope you'll be patient with us, and stick around for the ride!