That one time I rode on Amtrak.
tweet thisFiled under: Everyday, family, food, humor, life
I never really bought into the sentiment of those Lionel train commercials. Have you ever seen those? Their propaganda touts this concrete belief that Americans have some highly wrought love affair with trains. They're usually spread all over the airwaves around this time, each year. Because nothing says Christmas quite like the stumble-trap of a miniature railroad system circling hour after hour around the base of your tree. My grandmother, she’s 93 as of yesterday, and she had this train set that she would year-in-year-out place around the Christmas tree, letting it silently circle on its tracks, beneath the Douglas Fir. Inevitably, she’d forget...
I can't die here, not this close to the Mennonite bakery.
Filed under: Deep South, faith, family, food, health
I think I almost died last Friday morning, right outside of Macon, Mississippi. The weather was atrocious, as it has been for the past two solid weeks; the rain was torrential (FYI: that's a word on My Favorite Words List, which I keep in my glove compartment), the wind was ridiculous, and the roads held pockets of watery vengeance...but that's not what I thought was I dying from. Because I'm a fairly safe driver. It's one of the good qualities I inherited from my father. I kept my cruise control right on 60 mph, stayed in the slow lane, and I'd successfully...
I accidentally punched her in the face: Tacoma Tales, Part 2
I'm a big fan of water. And not just for drinking. I love to be near, on, and in it. Each year, a group of friends and I make a sojourn to the beach and do little else than sit on the sand until we crisp. All for the sake of that liquid salvation. Sometimes, it's enough to just hear those waves, you know. I wait all year for this one week (usually in May, because no one is on this particular beach in May) constantly envisioning the glare of the sun from the sugar sand, salivating for the long evenings, lounging in...
It takes a Village and Xanax: Tacoma Tales, Part 1
Things I remember about Tacoma, and its people: 1) it's not Seattle; 2) I had to fly on a plane to get to it; 3) they fully believe in a Farmer's Market - despite the fact that, in my estimation, there were probably only two or three actual farmers at the market; 4) they want everywhere you turn to be something worth looking at; 5) so, that means there's a lot of random art and sculptures everywhere; 6) Sundays are just as dead there as here, and 7) did I mention I had to fly on a plane...
I was able to order my fish sandwich without incident.
I can no longer ignore the inevitable because Wednesday, June 24, is fast approaching. And that is the day in which I must board a plane. And fly to Memphis, in which, I will get off one plane and onto another one...and head to Tacoma. A city in a state so far away from here that it might as well not even be a part of the United States. Few other things make me as defensive or difficult as flying. Because I'm so afraid of it. Not just because I'm mean. Flying is something that I can safely hate. I become neurotic, distraught, maybe even mean...I'm...
Rasputin and the Fateful Finger Day
I: Confession I don't have many great qualities, I'd imagine (for instance, I find it increasingly difficult to even get a date, so I'm tempted to say that I must be lacking some crucial quality - unfortunately, it's a temptation I never give into. I know better). What I do have, and consider a good thing to have, is a large, uncontrollably malleable heart. Even if it's quite a fault of mine to have it, a liability. It's still not the worst thing to have. Then, again, I'm also ignorant about a great many things, and most often, after the initial shock of owning so much pathos, I tend to...
And, for the record, I really like my shower curtain.
Last night. Oh, my, last night... Full house. Standing ovation. Sheer exhaustion. After party. Kudos. The usuals. Totally worth it...all the rehearsals, which in this case were rather tightly thrown together and quickly so, and the lines...oh god, the lines...I've never been that close to Shakespeare (he seems standoffish like my cousin Jonathan - sure, sure, he'll speak, he'll pass you the potato salad if you ask him, but he won't really like doing it, and you'll be able to tell from the look on his face, but it'll be a private thing, not broadcast to the whole dinner table). But, last night, Shakespeare...
…tomatoes who show no pity.
I'm trying to go green, but the cats won't stay out of my small, slightly ergonomically designed box garden. I've considered several ways to get rid of them: BB guns (but that's hardly a green attitude); a tin pie pan tied to a 2x4 (but that would ruin the aesthetic); placing lime, lemon, and orange rinds around the exterior (my fading grandmother with all her southern gentility and, now, senility, swears this is a feline deterrent - I'm highly doubtful and so have yet to choose this option); or simply leaving Max in the yard (he's a 100+ pound white German...
Advertise With Us
