Holidaze

The day after Christmas is always kind of lonely; I miss the contrived, pre-planned togetherness that eventually spawns actual feelings of togetherness. I miss making hot drinks last tasted or heard from in the 1949 novelty hit "I Yust Go Nuts at Christmas," and forcing them on friends and relatives. Worst of all, the holiday season is the only time when it is widely accepted to listen to Easy Listening shamltz (of which I have an abundance) and this precious time is almost over. Indulge, indulge, quickly while no one is judging!

"This is California. We can do anything we want to do."

I'm housesitting in San Francisco until January 3rd, lounging in a sort of artist's loft that I will never be able to afford, with sun streaming in through giant windows and attractive houseplants-- species unknown. The house belongs to kindred spirits, I can tell, because the cupboards are bursting with specialty teas and Beach Boys albums. I've only been here 2 days, but already I'm receiving a higher volume of calls than I have during the past 8 months. It's like I'm being born anew into the mythological California of my dreams, with a positive, Donovan-tinged understanding of the world and myself, and a loving community of friends! Either that, or the new vitamins I'm taking are POTENT. The animals I'm taking care of are uncommonly beautiful and well-behaved. The dog responds to commands. I didn't know dogs could actually do this. It's great! They also have some interesting reading material, including the 1990 yearbook of a now defunct college in Vermont (it was a Humanistic Psychology experiment and it failed) and one of the earliest copies of Our Bodies, Ourselves. Finally, I can gain a gentle, 1970s understanding of my body the way I would have liked to at the actual onset of puberty. In reality, I learned everything I know about sex from the school bully, but that's a story for another time and/or a licensed analyst.

You should come visit me while I have this outrageously sweet set up. Throw some flowers in your hair or some shit.
Recommended Reading: Richard Brautigan

Confession: I lack the attention span for NPR; love jello

If you are the sort of white person who has an art degree and whose heart lifts at the sound of the opening strain of the saxophone theme to All Things Considered, you might wrinkle your nose...oh woops, there I go alienating all 3 of my readers! Stay with me now!
This time of year always finds me thinking about my family's holiday menu, full of recipes plucked by my grandma from newspapers 40 years ago. The family holiday menu exists in a kind of 1960s Americana vortex. I didn't realize until I went to college that other people weren't eating Jello salads on Christmas-- that no one had eaten jello salad since 1983. When a marshmallow cream and cream cheese based fruit salad failed to produce the desired oohs and ahhs (and instead produced undisguised disdain) amongst my peers, I realized, with no small amount of shock, that my diet identified me as The Wrong Kind of White Person. Mainly for health reasons, and partially due to snobbery and embarrassment, I've wandered far and away from my food origins, trying, with a fairy-dust sprinkle of nutritional yeast, to make them disappear. Although I've learned to love health food as much as I formerly loved trash, there is no need to deny this part of myself. As a holiday homage to my now deceased Grandma Nina, I provide you with the recipe for Pretzel Salad. I dare you to make it-- though I'm warning you, this desert is in no way sanctioned by Terry Gross, and to your own horror, you'll probably love it.

Pretzel Salad
2 & 2/3 cups broken pretzels, in small pieces
1 & 1/2 cups margarine, melted
4 packages (3 ounces each) cream cheese, softened
1 & 1/4 cups sugar
1 container (9 ounces) whipped topping
1 package (6 ounces) strawberry jello
2 cups pineapple juice or water
1 large package frozen whole strawberries (no sugar added) or 2 to 3 cups fresh strawberries

Place pretzels and margarine in botton of 9X13 inch baking dish and bake 10 minutes at 400 degrees. Cool.
Mix cream cheese and sugar. Spread over top of lukewarm, baked pretzels. Spread whipped topping over cheese mixture. Chill.
Dissolve gelatin in boiling pineapple juice/water. Stir in strawberries and allow to thicken almost to jelled point. Spread over topping/cheese/pretzel layer and refrigerate until solid.

My Dearest Friends live thousands of miles away...

... and last week, we reunited in New York. We sang oldies while traipsing through the crisp, cold streets. We snuggled. We drank hot toddies. We stuffed ourselves with African delicacies. We recognized that some of the most seminal moments in our lives have been heralded by the arrival of Andrew W.K. We came up with hilarious premises and inside jokes too numerous (and possibly irritating) to mention here, though I'll give you one: live-action movie based off of everyone's least favorite comic strip, Cathy, starring Julia Louis-Dreyfuss (who gains weight for the role) as Cathy. Aack! I experienced a joy so pure that I felt compelled to make cornball proclamations like, "I love the fun that we have!" every few minutes. Loneliness, insomnia, and paralyzing analysis were annihilated in the face of friendship and belonging. I could enjoy the simpler pleasures:







doughnuts from Doughnut Plant in NYC, Dr. Bronner's Peppermint soap, D.H. Lawrence's The Rainbow, genmai-cha, the pictoral inspiration for my free perm, Sesame Street memories.

Theme Song 2k8

I thought for a few hours that I had pinkeye. I don't. Turned out to be a reaction to the mascara that ran into my eye after a challenging night at Club 2me. It is a tradition here in Sacramento, especially among Catholic school alums home from Chico/Cal Poly/LMU/Santa Clara for the holidays, to spend Thanksgiving Eve at Club 2me, a notorious East Sacramento dive bar. For reasons best explained by my facebook wall post (see left), I have declined to attend/tried to avoid/boycotted this event for the last 5 years. Feeling new boldness brought on, undoubtedly, by recent practice at this sort of thing, I decided to attend. You see, in the last two months, my social life has evolved (or devolved, depending on perspective) in a direction probably very typical of most people my age finding themselves back in their home town: on Friday and Saturday night I put on eye makeup and something too short or tight (quite a diversion from my usual), go out to bourgie bars to push through a sea of blue buttoned-down and Axe body-sprayed individuals towards a Vodka soda (or a shot of something that could be radioactive), then attempt to drink it quickly yet demurely whilst chatting with about 5 people from high school that were not my friends at the time but who are now staples, all the while wondering how the evening will play out in terms of flirtations, levels of inebriation, sleeping arrangements, and just what, exactly, will show up on the internet the next day to remind me of my fun if the headache and puzzling text messages fail to do so. To recap:

What I've Been Up To Lately:

• losing my identity in a shallow pool of alcohol
• attending a sort of weekly high school reunion
  

Mostly I'm just thrilled to be making intermittent eye contact with humans. It's been fun experimenting with a lifestyle that I never really tried in college. I do, however, find myself hankering after something more, or maybe something else. The casual levels of interaction made available through the bar scene, and the sort of defensiveness necessary to maintain that casualness is dissatisfying. This, and the desire for something (someone?) to add meaning is described perfectly by Roxy Music in "Mother of Pearl." I think of it as my theme for 2008. Skip the first 1:37 mins, unless you're like me and want to drink in Bryan Ferry for longer.


The search for perfection, your own predilection goes on and on and on and on...

What's your personal theme song for 2008?

Origins: My Name

One of my favorite talking points with my childhood best friend was that we were both named from The Thorn Birds, her after the main female character, Megan, and me after the actress who played her in the successful 1983 television miniseries, Rachel Ward. Our television origins (and zealous, competitive collecting of Garfield memorabilia) formed the crux of our inextricable best friend bond.

Best friend has since disappeared and I've since read the book several times, and am currently watching the miniseries as it's airing on Lifetime Movie Network.

I don't want to expose too much just in case you are poised there with your remote trying to OnDemand or TiVo this "event," but allow me to acquaint you briefly with the plot: Inordinately good-looking priest is banished to the Australian outback for breaking vows of obedience, takes forgotten daughter of large farm family under his wing out of pity, watches her blossom into beautiful, desirous woman before his very eyes. So there he is, graying attractively at the temples, wondering "Do I break some more vows or follow my all-too-earthly ambitions towards moving up the Catholic hierarchical ladder and into a handsome red cardinal's robe?" as Meggie/Rachel Ward shakes her sin-scented hair within inches of sniffing distance. If you are enticed at all by the soap-operatic, this book/miniseries is for you. Come on folks--forbidden sex! Getting gored by wild pigs! Barbara Stanwyk as cruel benefactress!

I'm always left with questions after the completion of this story. Namely, "Mom...Dad, what were you thinking, exactly, when naming me after this?" and "At what point did you equate 'taboo temptress' with 'our new baby girl?'"

Also, Megan, where are you? Not on the facebook, apparently. Do you still have your Garfield collection?

New Ways to Forget: Old School and R&B

Pharmaceutical-grade herbal mood stabilizers doing nothing? Up each night trying to silence that gnawing inner monologue with no success? Adopt the lyrics to "Boogie Nights" as your personal credo: "got to keep on dancin', keep on dancin'"--ignore your seasonal depression through incessant DANCE! Swap the word "dancin'" for "drinkin'" if you need to-- just make it your own! Use the following Dream Old School and R&B Playlist as your new guide to happy times!

1. Boogie Nights-Heatwave

2. I Like It- Debarge
3. Get Down on It- Kool & The Gang
4. Mary Jane- Rick James

5. Wishing On A Star- Rose Royce

6. I Wonder If I Take You Home- Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam
7. I Wanna Be Your Lover- Prince
8. Love Come Down- Evelyn Champagne King
9. Tell Me Something Good- Chaka Khan

10. Rock Steady- The Whispers
11. You Dropped A Bomb on Me- The Gap Band
12. No Parking on The Dance Floor- Midnight Star

13. Push It- Salt n Peppa

14. Special Lady- Ray, Goodman & Brown
15. Glamorous Life- Sheila E.
16. Tonight Is The Night- Betty Wright

Subliminal Loneliness, other ad mistakes

There is an ad for a laser skin treatment center that runs daily in my local paper. It has a picture of an attractive, smiling girl and says, in bold, "Reclaim Your Confidence." I consistently misread it as "Reclaim Your Co-Dependence." Yeah...

Also, I word on today's google ad: I'm not sure what about the content of my blog allowed Google to generate a "Yes on 8" ad, but this does not reflect my own sentiments. I am staunchly against Prop 8. Staunch, I tell you!