The Gospel According to Winifred

Dormancy

2010-03-22T20:12:00.000-07:00

When I began The Gospel According to Winifred in 2007, I hoped to create a space on the Internet where my mother could share her opinions. (She asked that she remained anonymous.) I had planned that if I started writing, she would eventually follow in my footsteps and post herself.

I provided written instructions for signing in to Blogger and posting content. I also offered to transcribe posts for her or copy and paste from e-mails she sent. (This seems logical, since many posts are taken from family e-mails she sent. When the screws were turned, she decided to call e-mails she wrote “blogs” instead.)

Winifred has Facebook—and her own Twitter account—now. I am very busy explaining the difference between status updates, Tweets, and wall posts. I am also explaining what a wall post is, what a news feed is, and encouraging Winifred not to back out on a status update, as she sometimes thinks all 11 of her friends constitute as too many people to know her opinion. (This is unfortunate, as most of my friend have rallied, requesting her friendship via social networking.)

I am currently busy job hunting and managing my own blogs. I am hoping to launch a cooking blog soon, and am busy writing educational and informative articles regarding technology and pop culture for adults. (I also hoped that blog would encourage Winifred to post.) Because I live at home, I am privy to my mother's funny, insightful, and revolutionary ideas (ask her about New Moon). Unfortunately, I do not receive her family e-mails (not blogs), and am unable to lazily use them for blog posts.

I hope Winifred will join the blogosphere one day. Until then, I hope you enjoy the archives.

Signed,
Your Captain

2009-07-01T16:01:00.000-07:00

Winifred joined Twitter (@WinifredQ) and today she hilariously wrote:

It is FULL OUT WAR!about 3 hours ago from web

A mole desperately wants to take up residence in my flower bed. I have gently suggested a variety of relocations to him to no avail, so ...about 3 hours ago from web

Hopefully she will keep up with Twitter. Since she never found regular blogging interesting...

2009-04-20T11:26:00.001-07:00

Emily is in town this week, and she helped Mom pack my lunch for work last night. (Yes, I know, I am old enough, but when someone says, “I took last week’s leftovers, put it into a Gladware container, and it’s in a brown bag in the fridge,” a person DOES NOT SAY NO.) And she wrote me a note!

Dude!

Enjoy your lunch, don’t work too hard.

It’s my first note since elementary school.

Yes, I tacked it to my cubicle wall.

She'll get her vitamins elsewhere, haters!

2009-03-25T18:10:00.001-07:00

Winifred sent this a few weeks ago. This is a new story to me, and has brought to light that my grandmother would boycott anyone, proving that my ability to drop anything (Domino's, Nike, The Frito Lay Company/Pepsi/PepsiCo...it goes on and on) may be genetic. Of course, this incident is far more important, and helped bring down Anita Bryant.

Hello Girls,

As it happens, Aunt [Ina], Dad, and I watched Milk last night. Aunt [Ina] and I were discussing it today. She casually dropped this comment into the conversation: "Do you remember when Mom was so angry with Anita Bryant, her railing was not enough--she boycotted the orange juice?" Well, NO, I do not remember this, as I was not living in the home at the time. Of course, Ina was not living there either. I KNEW you would want to know this bit of info about Grandma.

Love, MOM

That's My Mom!

2009-03-25T18:01:00.000-07:00

I'm not allowed to talk about controvery after 8:00 p.m. EST but I took a chance and held a pop quiz at 9:01 p.m. EST and asked my mom the following: Would you go on TV and ask why lesbians why they don't date women who look like men?

My mother was so astounded by the stupidity that her head began to tilt under the weight of sheer stupidity. I forced her to high five me, gave her an A+ and a gold star and yelled, "THAT'S MY MOM! YOU'RE WAY SMARTER THAN OPRAH!"

As I scampered into the distance Mom said she'd always hoped to surpass Oprah.

Fun fact! Mom doesn't subscribe to O, and sometimes she brings it home for the library for recipes or the special feature (when it's about books).

Related articles:
Oprah Asks: If Lesbians Like Women, Why Do They Date Women Who Don't Look Like Women?, Jezabel (You can watch the video but have a drink handy)
O Magazine Discovers New Trend: Lesbians!, Jezabel
Why Women Are Leaving Men for Other Women, O (this is only safe for weekend drinking)

Christmas Letters, Maybe I'll Write One

2008-10-30T13:39:00.000-07:00

To my knowledge, my mother (and father) has never sent a Christmas letter.

They could, if they wanted. It would look something like this:

Captain graduated from X University in the May. Emily visited from Pacific Northwest for the festivities and took all of us winetasting in Virginia before she left.

Charlotte and Emily are happily married to their husbands.

Okay, it would look nothing like that. I can’t even finish the mock letter because it so quickly has descended into “These are the accomplishments of my children! Graduating and married life!” As if Winifred would write, “Now I am waiting anxiously for my daughters to bear me a brood of grandchildren.” BLECH.

Plied with enough wine I could do better, if anyone wants my services. I’ll stray from domestic events and focus on the events in your career and community. I’ll include how patriotic you were when you didn’t vote for John McCain.

Winifred doesn’t write Christmas letters because she doesn’t need for her children to compete against the morons Winifred knows. (Which is my way of saying, we really enjoy the letters we receive from our family, which does not contain a single moron. I especially enjoy Aunt Ina’s letters.)

And because we do not write letters, we only receive the good letters, sparing the face-to-palm action caused by the parents of morons. Morons like Michelle Bachmann, Republican Representative of Minnesota.

Before I continue, now seems like a great time to urge, beg, plead, and bargain with Minnesotans to vote her out of office. I know that Minnesota is full of bright, friendly, charming, and intelligent people. I expect those people to eradicate her career. Now.

Bachmann’s letter from 2003 has surfaced. She doesn’t drone on about anti-Americans. Instead she extols the feminine virtues of her daughters and makes it her mission to find her son a subservient woman. (Lady would change her mind if she saw Audition, don’t you think?)*

In short, Winifred would never do the following:

Refer to her teenager as an “fantasy treasure” for the opposite gender

Refer to any of her children as “Utter Perfection”

Disclose the size of our bodies or clothes (unsurprisingly, Bachmann applies this only to her daughter)

Refer to her kid as a “magnet” or “magnate” (this is listed as [sic] but I suspect Bachmann knows what she’s doing—wouldn’t it be fabulous if her son owned women? Her daughters are property, collectible like Monopoly tiles, I wouldn’t put it past her) for the opposite gender

Patronize any of us as “organized,” a desireable attribute for the woman who will run day run her husband’s life, those silly men can’t organize their way out of a paper bag! To be fair, Emily is the only one with the life skills for organization. Charlotte and I don’t stand a change against her refined and mature skills. Apparently his hasn’t devastated Charlotte’s aptitude for marriage, though it did set back my family one goat.

Announce our inadequacies in landing a man. If Winifred did, it would be a long letter this year, detailing the failings of her last remaining unwed single daughter.

Relate her children to the participant of a harem. Nay a Boleyn here!

Future wives of Bachmann’s children, beware! You will clean up behind the slob, be expected to dance, often and well, have dinner on the table when he comes home, financially support him through medical school, and support him emotionally. Snap, this is where Daniel Abraham got it from! Fox News and Michelle Bachmann! Future husbands, you know what your ladies are being groomed for.

And, because I wasn’t born to Bachmann’s family, we’d never be able to announce that The King had opened some Christian-themed loony center, and Winifred would never brag about her cleaning habits. Of course, not only will Winifred never do any of this out of principle (we’re private people, except you know, the one on the Internet), but she’s too busy reading a book. Bachmann could benefit from a reading list, no?

*Charlotte, that was kind of for you.

I've turned into my mother

2008-09-30T07:13:00.000-07:00

Winifred likes to remind people—as frequently as possible—that the killer’s in Fargo WERE. NOT. FROM. NORTH. DAKOTA.

Then, to goad her, I remind her of that one time, how that old cranky man was in somebody’s yard causing a scene, and someone hit him with a shovel!

The shovel incident happened more than thirty years ago. Maybe more than fifty years ago, and she likes to add, “He had it coming. That old man was cranky!” This would seem harsh unless you know my grandfather, who never raises his voice or freaks out about anything. (By comparison it takes only a sound bite of John McCain or Sarah Palin to get me worked up and freaked out.) You could say that Grandpa’s age is a factor, but to Winifred’s recollection, he’s only been mad twice. And she wasn’t even living at home the second time because she was in the Army! (She just got to hear about it, as older sisters often do.)

But I digress. Among Winifred’s other claims that life is peaceful and non-violent in North Dakota: No one has ever been deliberately poisoned in the last fifty years (so far no evidence holds up), there are no pedophiles (as compared to the “fictional” town in Downtown Owl), and the firefighters exist to get cats out of trees. Gas is always eighty-nine cents a gallon. Everyone is voting for Obama to make up for how insane South Dakota is, etc.

This predilection has driven me crazy because it ruins the idea that The Grass is Greener on the Other Side. Yeah, the grass is green, but I bet the meatloaf in that kitchen sucks, and I bet the cable reception is lousy. I’ll eat the cooking here, watch my television under the comfort of my own blankets, and bask in the imperfections of my life here. And if you allege that somewhere, anywhere, things are perfect, it makes my imperfect little life look… well, kind of crappy. And I like my life! I like my quirky cast of characters, the way Metro is always slow, and how even the rampant problems of Baltimore have a gleam of charm.

But without meaning to I’ve set out to defend Baltimore, guns-a-blazin’. My friend IMmed me an article and included his comment: “THIS IS WHY I HATE BALTIMORE.” That’s not the right way to start a conversation. I didn’t even read the article before I set out in ALL CAPS to let him know that this isn’t even Baltimore County! This is Calvert County! “SAME THING,” he said.

It was all downhill from there as I had to set him straight. My Baltimore, which yes, had murdered a former council man last week (to my infinite grief), was NOT the same as Calvert County. God, had I even been to Calvert County?! (Not really, only to travel through it.) Moreover, the clearly disturbed woman had never even lived in Baltimore! City or County! She’s from Godforsaken Rockville! Rockville is where dreams to go die in a hell of suburbia! We have our own problems that we’re fixing (crime has dropped compared to rates last year, there are plans to bring truants back to school, etc.) don’t add any more!

Oh. Wow, did I get a little out of control, there? Maybe a little too defensive? May I have implied that My Baltimore is sunshine and lollipops? Because it is, you know.

Palin Population

2008-09-23T09:29:00.000-07:00

Winifred is from a small town in North Dakota. ND is a big state, and there are (shockingly) many people from The Peace Garden in my hometown, home state, and general tri-state area. ND is so big you could fill it with 5.7 of mine. It’s also so sparsely populated that you could fit ND’s population into mine 8.7 times. (That’s all the math I’m doing today, folks!)

Winifred is fiercely protective of the Peace Garden State. If you are a lone stranger to the Quimby family (unlikely), keep that in mind:

Me: According to Approximately as many people as Wasill a, Adobe employs as many people as the population of Wasilla.

Winifred: And how many people is that?

Me: Willa has 6,000. Adobe has 6,959. That’s almost a thousand more than Wasilla!

Winifred: …

Me: So she’s not qualified to run Adobe! Or be the mayor of [redacted], your hometown!

Winifred: Really? [To population not qualification]

Me: Yeah! [Redacted, ND] has 16,000+!

Winifred: And how many people are in Wasilla? You’ve been to [redacted], it’s a small town.

Me: 6,000! I looked up [redacted] last night to compare it to Wyndmere. Wyndmere is where Chuck Klosterman is from. He grew up on a farm in a town with 533 people! And they weren’t all old, either!

Winifred: Hey! [Redacted] has way more people than Wasilla.

Me: Yeah!

Winifred: That’s great!

Me: I wonder what the population of Alaska is if it’s the 47^th least populated state. 683,478! …Oh. North Dakota is the 48^th least populated. Darn. I wanted Alaska to have less than 16,000 people.

Winifred: That’s…not possible.

Me: I wonder how many people live in our hometown! 57,000! That’s way more than in North Dakota.

Winifred: Hey!

Me: And way too many people for Sarah Palin!

2008-09-22T19:12:00.000-07:00

=

I found this video post in the Inspiration on Sweet Juniper. It's by John and Faith Hubley, and they recorded their children and would later animate their conversations. (Jim posted about this a year ago with Cockaboody, and linked to my favorite, Moon Bird.) I dispensing it because the conversations of the Hubley children, Emily and Georgia, remind me of Charlotte and Emily. Or in this case (princesses!), Charlotte and Captain or Emily and Captain. And as an added bonus, this is the kind of animation I preferred when I was little, the weird squiggly vintage episodes of Sesame Street.

2008-09-20T16:06:00.000-07:00

Dear Internet,
Last Saturday Winifred dragged me into the puppy store in the mall to look at the pets. Then she reminded me that because she doesn't want to see me happy, I couldn't take home the Boston Terrier, even though I really want one.

Today she said we were going to have ice cream later, which meant we were going to the local establishment, which has the BEST ice cream. When we came home she went out side for two hours to read (most of it was spent on her phone). When she returned she said "that ship had sailed." She sunk it herself, apparently, without telling me.

These two examples are proof that Winifred must not love me. What a tease.

Love,
Captain

2008-08-30T08:47:00.000-07:00

If you watch the jaw of John while Sarah is talking about shattering the glass ceiling, you will see, aside from the fake smile, a clench and a twitch. Talk about body language!

We Are Not Puppets

2008-08-29T17:12:00.001-07:00

Dear John,

Do not think picking a woman for your running mate will bring any Hillary supporters to your side. Do not underestimate our intelligence. Do you think Sarah Palin "worked hard enough" for her position? Did she simply "work harder"? Is that what attracted you to her? Or was it her Penecostal--Assembly of God religious affiliation? Did you think we needed another John Ashcroft slap in the face? Perhaps it was because her son is in the Army? Since the two of you are so interested in saving the unborn from abortion will she show some consideration now for the lives of the soldiers you are so interested in keeping in the fight? Do you really think the intelligent women of America will vote for you because you have chosen a female running mate and not realize the age longevity in your family? Do we not know you have a certain amount of longevity in your family? We know your 96 year old mother is still tooling around C hevy Chase, getting speeding tickets. Do you think we don't know just how often a vice-president actually takes over the office of the presidency? Do you really think we believe,with your history with women, that you will actually ask Gov. Palin what she thinks? Even if you did, we don't care what she thinks--we already know! Please do not think you have pulled the puppet strings of women in America simply by choosing a token for your running mate. Will you help her look at herself in the mirror when she realizes you are pulling those strings? We are no longer available for your slaps in the face. Do not count us out. We are female Weebles--we may wobble but we don't fall down.

STAY AWAKE! MY CHILDREN NEED YOU

2008-07-23T19:36:00.000-07:00

Winifred loves Sarah Plain and Tall. Emily does too, so I'll demure with a polite, "And I do not." I look up from the laptop and find Glenn Close, Sarah, has fallen in the snow. She trudged in the snowstorm in the dead of night (2 a.m., approximately, but it's 1918 so I'll gladly take a 10 p.m.) and is found in the morning light (about 8 a.m.) It's the MidWest, people, so she should be DEAD.

I gasp.
And Winifred says, "It's Glenn Close! They won't kill Glenn Close!"

Really? What about Michael Douglas?

BEEP BEEP

2008-07-06T10:33:00.000-07:00

Winifred is at the grocery store and I am supposed to be ready to leave when she returns. She promised the honk when she got to the driveway, and I am supposed to rush outside, rush inside, put away the cold items (deli meats, milk, butter, et al.) and dive to the front seat. Coupons for our expedition, notebook, pens, and cell phones should already be in my purse; makeup already applied.

My aunt had a date one night and her date honked from the driveway. Ina went outside to meet him but didn't reach the car before Winifred drove outside to accost the young man. My aunt was a fox, so this behavior was strangely commonplace, but an enraged Winifred forced her sister inside and made the young man come to the front door, meet Winifred properly, and ask for Ina.

You can bet all Hellboy would break loose if a boy I was seeing honked in our driveway. When Winifred honks I'm going to stay inside and wait for a proper introduction.

An Emotionless Wonder

2008-06-23T20:36:00.000-07:00

In the interest of watching as many tearjerkers as emotionally possible ("Mellodrama," June 9) Winifred and I watched Grave of the Fireflies. We tried to watch The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants but couldn't find it, but I found this and The History Boys, which seemed to at least cover a few bases (teens, drama, angst) but to my surprise we chose the 1998 Japanese animated happiness killer that Charlotte "warned" us against.
Allow me to digress: Charlotte told me to see this movie years ago, against the protest of her now-husband. (See "now?" That's how long ago it was!) She warned us repeatedly that we should plan wholeseome uplifting activities to follow (I've found that my father owns Blades of Glory) that may or may not lift my temporary grief. Actually, it's not that bad. It's that Winifred isn't affected.
Her defense is fair: "I thought I had another 90 minutes to go," she says. Our DVD said 159 minute run time and when we hit the pinnacle of the sadness (mind that I was fighting tears from the first ten minutes, and I've now seen the first 40 minutes twice) it wasn't even an hour and twenty minutes into the film. So Winifred had braced herself for more devastation than had already occurred, and after a montage...the credits rolled. And the end, she called her daughters and chatted gaily and just moved on.
Maybe I'm not being fair. Winifred found several heart-wrenching notes that were written when Emily and Charlotte were little. They include

Can you avery gave me a bark? I'm the only little girl for a littele time.
(the back: 23 Oct 85 Can you ever give me a break? I'm only a little girl for a little time. [Emily])

and this one, which forced Winifred to call Charlotte as soon as it was read, or, "I just would not sleep tonight."

Mom- I still want a blond corn-silk kid. Love, [Charlotte]
(dated Oct 1986)

Huh. Still.
Oh, Part 2? I would have presented it tonight, but in light of Winifred's heartlessness, a positive post seems, I don't know... inappropriate.

[Update: It's been about two hours and I haven't thought about the devastation for at least fifteen minutes. Maybe I can see Dancer in the Dark and live to tell about it. By the way, have I made it obvious or mentioned it? I cry through animal movies, too.]

Failed Empathy, Part 1 of 2

2008-06-20T23:31:00.000-07:00

I was justifiably incorrigible at dinner tonight and instead of yelling at 1/3 of the newscast I openly gnashed at every news story that dared cross my path. This week I have refrained from yelling at news stories that were not about John McCain, his irritating wife Cindy McCain, Michelle Obama’s Fist Bump (She doesn’t wear pantyhose! We’re going to high five, soon.*), the mayor’s misspending, and gas prices. This leaves room for public transportation, corralling DC residents to their neighborhoods, retiring bus drivers, and foreclosures. Also shootings, school closings, and the weather.
But if I’m going to be persistent in this negative attitude I’m going to go all out, which includes skipping dessert because I don’t feel like eating things that bring me joy and pouting while clearing the table two activities which are rather difficult to multitask.
This sort of sulking means I went to my room to wallow and missed Winifred’s in-depth conversation about funnel cakes and Emily’s life-long best friend’s week-long dedication to fried sweets. I did, however, hear the King’s booming suggestion as I left the half-loaded dishwasher that we all go to the carnival and visit Emily’s life-long best friend as she serves fried dough! That sounds great, right?! Right?! Isn’t that fun, Captain?! It’s good to know in the face of hard time that your father knows the best pick me up is in people-watching with the aid of crisp golden treats.
The enthusiasm is doubled at my undying love for carnivals, as these open-air festival are an American testament to summer existing as the single most important season. It represents a sense of community while simultaneously trotting out a variety of characters: parents, children, the elderly, teenagers—both the sweet and the sort that are up to no good—large families, young professionals, and the weird people that don’t seem to exist during the rest of the year (except during Christmas rush at the mall). I spend every summer attempting to capture the spirit of the small-town carnival through my lens, so when Winifred promised a carnival, I amassed no less than five and agreed to wear bug repellant, because even at a surly moment I find myself dedicated to My Art. Her promised also said, I personally empathize with your inner angst and would like to relieve your trouble by way of this adventure.
The town we drove to is at least thirty minutes away. I know this because when I was 19, all of my friends lived in this town. They lived down shoddy dirt roads or in nice gated communities and inevitably, as the sun had set, I was on the wrong half-lane road without cellular service, and as I made a tight three-point turn, wondered how much trouble I would be in if I was found hung by a tree like an urban legend over the hood of my mother’s car. I hoped in this event I wouldn’t survive because after Winifred drove an hour to her car, I would be in so much trouble I’d wish away my life. When I wasn’t dreading an early demise I’d find myself wishing my life away as I neared the city limits, which meant I was only...twenty unbearable minutes from home.
I soldiered on, dear reader, as a buoyant Winifred described our good fortune: funnel cakes, old friends, and whirring lights! Long grass to swish through in jeans, I imagined, and mild weather devoid of humidity. Have you had a funnel cake in humidity? It gets lumpy, flat, and moist as soon as it exits the fryer and half the joy you taste is imagined. If you go into the dish without hope it tastes revolting. Providentially luck was ours was great weather.
Our trouble began when Winifred started to exit near a town thirty minutes in the direction from our true destination, and continued near an exit for Baltimore. “Just pretend you are driving to DC,” I insisted, and then, later, “Pretend you are driving to College Park!” As if, perhaps, she would revert to an old standby from visiting Emily in college. Finally, I adopted the mantra, “Drive like you are going to the Metro, but get off at the labeled exit.” The mantra continued for several exits, long after we were on the correct ramp and I was directing Winifred to the stop light, through a traffic circle, and to a byway.
There has been some previous questioning as to my veracity through these steps, and I begin to doubt my memory as we slowed to the elementary school where the community parks. As we passed the school and a large red signboard labeled PARKING I wailed, “There’s no carnival!”
We passed the empty grounds in slow motion and I began to whine, inconsolably. “There’s no carnival, Mom. Mom, where is the carnival. Mom, this is the school, you said there was a carnival!” I begin to wonder if I can cajole her to the 711 near the highway exit for an INCREDIBLE GULP.**
So much for bringing me true happiness, Winifred! The carnival in this town isn’t until July. We’d driven to empty fields, existing without purpose.
“There is a carnival,” Winifred promised, alluding to the widely known truth—as sure as we understand gravity—that somewhere, anywhere a town is hosting its carnival. During the month of June every night is a carnival night somewhere, which means that if one plans appropriately the entire month (and some years, full summers) is carnival night. This would rely on attending some towns more than one night, but in the face of whirligigs, bingo, and fried chicken, this isn’t a problem but an added bonus.
In due time, Winifred located the problem: she had presumed the wrong town. We found the carnival, but not without my share of heartbreaking. (After all of that she needed directions to the next town and I even knew how to get there!) When we arrived, I waited to turn the corner and find that the carnival had packed up and moved out the night before. It hadn’t, but we first passed a sign that mistakenly read “FIREFIGHTER CARNIVAL JUNE 1-2” and in one last dying gasp I bemoaned, “IT CLOSED JUNE SECOND!”
Thereafter I collapsed from emotional exhaustion and missed the whole thing.

*Short story: When we found Emily’s wedding dress after less than an hour in the mall, and only twenty minutes of try-ons, Charlotte turned to us out of the store’s entrance and raised her fists. I stared blankly, because though I was 19, I hadn’t been to enough keg parties to have bumped fists with any broskis, and was still really into high fiving. (I also had fire engine red hair and a handful of straight edge tee shirts. It was trying archaic times.) Charlotte confidently yet demurely inched her fist forward, “Come on,” she said, “High fiving is out.” I was deeply shamed, as everyone’s clenched fist bumped at once—Winfred’s included—as Winifred shouted, “Yeah! High fiving is so lame!”
A minute later Winifred asked what “that” was called and suggested a term I would re-print here, but it is so hilarious that I will save it for my novel. Also, Winifred’s friends are reading (sorry, mature responsible adults!) and it’s a story best for happy hours, workplaces, and my-mom-is-more-awkward-than-your-mom. It also works best in a trilogy.
Walking downtown yesterday my friend and I high fived. Internet, I remain lame three—almost four—years later.

**Exactly what it sounds like: The Hulk merchandised over a BIG GULP. Except that’s the only size that is GREEN against a sea of red plastic cups. INCREDIBLE GULP, GET IT? I am a fool for your marketing, Marvel. Ultimately I was denied the Incredible Gulp.

Mellowdrama

2008-06-09T11:01:00.000-07:00

Winifred and I kicked off the summer Saturday by watching our first melodrama of the season. Every summer in the Quimby home includes a marathon of black and white dramatic talkies. In 2003 we plowed through nearly every Hepburn movie we could as a dedication to Katharine Hepburn's pants-filled legacy, a filmfest I consider a tremendous victory because most of her movies were filled with laughs (and bonus feminism) instead of tears (Philadelphia Story and Woman of the Year were the focus).
Unfortunately the crux of a melodrama is that it will break your heart, toy with your emotions, crush your soul, and force you to question all that you truly know about humanity. Fortunately Winifred allows comedies (classic, of course) to soothe my fragile emotional state.

We started with Leave Her to Heaven, 1945 technicolor classic that is part of my personal collection. (It's beneficial to alphabetize your VHS and DVD collections! Who knew?) Delightfully over-the-top, Leave Her to Heaven is based on a novel of the same name by Ben Ames Williams. The trailer:

During the movie I tried to compile a short list of films for us to watch as the summer continues. We usually go to Charlotte, who holds a Masters in film criticism, but the truth is that we never get to the movies, and then we hurt her feelings, and we don't like letting her down. (Moreover, the films on the list have been reccomended by Charlotte before.) It was several years before we watched The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, and if only we'd rented when she told us to we wouldn't have waited years for our lives to change forever.

In Alphabetical Order:

All That Heaven Allows (allegedly part of the inspiration for another family favorite, Far From Heaven)
Back Street (1961)
Rules of the Game (1939)
Touch of Evil
Wings of Desire

We're watching Back Street again, though it will most certainly kill me. IMDB alludes to three versions of the Fannie Hurst tragedy, which seems unfathomable that the ultimate heartbreaking film could be re-made and re-made. With that much dedication over the centuries you'd think someone would have stepped up in the 90s and made another. I'd work on getting it financed but I feel too conflicted. First, if a Fannie Hurst movie is going to be made into a movie for wide release in our modern world, I'd nominate Imitation of Life first. (It's marginally less emotionally devastating.) Second, I feel conflicted over Back Street. Our heroine is a feminist icon yet she sacrifices her personal life for her career--not a message I'm willing to promote--and then suffers again and again at the hands of the man who loves her--but is unable to shrug his wife (a character who demeans the image of women everywhere) and her prize for her undying love is some other dude's kids! Oh, GAWD, WHERE ARE THE TISSUES, I CAN'T HANDLE THIS.

My retribution for the intense pain I've agreed to again withstand is forcing--if I can--Winifred to watch Rules of the Game. It's not really a melodrama, instead it's a strong, passionate film exploring social class, war, impending doom, government...a movie that leaves me empty yet full of dispair. It's probably an unhealthy obsession, yet on par with Winifred's love for all-things-Fannie Hurst which seems, ya know, fair:

Didya see that trailer? Mystery! Intrigue! That comes pretty close to the sensationalism of a melodrama, no? Post-script: a big part of a melodrama are indiscretions and adulterous affairs built on True Love, which just happens to be a major plot point of Rules of the Game. (I WIN.)

We could watch melodramas intermittenly through the year, too, but it's not nearly as much fun. (When I had the flu Winifred and I watched Martian Child and under the influence of medication it was as emotionally destructive as a melodrama, so we can win with that, right?)

As for Touch of Evil, any film the Coen brothers call "disturbing" sounds like a great idea to me. Wouldya look at that typeface? It screams drama! Plus the trailer includes explosions with its mystery, intrigue, and hysterical screaming. I think it's a tease to show an introdcutory film class the opening of the film and not the rest of the film, but I'll willingly do the same to you:

I know that's a lot of videos I've forced you to watch but it's still June and I think we can do it. There are other movies too, and we've promised Charlotte to wait for her. (But I can't find those few movies right now.)

2008-05-07T20:22:00.000-07:00

John McCain--who drives me absolutely crazy*--is on The Daily Show wearing a blue oxford shirt.

The King--who I said I wouldn't talk about here, but I guess I'm a big liar--has consistently worn blue shirts to formal occasions for my entire life. Weddings, funerals, obligatory church services, honors and awards, commencements, graduations, meet-the-parents, anniversary dates with Winifred, rehearsal dinners, baptisms (I presume, I didn't go to any), formal occasions that involved green bean caserole and plated ham, convocations, first communions, indoctrinations...I'm thinking of a nice way to order my father to wear a blue shirt for my graduation. (Because it's My Special Day and apparently, I think I'm entitled to boss people around!)

The King looks good in blue because it brings out his bright steely eyes. Also, The King has to wear a white shirt and a tie to his Real People job everyday, and even though he looks good dressed up, we subconsciously want him to have some freedom from obligatory family celebrations that forced him to take the day off. Like my graduation, which I presume he has called-out for. (DON'T WORRY, I KNOW HE HAS.)

John McCain needs to remove that shirt, posthaste. He has a dirty record, and only clean souls destined for heaven--and future paramours with blue eyes--can wear the blue shirt. Don't look at me like that! I'm making no promises that my future husband(s) are destined for the Lord. That's a lot of responsibility. POST HASTE, OLDY MCMOLDY.

Jon just told McCain to make his running mate Hillary Clinton. McCain's brain is going to from the explode from the suggestion. Dude, it's unbecoming to get Brain Matter on the Blue Shirt. Don't even think about it.

*I have threatened to find employment outside the United States if he wins, and I intend to act on it and spend the next eight years acquiring a new citizenship. I. Am. Not. Joking.

A Perfect Fit

2008-04-24T20:49:00.000-07:00

I’ll invariably tell my friends a somewhat unflattering story about myself, a story that will end with a witty comment my mother makes, eviscerating my unseemly behavior, and the guffaws end, my friends say, “Wow, you have a great relationship with your mother. I could never do that with my mom.”
And I always want to ask if they can’t talk about farting passing gas bodily functions, because that’s the one thing I’ve always desired in my relationship with Winifred. I’ve also desired her leniency when it came to letting me get a puppy, but she made up for her harsh, Ms. Trunchbull-like ways last year when she lovingly promised one day the Right Dog for Me would come at the Right Time. Which is better than the feeling Carrie Bradshaws of the world get when they watch a Lifetime movie and the erstwhile heroine realizes when she’s ready to quit her career The Man will Come. That was harsh, wasn’t it? That happens when I digress.
Or hang out with Winifred!
And that’s my point.
Winifred came to Collegetown this afternoon to linger the campus while I presented a four part large-scale photographically based series examining the process and psychological relationship with mortality, decay, and interpersonal relationships. When I finished my requisite hour of question answering and explaining (by the way: it was fun, exhilarating, and satisfying!) we disappeared into the city. First we went to the BMA to see its new photography exhibit. And then we slipped through rush hour traffic to Sofi’s, a crepery that has stolen my heart.

I’ve been looking forward today for months. First, because it marks the end of this seemingly infinite project. It signals the end of the class that I’ve been working in, and is the gallery opening for a piece from the series. But when I said hey, let’s hang out in those hours between my demo and the gallery opening, and Winifred said, sure thing! I knew I’d have the fun I’d been yearning for since October. Wednesday night I walked around my apartment, wondering if I ordered one sweet crepe, and Winifred ordered one savory crepe, if we could enjoy both sides of the menu and still satisfy our needs. I’m a fly by her pants kind of girl when it comes to Sofi’s, picking which side I’ll order from when I belly up to their tiny counter, impulsively picking a menu half that will satisfy my needs. Inevitably I choose the sweet side.

As we parked Winifred asked if I’d acquiesce her brilliant idea: would I mind if we ordered one of each and split both, thus getting one crepe each and the kinds we wanted?
Heck yes, I’d do that!
It was another moment in which the heavens opened and reminded me that in spite of often feeling like I spend the majority of my days explaining again what my thought process was and why it makes sense to me that no, there is someone on the same plane as I am! And better to have that person thinking about maximum crepe exposure than giant squids, right?

It gets better, of course. Charlotte met us in Collegetown too, and we all went to my gallery opening together, and as if I hadn't already been so ribald in the company of Winifred--which I do in public, I talk about all of my weird dreams, how people have annoyed me lately--I became down right scurrilous in the company of Charlotte.
It's a natural change, from polite and quietly seething to the open giggling and theoretical discussions we hold. Or, even better, stories of life in North Dakota or Charlotte's college years. And when we were all done we got out of the car to say our goodbyes in front of my apartment and accidentally talked about politics for an extended period of time.
It makes sense of me to do that. To talk about politics, birth control advertisements, and why it is that McCain shouldn't be president. I think, without a family that was okay with that--an open discussion of anything, without any "reason" why--I'd be fairly miserable.

Oh! We split one chicken curry crepe (picture) and one apple crisp crepe. Real apples, people! Not canned.

OVERHEARD IDIOCY

2008-04-17T09:47:00.000-07:00

I like to think that I am, occasionally, a practical person. Or at least operating with some minor level of common sense when I'm not a raving lunatic, and I think the best way to prove this is that I've managed to get by financially in part to a long, seemingly neverending string of on-campus jobs while I've been a college student. Generally these positions pay more than minimum wage (except for that stint working in the dormitories, where I was paid $1 less than minimum wage because ~~former Governor~~ jerkface Ehrlich said it was okay*), are easy ("Babysit these PCs for a few hours and do your homework!"), and enhance my qualifications (I know so much about the network!)

*When I find the news article backing this up I will post it, because I know no one but Winifred will believe me. If I hadn't been so militantly drug free I'd never have been able to purchase my theoretical and hypothetical underage booze! Never mind that what I did need was impossible to obtain. I AM CLEARLY STILL VERY UPSET.

The unfortunate side effect is dealing with mundane student-based conversations, which brought this delicious nugget from a female student in here early twenties, to her mass communications professor:

"The good thing about Family Studies--and the only thing goin' on--is why it's beneficial for the man to work and the woman to stay home. But I mean, it's all common sense."

Did I say delicious? I think I actually gagged out every internal organ. Oops. The professor, which until now, was my least favorite person in the entire world (after Bush, Cheney, Joe Simpson, Joe Francis, and the New York Yankees), rose through the ranks to People I Can At Least Pretend to Tolerate when he said, "Really that's what they teach you at Towson?" Prof. I Can Now Pretend to Tolerate teaches at another state university, where he presumable strikes fear into those students in addition to providing nightmarish scenarios where I am this close to graduating.
She confirmed, yeah, and duh, "It's all common sense! Of course the mother has babies and stays home! And the husband, he works. Because it makes sense."
At this point I was gasping for air, trying to pick up my now completely unhinged jaw from the floor, and struggling to find the words that would swiftly eviscerate the student without causing myself more mental strife.
Prof. I Can Now Pretend to Tolerate looked at me, looked at her, looked at me, and then looked at her and said, "Really. They tell you that? Huh. Well." Then he rolled his eyes, held his breath, got up, and walked away while the student's friend--a male, also enrolled in this backwards gen ed.--argued, "No, no, it's theory. I mean, they don't say we should..."
Then I sputtered all over Facebook, wherein I repeated this to Biscuit, who suffered through a class (which, for the record, did not share these nuggets of "truth" and "common sense" but was regrettably filled with 18-year-olds who swore, "I want to be a Moooooomy!") I voted that the school give me the power to revoke her previously earned credits until she reconsiders the entire reason she's here (to get an education, like, oh my gawd, that wasn't common sense?) Biscuit suggested, "I petition to revoke her LIFE."
Harsh, but I feel a little better.
This is, of course not the objective of women's studies, or my university. This downside would heavily outweigh the ability to continue on with my day, were it not for my access to the internet, and this, this video from The Daily Show. This clip now has powers that are two-fold. Before it just made me feel better that anyone would show cognizance to China's past. Because my peers? They only know that China has some good food and some factories. Right on! It's hard being the only one you know In the Know. Now I have this image of a nine-year-old hiyaaah!-ing into the classroom in the middle of this girl's speech about "common sense" and family rearing.

Do you think reading any number of SAHD blogs would totally blow her mind?

2008-04-04T09:04:00.000-07:00

Usually these kind of speeches are made by Winifred and I nod, to say, Yes, but it isn't like that, can't I enjoy it anyway? I foolishly did that with The Dangerous Book for Boys thinking foolishly that The Daring Book for Girls would actually be The Dangerouns Book for Boys II, you know, a "We made an error! Here's more exciting stuff! And fun things are for both genders!" I was wrong. So when Feministing linked to Gender Inequity in 'Whoville' I thought of Winifred, who would have been irate about the film's newly added plot.

It makes me wonder how she fared through Disney princess movies until Beauty and the Beast was released when I was seven. Until then Winifred had little to say, probably because I was interested in dog movies (Lassie, 101 Dalmatians, Benji), but when Belle arrived, with her nose in a book, Winifred spent years expounding on how wonderful it was that Belle Saved the Day, the Belle Read, that Belle Was Independent! It was true. Belle didn't need no man. Buzz off Gaston, I'm Reading!

Except this is very much a rant from The King. I told myself I'd leave The King out of the blog, because The King sees Blogs as A Means For Your Own Doom, and didn't sign up for this, but I think it's worth saying today that The King is like Peter Sagal. The King has standards and it would be better to meet them. I could hear the king say this:

Have the clowns who made this movie ever met a daughter? Have they dated one? If they did, did they meet the daughter's father? Did they then ask that daughter's father if there was anything more dramatic, interesting, arresting, and moving to him than his relationship with his daughter? Did they ask him if he might find that a close relationship with said daughter might be something he would care about? What do they imagine that we do — sit around, and watch our daughters grow and change and suffer and fail and triumph — and idly wish for something more INTERESTING?

Segal then goes on to list popular media--Harry Potter, The Matrix, Peter Pan, ET, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings--as having boys saving the world. Of all of those features, on Harry Potter has a female character worth emulating. The other females (if they're there at all--LOOKING AT YOU, TOLKEIN) are all pretty dopey. I always wanted Princess Leia to step up! Darth Vader is her father too! But instead her few moments of badassery are restrained to a bikini. And Han, the rogue with a heart of gold (le sigh) has to bumble his way into saving her. I love Han, but really? Leia, you couldn't have done that on your own?

I had a friend in town a few weeks ago and he asked if I was going to see Whoville. I snorted and said I couldn't see a movie that would butcher the classic. Now I'm glad I was too snobby to see it, because I'd probably go out of my way to ruin it for everyone else.

It's On the Box. We Verify and Ship!

2008-04-01T20:07:00.000-07:00

A bunch of good things happened today, and I am convinced that the heavens smiled on me because it is Emily’s birthday, and because they know how lonely I am Without Her, they said, What the heck, while make some good things happen. Because last week? Bad things Happened.
First, the sky opened on my walk from my bus stop from my apartment, showing a big blue sky. I would have accepted this and called it a good day without anything further. (See? BAD THINGS, people BAD THINGS.)
Then, after a quick shower, FedEx arrived with a package. Last week FedEx would have arrived during the shower and the box would have been in the front office for two weeks. I was glad that FedEx arrived when I could sign. I thought it was some art supplies I ordered last week, but I was wrong. (I would like to know where those supplies are though, Montana.) It was my graduation dress!
I’m not a Dress Person. In fact, when I had a swanky work party and, with money in hand, could not find anything satisfactory. Part of the problem was me, and we’ll get to that, but part of the problem is that I’m not very good at finding dress clothes. I’m very good at finding clothes for other people though.
The other, slightly aforementioned problem is me. I’m vaguely unsatisfied with my appearance. To be honest, and this is “hard” (the brain says: DO NOT SHARE, DO NOT SHARE), I was sort of hoping I’d lose some weight and order a size down. Well, shit, I ordered my usual size, but unlike Target, it’s really cute. Appearance is something I struggle with it. A big part of it is just me, bowing to a harsh, shallow, and vapid patriarchal society that asks that my waist be the same size as Ma Ingalls and sees myself as much larger than I am. And a big part of it is that I really like cookies. It doesn’t help that I am surrounded by skinny friends, many of whom have worse images of themselves than I do, and judge “larger” people as a means to cope, so then, in this nasty little circle, I feel like the…nevermind. The end. SO THIS DRESS, IT CAME IN THE MAIL. It came and I ordered a few days ago! And, the best part? It fits. Part of that joy is because it was made by a woman, a woman who knows how to make You Look Good, and she did it using red and black and some nautical stars and an anchor, so now I look Really Good, plus a little bad ass, but mostly just cheeky.
But wait! There’s more! Winifred was in Baltimore today, so I showed it to her, and she loves it. We agreed that because it is strappy, I will wear a cardigan to appease the old people in our family. Also, because according to Delia’s, cardigans dress up a casual dress. She asked if I had a “shrug” from when I was in Laura’s wedding, and lo, I reached into my closet, pulled it out, and put it on.
I win! Well, I win above the ankle. I want to wear my old crappy red Chucks with the dress. If I have to sit for six hours and listen to the President of my University blab about social responsibility and environmental awareness (I agree! But not for so long.) and our success as people, I should get to wear footwear I personally enjoy. Also, I think I’ll bring a Bic and write every band I’ve ever heard, just to make a juvenile point. You’re boring me dude, hand the diploma, like a fourteen year old asks for the bell to ring in math class. Don’t look at me like that, I know you wrote 80085 on your calculator. Winifred asked if I wanted a new pair of Chucks, but I don’t want real Chucks, remember?
And with that conversation done, we decided where to eat dinner.
But wait! There’s still more! Before we ate dinner, I checked my e-mail. Before Winifred arrived a woman from school e-mailed me to let me know that I was eligible for a scholarship renewal. The school still e-mails me about registering classes by default, so I said thanks but I’m out of this place in May lady. She said no, we want to give you the money anyway. I called her right there, and she asked if I intend to pursue the career I did last year, and I said, heck yes I do, and she said cool, that’s what I thought, the money’s all yours. We’ll “cut you a check” when you graduate and you can pay the money to those nasty loan people. Hip hip hooray! It’s like money fell out of the sky!
Winifred was so excited she almost fainted, so I left the room to give her some air. When she regained consciousness we went to Bel Loc diner, where we dined, ate cake in honor of Emily (it was good, with orange essence!) and dragged Biscuit to a lecture by Marjane Satrapi. Marjane was everything I thought she would be, and I desperately want to meet her one day, be witty and smart, and have her realize we should be friends. Over cocktails we will discuss the evil patriarchy and then drunk dial my ex-boyfriends.

Now that I’m done wallowing in my own glory, I’ll make up for it with a story about Emily.

When I was little I would whine until she agreed to walk me to the playground near my house, where I would force her to push me on the tire swings, stand at the bottom of the slide to catch me if I went to fast, and cajole me into hanging from the monkey bars without hands. It didn’t take too much whining to do anything, because I am spoiled. (Except the monkey bars. I still can’t do it without burping out my heart, and then I don’t hang for long before I wuss out.) On a warm night we walked to the park after dinner, before it was too dark, and on the way out, Emily announced that tomorrow, she would be thirteen.
And I panicked, begging her to stay twelve until I could catch up and do big things too. She refused, on the grounds that physics won’t allow for it, and that duh, she wants to be thirteen. Really, who doesn’t want to turn thirteen? My angst amused her, and she asked why it was a big deal, and I told her I was afraid that if she turned thirteen, she would get snobby and mean—because that’s what kids on Nickelodeon did, never mind that Charlotte was already past thirteen by two years—and then we couldn’t go to the park anymore, or the pool, or any of the fun things that she let me do by agreeing to hold my hand and supervise.
I was wrong. The next day, she waited long enough for me to wake up to open presents, and then I think she may have even taken me to the park again after dinner, and wouldn’t you know, she held my hand and supervised all kinds of things.

In fact, she taught me math, how to drive, how to make my essays appear longer by using teacher-sanctioned typefaces instead of fudging the margins, and in high school, took me to movies at the cheap theater and the regular theater. Because every post-undergrad twentysomething wants to hang out with her little sister, a sophomore in high school! (And she did!)
And when Annie got married, we had to do some sticky family things, and in nudging her with my elbow, briefly grabbed her hand to say Holy cow, these people are all crazy. You're my witness.
Happy Birthday, Emily! Thanks for not getting snotty like those jerks on Fifteen.

CAROLE EXPLETIVE KING

2008-03-19T20:12:00.001-07:00

I've been fired up about everything this week and deliberately shutting myself from political commentary. Daily Show is on? Gotta go play Nintendo. Countdown is on? I think I should make cookies and listen to Moby. (Fear not! My obsession with Google headlines continues!*) When I sat down with dinner this evening the television found Comedy Central on its own and was re-playing last night's Colbert Report. I've already made no secret about my love affair with the sixty minute block of political irreverence on Comedy Central. I was going to change it though, because when I get stressed I get hives, and oh my god, I just can not deal with that right now, when Stephen promised me Carole King.

Carole Expletive King! I stayed.

For the sake of brevity I'm not going to argue that Carol King rocks. I don't think I need to, and if I do, you might need to seek another blog (or stick around and find common ground another day!).

A few Christmases ago, Charlotte came home with two copies of Tapestry. One was for Winifred, for reasons still unknown to me, was unfamiliar with the Queen of Songwriting. I was knee-deep in love for King, having enrolled in a history of rock and roll class with a professor who had dropped out of college at 20 to become a singer/songwriter before finding success and quitting the industry at the height of her career to get a doctorate in music ethnology and teach young, hip, 19-year-olds about Joan Baez** and how much pop music owes Carole King. This was the same year I started to commit myself to watching Gilmore Girls on Tuesday nights, so I'd leave class just before the show started to walk back to my dorm room and watch Carole King after spending a few hours talking about her.
Charlotte had already tried this with me though, when King and her daughter were on a Christmas Gap commercial when I was in high school. I know, Gap! I haven't forgiven Dylan for his dive into commercialism, but my love for King runs so deep that I don't care. Her moments have always been deeply touching. Also, I want to believe that as proprietor Sophie Bloom on Gilmore Girls, King would really help Lane find her footing in music against Mrs. Kim's knowledge.
Thanks to Charlotte, my happiness was heightened when King was on Colbert. I don't know what I love most about this interview, but I think it's that King openly says the label just wants more money from her:

If you don't mind I'm going to go eat some cookies and defeat Slash on Guitar Hero III. If I don't beat medium all I'll have to show for these six days of Spring Break will be all of the real work I've accomplished and we can't have that.

*And now I'm mad at Joe Francis for new reasons.
**Interesting side note that will embarass my family: At the time I was also knee deep in love with a boy I'd known--and been In Like With, Like Oh My God--since I was 12 and we started a passionate debate about Joan Baez. It ended with us agreeing, if you can believe this, "I totally wish I was Bob Dylan, because I'd be doing the hottest babe in the history of rock." (You're hot too, Wendy O., but you died, and ten years later I'm still kind of upset.) Winifred doesn't like Joan Baez--or Bob!--and that always bothered me, because Winifred was a babe, and she's just as mad as Joan, and I like to think they could have met at a cafe and had a Coke while talking about politics before Winifred went back to base and Joan met with Bobby to share a spliff.

THURSDAY ROUND-UP, YEHAW

2008-03-13T10:05:00.001-07:00

This is post #51 and Winifred has still failed to login herself and share these things with the web. Just sayin'. It's been a gender discriminatory two weeks, and I've been an aggressive monger this week. So have the other Quimbys, and my inbox is bursting with material to share.

Let's start with my most recent e-mail from Winifred. She wants us to check out wowowow.com and read Marlo Thomas and Julia Reed's responses to yesterday's Question of the Day (Should Silda Spitzer Stand By Her Man?)

wowOwow is a "website created, run and written by Lesley Stahl, Peggy Noonan, Liz Smith, Joni Evans, Mary Wells, Sheila Nevins, Joan Juliet Buck, Whoopi Goldberg, Julia Reed, Joan Ganz Cooney, Judith Martin, Candice Bergen, Lily Tomlin, Jane Wagner, and Marlo Thomas." It launched last Saturday. I'm not so keen on Whoopi but I'll hold my breath that this doesn't go downhill. I'm all for women on the internet, and hey guess what! I'll get to that next.

Here's what Marlo has to say:

It is her decision whether she wants to stand by him in the long run — but for God’s sake — why must these women have to stand next to them when they confess their sins?

I really didn’t mean it to be funny. I think it’s painful to see these women, time and time again be dragged out to these press conferences to stand there by their man. I’d think more of Spitzer and any man who refused to make his wife stand there in humiliation with him.

and Julia:

I can’t imagine Silda staying with her husband after so public a humiliation, but she wouldn’t be the first woman to do it. Just last July, when Louisiana Senator, David Vitter, was caught in almost the same situation, his wife — another attractive, highly intelligent, auburn-haired lawyer — stood with him by the press conference podium in a photo that looks exactly like the one today on the front page of the New York Times. So far, Wendy Vitter is still standing by her man and he is still in the Senate, but either of these women are made of far sterner stuff than I…or they are nuts. I still remember the awful stone face of Lee Hart in the wake of Donna Rice, and Silda’s face was heart-breaking. She was just so obviously thrown. As Candice said, Bill Clinton’s philandering did not come out of left field like this. And whatever bizarre pact the Clintons may have, Hillary has her reasons for sticking it out. I would have a far more difficult time, especially since these guys are not just unfaithful, but so arrogant. Gary Hart went so far as to challenge the press to follow him, and then he led them right to the monkey business. Did Eliott Spitzer honestly think he would never be outed as client number nine?

Okay, I lied. I can't hold back from wowOwow. I just. Can't. Do. It. The website includes a piece titled, "PRINCESS DIANA! Remember Her?"Liz Smith alleges, claims, and shouts that America has forgotten Princess Diana and that her former lover, Dr. Hasnat Khan, has gone unheard in American media ("And nobody stateside seems to have printed what this man said.") REALLY? BECAUSE EVERYWHERE I TURN HIS CLAIMS ARE REPEATED. Smith doesn't expound on The Pill (hopes dashed) but how we've "forgotten" Diana in the Democratic nominee goings-on and Spitzer scandal. Smith, I've got a tip for you: Turn on E! Check Google headlines. I promise you'll change your mind. What's your point, anyway, Smith? You've only regurgitated what Khan has said. And Khan's testimony was more than a week ago. Okay. Done now, really.

ABOUT THOSE INTERNETS

This season's issue of Bitch arrived in the mail this week and its theme is "THE WIRED ISSUE" (just in time for me to exasperate over dumbed down websites 'run by women for women') and details "blog bandits" among other tech-related stuff. Charlotte gave me a subscription last year, and it has brought me endless joy because the thing about Bitch is that it tends to arrive when I've found I can take no more from the masses. I find solace knowing that other women are as fed up as I am.
Yet issue #39's "Wack Attack" by Jaclyn Friedman addresses an issue I can't (and luckily haven't had to) relate to (yet). Addressing "blogging while female," gender bias on the internet, and the overwhelming amount of power handed to men in control of the internet, Friedman includes several resources for avoiding and supporting one's words on the internets, so I've added them to The Gospel's links. (And, oh yeah, we're part of BlogHer.)
...So I want to like wowOwow but it looks like it just won't work for me. It's not you, it's me, and I'm sure Winifred will have more she wants to share in the future.

BACK TO GENDER BIAS AND SCANDAL

First: The Vatican has released new sins. I love to sin, so I love to know that my inability to recycle in the apartment (bad habits die hard, I guess) or accept my college's graduation pledge (it's just not your business, degree dispersers) can add more sinful delight to my daily life. That was tongue-in-cheek. Honest. A thorough discussion has been shared by e-mail by the family, but I think Charlotte summarizes everyone's feelings accurately. She wrote, last night:

I have been considering the "new sins." As it turns out, this is just one guy's opinion and not actual policy, but it was telling nonetheless. I am encouraged by the emphasis on the effects of one's actions on others, but why are these specific sins mentioned? It seems that those who bear social responsibility are still disproportionately female.

I also think that it is insane to single out drug use as a sin in general, much less as a mortal sin. Do caffeine and Ritalin count? Was Frank McCourt's father sinning by indulging in alcohol, or was his sin the neglect of his family? Is it a sin to have a mental illness? Why aren't owners of gambling establishments, pimps, or sellers of alcohol mentioned instead? Is this really about targeting pleasure yet again?

I liked this from the BBC: "Father Gerald O'Collins, former professor of moral theology at the Papal University in Rome, and teacher of many of the Catholic Church's current top Cardinals and Bishops, welcomed the new catalogue of modern sins. 'I think the major point is that priests who are hearing confessions are not sufficiently attuned to some of the real evils in our world,' he told the BBC News website. 'They need to be more aware today of the social face of sin - the inequalities at the social level. They think of sin too much on an individual level. I think priests who hear confession should have a deeper sense of the violence and injustice of such problems - and the fact that people collaborate simply by doing nothing. One of the original deadly sins is sloth - disengagement and not getting involved,' Father O'Collins said."

I particularly like that this priest focused on priests' responsibilities toward their parishioners, who should, as Deacon Manley says, be exercising their consciences rather than obeying a catalogue of mortal and venial sins. It is absolutely time for an honest examination of the intersection of individual freedom (and moral agency) and social responsibility. I take comfort in the idea that there are at least two priests who care about the divide between rich and poor. I do wonder what the definition of "poverty" is -- vis a vis, say, Mother Teresa and her views. Is it still okay for nuns and mothers to be poor? Will the Vatican share some of its "excessive wealth" to feed those who heed its warnings against "bioethical" sin? Or are they still receiving "graces" in return for their suffering?

AND FINALLY BACK TO SPITZER

Charlotte used to live in New York. In fact, I've told people that she's "from New York" even though she was raised in the same house that Emily and I were. She's more devastated than I am, and I'm embroiled in my own drama, preventing me from really getting involved.

I am so disgusted by Spitzer. I had been telling people how great he was for years. What a load of CRAP about testosterone. The problem here is not hormonal. It is entitlement to women as products -- as of today's tawdry revelations, we know that he saw them as products whose lives were of no import to him. Clearly the feds are lying about how they caught him, but he knew that there were incredibly powerful people after him -- including "Tammany" Joe Bruno and the entire Bush administration -- and he goes to the Mayflower?? Ugh. I would like to know when we can expect David Vitter's resignation as well.

Also -- Geraldine Ferraro cannot really be that clueless. Why is she making things worse??
Why, Geraldine, why?

Winifred is disappointed that he had to "import" women from DC. (If Winifred had to pick a home-away-from-North Dakota, she'd pick the District.) I've called her three times today about this post, and forgotten each time to ask what she thinks about Dragging These Women Through the Mud with him. So I'll go out on a limb and assume. (Deep breath.) It's not really our business, and while I think it's important to cover every corner of a story, I don't think it was in the best interest of my campus newspaper to report about Spitzer's clients, and I don't think it's anyone's business what these women look like, what they do, how old they are, and what their myspaces say. He did something illegal. They did too, but prostitution isn't really a woman's career goal and maybe it's better to help women then lambaste them for their choices. BUT MAYBE THAT'S JUST ME.

MY DRAMA
Is coming later. It's good. I promise. Charlotte said I had to share, and I typically do whatever she says.

You're Kidding Me, Right? II

2008-03-06T10:50:00.000-08:00

BOOK CLUB

While I'm hungry and cranky, I'm going to dive into the Quimby Family Road debacle.
Here are the facts:
1. Emily read it first.
2. Charlotte read it second, and in the Portrait Gallery in January, asked if I wanted to read it.
3. Post-apocalyptic societies are so my thing. I want to know what other people think the End of the World will be like in the way most people wonder about Heaven/Hell. (Actually, I wonder what other people think about the After Life, I can't really prove that anyone wonders what other people think, especially when people are so locked into their own interpretation.)
4. Winifred read it before I did. Subsequently she sent a lot of e-mails. Here is an excerpt from an e-mail:

Who is the man in the yellow/gray slicker near the end of the book. Have we met him before?? I do not recall. I guess I cannot comment any further since KMH is going to read the book. I finished it Friday at work during a slow lull. One of the most enduring images in the book for me though is the finding of food jars in the abandoned farm house. I can see, smell, and hear the [FAMILY NAME] old farmhouse once it was abandoned.

4. I read it next. I liked it. It was grey, it was dark, it was cold, and it moved slowly. I liked that I was fearful that the next page would contain more cannibals, that this would be the last struggle. I liked that instead there was shelter, canned peaches, and an exploration into an unknown. There was constant misery, and the dialog was sparse, but it worked.
4. The King was not a fan. He wrote:

Well I finished reading The Road. I hated the book. I'm already depressed and this did not help whatsoever. Most depressing book I've ever read. Gave me no hope at all.

I tried to talk to The King about this, maybe get a little more, see if we could actively debate, but failed. He's not interested.
5. Charlotte and I feel kind of bad. Actually, I feel kind of bad, Charlotte is crushed by guilt and unenthused to recommend more books.
6. Seeing Charlotte last week, we discussed The Road before dinner. We had several unanswered questions about the cannibals. She posed the plot hole: how can a pregnant woman survive if she's eaten limb-from limb. If you harvest fetuses, isn't that a disappointing meat for end product? And, isn't that a lot of work to keep someone alive for the purpose of fetus-harvesting? Seems counterproductive. In the end I said I thought McCarthy was trying to just make the whole thing scary. Walking for miles endlessly in a nuclear holocaust is scary without raping, maiming, and exploiting women for plot devices, and we both ended the conversation kind of disgusted. So we talked about chicken and waffles instead.

AND ABOUT THOSE SOCIETIES
I need to blurt this somewhere, and my regular blog doesn't want to hear it. You know why? Because they want "happy endings." Also I've been screaming about this abomination since I found out it starred Will Smith. That was more than a year before the movie was released. So, well...I guess it makes sense that they don't want to hear about it anymore. Never mind.

I am Legend did suck. It changed the ending, never mind the location/setting and general message. The best part about these movies, for me, is when everybody dies. Luckily for me, the blogosphere spared most of my pain by spoiling the cinematic release (make sure you check out Baldwin's commentary in the comments). Richard Matheson's I am Legend spawned an entire genre, so its lackluster ending was a disgraceful excuse for film. It did in fact, give us Night of the Living Dead.
Because Winifred hasn't seen Night of the Living Dead, I'll give it away as a means of explaining why I am so angry. Brother and sister Johnny and Barbara drive to rural Pennsylvania (note location and symbolism) to pay their respects to their father's grave. There's some action in the graveyard, and some action in the general area of the town, and eventually we realize the area is besieged by zombies. Mayhem ensues, until there is only one uninfected person, and in the last scene of the film (really, I'm spoiling the movie) he exits his hideout, only to be mistaken for a zombie and is shot dead. And then his corpse is burned with the zombies. It's completely horrifying, and Romero is saying more than oops, I killed the hero. (The character is African American, the film was released in 1968, and sci-fi/horror movies are never about the plot on the surface which is what makes it so awesome.) This film has a tragic ending, which is what should befit I am Legend. Just like last year's Halloween, I am Legend doesn't say anything about American society, and It Is Supposed To.

The film is poised for its DVD release, which includes an alternate ending. This is still a crapshoot:

Because this ending sucks too, and still doesn't say anything. AAAARGH.
Sigh. So much angst. Speaking of the Portrait Gallery, a few days after we went, Stephen Colbert had his portrait hung there.

Don't you feel a little less irritated with me, now? What if I told you Night of the Living Dead is tagged on IMDB as "Tragic Ending" and I've found a loot of movies tagged the same way? This is a goldmine, Quimby family. You may remember how much Winifred loves sad movies.

You're Kidding Me, Right?

2008-03-06T10:19:00.000-08:00

I want to preface the following dialogue by letting you know that I'm at work, in a computer lab, until 2:45ish, and that the vending machine, which is stocked with all kinds of goods (pizza flavored Combos, for one) and is not working. So I went to a building nearby, which houses the nearest vending machine, and it had nothing in it but "sweet n salty" Chex Mix. There's no salty in the Honey Nut Chex Mix and now my work area is covered in a fine-grain sweet powder. I demand satisfaction! (That's my mantra this week. It's been blurted from 711, to the MTA, to the photography lab. It's going nicely, thanks.) What I'm saying here, is that I'm cranky, rightfully so, so watch out, suckers.

In response to last night's post Winifred e-mailed (but refused to comment):

Good Morning!

Two things: I would like it to be known by the readers of this blog that while I was obsessed with the GMA Mac and Cheese Challenge, and outraged when my personal choice, Princess, did not win, I have not actually eaten one forkful of mac and cheese during this whole time of challenge. If I had someone in the home who would eat mac and cheese, I would like to try Princess's recipe.

Also, If I have time when I come home from work, [blah blah blah personal and unrelated information to this post.]

Love, MOM

I think demanding content is a little out of line from a woman who agreed to make posts here on her own. A woman who has an excruciatingly detailed how-to-post-on-Blogger manual taped to her cupboard. A woman with a lot to say. I'm the editor here! This is post #49, Winifred, and I demand satisfaction!
Winifred said she'd take me to Sofi's for late breakfast on Friday, so I'd better do what she says, or that $4 butterscotch crepe won't be mine. Alright, then. You win. This time.

In an e-mail sent last Friday and titled "NO, No, No!" Winifred wrote:

NO!!----The winning Mac and Cheese recipe on GMA should not be a recipe containing applewood smoked bacon! No bacon in a mac and cheese casserole! The winner should have been the woman named Princess!

Love, MOM

Charlotte (and Emily, I presume) thought from this title that Winifred was upset about Dubya (or the papacy). No, she's outraged that in an Emeril Lagasse-related challenge (which forces me to question her sanity and lucidity) Laura Macek won the challenge. Her win was determined by Viewers Like ~~You~~ Winifred for her "Best Mac 'n' Cheese Ever."
When I saw Winifred this weekend her major complaint--aside from the inclusion of pork--was that Macek didn't have a good story. It's just something she whipped up. Princess Thompson, who Winifred was gunnin' for, had some kind of family history with her recipe. If Macek had really thought this through, you would think she might have concocted some kind of story. Instead she let the recipe speak for itself, which worked for her (and I guess honesty is always important too).

This whole affair is gross to me. First, I don't like mac and cheese. Second, there's a lot of crap thrown into these dishes, and I dare say it's not mac and cheese, but a dairy-based pasta casserole. There! I SAID IT! One woman had muffins, but that's gross too. How about you leave my muffins alone with their fruit, unless it's chocolate, and move on.

Truth be told, Princess doesn't deserve to win anyway, Winifred. It's homemade mac and cheese, except she added some colby/jack--which are mild cheeses at best--to the basic Velveeta. Three cups of whole milk and butter and heavy cream are enough to give me a stomachache. Moreover, her recipe is titled "Smack Yo Mamma Mac and Cheese" which, offensive and vaguely disturbing (I'd like to see how Princess feels when her children smack her and yell, "MAKE ME SOME MAC AND CHEESE, WOMAN") lacks the punch she's promising. She's loaded all the mild a milquetoast eater can muster. Where's the "BAM!", Princess? The whole scenario has left me confused and considerably less hungry than when I started the godforsaken post ten minutes ago.

My friend K in Chicago makes Patti Labelle's Over-the-Rainbox Mac and Cheese. (K, is the name part of the reason? Be honest.) I think he owns her cookbook. It involved five kinds of cheese, which is up my alley, even in the mild, bland, cheeses. If there's anything I believe in cooking, it's mixing a variety of cheeses (instead of "one cup of cheddar" i'll take sharp cheddar, pepper jack, and something crazy, please; three ounces semi-sweet? how about two ounces and one ounce something more refined?). I learned this from Fitzwilliam. K is the kind of host who throws potluck parties, which is an impossible dream for me in Collegetown, and I've always resented his friends for 1) getting to go to a potluck party and 2) having a guarantee for his mac and cheese. I don't like it but he makes it sound so good.

I hate all of this mac and cheese talk. Hand me that box of Chic-fil-A nuggets, I'm hungry.

So...uh...

2008-03-05T19:58:00.000-08:00

You know what rocks about college? The homework. I had to crawl out of my manhole, filled with sketchbooks, scraps of notebook paper, gluesticks, mechanical pencils, and textbooks to retrieve the following e-mails. I've been so busy I haven't shared this past weekend's adventure to Coney Island, the ensuing adventure to see B.B. King, and finally, Winifred's new inexplicable obsession with mac and cheese. The mac and cheese e-mail is a week old. It's still marked as unread in this blog's e-mail account. CRAP! I AM SO BEHIND.

I think it's best to take the cream off the top though, given this Lenten Season.
Pope Benedict XVI, which the family calls "The Rat," decided what the heck, some baptisms aren't legit! Gotta weed out those less legit members as a punishment for the less conservative clergy, eh. (Oh, but marriages are okay because once You Do It in the Catholic Church, you're married.) I was living in happy ignorance until Charlotte chimed in. Thanks.
In a more sophisticated language, she wrote by e-mail:
Have you seen the latest from the Rat? http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2008/03/01/2008-03-01_vatican_rules_some_baptisms_invalid.html Where are these churches, I ask? The Vatican has clarified that this does invalidate marriages entered into by those baptized with the unmasculine wording -- but they have not addressed how this affects the first five centuries' worth of non-Trinitarian baptisms.
Usually The Rage is from Winifred but this time it was from The King. Usually I try to keep mum about The King. He hasn't asked to get dragged into this blogging experiment, but The King's response brings so much joy that I'm going to break my own rule. In an e-mail from Winifred:

DAD: "This is crap. What bullshit. What nonsense is this? Did you click on the Vatican word--to see what other tripe there might be. This is just stupid. Is he saying God will not let you into Heaven with that particular Baptism? That's just crap." What more could I add to that--except to say that the rat might want to concentrate more on the numbers leaving the church. I will say that I am pretty positive all three of you were baptized with the father, son, and holy spirit.

I don't see what the big deal is. The Rat's just being a snob. Like The God is really that concerned. I mean, really.

Sigh. Well at least Suckabee isn't the Republican candidate. I'd like to elect that we rename the Republicans the Kremlin party. It's just a little more honest, no? You know what? I can't talk about this anymore. I have a portfolio review tomorrow. Also, Biscuit bought a new video game and I need to beat it as soon as humanly possible.

Quick Note

2008-03-02T18:09:00.000-08:00

Hello Girls,

My, my, you know I am not a big fan of Jack Nicholson, but now he has a YouTube in his support of Hillary Clinton. I hardly know what to say, but I am ever so slightly warmed.

Love, MOM

Winifred hates Nicholson. I took a cab today (for $4) because my bus didn't come and didn't come and didn't come, and the cab driver asked who I was going to vote for. To my surprise he was with me, and on all points.
Here's the video:

I think it's kind of lazy editing, but whatever.

Lookin' for LOLKiddens on the Internets using the Googles

2008-02-28T09:53:00.001-08:00

Henry was in Baltimore Tuesday night on another leg of his spoken-word tour. I live in Baltimore. I bought tickets. I went with a friend this time, sparing Winifred from his stories, and as Henry explained the process it took for him to visit Syria, he said, "...So I got on my Internets," and a small tremor of laughter traveled through the crowd. Well, I know it's not really said like that, he explained, delving into how Internet is a singular word, but Bush, well, Bush adds an "s" to the word and Henry thinks that's "just so cute" that as a tribute to Bush he has joined the fray and says "Internets," too. And whenever Henry said "Internets" he giggled, just the tiniest bit. Then, just for fun he said, "Googles" and whenever I hear "the 'net" or "Internet," I hear Henry Rollins giggling, "I got on my Internets and used the Googles."
Really, you've got to have a sense of humor, or the next 10 months will pass excruciatingly slow.
ANYWAY here is a semi-relevant e-mail. About words.

Hello Girls,

One would think that a presidential candidate who has a degree from Harvard, who is widely touted as being very intelligent, and has several debates already under his belt, would be able to properly enunciate the word, "Clinton". A five year old girl pronouncing "kiddens" is one thing, the deliberate enunciation of "Clinnon" is extremely irritating.

Love, MOM

I'm the one who wasn't about to say "kittens." I'm better now.

I See

2008-02-21T06:01:00.000-08:00

The entire body of an e-mail sent last night:

There are two very appropriate uses of the word moist. One is as is moist ocean air, the other as in the moist crumb of the cake.

Love, MOM

I'm not sure what prompted this, but I can confirm that for a time, Biscuit and I were mildly obsessed with the word "moist" and how gross it sounds.

It's ON!

2008-02-20T20:10:00.000-08:00

My Aunt, who the sisters, my roommate, and I, refer to as "Aunt Ina," is a warm, gentle woman who had been providing her co-workers with cookies. The moniker is occasionally confusing as The Real Ina may be on at any given time, and finding her on Food TV often results in Biscuit proclaiming excitedly, "Aunt Ina's On!" and though I know she means Garten I sometimes think about my Aunt, living in Middle America Where Cookies Are Not Appreciated.

I worked for Target one summer, stocking the shelves with toys and sports equipment during the day. This has been my only job that included a break room, but if one of the women I worked with had made a plate of cookies and left it out during the day, she would have returned the next morning and found it covered in thank you notes; cards from the store, cards from Hallmark, and scraps of napkins inscribed with sonnets would cover the plate. I know what you're thinking. You think that the 1,000+ Target employees weren't used to hospitality. HA! Once a week, and usually more, the management team shared goodies. Often the overnight team was plied with pizza and goodies, and more often than not, the overnight team made an effort to leave the morning employees more than stale remnants. We were spoiled with surprise presents in the form of liter bottles of soda, fresh veggies, and warm cookies. Still, we loved it, it made our day, and homemade cookies would have changed the efficiency of our perfect store tenfold.

These people are fools. Just look at what they did! In an e-mail she sent last week (personal details have been omitted):

Okay, I am giving up taking cookies to work. we brought in desserts today for Valentine's. I brought in a container of my delicious heart shaped sugar cookies with cinnamon hots on them. Other desserts included pumpkin cake, cherry pie, red jigglers, berry lemon bars, Rice Krispie treats, large decorated chocolate. chip cookie from the store and a package of fat sugar cookies from marsh that iced with red sprinkles. People raved about those cookies! "Oh, I love these cookies!" and "These are my favorite!" About 3 people asked who made the heart sugar cookies and I said "I did. Have one, I make good sugar cookies." I did not count them but I don't think any were eaten, if so, only a couple. Bought those too thick cookies from Marsh were a hit! All the desserts were left for tomorrow so I'll see if any disappear tomorrow. I would have brought them home because I have eaten all the ones I kept here, but who knows who touched them and how clean their hands were. I didn't want to bring them back in the home. I have made oatmeal cookies, oatmeal rolled cookies, p.b.cookies, and now sugar cookies, and have not been met with the reception I would like, so I am done baking cookies for that office. My p.b. cookies are also extremely tasty but it seems that people like store boughten ones or choc. chip. I do not usually share choc. chip as when I make them I make dough balls and freeze them and make only 4 at a time.

I've had her peanut butter cookies. They are amazing. I mean, the nerve of some people. This e-mail was preceded by others, all detailing the process and selection of which cookies to bring. Aunt Ina was also responsible for organizing this sordid holiday affair, and supplied party supplies out-of-pocket. I say, remove the pink napkins from the whole lot of 'em! She also put a lot of detail and thought into getting and arranging platters, which I think further proves her personality likeness to Garten. A woman who will arrange a meat tray is a woman who can plan. I am not a woman who can arrange a meat tray.

All of this talk about cookies makes me hungry. Winifred was here on Saturday because she missed me, I think? And she brought cookies, which are pictured above with a bottle of Bubble Up, which she shared. We don't have Bubble Up in Baltimore, and Aunt Ina sent a private reserve to her sister for Valentine's Day. I was hoping to expound on the weekend days ago but I think that will wait until tomorrow. Thankfully the oatmeal and fizz has gotten me this far!

Oh! Lest my real job stumble over here, I should add that there are often days where people crowd around the table and fill themselves on food. One day, a day I was called in, my friend and I brought lunch to find out that there was lunch downstairs! We waited for the crowds to go before us as we are terribly awkward and nervous people, and then our supervisor urged us to go now before it was too late. We ambled to the kitchen downstairs where a giant turkey and ham were joined by homemade mac and cheese, vegetables, cookies, fresh baked rolls, and fudge cake so obscenely large that only Ms. Trunchbull would dare conquer (though someone must have, it was almost all gone). We arrived maybe ten minutes after the lunch announcement and as we hemmed and hawed the office ladies hovered so they could reclaim their wares. Previously, one day in the summer, everyone gathered outside to eat fried chicken and picnic fare just because it was summer. I'll make sure Aunt Ina's lousy co-workers never darken my workplace doors.

I'm going to bed, disgusted. If I move to Middle America I'll think twice before sharing my Jell-O salad.

2008-02-10T10:42:00.000-08:00

Last night's politically themed e-mail, minus two paragraphs about colored sugar and sugar cookies.

Hello Girls,

Captain, I keep forgetting to tell you that there is a new character on Friday Night Lights--for the last 3 weeks. It is LOGAN, from the Gilmore Girls. He is the same creep, with the same, I want to smack the grin off your face, smile he had for the Gilmores. He plays a Christian with a radio talk show. Has a rich ranching family. Ish.

Captain, don't forget this Tuesday you will, for the first time in your life, be able to vote for a woman for President. This may be your first presidential election, and you are young, but voting for a woman is HUGE, and a right for which women have fought for FOREVER. Think of your grandmothers, who of course never voted in Russia, taking their grandchildren out of class into the voting booth with them. I can only assume they would have been delighted to pull the lever for a female. I pray this golden opportunity will not be your last. Dress properly.

Democratically Yours, MOM

P.S. Suckabee was just on the newscast. Dad: "He looks crazy. Look at his eyes." He looks CRAZY." (Let me point out how many idiots say how "down home" he looks!) You have to love your Dad's ability to cut right through the crap with a perfect one liner.

Some personal details from her day were cut out of this re-posting. They were irrelevant to this post, so I think you'll understand.

Friday Night Lights is irrelevant too, except that I HATED Logan. He was condescending in the way he treated Rory, always calling her "Ace" but never really believing she was capable of being anything but his sidekick. In the end, I was right, he wanted her to give up most of her dreams and settle in California; at one point he argued there was a writing job somewhere near him, even if it wasn't what she had worked so hard for. He bargained with an avocado tree, and while I can agree that picking and eating avocados in my backyard sounds like a dream come true, never at the expense of my individual freedom, jerkface. I was always on Team Jess anyway. Partially because I'm defensive about the boy I dated when I was sixteen, who had a lot in common with Jess (except in the end we broke up because he was dumb and not "bad") but ultimately because, hello, he's smart, nice, makes his own living, and writes a zine. (The final ending though, free and single, is still preferred in the Stars Hollow Universe.) Matt Czurchry is cute but he's forever tainted as playing Logan Huntzberger.

Oh, and for those wondering, this is my second election. I voted for Kucinich in my first primary and ~~Dean~~ Kerry in my first Presidential election. Not that you're surprised.

This is a Post That Isn't About Politics

2008-02-06T20:03:00.000-08:00

By popular demand I am hear to talk about Lent. Huzzah, it's time to buckle down and fast by giving up something for six days, reveling in the sin every now and then to feel guilty about relenting, guaranteed pizza once a week, plus at much gloating as possible. I mean suffering piously! I'm sorry, do I sound sarcastic? That's because I went to Catholic School.
So did my parents, who instigated this family-wide weeklong discussion about today's day of fasting ~~suffering~~, Ash Wednesday.
Ina (if I may identify her commentary), wondered what we think about the regime of Ashes, going to work as a marked person.
The King was raised to believe, Winifred says, "That is the point--you are supposed to be marked, proud to be a Catholic, and go out to convert others."
I think that's total crap. First, I was only ashed in the presence of 400 other blackened foreheads. Second, Catholics are so not into conversion. Or, my Catholic upbringing wasn't. Ashes were about who was the Most Catholic. Outside in public, it made me a marked girl. I was already wearing a uniform though, so really, at that point the stares weren't noticed anymore.
Let me tell you about my version of Lent: First, everyone in school had an ashed forehead after the school wide mass. Inevitably my small forehead was ashed by the priest with the biggest thumbs, smearing a thumb print from one end to the other, covering my skin in ash. Sacred ash. I spent most of the nineties with fringer that covered my head and tickled my eyelashes and as a result, was targeted during pre-scheduled bathroom breaks as "hiding God." I was also a smudgy fidgety kid and, wouldn't you know, 3/4 through the sermon I really needed to itch my forehead? And get black dust all over the pew? Sorry Jesus, but my forehead itched! Talking about it makes my hairline itch.
Scratch scratch scratch. Oh, that feels good!
By recess, laps around the asphalt kickball field meant that my ashes had slowly disappeared, as had the most athletic and/or dedicated boys. Of course, they were so pious, but I was still asked, didn't I believe? It's a sin you know, to wipe off your ashes. It's like wiping off Jesus. Ew, can you believe a nine year-old would say that? Like I really want to think that Jesus is in the cinders on my face.
In the excruciating weeks leading to Lent in third grade we went around the room and announced what we wanted to "give up" for Lent. We were told that we would give up something important to demonstrate our Love for Jesus who spent 40 days and 40 nights in the desert without water or food, deep in prayer, or, in fisticuffs with Satan. Satan does a lot of third-grade style taunting, suspiciously similar to my pious classmates, and Jesus, you know, doesn't give in and stuff. This month of waterless fasting in the desert is never mentioned in his List O' Miracles, which is unfair. I mean the guy didn't die from dehydration. How long will I make it in the desert without H20? Maybe Jesus drank his own...nevermind.
So. All 25 of us announced our intentions. Chocolate, candy, pizza (this elicits gasps, as pizza is Friday's lunch in the cafeteria and dinner at home as it is a meatless entity that can be consumed and enjoyed when land based meat is forbidden). Eventually a smartass announced brussel sprouts or homework and we collectively suffer through a lecture about how this is not a way out of something but a way to suffer for Jesus, and we all suffer for someone else's sin.
I spent seven years in the front of the class where I was forcibly placed with the most talkative and simultaneously least motivated student, going last in these "discussions."
"I'm going to do something nice," I announced fearlessly, "instead of giving up something easy." This does not go over well with a former nun. It does not go over well in second grade with the almost nun, and years later, still falls into a dangerous category. I am breaking the rules! I am a thinker! No wonder I declared myself an anarchist in eighth grade.
"It doesn't work that way," I'm told one year, "You have to give up something. For Jesus." I argue that my mom says it's okay, and isn't this a more positive thing to do? Looking back that was very Lisa Simpson. Because we have an endless amount of weeks to consider, this continues until the teacher relents. Meanwhile, one of those athletic boys says, "I'm going to be nicer to my little brother. He looks up to me and sometimes I think it's annoying." Do you know what happens? Everyone think this is so nice. He basks in fake piety and he begins to glow in the praise that is showered. He becomes a hero.
In high school I am best friends with one of those people I have to sit next to in the front row. For many years she gives up "soda," distinguishing diet/caffeine free, root beer, and orange from Coca-Cola and Mr. Pibb. She suffers vocally, constantly, while I use my spare change on Fridays to buy a Cherry Coca-Cola every Friday when we talk around the corner for pretzels to celebrate the weekend. In high school she suddenly changes from soda to Ketchup because, "she needs it on fries." She is loud and raucous about this, convincing that the more we know, the more she is redeemed in the eyes of God. My senior year she tells her boyfriend that she is giving up sex to instigate a fight. He is Jewish and disturbingly devoted. She misses her morning classes on Ash Wednesday to go to Church and when she arrives during lunch, she is gloating, puffing her chest, making conversation about her ashed head. (Later, she accuses me of lacking integrity for not missing spanish and math to go to class. I tell her that mass starts at 6 and she didn't need to miss class.) When she meets the lunch table the sexually active girls are dying to know what her boyfriend, in a high school forty minutes away, thought. They met in the parking lot for a rendezvous between classes.
She's angry. He said, "That's okay. I respect your religion." This infuriated her so she punched him in the shoulder sand said, "You're supposed to be angry!" He didn't understand, and she confessed that she just wanted him to get mad. This hurt his feelings and he sulked the rest of the night. The irony, that she is an Awesome Catholic, but engaged in an absurd amount of premarital sex, is lost on her. I stop giving up serious things that year, realizing nothing will top TV in eighth grade, that there's no effort needed anymore in doing nice things, that doing nice things for Lent obscures doing nice things because it's the right thing to do.
In college, Charlotte suggested I give up really outrageous things. Biscuit and I considered the following: knives, pre-marital sex, smack, words ending in [letter], studying. Nothing beats the year Charlotte gave up utensils, so we stick with smack. It's counterproductive because we never used smack anyway. Ew.
This year I thought I'd convince people into sinning. I tried to convince Winifred into brewing beer, as it is a male dominated business, but she doesn't drink beer and is uninterested. On campus I saw one forehead, and she looked bored. She was bored because she was going to class.

Here is what Charlotte had to say, with more clarity and less words:
I try to respect the idea that leaving the ashes on one's forehead is a way of a) showing deference to the sanctity of the ashes themselves and/or b) a way of keeping one's thoughts centered on the meaning of Ash Wednesday throughout the day. However, I cannot shake my irriation with smug people who sport the ashes to show just how observant they are. Having read about many a saint, I always thought that one should examine oneself for scrupulosity. I'm pretty sure that Jesus told people to fast in private.
I am of course uncomfortable with evangelism. Where is the difference between showing pride in belonging to a group and letting other people know that they are not part of it?
I do think that it is all too fitting that a nun would think that a good way to bring people into the faith is to tell them that we all must remember that we will return to ashes.
Way to pull people in with misery. Wouldn't the pancakes or donuts be a better sell? God created pleasure here on earth -- it's yours to enjoy before you turn to dust? And while you're at it, maybe you should share your pancakes with someone else who may not have any, because she's on her way to dust herself?

My grandmother is the most obedient and devout Catholic I've ever known. She and my grandfather are not ones to bend the rules, but that doesn't mean that she wasn't quick to remind me that the rules can be bent. Out with my friends at the skating rink Friday night and accidentally ate a hot dog? Eat a chicken nugget at a friend's house? Pick another day and go without. It's a system of check and balances from the most devout woman to grace the planet. Take that, third grade!

Finally, this is what Winifred had to say this evening. She said it was unpromted, so I'm thinking whenever she thought, "Wow I could go for a piece of chocolate between meals," she prayed for strength so as not to break the fast between lunch and processed fish square from McDs, to show reverence for Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, Amen. (I just ate three Hershey kisses! They melted all over my molars.):

Hello Girls,

Here's the deal: If Easter is the very highest, most important holy day of the year--and it is in the Catholic church, then Lent, the preparation time for Easter, ought to be a joyous time. Perhaps one can reflect in a joyous atmosphere.

Love, MOM

Happy Lent, Ya'll! Have a good time suffering. If you need me, I'll be over here, snacking between meals and eating meat by the pound seven days a week.

Thank God, the Wait is Over

2008-02-06T10:14:00.000-08:00

E. Asselbeck has "returned," or at least appeared again, on The View. While her involvement is mentally devastating to 98% the world's women containing a functioning brain, I managed to live in happiness while she co-hosted these last few weeks. I floated in a simple, uncomplicated life, unknowing that she has returned to her stomping grounds of oppression.
What's more devastating is that I didn't know until I saw her in a clip on The Soup (I was serious about round-ups and countdowns people). I've been dormant, waiting for Winifred to reference Asselbeck or at the very least, Sherri Shepherd's infuriating lack of knowledge (first the world was flat, now we elect a new president every year). Winifred hasn't commented about Shepherd, probably just so I can stew some more, but has finally opened up, albeit briefly, about Asselbeck:

Obviously Senator Clinton won the state of New York without Asselbeck's vote. When Asselbeck went to the polls to vote this morning, she was given a Democratic ballot. She got to the booth, realized there were no names on it for her to vote for, and had to go back to the desk. She was peeved. I was amused. You'd think she'd take it as a sign.

Love, MOM

I’VE BEEN HAD

2008-02-05T10:24:00.000-08:00

I’m a woman who loves a good list: making lists, reading lists, Top Tens, Best Ofs, Clipdowns, Countdowns, 50 Reasons Why, and a glossary overview of [property or principle] sets my heart aflutter. As such, I’m liable to tune in to Countdown with Keith Olberman on a Friday night whipping up the brownies and my nightly routine is not crawling under the covers with a book and a soothing stereo, but the remote and my buddies John and Steven.
John and Steven alleviate the nightmares Keith has implanted while angrily reciting the day’s news. I didn’t watch Keith last night because the local news is already too devastating (babies over bridges and homicidal teens) to know just what exactly Bush did today. I’ll catch up later tonight, and then I’ll come down from the anxiety with irrelevance.
The WGA strike has been devastating; before the writers stood up for themselves (FYI: I’m totally behind them, gooo writers!) I had set a schedule for myself at night revolving around a talking dead girl and Nate Fisher The Lawyer. This is monumental as I spent almost an entire academic year devoted to reality television in the interest of college journalism. I was once bereft without Stewart and Colbert but today I feel empty and used from their comedic tactics.
And here’s why: Colbert was engaged in a playful feud with late-night host Conan O’Brien. Colbert was promised that if #$%uckabee won the primaries he could serve as Vice President. Colbert believes he “made #$%uckabee,” while ‘O Brien claims that because Chuck Norris with his Walker Texas Ranger pull, thus making Colbert, so Stewart steps in and says no, He made O’Brien, and finally O’Brien says that’s it, we’re going to fight. Fisticuffs! This brings me much joy. So much joy that I stay awake to watch Late Night with Conan because the fisticuffs don’t come out on Comedy Central.
And then I realize I’ve been betraying The Good Word of Winifred because this is all over #$%uckabee! #$%uckabee interrupts the fight claming—wait, is there anything in your mouth right now? Juice? Animal cracker dust? Pasta maybe? Swallow.—that this great nation made him. Hold on while I find a barf bucket. Feeling nauseated I turn off the television and go to sleep, hoping the world will spin a little slower.
I was already feeling bad about my accidental betrayal, until I realized that today is Super Tuesday (Maryland votes next week, so while I was paying attention to politics it hadn’t quite clicked.) when I sat down in front of a bigscreen TV tuned to CNN’s all-day-all-night-all-the-time-with-Anderson-Cooper SUPER TUESDAY COVERAGE. Oh, God, I felt sick. Not only had I betrayed my beliefs in the name of humor, but I’ve been played. The fight was staged the night before Super Tuesday. For votes!
My head is so heavy, the pain so excruciating, that I need both hands to hold it up. Typing this, you may imagine, a grievous task. I’m in a sea of sadness. I am bereft. I am drowning in waves of doomful regret.

COMING SOON: It’s Fat Tuesday, Let the Sinning Begin!; Ash Wednesday; Reasons Why Ina Garten Reminds Me of My Aunt or Reasons Why Even Biscuit Calls Ina Garten “Aunt Ina.”

I Hope You're In Your Sunday Best

2008-02-03T09:55:00.001-08:00

Because once you read this e-mail you can skip church, Amen, and go to brunch.

Sent last night to her lovely daughters:

Hi Girls,

Ina claims that whenever she brings in cookies to work--or has brought them in, no one likes them. This is the case of classic family cookies, such as the rolled oatmeal cookies. So she stopped. This week she cleaned out her freezer and found a Nestles brownie breakup. She baked them and put them in the kitchen there. Someone asked her who made them. She replied--boldfaced--"I have no idea." The nurse said, "They are delicious." I teased her for lying as she so rarely lies. Then I asked her if she had told Grandpa that her hospital has golf cart type vehicles to transport patients etc. She went to the hospital pharmacy to pick up a prescription and an old man, a volunteer like Gramps, told her to hop in. She said she could not tell him because he does not know she has a prescription--blood pressure. I said she had to because he would love to have such a cart at his hospital. So she said, "Well, I guess I could rearrange the details." !!!!! So none of you have to lie again--just rearrange the details.
Love, MOM

The point here, said the Word of Winifred, is to rearrange the details. My Aunt, whose real name isn't Ina, doesn't lie. I'm still shocked that an office would be so unappreciative, because not only does Aunt Ina remind me of Ina Garten, but she does make tasty baked goods. That's crap. Let's discuss over hash browns. I'll see you at Ihop in five.

Happy Day After Groundhog's Day!

2008-02-02T20:38:00.000-08:00

Illustration from Cat and Girl.

Groundhog's Day was frustrating to me in my early digits until I realized that six weeks of more winter was the same thing as six weeks left of winter. Oh, you mean either way it's six weeks of unbearable cold and unfulfilled snow days? Gee willikers, I wish I hadn't wasted my angst on an oversized rodent. Now it's closer to a sad realization that this cold has only lasted 31 days and not 31 weeks.
I think adopting New Year's Resolution for the sake of following in line is completely bogus. So do the perfect Quimbys--Charlotte spent a month traversing across Europe, so there's nothing left anyway, Emily is a modern day superhero, and The King has already talents in wit, smarts, and responsibility--leaving Winifred and I to grasp at qualities to better ourselves while our family scoffs.
Or they should. I doubt anyone scoffs at Winifred, except me (today she called and asked if I was watching the America's Next Top Model marathon and I scoffed and said, "No, I'm watching Real Housewives of Orange County).
It's not the bettering of one's life that is bogus but the need to adopt it on a predetermined date. Instead of, you know, right now. You think, I should de-clutter my life! So instead of cleaning up two weeks before Halloween you wait until January 2.
Winifred decided to keep her mouth shut. ("This year I will keep more opinions to myself.") There was also some tie-in about being nice to people with different opinions, by which she means, when someone says they're going to vote for Obama because they hate women, she'll only launch a verbal counterattack for ten minutes instead of 60. This was a crushing blow for someone trying to blog about her but 33 days into 2k8 and she's failing miserably. (This is the 39th post on The Gospel if its any indication.) See, look here:

I just heard on the news that Caroline Kennedy has
endorsed Obama! This was a POOR time to make such an
asinine resolution--though I really meant it more on a
non-political scale.

But wait, there's more!

Having read Suckabee's quote I realize this is the worst possible year to enact that type of resolution. How ridiculous to have made it. I will attempt just the kindness aspect of the resolution.[Editor's note: the other Quimbys have taken to "#$%uckabee"]

Seriously. Given that I write three other blogs and can't keep my mouth closed, I think we both lack the genetic infrastructure to support closed mouths. Winifred will persevere, but I remain victorious!

I debated on a couple of ideas before Christmas. I thought I might "use more condoms" after accidentally watching a Tila Tequila special on MTV. "From now on, I'll use more condoms," a Frat boy solemnly promised, and I wondered why he wasn't using them regularly to begin with. Given that I'm a chaste woman, I thought this was especially ironic. Then I thought that I might "do less smack!" as Biscuit gave up smack for Lent one year (she's not Catholic or an intravenous drug user). Neither of these can be repeated to Winifred so I decided that I'd try and lessen my envionmental impact. I have 365 days to change my ways and a year and a half of residual guilt from buying an Ikea plastic bag and intending to reuse it on my consumerist-based shopping trips.
I'm a little smug when I say I've made serious progress.
I decided I'd start right away though. I made serious efforts to read the following books:

1. The Green Book: The Everyday Guide to Saving the Planet One Simple Step at a Time by Elizabeth Rogers and Thomas M. Kostigen. Unfortunately with a forward by Cameron Diaz (and William McDonough) short essays from Martha Stewart (pretending I’m Martha: Well I have SOOOO many horses I fertilize all of my organic vegetables—enough to cater my HUUUUGE parties—myself!), Owen Wilson (pretending again: I was like whoooah duuude the environment’s not popular so I’ll tell people I’m not sensitive to those issues when they ask about my Hybrid from Toyota! It’s cool now though because I’m in this book!), Ellen Degeneres, and other MTV-friendly celebrities.

All of it is made from recycled paper, which I think I like the most because it seems ironic and counterproductive to buy a book about saving paper among other strategies. That said, I'm never getting an electronic book because the collector in me needs to savor the space bound novels take, and my love for reading type and paper will never be satiated by pixels, no matter how revolutionary the technology becomes. I knew it would be easier to read a book that waters down the facts (though this is trying: the solutions are calculated without mathematics for readers but instead , "Every additional ten pounds per traveler requires an additional 350 million gallons of jet fuel per year, which is enough to keep a 747 flying continuously for ten years.") Still, the other small tips help me make small gradual changes. I'm already turning off the sink when I brush my teeth, my thermostat is low, and I dry most of my shirts on a rack instead of in a dryer.

2. The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook: 77 Essential Skills to Stop Climate Change by David de Rothschild

The truth about this book is that I found it in Daedulus on clearance when I was supposed to buy Harry Potter during Harry’s midnight sale. It’s also the truth that I liked the book’s design: as an instructional manual for the globe’s untimely doom the illustrations mimic flight disaster plans and I think that is so cool. But the results of Live Earth are so head scratchingly frustrating—the amount of energy output and trash produced is dumbfounding—that I feel dirty owning it. I went to last summer’s Oregon Country Fair where everything was recycled and vendors did not offer plastic utensils. Silverware was used, washed at the nearby high school, and returned clean for another use. I like that the tasks are rated by time, personal financial impact, overall global impact, and effort, but I hate that the last twenty or so items are impossible (#68 Buy a Camel), that the least frugal have the least effect (#47 Install a Windmill; cost has declined 90% and I love wind power, but it's not happening Rothschild), and the residual hipster-related guilt.

aforementioned recycle center

Speaking of guilt, this cause is increasingly popular. Ew. Today's Washington Post style section listed environmental friendly alternatives to Valentine's Day (may require log-in) and American Eagle is taking up the cause with hand bags urging to recycle and ride bikes. See?

The hideous bag is intended as a 3-in-1. The last looks cute in Easter baskets of lapsed Catholics, Amen.
Whenever I feel dirty I read The Simple Family. I don't have kids and Rachel (who I do not know) is putting in far more effort than I am, but I need to see someone eschew this corporate smiley face plastered among recycle signs, flowers, and unicorns.
Ultimately, I've recycled more (there's no pick-up here, so it just piles six feet high) and bought more biodegradeable chemicals. I've had a 70% Ikea Bag increase, and today I told the checkout girl at Target that I didn't need a plastic bag for my detergent and handed it back. She was dumbfounded but I had one less thing to throw away and lose sleep for at night.

Ultimately when it comes down to it, I'm going to vote for the candidate protecting my rights other the candidate who wants to use paper over plastic, proving I'm not ready to move to Oregon. (Ha, GET IT?)

EVERYONE WANTS TO HEAR ABOUT SOME OTHER KID'S DREAMS, RIGHT?

2008-02-02T14:35:00.000-08:00

I finished The Road early this week. The day before I finished it I read it at the bus stop, and then on the bus, and then walked the few blocks to my apartment while reading (and did not trip). The King is reading now so I am holding my comments to myself. He is reading before he goes to sleep at night, and that, I think, is a bad idea.
I used to scoff at my roommates who had bad dreams as the result of the books they read before bed, and then I read The Road and dreamt I was in Portland, arguing with my ex boyfriend/BFFOMGZ on a train platform. "The world has ended," I said, "You don't need to buy a train ticket!" We were both wearing backpacks, the kind bike-riding serious hikers have, that tower over your head and hangs far past your butt. In the Real World I'd topple over but in Dream World I was kicking major ass with my backpack, which had camping knives and pots, and maps, and some random tools. Our families were okay but we were joined by several annoying friends who totally brought us down in our quest to escape and save the city. Which had sky scrapers. Portland doesn't have sky scrapers!
This dream would have been awesome, if it hadn't followed reading The Road, and wasn't two months after the most AWESOME apocalyptic dream of all time.

Following no books, movies, or discussions (which occur often between Biscuit and myself), I dreamt that The King and I set out in his car to go on some vague errands. We had to return in the late afternoon because, "my mother was making a casserole." This is your tip that things have gone awry as Winifred, while a master in the kitchen, is not Mrs. Cleaver and does not make casseroles in a dress. In fact, she doesn't wear dresses at all, but in Dream World she was wearing a dress, with heels, and making a casserole.
Around 3 p.m. we had to pull over because the road was full of zombies. We knew we had to get home, ("Captain, we need to get to Mom! She made a casserole! What if she's in danger?!") and we took miscellaneous items from the path to get home. I think at one point we both weld an axe. As a spoiled suburbanite turned almost-city dweller, I've never held or swung an axe. I mean, please. There was also some trashcan lids, tree branches, and boots. We swung boots and defeated zombies. I am serious. Eventually the Army came over the hill, and some people ran away because they thought, you know, the Army would take care of it.
The King and I groaned as Major Jerkface was of little help at all. Eventually we had fought the several miles home, clearing a path, making it easier for the Army, and made it home.
Where Winifred had finished her casserole and taken her oven rack and hit a zombie upside the head. She was tapping her foot as she scolded its body for getting in her business, who did he think he was?
The King and I were embarrassed then that we rushed home.
And then we got in her car and drove to the movies. Afterall, we'd done all the hard work, it was time for a reward.

Too Young to Party: The Blog of an Over-enthuse Jaded Something Something

2008-01-30T18:35:00.000-08:00

Hello Girls,

Dad and I are watching Two Weeks, wherein Sally Field is dying and her family has gathered around her. Neighbors and friends are bringing casseroles. At one point, one of the sons opens the refrigerator and says, "There is no food in this house that was invented after 1967." (There have been numerous casseroles involving cream of mushroom soup.) Despite the death theme of the movie, there are very funny portions!

[There is more but it's ommitted for relevance. I'm the editor and publisher I get to do that.]

Winifred's "vice," unabashed media anchor, are films and books wherein people are dying. Sally Field is also a big draw, living or dead: The Flying Nun, Brothers and Sisters, ER. She really brings the emotional pain with her viewing choices (still haven't forgiven you for Backstreet, Mom) and the irony, the irony is that she is watching this on her date night with The King after vowing to watch happy movies. Blood Diamond and The Last King of Scotland pushed her over the edge this summer and she dove headfirst into Cary Grant land. After she'd seen several romantic comedies I begged them to watch North by Northwest "because even if it's suspenseful and frustrating it has a good end!" (It bombed. Their interest in seeing it at The Charles this spring has waned. Baltimoreans, you can come with me instead.) Anyway, this woman. She hates blood lust but she loves the sadness. Bring it on, she subconsciously cheers as she settles into a TNT marathon of Beaches, Terms of Endearment and her all-time favorite Steel Magnolias. Even my cold heart can't handle that. Actually, I tried watching Beaches a few weeks ago and I couldn't do that because I knew how it was going to end, and despite 50 previous viewings, started to tear. I found comfort in Tim Gunn elsewhere. Yet...

This is Shanna. She won't wake up. Shanna, Shanna, wake up!
I am my mother's daughter (but with 50% more panache and a higher serving of flippancy!): I have this "problem" wherein I'll see any number of teen actresses on television and yell out the plot of a horribly depressing Lifetime movie the subject was in before hitting the bigtime. It's horrifying for anyone that is indirectly involved. Growing Pains on PAX? I'll conjure the scene where a skeletal Tracey Gold is giving a hoarse monologue on the family couch where she is almost-dying. (There is some respect here, given Tracy's personal history, and you know, eating disorders are not a laughing matter.) Sleepover airing on ABC Family while channel surfing? Not only will I repeat the entire plot of The Party Never Stops: Diary of a Teenage Binge Drinker (misleading: she's a college freshman, not a high school sophomore bummer) but I'll renact 56% of the movie, starting with one of the last scenes where Jesse Tanner desperately shakes the cold dead body of her freshman roommate, Shanna, and work my way back through the interesting parts of the middle. (I want to go on record that I did not make a character page for Jesse Tanner. But only because I don't have an IMDB account.) I gloss over some of the verbal content with the frat ladies and gentlemen, but only because I was so flabbergasted; I saw the last twenty minutes before I saw the beginning.
Except Winifred is more respectful. She thinks these movies are "touching portrayals" of people's lives. She won't play a role in a dramatic re-telling of Odd Girl Out and is probably ashamed at my lengthy diatribe sharing my intimate Lifetime secrets. (She has a point.)

There's a little of this plot ruinage in The Sisters. Emily loves a good one; Charlotte and Fitzwilliam suffering residual angst and suffering from She's Too Young. But the never rise their voices to falsetto. Yet they seem slightly less involved in the tears than Winifred. Charlotte will take a good noir any day but is less impressed with the Italian male weepies post WWII (I sobbed my way through the one about the suicidal man and his dog, leave me alone). Emily is neither embarassed or 'shamed. This is a part of life, a love for surface entertainment, and she does it with grace and poise. What, this is normal, she says, and then she flips to Martha for the monologue before making her own brown sugar from scratch. And there I am, playing the role of Shanna's dead body on my living room floor while her mixer whirs in my phone.

The thing about Winifred is that she doesn't cry. Death is a part of life. Beaches will easily ruin the rest of my sunny afternoon, but Winifred is probably in bed watching late night television right now still giggling about the mushroom soup based casseroles and their inevitable servingware of white ceramic bowls and colorful Tupperware.

On the other hand these families always end up with dogs in the end. Where is MY dog?

2008-01-26T21:54:00.000-08:00

I tried to make brownies Friday night to see if it really does taste better when you add a little vanilla in the batter. My college years have subsisted on spaghetti os (Batman shaped with meatballs, please) and hot pockets despite my ability to make spring rolls and French macaroons from scratch. I can accomplish series things with a whisk but by and large, I’m happy with frozen food and a microwave. Which is where the curious void concerning boxed brownie mix with vanilla comes in: I needed to know and I needed to know now. I whipped up the mix while watching Countdown with Keith Olberman and basked in the scent of baked goods. I basked in that scent for thirty minutes instead of eighteen and ended up with twelve heart shaped hockey pucks that smelled like brownies but tasted like rocks. I threw them out this morning.
I turned on the television this morning and the first real words I hear were, “WELL YAAAAAA’LLLLLLLL,” a loud boister “Ya’ll” that jarred me awake in her Southern hospitality. Good Lord, it was Paul Deen and with the help of her Neanderthal son, she was making brownies. She made brownies last weekend, and some kind of chocolate dessert this week that wasn’t brownie, and wasn’t pie, and wasn’t cake or pudding, but something between. All three dishes ended with ice cream plus whipped topping. This was a sign that my apartment was meant to have brownies, and later that night I was hunched over the stove melting chocolate and banging a block of brown sugar against the counter in effort to have a passable form of brown sugar.
It didn’t work. Ultimately I had an edible brownie batter, for which I set a timer. Around 10 p.m. Winifred called to check in on my progress as she did chores around the house. She says she has to go soon; a new movie will air on the Hallmark Channel. She then begins to describe the plot, as seen on the commercial in depth. Something disturbingly similar to P.S. I Love You plus old people with hearts of gold, and a girl who has to carefully notate the details of her days. As soon as I heard that Some Old Guy handed Young and Cranky Youth with an assignment to Better Her Life Through Virtue, I wasn’t interested. “Oh barf,” I say at a pause in Winifred’s detailed synopsis of one commercial.

Winifred sighs. “I guess we won’t be watching together she says,” slightly irritated.

“Nope.” I consider lying and telling her I don’t know where Hallmark is (channel 73 and mysteriously, a repeat of the same broadcast one 140-something) but bite my tongue lest I hurt her feelings.

Winifred says outright that her synopsis was meant to get me involved, “But I guess we can’t get roped in together,” she says.

“Nope.” Hallmark aired several poorly constructed holiday movies in which Single Dads looked for the Love of a Good Woman; usually with a career, no kids, loads of money, and happiness without housewifery. Or, Women Who Yearned for Domesticity found Cranky Ol’ Men who Hated Christmas. In the end families became nuclear, women gave up their professions and took care of kids and had dinner on the table at 5. I’m still mad at Giatta’s slight insinuation life is still that way after watching an episode of Everyday Italian this week; it’s probably not good for my mental health to settle into Hallmark tonight.

I called Winifred later for help with something else. She didn’t tell me if the movie ends happily or not.

If everyone didn’t end up alright in the end I’m going to be very upset.

From an e-mail titled "And one more annoying thing...."

2008-01-21T20:20:00.000-08:00

Hi Girls,

Have you noticed Suckabee's walk?? I don't care for that type of walk. The only person with a similar walk that I DO like, is Leonard Slatkin, conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra. He has a very good reason for his walk/posture, having held the baton for so long. Did you know Mrs. Suckabee has jumped out of planes? I will leave that comment and my successive thoughts on the subject to your imagination.

Dad is UP IN ARMS at the possibility of the reflecting pool being removed/covered up/ or in any way changed to accommodate attractive grass during public protests. ...

You know, I'm not sure what she means about the Mrs. I'm too hung up on Mrs. Romney's creepy past. Ew.

Then she gave away the ending of The Road, which I am reading right now. Which is unfortunate, since it's a suspense novel about a dystopian world, and you know, maybe I don't want the end given away, even though I ended up stressed out near page 50 and had to flip near the end and see if this was like I Am Legend the novel (spoiler: HE DIES! Goodbye, modern civilization!) or I Am Legend the movie (spoiler: Will Smith finds the cure for AIDS, lives, and gives hope that in time, civilization will return to as it is now--but probably better). Also, I just want to say that Charlotte's copy is not emblazoned with stickers for Oprah's Book Club (HEY GIRLFRIEND!) and that Oprah's advice is not what has forced me into the nightmares I'll endure of looking for civilization with the help of my last boyfriend who is, by and large, fairly incompetent and lacking in common sense and survival skills. (And then I had a dream that Ted Leo was performing on Capitol Hill and after everyone left he was going to join my family and friends at the bar when a tiger the size of an elephant lay seige to the city, but as hard as I try I can't blame Cormac McCarthy for that. And, what's weirder? That Ted Leo is going to save us or that my subconscious thinks Winifred and the King totally want to hit some Hill aide watering hole and shoot the shiz with Ted?) She asks a lot of questions really, because Charlotte read it first, and I tend to skim past it. BUT NOT THIS TIME. When I finish I'll post her commentary since I can't rely on her to do it. I'm clearing my throat for emphasis. Faux emphasis, since I'm not that upset.

THE FINE PRINT

2008-01-18T16:37:00.000-08:00

I meant to post this a very long time ago. I have three drafts on my computer! It was time to stop trying so hard and officialize What This Blog Is All About. Read and enjoy, suckers, I'm off to Paper Moon for nachos!

HOW WE GOT HERE

I was reading a post on Fussy to Winifred on Easter afternoon while she prepared dinner. The resulting discourse convinced me that Winifred’s opinions needs to join the millions of other voices online. But because what Winifred has to say is, you know, valid. Since joining Blogger, Winifred has clammed up under the pressure of an audience (which to our knowledge, is only Charlotte and Emily). We’re currently under a treaty in which I represent Winifred. She’s under pressure though, I have Charlotte on my side, and usually what Charlotte says, goes.

At Winifred's request, all named have been changed to protect those mentioned and uninvolved. If you know who I am/we are, please respect her request. It's all she asks, really, and it's not too much,

The title of this blog goes beyond forcing Winifred to discuss current events and issues with the public. Winifred has a way we, her daughters, think is worth sharing. So until then, I’ll happily share The Good Word of Winifred, Amen.

WHO I AM AND WE ARE

Winifred…is the inspiration and reason for this blogging project. She lives with her husband of 30+ years, outside of Washington, DC. She is an avid reader, passionate voter, and former Midwesterner. Unfortunately, she does not like to talk about passing gas and is deeply offended when I burp. This has not yet strained our relationship. I don’t know how Winifred chose her alias to be “Winifred,” and when questioned, she says she doesn’t either. But it works well for her, and so it will stay.

The King…Is my father. He’s a compassionate man with a strong work ethic. We like him a whole lot. I don’t know why I called him The King; he’s not the kind of man who is the “King of His Domain,” he doesn’t boss people around (in fact, he hates to do that), and he’s never been “King of the House.” In fact, he sometimes calls Winifred “Boss,” which is endearing and a little nauseating. He’s a private man though, and I want it kept that way.

Charlotte…Is the oldest of the three Quimby daughters. We think she’s pretty swell. I think her name is somewhat obvious, no? She’s married to a fella named Fitzwilliam. Obviously that isn’t his real name, either.

Emily…Is the second oldest of the daughters. She got married to some dude and left me. I don’t know what he has that I don’t, but I suspect my unabashed for teen soap driven by angst puts at least one more point in my corner? Actually, we’ll all fond of Emily, even though she left us, and her husband Charmont. Her alias is not a tribute to a European lifestyle, artist, poem, or author, but a name that we know she treasures. It's the name of one of her Cabbage Patch kids. But, hey! It's also one of her favorite poets and a Bronte sister. SCORE!

Captain…I’m a twentysomething soon-to-graduate college student. I live outside of Baltimore, Maryland and I’m very happy here. I like everything but fuzzy lint, warm mayo, and commercials for internet dating. I'm especially fond of sugary treats like cupcakes. I’m considered the publisher/editor for The Gospel. My name is suspiciously similar to my alias here but with slightly more letters. When I was 17 I thought it would be a good idea to work at Hot Topic as a means to spite Winifred. "Ironically," the summer employment resulted in several good things for me as my co-workers proved to be incredibly friendly, loyal, and sweet people as compared to my sinister high school friends. At this store everyone had a special nickname. Mine resulted from one co-worker with subpar hearing misunderstanding our boss, who was a fast speaker. As the store's youngest and least managerial employee the name stuck, as did references to Uncle Walt. Now that my roommate works at American Eagle I am wearing suspiciously less black band tee shirts. Oh, the irony.

Biscuit…Is my roommate. Given that everyone gets to live anonymously, it’s only fair. It’s her favorite food. She’s also buttery and soft. I think it works.

COMMENT POLICY

Until I posted a formal About The Gospel post, I was carefully screening all comments. Thus far, every comment has been published. I’ve done this as my other blogs tend to receive spam (from Argentinean Internet providers). This hasn’t been a problem here, but I’d like to ask that you not spam the The Gospel in the comments, because then I have to log in and delete the comments, and boy, is that a pain in the butt. In order to do that I have to put down my bucket of French fries and I’d rather not. It’s not as if you’d post advertisements in your chapel, would you? Or, at the end of a sermon shout, “THIS SECRET WEAPON WILL GIVE MORE POWER TO YOUR LITTLE SOLDIER!”

Anonymous commenting is fine, too. I think it would be mature and respectful if you signed your name or left some indication of who you are. Emily has a way of commenting on all of my projects without having to sign her name, but most people aren't as proficient as she is.

What I love about the internet, aside from its rampant freedom, is its access to discourse. You’re wholly encouraged to comment, critique, and discuss this blog’s content with the Quimbys and each other. Rejoice!

AND IT WAS GOOD, AMEN.

Mean Mom

2008-01-18T14:56:00.000-08:00

Winifred is obsessed with the Meanest Mom story. Apparently it's all over the Today Show but I wouldn't know. Because some people? Some people go to class every morning, do their homework every night, schedule free time around The O.C.'s two-hour airings on SoapNet, and go to bed.
At least that's what the kids who aren't the Dumbest Kids on the Planet do.
In short, a spoiled teenager was given permission to drive a car--which was purchased, owned, and covered by his parents--provided he didn't drink and drive.
Jane Hambleton, the mother, checked his car, found alchohol, and placed the following ad in the Des Moines Register:

"OLDS 1999 Intrigue. Totally uncool parents who obviously don't love teenage son, selling his car. Only driven for three weeks before snoopy mom who needs to get a life found booze under front seat. $3,700/offer. Call meanest mom on the planet."

She says the ad cost her a fortune. Hambleton is a copyeditor and has received a buttton of attention for the ad.

When I was finally allowed to get my license at 17 in 2003, days before my senior year of high school began, I wasn't allowed to leave town behind the wheel for more than a month. (I was told I had to wait one full month but come November I was desperately negotiating permission.) My town is 4.3 miles, mostly farmland, and has nothing to do for a high school senior. I was fortunate that I was allowed to drive Winifred's car at all, and one morning a month for six non-consecutive months I was allowed to drive Winifred's car in the morning for newspaper day which required that I arrive a little after 6 a.m., before most of the faculty. Every month that she agreed, I spent the next five days kissing her butt. Because she was the nicest mom.

Oh, but I digress in the face of spoiling parents and their children! Hambleton's son says it was left by a passenger. ...If I allowed alcohol into the car at all I would have been lucky to live. It wouldn't matter who left or was drinking it. At 19 and out of college I wouldn't be allowed to argue that my 21+ friend left it behind. I knew what the driving laws were and I knew what my parents said, and that was what was obeyed, period.
I'm not sure that Winifred would revel in her new fame. I'm also sure that I'd be yanked out of school and out on my own. And if Hambleton were as mean as she claims, she'd do that too.

I'm a harsh woman.

Pancakes For All!

2008-01-17T18:01:00.000-08:00

Biscuit and I are under the weather. As such, we have been in front of our television all day (10 a.m.-8 p.m.) watching Six Feet Under and parts of a Project Runway marathon ($45 flight to Elisa's homeplanet on HotWire.com, going fast!!) and dreaming of better times...namely the weekend. Sharing these dreams with Winifred, she replied by e-mail.
Keep in mind I use gmail so when I get the e-mail I see only the first line. Making it all the better for me:

YES, go to IHOP !!! I can put money into your account to finance this operation. I think it is still all you can eat pancakes--though who could eat more than three anyway??

Love, MOM

ALL YOU CAN EAT? Good Lord I hope I feel better soon.

AND THE HITS KEEP COMIN'

2008-01-16T13:04:00.001-08:00

In an e-mail sent seven minutes ago:

Hello Girls,

At first I could not believe Michigan voters would vote for Romney. Then I realized the people he helped to put out of work are not Republican voters. On another note the AARP is endorsing Obama. Why? Because he "was raised by his grandmother so he will understand the needs of the elderly and retired." The real reason in this crock of crap is because the AARP has a significant number of old white members who are not going to vote for Senator Clinton.

On still another note, no one makes a better lemon meringue pie than I do. No one makes a better lemon tart than Charlotte does.

Love, MOM

I don't know about you but my favorite part is the pie.

#$%uckabee

2008-01-15T20:37:00.000-08:00

At the urge of my supervisor, Winifred has taken to calling Huckabee "Suckabee"; this is unlike Winifred (but not so much The King, who has, to my enjoyment egged her on and found other more profane nicknames) who has, to date, eradicated the following words from her home: fart, snot, sucks, and pissed. (I am in so much trouble now.)
Winifred is a woman of many articulate words, but she must be frustrated to fall into the King's traps and break her silence on using "Suck." You know what? She's not just frustrated. She's angry.
Any chocolate-lover who crosses her may in fact, be going down. Any woman that is overheard saying they don't think they can support Hilary will find herself in the cross hairs. One woman said she would vote for whoever would make "the country safe," and I realize now that she probably meant terrorism but I was thinking street crime which finally launched my own homegrown/anarchist safety-and-change-begin-locally harangue. This can only mean one thing: Winifred has expounded on her frustrations so much that I am no longer amused. I have cracked.
We met with Charlotte downtown wherein Winifred Lost It again, and began a long harangue about politics, and why is it women won't vote for a woman just because she's a woman, and why am I the only one afraid of Huckabee, and, seriously, people are behind Ron Paul, and why is Obama so much better, isn't he just the same? And then I walk to the next room because, well, truth be told, I'm burned out on "candidates" when I know I'm going to hate this president as much as the current one.
Hi, I'm Captain, and I was so excited to see Anti-Flag I went by myself, and even knowing that the mom next to me was rolling her eyes, giggled when Justin Sane announced, "IF I HAD IT MY WAY WE'D MARCH TO THE WHITE HOUSE AND PAINT IT BLACK!" It's very nice to meet you.
I told Winifred, with the museum patrons and Charlotte present, it was time to step into her anonymous power and post these issues herself. Not because I am burned out--I enjoy her tangents, her complaints, her grievances--but because there are others who feel the same. And given my inability to discuss politics online with getting exasperated, it's probably better that she takes this cause.
She's still shy, though. Even knowing I'll do all the work for her, I'm left to share these bits of e-mail:

The tv is full of crockpots. My annoyance with John Edwards had to do with his criticism of Hilary's war vote. I want McCain to just go away to wherever it is old soldiers go to.
2/23/2007

I am here to tell you that this election, more than any other, is going to drive me absolutely crazy. If I see one more woman on televisions saying how she would loooove to have a female president, just not this one I think I will shoot out the screen. God knows I would love to not have this man for president either! On top of all this, the news just showed a jackass teen from NH who registered to vote today so he could vote for Sen. Obama. Why you might ask? "Well, peer pressure had a lot to do with it. All my friends wanted to vote for him." Ok, so where are all the girls and their peer pressure to vote for Sen. Clinton? Undoubtedly following the boys. You see, I am going to lose my mind.
1/8/2008

Today she forwarded an e-mail of Charlotte's, which included an alarming quote from Suckabee:
Terrifying quote of the week from *&^uckabee: "I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that's what we need to do is amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than trying to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other and how we treat the family."

Oh wait! That's it. I guess Winifred should step up her game, then. Because with a modern, feminist, up-in-arms, mother of three daughters, vet must have a lot to say, no?

I wanted to link more, but I grew angry. As for readers who disagree, I hope you'll stick around despite our differing opinions.

With These Ice Packs Removed

2008-01-07T21:12:00.001-08:00

I'm a busy girl. I have big city jobs to go to, big city jobs to apply for, blogs to write, French fries to eat, films to articulate, and trains to catch. I am not exactly running after men--I am not trying to bag a boy, net a husband, or tackle a suitor. At a comment through a family e-mail--made by a non-family member--that someone, somewhere, anywhere, was, I responded, at large:

It's not like I have sneakers strapped to my feet so I can chase down a man. UGH.

I mean, puhhhleease, homegirl has things to do! And The King, recognizing this, set out December 19, 2007, the night the e-mail was sent, to find me a pair of sneakers for Christmas.
...Because the Quimby's celebrate a woman's singlehood, mmmhmm.
The King is not one to settle. No, he showed refined taste as Winifred suggested various options, which were too bland, not red, not bright, not Captain, unable to balance on a skateboard, too flimsy, incapable of allowing flight, etc. A pair surfaced, not red, but sturdy and most decidedly Captain in its prominent use of plaid (and its name "BEAR KITTY") wad especially fitting.
The streets in the city grew wet the following weeks, and running after a train and a bus through puddles and over hills, slogging through damp detritus, and parading around a sullen town seemed inappropriate for the inaugural outing of shoes that were purchased for that very use.
So they lived under my desk until yesterday, when suddenly everything went seemingly right.

First, the sky opened to reveal a bright blue sky. It beckoned 60 degree weather and a number of spontaneous adventures with Biscuit when my work was unexpectedly finished in little more than an hour: lunch at the Ikea milk bar (we wanted to be more European), an odyssey of Consumer joy through clearance minimalist mass produced products, a secret ninja mission within the blue and yellow walls, unrestrained fantasies of our adult lives beyond college (real jobs, benefits, motor vehicles, painted interiors, unabashed freedom, albeit more bills), a film screening, etc. The earthly joys of 20 somethings. But the air was filled with the promise of good things, and I knew it was either the shoes, still squishy in newness, or, it was The Cake.

We celebrate Three King's Day in Winifred's C + E Catholicism, the results of which yielded a batch of carrot cupcakes and fluffy cream cheese icing. Inside Winifred baked a small, round blue stone, which I received in my cake, theoretically promising a year of good luck. ("A Red Letter Year," I sleepily mumbled on the return trip to Baltimore.) Offline I am not a believe in superstition but...it was either the cake or the shoes. I thought I'd see what happened when I wore other shoes in the printmaking studio.
You know where this is going from the subject, don't you? Everything went horribly awry. Far past so-bad-it's-funny-years-from-now. I'll be bitter when I'm 82 about January 8, 2008. Long after everything went wrong, I accidentally sent my fingers through a printmaking press. They didn't break, but my spirit did, and I bounced from grumpy to near-yarking/sobbing through the rest of the day.
Winifred made me promise to slowly back away from the keyboard, find a couch or bed and TV remote, and reconnect with an ice pack. I did, and later, I reconnected with Chipotle's burritos with carnitas sour cream, rice, corn, and salsa. She also said to wear The Shoes.
Later, to show her camaraderie, Winifred dropped a steak knife, slicing a sizable gash in her foot. The King bandaged her, and I hope, dried her tears. He used Band-Aid brand big band aids, not that sticky stuff from Target that gives me hives, and is probably looking into steel enforced house slippers.
Tomorrow I'm wearing The Shoes to class; if disaster befalls, I'll probably have to wait for another six years before I get another Red Letter Day; either way I'm owed a crown for my Epiphany win, Winifred. That's what Wikipedia says. In return I'll host Candelaria Day next month and serve whiskey. Unless you were dying for Atole?

(Thankfully I already started to type this post last night. Instead of nothing you get a 2-for-1 special!)

Winifred Has Better Guitar Hero III Scores Than I Do

2008-01-05T20:54:00.000-08:00

Winifred and I went to a dinner party tonight and the between food that's made for dipping and caseroles made for scooping a massive Wii tournament was held in which five ladies and their respective parents picked up a plastic guitar and attempted to dominate the rock and roll world via Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock.

I've refrained from releasing my inner rock legend since the game came out because I'm not very good at Dance Dance Revolution, don't like the way the songs are presented, and don't like embarassing myself. (Only, you know, on the internet!) I'm also morally opposed to this game because the developers of the series (which had been making my skin crawl long before Legends' release) didn't contribute to this game (they made Rock Band instead). I like to postulate and say things like, "Real guitarists don't play well anyway," and "It's not like playing a real guitar," and, "I've heard the songs, they're all watered down representations!"
I really do believe the last two arguments but the truth is, for me, it's about humiliation.

I kept telling Winifred, no, you don't have to! It's okay! But no, she was having a good time, and no amount of anxious projection would keep her away from her Rock God Glory, and there she stood, performing--no wailing--Foghat's "Slow Ride."
Foghat! Did you know? Winifred adores Barry Mainlow. She was wearing a winter-themed sweater. She sings "Sunshine and Lollipops" at whim and hates it when I criticize family movies for being so freakin' happy. You know Captain, you shouldn't be so critical, she'll say nicely.

Sunshine and Lollipops found her groove, so to speak, in a Foghat song.
I made it through 21% of Social Distortion's "Story of My Life" which I found was significantly easier than the other songs in The First Level ("Starting Out Small"), like, you know, Foghat. After that 21% I missed a bunch of notes and was booed off the stage.
Oh. Winifred made it through 22% of "Slooow Ride." I'm guessing she's not taking a ride with Foghat, but she's marginally more likely to do that than I am to share much of anything with Social D.

The other parents and a few of the fellow youth performed just as well, except for one 14 year old, who picked up the axe for "the first time" and slaughtered the astronomically high scores established by a real band who borrowed the game a few weeks ago (and beat the game in a few hours, actually).
"I might be better, you know, if you let me learn guitar in middle school," I joked at one point to Winifred, who, in addition to never getting me a puppy, never let me take lessons. She nodded and said something about how I "was really good" but it probably wouldn't help anyway.

...So not only did she beat me. But she wouldn't shoulder the burden of publicly tanking my reputation.

(I'm just kidding. She was so cute playing the game. I'm proud of Winifred for being so much cooler than I am. Admittedly, it's not hard.)

Busted!

2007-12-29T18:46:00.000-08:00

In another post that isn't actually about Winifred's gospel...

I went to Favorite Bar this week with my friends to see a semi-local band's reunion. They broke up two summers ago after years of touring, a record or two, and an endless stream of grange halls. It was a group I saw almost ever Friday my junior and year of high school in the tiny town next to mine; the grange hall had a small capacity and was jam-packed with crusty punks, cheerleaders, hipsters, parents of bands, and curious tweens. And with any local band's reunion, the venue was merrily filled with frat brothers, family, best friends, former promoters, other local bands, casual drinkers, and a few girls who willingly cried during the encore.
Between songs my friend leaned in and told our small group of four that her little sister, fourteenish, had confessed over the holiday that she "loved" this band. Oh! she had cried, I love them! My friend was aghast as her little sister then professed to love my friend's other favorite bands: Dashboard Confessional, Jamison Parker, and various pseudo-indie rock bands who had hit the pinnacle of their critical and underground stardom wallowing angst when we were seventeen. She's almost fourteen, my friend hollered as the next raucous jam began, and we giggled at her sister's tenacity.
I turned back a few minutes later and confessed, I do that all the time! It was in fact, the force that pushed me into several subgenres before my peers and bands I would find I loved. What, Charlotte? Yeah I totally love Belle and Sebastian, too!
I do like them, but it's possible that I may have overstated my preference for the sake that my sister would think I'm Really Cool.

Quote, Unquote

2007-12-26T17:38:00.000-08:00

Winifred, in an e-mail this month, in regards to GWAR:

Hope you have a good time tonight [Captain]. It would seem that the throwing of blood at a concert might not be the best way to evoke musical feelings for a tune.

Lest I Find Another Feminist Harangue

2007-12-24T10:32:00.000-08:00

It's Christmas in my parents' house, and I know this because there are oodles of cookies--some from Winifred, many from Charlotte--caramel rolls have been baked, and most notably, I am schlepping through the house in the King's oversized slippers. Luckily, he has several pairs, and thusly, we all have toasty feet.
But there are also rolls of wrapping paper in the living room, because as important as it is to "Keep Christ In Christmas,"we are Present People. I have looked high and low in this house for a puppy but haven't found one yet, but my sorrow is overwhelmed by The Washington Post writers who were given gender specific gifts and used white dolls ("You Call That a Gift?!").
The most heartbreaking of these stories is the the woman who didn't get the set of race cars:

Was Santa Sexist?
It was the 1970s. I was around 8, and what I really wanted that year was a race car set. I had my eye on a fleet of tiny, dazzling cars that came with their own looping, twisting track. You pushed them along the track by hand, and if you used just the right amount of force you could get them to spin through a full corkscrew without flying off-course. My cousin, three years older than I and the coolest person I knew, had some.
But he was a boy. And I was a girl.
I never got the cars, even though I spoke to Santa several times about them. I started to think Santa was a chauvinist.
A few years later, I finally got a toy car: a Barbie camper. It wound up in a terrible wreck. Barbie kept trying to pop wheelies.-- Robin Givhan

Under our tree were both dolls and trucks, hand held video game toys featuring Ariel and tool sets, stuffed bears, Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death, and for several years running, K'NEX sets. (Ultimately the K'NEX building was left to the efficient Emily, who was able to complete roller construction in one evening.)
And I inherited two serious sets of race cars--I got Charlotte and Emily's cars, their sets and ramps; The Parents were so gung ho when they were young that ever car was marked with a splash of pink nail polish on its underside, lest one of the neighborhood boys try to swipe one (and those little rats did). Of course I have a speed/force problem--my cars were incapable of making tight turns because I'm more interesting the the clattering catastrophe of metal cars on bare floors.

I could go on, but I just found a Tori Spelling holiday movie on Hallmark; I think it's one of the ones wherein she finds the holiday of the season as the result of a Good Man. Awesome. I should probably find my own shoes because slippers to C and E Mass is probably inappropriate...

Don't Call Me Baby (1595)

2007-12-14T20:42:00.000-08:00

Winifred has an assortment of male admirers. There is a married man in Texas sending her grapefruit (what she considers to be the state’s only positive contribution to the country is its fruit); there is a daily customer belonging to The King who sends her flowers, through my father. It is grapefruit season and Winifred has a taste for fruit this year more than ever before—and a man asked her today what The King Thinks of a Man in Texas Sending Her Fruit.
This man, though joking, is kind of old. But his implication was that it is not prudent for a married woman to accept fruit, even when it’s Texas Grapefruit in the dead of winter after weeks of endless rain and daily phone calls from your crankiest daughter. Winifred told her friend that The Grapefruit Man is Happily Married.
I don’t think it matters what Dad says or thinks. It doesn’t matter to him. These are friendly gestures—and even if they weren’t how much business is it of The King?—W inifred likes fruit, end of story. That’s how it is for The King. And that’s one of the qualities about my father that I like best: that he’s a feminist. That he’s comfortable in his relationship with Winifred.
Of course, his lackadaisical approach is only my illustration; Homer Simpson wouldn’t be bothered if Marge was receiving gifts, and I’m hesitant to tack that label to him. But I know The King, and you don’t, and I know that he thinks women are equal.

At some point in my teens I started to date a boy who took to calling me an endless string of pet names. “Baby,” “Sweetie,” “Pet,” were tossed across instant messenger and I was immediately revolted. It wasn’t that he seemed to genuinely think I was sweet, but that he was expected to say these things, and more appalling, that I was now “his.” When “Babe” and “Mine” followed, I wasn’t going to have that. I set him straight, I dumped him.
Friends, boyfriends, roommates, and co-workers have adopted their own network of nicknames. My roommate, whom I lovingly call Biscuit, started to call me “Boo” as a term of endearment when we were 19; my co-worker in high school called me Captain because he misheard our boss calling me by my actual name (and then recited Whitman); Emily and I use “dude” as a most extreme form of endearment.
Yet I find “Baby” revolting. So is cooing, or the deliberate use of “simple” words. “Baby” makes my blood curdle—my jaw clenches, my fists curly, and my eyes narrow. Good Lord, use any term of endearment so long as it is genuine, has some sort of foundation (I held the door open for you, I gave up my seat on the bus, I paid for your bus fare, I gave you directions to the courthouse downtown), and isn’t “Baby.” I feel the same way when I’m at the grocery store on Saturday afternoon and after briskly passing a man hear him chuckle, “Whoa ho, there, Little Lady!” I’m sorry, but how is the speed and determination of this trip offensive to you, Oldy McMoldy?
There seem to be few exceptions to my utter outrage. One holds a double standard and the others is my father.

The King’s birthday was a week after my own and fell on a Tuesday. Tuesdays are inexplicably my busiest day finds me on various forms of public transportation between classes. As such, I waited until 5 p.m. in hopes I’d reach The King by phone “in person” but left him a voicemail. He called me back but because of the limitations of public transportation was force to leave me a voicemail. “Hello, Baby, I got your message…” and I smiled when I heard his rare term of endearment, because I could tell I might have brought even a marginal positive difference to The Kings otherwise craptastic workday.
The King is not averse to sweet nothings. “Sweetie,” “honey,” compliments, and encouragement is his strong suit. He is fond of “shug” which may easily be Washington, DC’s “hon.” Short for sugar, he and Winifred throw it around the house on each other and their daughters just as The King’s parents may have. They do it with great fondness.

As I bounced through the bus route to campus, I realized the only man I’ll allow the courtesy of “Baby” is my father. He’s the only person who will leave me unbothered because I am the baby of the Quimby household. Yet, while Winifred may regularly say, “You’ll always be my baby,” this affirmation is rare from The King. At Thanksgiving we swore solidarity as the Youngests in our families. With his two older brothers, and my two older sisters we braced for the impact of Too Much Family During the Holidays while Winifred read internet-advice about Thanksgiving (“Remember that though the youngest is easiest to pick on, and will always be the youngest, they are probably adults now…”) and I swore again, my allegiance. I know I will always be the last to pass through significant life milestones, and this is okay with me.
The following Saturday found me careening through an intersection with two 18x24 frames under my arms. I had a walk sign at the crosswalk and bolted across six lanes of traffic as a car prepared to run the red light. We both skidded to a halt, and I hoisted my arm in a gesture to indicate that my framed artwork, recently picked up from the gallery at the end of the upper level art student show, would cause significant damage at the point of impact. An older man ran behind me. “You gotta watch where you’re going Baby,” he laughed, and jogged across the last three lanes.
Our strides eventually met and as we traversed the narrow sidewalk near my apartment he began to ask me a series of questions. Where are these frames from? Are you a framer? Are those your photographs? His condescension—that I was unable to cross on my own accord, that I was incompetent with crosswalks, that I was beneath him to the point of pet names given our unfamiliarity as a result of age and/or gender, put us at an unfortunate disposition. Inarguably, the cross-examination if the artwork was mine didn’t help his case either. I politely delivered monosyllabic answers before darting past cracks in the sidewalk and hastily hurried home, where I stewed over the general condescension through our entire exchange. While we walked he made a point to walk on the sidewalk to face traffic, and seemed to loom over me even though we were close to the same height.

The double standard, however, seems to be the same treatment from women. Old ladies seem to love me, and I have stricken camaraderie with the baristas on-campus. Despite my guilt in contributing to Starbucks, I found myself next door to my job every Tuesday before class (Tuesdays wherein I was not in the city), plunking $5 on the counter in exchange for the caffeinated promise that I would remain awake for the next six hours while I wilted through class. The women are older than Winifred, they are harried, and they too, are tired. We share knowing glances while spoiled eighteen year-olds hem and haw over the myriad of options, and then we share tired smiles while my drink is prepared. One night I’d had it with the stereotypical spoiled student and inadvertently took it out on the barista. I was mean and when she handed me my drink she said, “Have a nice evening, Baby.” I was overcome with guilt that I’d been rude and that my barista had been so nice that I called Winifred in an attempt to atone for my sins.
Yet I convinced myself that it is our shared agony that these women insist on calling me Baby. It is not that they think I am so gosh darn adorable when I am flustered, or that they have some shared ownership over me, but that they have found an affection in my hard work—a fondness through shared attributes. There was an implication that they understood I was snotty because I was tired and frustrated, not because I am predisposed to finding people beneath me and had secretly taken me as their own.
My gender discrimination in this issue is unfair except that I am bothered more by the meaning than who says it. It’s almost in my favor that my friend calls a group of guys “baby” and “her babies” when they roll into town on tour. However, it’s almost justifiable in its gross meaning because she tends to supply them with food, lodging, and cold medicine. It still makes me squirm a little whenever she coos over their ability to exist in the same space that she is currently habituating.
I expect I will feel this way the rest of my life. I expect that if I married, my husband would have other terms of endearment. I hope they will be unique, or vaguely ironic, but it makes me nauseous to think it would be Baby. I’ll let The King and Winifred keep that one, always.

When Winifred squared her fruit at home, The King remarked that everywhere near the kitchen smelled like grapefruit. Winifred says the fruit tastes good. And, she wrote in an e-mail tonight, “People are generally so very nice.”

I Knew You Before You Were Born

2007-11-15T20:42:00.000-08:00

Winifred has been lovingly nagging me for two weeks to bundle up against the cold weather in preparation for my birthday. I turned 2X today, and am on day two of nasty cold and day four of "Oh my God, I shouldn't feel that woozy when I stand up." Because the worst thing you want to happen at your local dive bar when seeing your friends, who you haven't seen in more than two years because they have real jobs and live in a van that tours the country, is passing out from exhaustion and Mysterious Illness. (And now you know what to avoid!) I heeded this advice--and I was chided by my roommates before leaving my apartment too--in multiple layers of clothes, hates, mittens, scarves, and "long johns." But pre-finals won out, and here I am, a snotty mess on Winifred's hands. Still, I'd like to iterate that I went to two "concerts" wherein I was not only the only person undefined as a "crusty punk" but also the only one wearing more than long sleeves. I also wasn't leather, and that's what the dirty looks were for, but that is not the point.

I am sorry, Winifred and The King. I promise to keep myself properly hydrated tomorrow on Our Grand Adventure with Coca-Cola, quietness, and naps. I also promise to self-administer cold medicine as needed so that when we hit the many pinnacles and penultimates of tomorrow that I am properly irreverent, witty, and engaged. Given tonight's irreverence over ER while eating cake, I think you can believe me when I say my promises are true. I cannot promise I will be quiet for any extended period of time, even when I am sleeping, as sleeping under the influence of germs provides some strange dreams, but I will promise to do my best to behave. Which is more than I'll give anyone else, that's for durned sure.

I feel weird about birthdays. I love other people's--for my roommate's, I decorated the apartments, bought party decorations in a central theme, and baked cupcakes from scratch. I love giving gifts more than I like getting them, and I think going to the bar for one beer in celebration post-21 is mandatory. But I don't like celebrating with anyone who isn't my family (and incidentally, my roommate, but she doesn't really count, right?) I like celebrating with The Quimbys--which includes the brothers-in-law--because I like them. And birthdays it seems, are a good reminder of why we like each other.

For this birthday I was mandated to drive straight home from school. Which I did, when I finished my homework, and when I pulled into The Quimby Drive an hour later, was greeted with a car that looked suspiciously like Emily's. I knew that Emily and The King both have the same type of car. Yet for a fleeting moment I wondered, is this the surprise? But I knew, no, that Emily could not drive from across the country to our small hometown just as I knew that the tags were in-state, and not the Great Pacific Wonderland from where she now hails. And my heart sank for several moments, because the downside of liking your family is the immense loneliness you share when you are apart for birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and mandatory Catholic holiday mass. (Who else will share my irreverent church giggling? I am already in trouble with Winifred for wearing red Chucks to Christmas Eve mass last year. And not because they clashed with the green polo and navy blue pants.)

Emily's Thing every November 15 has been usurped, it seems, by Winifred. The thing about my birthday, that will always make it special, no matter how curmudgeonly or apathetic I become to my birthday is that The Quimbys will re-tell the story of my birth. The TLC Channel version is not a part of the story. You will not find us watching A Baby Story but you will find everyone giving their own account of how I Changed Everyone's Life Forever and how I was (according to Emily at least), "The Best Thing that ever happened to me."

The story, in short, was this: Emily and Charlotte were pulled into the kitchen for a pre-arranged meeting, in which they were told they would have a sister. According to the two hooligans, this was something they'd been hoping for (why is beyond me), and they were immediately "over the moon." From then until November, there was agony for only Winifred, and delight, for Emily and Charlotte, who insisted on my name (which is after our great aunt), and several other characteristics: I would be smart, tall, fun, charming, and special. There are surely more, but smart and tall was definitely in their priorities, which is well known as I've managed to live up to those.
They knew what day I would be born. Winifred packed lunches that morning with notes that said, "When you read this your sister will be born." There were pretty pencils with pencil toppers, Hershey bars wrapped with pink ribbons, and assorted toys. The sort of toys you look at now and wish were still available in bubble gum dispensers. There is an 80% chance that if I snooped in Emily's childhood bedroom that I would find a small wooden box with the note, the trinkets, the pencil topper. There's probably an equal chance that it is in her underwear drawer in the Pacific Northwest. I'd snoop, but I'm afraid she'd know as soon as I crossed the threshold that I was not looking for a University of X State sweater but seeking something more private.
That night they had McDonald's for dinner, something oddly special as we aren't much of a Shut-Them-Up-with-a-Happy-Meal family. We're a meat and potatoes around the nightly news as a family group. And not what Lindsey Lohan has done family, what's going on in the Middle East family. We're those people.

Winifred's excitement to tomorrow's grand adventure has included a countdown. As an example, she sent on Tuesday:

Good Morning!

Only ONE more day to the big birthday! Twenty [X] years ago today Charlotte and Emily were too excited to sit still. Hershey bars were beribboned in pink. The next day was a glorious day!

Love, MOM

I think most people wait their entire life to meet one person who might think, even marginally, that much of him or her. Maybe the reason I've never being concerned with finding a guy that would think that of me is that four people already think the world of me, so why bother rushing now?

In their style, the Quimby Parents have packed a pink knapsack with bite-size Mr. Goodbars and an invisible ink coloring book (among other things) for the three hour drive to tomorrow's Destination. Some things never change, and I like it that way.

Snooze Song

2007-11-08T09:56:00.000-08:00

My roommate and I have long wondered what the appeal is in leaving an evening class and joining one's classmates at the bar. You've just endured three hours together, is it necessary to continue post-lesson with a Miller Lite? ...Then we began our final year and found the comraderie in alcohol and a joined sense of despair.
And that's how I ended up around the corner from my apartment with one of my best friends, Miller Lite in one hand and a Nintendo DS Lite in another while we ildly watched a handful of bands. During this time I received the following sage wisdom from Winifred:

Hi Honey,

You take yourself home and tuck yourself into that bed. Dress warmly tomorrow!

Love, MOM

More More More, on Sunday Sunday Sunday.

2007-10-31T09:16:00.000-07:00

I drove Charlotte’s car to my “childhood home” a few weekend ago to spend a Sunday overnight in hopes of accomplishing Very Important work in their town the next morning. For me, it meant free laundry and a family dinner with my parents. It also meant a quiet slumber before an early morning.

The silence at home is nearly deafening. Still, in the fall evening, I could hear crickets and insects in a late summer chorus, 18-wheelers on the other side of the farmers’ meadows that back into their backyard, and silence accompanied by a quiet slumber.

At school, there is a consistent chorus of late night schlepping; at 3 a.m. someone is coming home to his or her apartment from the library, the bar, the club, or the boyfriend/girlfriend’s house. There is a steady stream of ambulances on the highway, our street, or the busy roads that run parallel to mine. There are cars that thump in the night, there are desperate knocks on apartment doors, there are cats howling at the moon, and there are dogs that bark at them. The previous Tuesday night’s activities began around 10 p.m. when the girls next door held a raging party with red Solo cups and jumped from our roof to the worn wooden planks that connect our residencies. Minus the roof jumping, all of this is normal. It is what we expect in my apartment, whether or not we respect and accept it.

The drive home was not planned from the beginning, but it was welcome. I didn’t expect to find a new comfort in home when I drove home, but I’m glad I did.

An acquaintance I am not especially fond of blogged about her own anticipated trip home that weekend. She wrote: “I miss seeing the stars. In [Collegetown] you can’t see stars...but back at home you can see everything.”

I thought she was ridiculous. Our hometowns are similar—mine is slightly more metropolitan, but holds the same elements of country life. I thought of the summer evenings I spent on the deck in my apartment and admired the constellations while on the phone with my best friend. I wouldn’t deny that the street lights and pink haze from civilization is a slight hindrance, but I can’t help but silently dismiss the dramatic claims. When I take open my front door the first thing I see is a dark blue open sky, dotted with tiny points of light. Even in the City, I can see the same pattern of stars, galaxies, an open expanse of Elsewhere. When the August meteoroid shower occurred, it was overcast skies that kept the roommate and I from stargazing, not the traffic or lights. Later when the sky cleared for a few minutes, I saw the wisps of light.

That Sunday night was set for a flurry of comets. Winifred asked that I check the sky at midnight and wake her up if I saw anything. In the basement, engrossed in homework, midnight arrived and left, giving way to 1 a.m., and finally 2 a.m., when I pulled myself away from the glowing screen and into the driveway. Activities in the sky is Winifred's Thing. She knows which planets are in the sky and when to see them.

Only the newest neighbors had left their yardlight on. The neighborhood was silent, and the only activity was a stray cat that briefly crossed my path before darting into the backyard, en route to the meadow which is filled with all sorts of wild cat food.

And when I looked up, I realized how wrong I’d been. My front door still opens to a starfield by night (and bright Simpsons-blue sky by day), but Winifred and The King’s sky is a different atmosphere. They had constellations that I didn’t, darker and more vibrant hues, and the pink hue of civilization was only found in the backyard—and only because their neighborhood is near a Sheetz. I waited for my eyes to adjust so that I could see more—as I do at school—and was disappointed to find out that I was presented with More when I stepped outside.

There was no adjusting for more stars at home, because there is always More of everything. More time and space for laundry, More free dinner, More parental advice, More understanding, More of Everything.

I saw only one flash of light outside; I had missed the comet shower—if we’d been able to see it at all—by doing homework. I stayed outside until I was too cold to remain outdoors and went inside, to finish my homework.

I know that Home with Winifred and The King will always offer More; their laundry is always free, their hugs are always available, and the dinner is always accompanied by conversation. I’m only sorry I’d taken their skies, and these past years of Free More, for granted.

"Always Get Chili on Your Nachos Bel Grande"

2007-10-15T19:20:00.000-07:00

In keeping with legitimate blogging, The Gospel has its own feed through FeedBurner. To be honest, my web publishing experience is in personal webpages, pages handcoded and managed on its own server, so I am learning how to work the Feed. Real bloggers and blog readers, however, know feeds, so this is to serve you, the reader.
So much adieu. The feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheGospelAccordingToWinifred

And, thanks to my friend, you can syndicate The Gospel to LiveJournal. Go to this website to add it to your friends list: http://syndicated.livejournal.com/winifred_blog/profile

Many, many thanks!

We used to order the #10 at Taco Bell after concerts. I'd eat the taco and my friends would eat the nachos. I think it's a college thing because now we're too old for Fourth Meal and the nachos sound gross. I am abstaining from ground beef as a New Year's Resolution but if you're going to get nachos go all out.

The Other Winifred, Round II

2007-10-12T10:58:00.000-07:00

I had my own personal adventure this week, traveling from My Fair City, to Charlotte’s Fair City, where I was scheduled to interview my favorite indie rock band. It took a local bus, local train, Marc train, and another local train to get there, but it was worth it. There was thai food, peanut sauce, thai beer, time with Charlotte, and music.
The interview was cancelled before the date of the show, and with Charlotte’s birthday the day before, I set out for dinner.
And before I could get there, I was hurled the dreaded family comment. Talking to Emily before boarding the Marc she asked, “Are you going to blog about this?” It wasn’t a pleasant tone, per se, and it wasn’t the kind of disgust Heather Armstrong weathers on a regular basis, but there was a thread of regret. Which is unfortunate, because I haven’t even begun to drag the family through the mud in my literary quests. And, I think Emily is the only one reading, anyway.
After that Emily asked me why Charlotte hadn’t been mentioned much, and beside, what was her name going to be, anyway? Sophie? No, that was unfair, I argued, I’ve used it too much at Starbucks as an alias, and Charlotte likes that name for children. I thought Charlotte might be nice, but feared it was too Sex in the City.
After we talked, I boarded my train, Emily ate lunch on the opposite side of the country, and hours later, I met Charlotte for book browsing. Then I declared, irrelevant to dinner options, that a life without peanut sauce is a life not worth living. Moreover, I can not marry a man who can not revel and appreciate peanut sauce as I do. (Or, I can, but he’d better be liberal and never mention nary a negative word about the glory that is peanut sauce.) Oh, my goodness, I am salivating. How unbecoming.
Hungry for peanut sauce, Charlotte suggested we try a new restaurant. A restaurant that uses white table linens. A restaurant, not a diner, where you are served, there is not a counter, or white Styrofoam cups, that doesn’t serve soda, that has gone out of its way to design a clean, modern, and trendy atmosphere. I was wearing nice jeans, so it did save me in some ways. Not that Charlotte would have minded; she never has.
Charlotte is ten years older than I am, and in those ten years, has gone out of her ways to spoil me rotten. Birthdays have been spent in the metropolitan city she used to inhabit (and in some ways, still does). She has taken me to museums, silent films, exposed me to epicurean delights, and let me stay in her guest bedroom multiple times. Her currently un-aliased husband has participated in these spoil-fests, so I have two sisters and two brothers-in-law who provide endless fun.
We went to the National Book Festival two weeks ago with Winifred to see Joyce Carol Oates speak; she said everyone has one person who loves you unconditionally—no matter how bratty you are—and she was given her grandmother. I, on the other hand, have gotten two sisters. Which is almost unfair because I am a little shit sometimes.
But moving along, over dinner, we discussed [Queen] Winifred and The King, and concluded and deliberated the following points (whilst I shoveled chicken pad thai into my mouth):

1) Winifred’s constant and seeming unverifiable claims that what we did at ten through seventeen (and present) would come back to haunt us. Police blotters, political campaigns, and court records aside, security clearances, Google, and tattle tales really do come back to haunt you. Luckily for us, only eye rolling followed these admonishments, and none of Winifred’s daughters have participated in any activities unbecoming of a Quimby. Winifred’s standards are high, which certainly helps.
2) I wonder (mused, with head nods and commentary from Charlotte) what careers Winifred and The King would have chosen if they were in college now. Charlotte and I are hell-bent on making a contribution to society sans children. My arbitrary marriage age is 28 (minimum) and child-bearing age is 35 (but adoption sounds painless). But I (we) aren’t criticizing our parents and more than anything, are glad Winifred is not demanding children, or marriage (though I am now the only unmarried daughter).
3) Our parents are not only good people, but good to us…especially in public. I share a night class with an adult mother, with two teenage daughters and one son. She complained last week, and twice this week, that her daughters are interested in posing for photography homework for no more than fifteen minutes. (Truth be told, I can’t even participate for that long, either.) Then she added, “She’s a little shit. I hate my kids.” The comment received a few giggles, but I was horrified. I’m sure Winifred hasn’t told anyone she hated her kids before, I thought. I’m sure—I even hope—she’s complained in other ways. To her sister, maybe close friends, that her youngest is kind of a pain in the neck sometimes. Her music is too loud, her politics are a little weird, she hates math, but I don’t think Winifred ever said she hated me. That the woman said she hated her kids wasn’t necessarily horrifying because she was a mother—neither Charlotte or I think a parent is bound to loving their kid unconditionally, and we’re both grossed out by Helicopter Parents—but it was scary because her kids probably don’t know thirty twenty-one year olds are privy to this information. Charlotte agreed we were safe in knowing that neither Winifred or The King would share that with strangers. First, both are private people (surprised! you’ve been blog’d!); second, they like their kids, which works out well because we like them too. Third, they wouldn’t share information with a group of kids. It’s weird how college makes you realize how much more awesome your parents seem than they did before.
4) It’s probably weird that I check the court records database before I date a boy long-term. Probably true.
5) Winifred is a smart, engaging, charming, and fiery woman who should contribute by writing her own posts to The Gospel. I have never seen Charlotte agree with such fervency than when she began to laugh, “Mom should blog!” She has a lot on her mind! And a lot to say! Agreed, Charlotte. Now that we’re older, other inhabitants of Planet Earth need to be harangued about proper footwear, politics, women’s rights, current events, historical accuracies, and the secrets to successful baking. Probably not the last one, actually, because I like being the only twenty-one year old in town that can make baked goods from scratch.

After all of this we discussed aliases and Charlotte listed names she likes. Most of them were French and for hypothetical children. I only mentioned Henry, but not Rocket. She said that if our sister was Emily, then she should be literary too. I said Jane didn’t fit—even if I loved Jane Lane for being outspoken and a little weird—it was too common. We didn’t commit, but for now, Charlotte Bronte is appropriate.
Then Charlotte paid the bill, I went to rock out, and we spent the next morning procuring Coca-Cola imported from Mexico.

Henry, Henry, Henry!

2007-10-12T09:34:00.001-07:00

As mentioned previously, Winifred and I went to see Henry Rollins on his Provoked tour. It is worth discussing, even briefly, because Winifred is not a typical Henry fan.
...But I am. I regard Henry, or as my friends have taken to calling him, "Hank", with the utmost reverence. The only pedestals higher than Henry's and Joe Strummer's, are Lisa Simpson's and, finally, my family. Oh, but my love, for Henry! First, there is his career in music--he left his job at Haagen Daaz to sing for Black Flag, a band that pioneered hardcore punk with an unmatched ferocity. Musically, Black Flag took jazz and played it really fast. I'd like to see My Chemical Romance give that a shot. (Actually, I'd prefer they don't; I'm not fond of MCR and their ultimate failure would probably give way to frustration.) Henry didn't write the music, but he took copious notes in the form of journals, which turned into his book Get in the Van. After Black Flag, he started his own publishing company. He hosts/ed his own TV show on IFC, radio show, and tours tirelessly with stand up and The Rollins Band. I saw the band last summer in DC, and lost my mind in the excitment when Provoked was announced. The man never stops, and I think it's cool. I find a solace in his anger; like Jeffrey Rowland, he Takes One for the Team and watches Fox News so I don't have to. He's angry with the State of Things. I'm surrounded by apathy and I need to see someone riled up; Henry is the man for me. He also let me interview him in what is my biggest journalistic accomplishment to date, if only because I find it so incredibly exciting.
Winifred decided the night before that she might like to go too, so I bought her a ticket. I warned her, Henry is an angry man. Henry yells, and he uses profanity. Henry is angry with President Bush, furious with Ann Coulter (where to now, my sweet fascist?...you will learn the meaning of respect and learn every word of Caddy Shack!), and aggressive. He is The Biggest Neck in Rock 'n' Roll, I say. But The King nods enthusiastically and says, "Your mother hates Bush, too!"
So onward we went, though I was hesitant. We secured the last two seats at the venue after a delicious lunch down the street. A life altering lunch in which Winifred discovered that she loves chimichangas.
...And...nothing bad happened. Henry yelled, he used profanities, but he encited laughter from Winifred. Winifred nudged me as she agreed with Henry, and she nudged often.
She said the following in an e-mail to the family, cementing her approval of Hank:

Henry Rollins was very entertaining. He talked non-stop from 7:30 pm to 10:10pm. No intermission and not a sip of water from the bottle he brought on stage with him. There was a story about his singing at a benefit with the Ruts, an English band that, in my mind, did not need to go on for 40 minutes or so, but KMH enjoyed every one of those words. My most enjoyable moment was his take on Condoleeza Rice.

Questions followed. CondRo? What could he have said about CondRo? It must have been revolutionary, they agreed. (You can read a review from DCist here.)
The biggest accomplishment, however, was not that she agreed, but that the drive home was filled with questions. Who were The Ruts? I didn't need to know so much, but... and Tell me more about Henry.
And because I am obsessed, I did. I was able to answer questions about his upbringing (mother, DC), college (American University, but it was short-lived), music (Black Flag, The Rollins band), friends (Ian MacKayeww, Fugazi, Minor Threat, Discord Records people, Bad Brains), bands he mentioned (The U.K. Subs, Iggy Pop, The Stooges, The Damned), DC's then-burgeoning hardcore scene. How he walks through his old neighborhood, pays regular visits to his mother and MacKaye's family, etc.
I am always over-the-moon when Winifred wants to know about a topic she thinks I am well-versed in. But this time, she wasn't asking about current events, she was asking about hardcore, and it was the coolest thing I'd told her about in a long time.

A Message from the King

2007-10-12T09:16:00.000-07:00

In an e-mail today, sent around 10:15 a.m., EST

Hi Honey,

This is what Dad said about Doris Lessing winning the Nobel prize for literature: "She was the first feminist author. The winner wasn't [Capt.], but at least it was a woman."

Love, MOM

A Few Technical Things

2007-10-01T11:52:00.001-07:00

1.) I changed the comment settings so unregistered (people without Blogger and/or a gmail.com account) "users" can critique, criticize, and discuss The Gospel.

2.) The comments will be sent to my email, captaincaptaincaptain [at] gmail [dot] com. That's three captains (my alias) sent to google's mail, dot com. One dot.

I have to go--Winifred needs outfit assistance for tonight's Main Event, Henry Rollins' spoken word tour. The irony of this will be discussed in a future update. As will her feelings on Dancing with the Stars.

The Other Winifred, Round One

2007-09-27T19:41:00.000-07:00

I received the following e-mail from Emily:
(some of it has been edited to complete her person private; I hope it's okay her response is "published"...if not I trust she will immediately contact me and let me know that 1) she is not amused 2) she doesn't want to be talked about on Winifred and 3) her feelings are hurt)

Subject: I wanted to leave a comment on the Winifred blog

Body: But, it would not let me without signing up for a Google account...I will just e-mail the comment and you can guess to which blog it belongs:

I did not know that you freak out about bugs. I thought I had taught you to smash them, just like I always did. I suppose I should get you a can of Raid and then you can just spray them with the lethal killer until they die, like my husband does. Then, take a tissue and flush them! Hahaha

Emily is seven and a half years older than I am. When we hung up she made a special point to tell me "not to do anything stupid tonight." This is worth mentioning not because I invited her out for a drink (from the other side of the country) but because my idea of a rip-roaring Thursday night is to watch The Simpsons for an hours. There was a time when The O.C. was the highlight of my week, and it's taken some time to adjust to a life without Seth Cohen. Sometimes on a wild night my roommate and I go to Chipotle before 8 p.m. and we get burritos. With pork and guacomole.

Emily's childhood was filled with various exciting activities, many relating to science (and some to Tonka trucks). An especially significant highlight was her bug observation tools, which included a bug chart and a device for observing and examining bugs. I inherited these tools and brought caterpillars into the kitchen when Winifred made dinner. Emily went out of her way--as did Winifred, obviously--to make sure I wasn't one of those whiny girls who can't stand bugs.
I like bugs. For example, I really like spiders, caterpillars, butterflies, and roly poly bugs. I like them when they aren't creeping through my living room en route to my cabinet, where the cookies are. I also don't like it when they are filled with goo and won't smush against the bottom of my sneakers when I have raised my arm over my head to bring it down with a quick smack.
I just had the floor cleaned. I can't get guts out of this carpet! Also, I tried to flush a bug once and it jumped out of the toilet and into my face.
The bugs in this city are tough.
Still, she must be devastated. The kind of way I would feel if she called me tomorrow before 9 a.m. and told me that she was Republican. (Two horrors at once: communicating before 9 a.m. with anyone and finding out I am closely related to...a Conservative.)

I am of course incredibly fortunate to have Winifred II, all sarcasm aside. Emily is reliable in all tough situations. And it's good to be reminded not to do anything that might be stupid. Because goodness knows, I come up with some stupid ideas...

SWEET REWARD

2007-09-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

As promised, I have the shoes. They were ordered Wednesday around 1 p.m. EST and were in my fair state by 5 a.m. Friday. I picked them up in the leasing office at 5 p.m. yesterday before going to the greatest diner in the city, further cementing how spoiled I am. (Except it was my money so it's...nevermind.)

It was a mutated monstrosity, you'd have been scared too.

2007-09-09T19:57:00.000-07:00

I was going to revoke Winifred's rights (temporarily) as the cool mom who took her daughter to concerts. The cool mom who encouraged her three daughters to become independent thinkers. I was going to regale you with a tale, a story in which she took her college daughter to lunch (thanks!) before the bookstore, wherein she said, "Yeah, didn't some woman die from CBGB?"
I was then going to remind the reader how important CBGB was as an institution, that the founder, who fought tirelessly for his institution and was a humanitarian!, died of lung cancer last week, and how while in New York City my roommates and a merry band of friends paid our respect.
But Winifred put me in my place last night, so I won't.

I called Winifred last night around 10 p.m., interrupting her during a movie, to ask a question. She didn't mind of course, and as we discussed whatever it was I had called her about, I spied a brown spot in my living room near the couch. Usually a brown spot is an indication of a cupcake crumb, but this spot moved, and I sprang into action.
"Wait, there's a bug, don't leave me!" I cried.
"There's a what?"
"A bug! A big one!" I flew threw the air with a POM glass in one hand and a flexible cutting board in the other, landing inches from where the bug was blissfully crawling across my very clean white carpet. "Oh! It's so big, ew ew ew, please don't hang up," I begged.
"It's a bug? Squish it," she said, without pity or sympathy for her final heir.
"I can't squish it, it will ooze. It's big." I slowly and decisively attempted to cover the bug with the glass but it jumped into the air in the general direction of my face.
I also jumped into the air, in the opposite direction, and flailed my limbs.
"It's just a bug," Winifred "reasoned."
I went after the bug again, just as it began to head under the couch, a haven for bugs. (The three of us that cohabitate here refuse to move the couch to kill a bug.)
"No, it's a big bug," I said, because ranting about how it was spotted, strange, large, menacing, and squishy. I then explained how gross this breed is when my roommate picks up her sneaker and thwack!s it against the carpet or bathroom wall, and how I can't stand to look at its milky interior. Moreover, that I can't wipe off the guts from my shoes. I love my shoes that much.
I caught the bug through all of this, and squealed with delight when I had captured it between the glass and cutting board, and promptly began to shrief when it bounced from top to bottom of the glass, leaving behind part of a leg that was trapped under the glass.
"It's just a bug. Stop being such a baby," Winifred reprimanded me.
And in that moment I knew I wasn't allowed to reverse her long-standing cred.
Because she was right.

2007-08-29T13:59:00.000-07:00

In an e-mail last night:

Does anyone believe a sentence that begins with "Let me be clear", and ends with "I am not gay and have never been gay."?? Sigh.
Love, MOM

Winifred followed up this topic--notably with her heir of disbelief--by directing me to page A2 of The Washington Post. "Men all over America are going to be watching their wide steps."

And it was good. The Gospel Acoording to Winifred.

My Representative Squawk was an Echo

2007-08-27T20:23:00.000-07:00

Hello Girls,

I just heard three squawks from 3 different directions when you all heard that Michael Vick said he "needs to grow up and find God." Perhaps he ought to be seeking out St. Francis of Asissi.

Love, MOM

But only because I had turned off the news to go to bed.

SPOILER WARNING

2007-08-23T19:47:00.000-07:00

From an e-mail sent tonight:

DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU PLAN TO WATCH *THE ULTIMATE GIFT *MOVIE------ READ AFTER YOU HAVE WATCHED SAID MOVIE !!!!!!

CAUTION--THIS WILL REVEAL THE END OF MOVIE-----DO NOT READ IF YOU PLAN TO WATCH THE MOVIE!!!!! SAVE THIS UNTIL YOU HAVE WATCHED IT.

Hello Sweet Girls,

The following is a conversation I had with your sweet Aunt Renee this evening.

Renee: "You simply must rent The Ultimate Gift. I am watching it right now."

LaVonne: "Oh my, Ray and I watched it Tuesday night. I loved everything about the movie except

when the girl died at the end. I kept hoping...."

Renee: "EXCUSE ME-----I said I was WATCHING the movie. Now I guess I go watch her die."

Trust me, this was hilarious!! I am still laughing aloud. I did her a favor really--I made her laugh.

Love, MOM

I have been banned from watching the movie because I am "too jaded." Since I know how it ends (Thanks Wikipedia!) I'm not particularly interested in a movie wherein a dead guy leaves his money to someone when he could have just left that money to build a children's hospital in the first place. And what kind of town doesn't have a children's hospital nearby? And what, they build a hospital and don't save Abigail Breslin (who wasn't in the book anyway)? This is like that damn shoes movie. What a load of crap.

The Luckiest Girl in All the World

2007-08-21T19:49:00.000-07:00

I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t enthralled with the sounds and internal emotions of punk rock. There was a time—before I read about small New York clubs and facial body piercing devised solely from safety pins—when I yearned to hear “Should I Stay or Should I Go” and “Rock the Kasbah” to its very end. These dire needs to please, don’t change the pop station, were backed by constant pleas to pop the Bobby McFerrin cassette in, once more, please, and the optimistic yet disillusioned attitude soon followed.
I imagine Winifred must have been annoyed when, stomping my little white sneakers, I asked to explain why peace treaties exist if wars continue. This was the mid-eighties and I’m certain I was carried off to my bedroom for a nap soon after Winifred promised the President would try to make sure the treaty worked.
Running tandem to my inability to remember a time without Joe Strummer’s presence is clear evidence that indicates my sisters were ever bribed into doing anything. The Quimby daughters were never permitted an allowance (“your payment is living under my roof,” was a common and fervent response); good grades, good behavior, chores, and compliance was expected without a complaint. Mind you, our parents met in the Army. Winifred joined voluntarily and The King was drafted, and though neither are especially conservative and had moments in which they gleefully eschewed the rules, both raised their children as Army members.
Or they did until I was born, when they threw their hands in the air and with the help of my sisters, spoiled me to my very core. It is with some regret that I divulge that I was the first, and only, to receive bribery as form as an incentive and motivation. It started in fourth grade, wherein I entered a deal to receive music and rugby shirts (all the rage with the high school sophomores) if I did well in math.
The plan backfired, of course, because I didn’t think I was good in math and only pulled out a B as an end grade.
I was bribed again by Winifred and The King, who said I could dye my hair if I got an A as my final grade in Honors Algebra II. Despite voluntarily signing up for after school study sessions, kissing some major ass, and achieving an A on the final, I only had a B at the end of the semester, and did not get to dye my hair a fiery shade of red. By now I was totally into the punk thing and desperate to convey my internal politics with how I imagine I should look on the outside.
To Winifred’s credit, she only encouraged this path (minus the hair, obviously, and body piercing, which she is still very disgusted by) and went as far as to purchase a baby doll style black tee shirt with a silver Anarchist symbol emblazoned across the front. She even called it “cute” in the Hot Topic fitting room, sending me into the throes of joy for months to come.
Though most of the ploys to apply myself in math never resulted in prizes for me, The Sisters were never particularly pleased with the underhanded tactics of Winifred and The King. I managed to graduate without one free compact disc or a red head of hair.
In between the shifts at my “office job” and my “summer job” I scoured the internet for a knock off pair of Chucks to replace my rapidly decaying eight year-old pair of shoes. Purchased before the factory was closed in the United States, and even longer before the company was purchased by Nike, the shoes became a point of pride. Even my roommate, who is politically apathetic, takes a great deal of pride in her dirty black hi-tops. So much, that she makes a point to wear them to her job at American Eagle. My shoes have crept into the office since the summer began, only to join the ranks of my bosses who own them in black.
Unfortunately however, the day is slowly approaching when I will no longer be able to wear my shoes. The disillusionment from the mid-eighties remains, and I refuse to compromise my principles (the stubbornness is mostly genetic, by the way). Imagine my joy when I found not only an alternative, but an alternative to the alternative!
Financially, I can’t afford the Black Spot Sneaker. Ultimately, I’m not comfortable with aligning myself with another corporation, no matter how strongly AdBusters proclaims its liberalism, supporting the group feels less like an alternative and more like buying into a culture. Since my efforts to appear on the exterior as I though I should, I’ve realized futility (and irony) of following the cookie-cutter form. Hipsters, your day will come.
No Sweat isn’t inexpensive either but the price is less than Nike and if I save, I’ll sleep at night, I reasoned.
Winifred called me during the scouring and was met with the penultimate joy. Then she made a daring proposition: she would front the $42 if I would clean the closet in my bedroom in her home.
Really, you’ll buy me a forty-two dollar pair of sneakers if I just clean a closet? In a room I don’t live in anymore? You’ll buy me shoes if I throw some old pairs away?
I cleaned the closet in less than two hours. I filled two kitchen-size Hefty bags with clothing for Purple Heart and two similarly sized bags of trash. Tennis shoes from ninth grade gym class and old math homework (the irony was astounding).
Winifred was given a formal tour after Family Dinner. She would have fainted if she hadn’t acknowledged six months ago that my apartment is also impeccably clean. To Winifred’s dismay, I did not sift through the sweater pile at the top of the closet. The sweaters sit conveniently next to the Top Shelf Rummage, the designated area where Stuff You Don’t Want to Organize But Can’t Throw Away goes. It’s unreachable and not necessary, yet too important to, you know, get rid of. As an indication, my roommate took The Top Shelf Stuff from her bedroom in her parent’s house and moved it to The Top Shelf in the apartment.
She asked for an explanation, of course, and I justified this decision because 1) I will wear every sweater there really! and 2) I refuse to part with those beloved concert tees. Buried between tank tops I wasn’t supposed to wear to the Legendary and Defunct HFStival is the Anarchy tee, Winifred. I’ll turn it into a quilt, one day or something.

She's That Kind of Mother

2007-08-17T16:03:00.000-07:00

Hello Girls,

This is how an article in the [local paper] begins: "Whenever my mother starts out a conversation with "Did you know so and so?" it can only mean three things. The person is either in jail, pregnant or dead."
I admit it--I am also that mother.
Love, MOM

Maybe it's because of my age, but so far all of the names have been former peers who have received scholarships or awards.

Luckily I Bought An Extra Box

2007-07-27T19:53:00.000-07:00

Winifred sent this almost an hour ago in reference of this week's events. The two of us have been communicating most of the evening: first I called her to ask advice on melting chocolate without a double boiler, then she called some hours later to advise how to melt the chocolate because my attention for the slowly melting chocolate in the microwave faltered and I severely obliterated two of the ten ounces. I started over and succeeded, marking the third call. All of the melting was to construct Magnolia's Chocolate Buttercream. At the end of the day I've made two types of icing, 30+ cupcakes and defeated level five in The New Super Mario Bros.

Winifred's fellow chocolatiers range in age; this one is a recent high school graduate. He

Hi Honey,

[Co-worker] went to Warp Tour as well with friends. They then "followed" , to use Ann's word, the band to Hard Times Cafe in DC. The band is Amber Lynn. I asked him today what the band is--I may not be spelling it correctly. I had planned to inquire about the following, but it got so busy and then I forgot. Are you familiar with the band?

Love, MOM

It turns out that this is my seventh year at the Vans Warped Tour. I've almost come full circle; the theme during my first year was Lucha Libre; this year's theme was "Lucky 13" but the main attraction were three one-hour lucha wrestling demos. In the frenzy of interviewing bands and photographing the thirty minute sets for my self-published magazine I accidentally managed to miss all three.

The band that Winifred's co-worker followed was Anberlin, a Christian rock band from Florida. I'm somewhat apathetic to the group in general; I'm not specifially engaged by the group's album, which isn't to say that it isn't good, I'm just sort of bored. Still, the band has some hype and an avid--almost psychotically devoted--fanbase (which includes one of my three roommates) which is what drew me to the interview with Stephen Christian. He was friendly, soft-spoken, and insightful.
The after-party Wednesday's show was held in Washington, DC--I left my last interview around 4 p.m. and dragged my weary body to the parking lot. My other roommate drove us home and we both fell asleep before 9 p.m., before the after-party was scheduled to begin. We would have never survived an after-party to work Thursday morning at our respective jobs.
However, Winifred's e-mail implied a variety of things, so I called her. First, I said, Anberlin played the SmartPunk stage after my friends immediately left the adjoining Hurley.com stage, meaning it was 1) possible that her co-worker and I rubbed elbows 2) as a result of sharing the floor pit, watched my friends together 3) 88% of the crowd didn't know my friends but after three songs were actively engaged, meaning he could be one of the people who picked up their CD for $5.
I told Winifred this on the phone. She was quiet for a pause before she said, "He could have bought it. That would be cool."
I agree.

Insert Poop Joke Here

2007-07-20T23:03:00.000-07:00

Winifred sent the following at 11:58 p.m., well after her standard "bed time." What's really worth noting, outside the hilarious content, are the ads/links provided by Google in the sidebar...

Just tell me why in god's name is Bush having his colonoscopy at the medical facility at Camp David? Shouldn't he be at a state of the art facity--such as the type the rest of us go to for such a procedure--and if the medical facility at Camp David is such that the top of the line colonoscopy machines are there--why is that?? Why is he not having it at, say, Walter Reed?? Someone needs to have some sense shaken.

Love, MOM

Google, I'm not sure that's what you meant.

Brew Gate

2007-06-27T15:55:00.000-07:00

Winifred sent me this e-mail yesterday. It would have been funnier to post then, when I wasn't in class.

Hello Girls,

I have just received a call from Debbie at the post office inquiring as to the contents of a package I mailed earlier today. Apparently there is a smell emanating from it that is suspiciously beer flavored. How did this happen you might ask? I decided to send Yuengling to my son in law in Oregon. I carefully wrapped 7 bottles individually in bubble wrap, managing to fit 7 bottles plus a bottle of cherry blossom bubble bath into a flat rate box. I was very pleased at this feat as the box weighed 9.7 lbs and would have cost $25.20 to mail at a regular rate. I did this feeling I was in FULL compliance of the law, having been so advised by my other son in law---aka, [Bert]-- that while it is illegal to ship alcohol INTO Maryland, it is NOT illegal to ship alcohol OUT of Maryland. They currently have the unopened package in a bin in the back office and are trying to ascertain whether the contents leaked onto any other packages i n the facility while they await my arrival for pickup. Those packages would include one sent to you [Emily], filled with miscellaneous items--lots of them--and a smaller package to you Captain, containing the elusive purple tank top and Marvelous Market brownies, prepared in this very kitchen. I apologize in advance for any errant smells or tastes in said package. If you do not hear from me by close of business at 5pm, send my attorney and a bail bondsman. While Dad initially said that the P.O. ought not to cavalierly toss packages about so as to preclude breakage, he is at heart, a Catholic school boy and is opposed to breaking the law for any reason. He is rinsing his hands of this operation and has gone off to work. He did stop to point out that my attorney is several states away and not licensed in Maryland. I have high hopes for my local attorney, [name of family friend omitted].

Love, MOM