Our Family Christmas Tradition

We're not really much of a "tradition" kind of family -- there's just the 4 of us, so our holidays are always pretty low-keyed and more about just spending time together.

BUT, there is one activity that my Mom started when we were really little, and even now that we're in our 30's (well, little bro will be in a few weeks) it's still something we look forward to at Christmastime: making fun Christmas-shaped sugar cookies!

It's super-easy... we start with a tube (we each get our own) of store-bought sugar cookie dough. Then, using a knife, we slice the dough and then use our hands to start making some very familiar Christmas shapes.

Here you see two snowmen, an angel with her wings, a Christmas tree, and a jolly little elf with a hat.

When making the cookies, it is best to try to get some uniform size of the dough so it cooks evenly. Snowmen, cuz they're rolled-up balls, are always the gooiest.... YUM.

Here are more snowmen, another angel (with a bigger head this time), and a sad-looking elf. The one shape I forgot to make was a candy cane, but you can picture how easy that is too. I like my cookies plain, my bro adds red and green sprinkles. You could ice them, too, but doesn't that just delay the tastiness???

Deelish!!! I don't know who enjoys this more, my bro & me for making them, or my DAD for eating them! This year, he grabbed one off of my bro's pan so fast he burned his hands, and we laughed reminding him that these cookies do come out at 350 degrees!

Good times. :-)

First Time for Everything

What in the world could possibly make me -- about as unaware of sports as one can be, and the absolute least sports-minded person of my entire family -- stay home and watch an entire football game on my own on a Friday night?

How about the chance to hear these words?

The Richmond Spiders are National Champions!!!

Yes, indeedy, my alma mater scored tonight -- several times, in fact. We defeated the Montana Grizzlies 24-7 in the FCS Championship Game in Chattanooga-ooga-ooga. The mighty Spiders (don't get caught in OUR web!) were led to victory by first-year head coach Mike London, an '83 Richmond grad himself with a pretty inspirational personal story.

This is the University of Richmond's first national championship, in any team sport, ever. The school was founded in 1830. That's a mighty long time, so we'll milk this one for a while. And I'm guessing this gives President Ed Ayers (co-host of one of my favorite geeky podcasts) an even better case for moving the football stadium out of downtown and actually onto our suburban campus.

So... even though I'm the lone non-sports fan of the family, looks like this year *I* will be the one at Christmas dinner with a little something to brag about... how did those Hoosiers do this year, anyway? ;-)

Who Could It Be?

Seems I'm not the only one on a nostalgia kick.... my younger bro is a bit of a YouTube addict, and with the end of the school year (he's a guidance counselor) approaching, I'm guessing he's pretty bored. He sends me random YouTube finds about twice a week, and this one came under the subject line "Just for You." He actually found and sent me the intro to one of the most awesome tv shows of the 80's, the Stephen J. Cannell creation that gave us the GREATEST TV THEME SONG OF ALL TIME. Check it:



Oh yes, kiddies, that song existed long before the 40-Year Old Virgin soundtrack, and I used to sing along to every word 20 years ago. Still do, to this day. Believe it or not.

Let's Do the Time Warp Again

I'm making lots of progress on the move prep, and I've spent most of this weekend going through all the random years' worth of stuff I've been storing in my giant, unnecessary closets. Downsizing is going to be very easy, cuz I'm just getting rid of tons of junk.

Anyway, going through all my storage stuff is like a trip down memory lane. I'm finding old journals, notebooks, keepsakes (like doodled-on Denny's placemats from 1996) - hey, I'm a packrat! - and especially lots and lots of old photos of friends, places, events, and crushes past. What a trip, seeing old pictures* and remnants of a life that still seems familiar, but is starting to feel very far away.

But - actually - not so distant anymore. Cuz while I'm sorting through all the stuff of a life, through the magic of the Internet I am actually starting to reconnect with the people of my past lives. Now on Facebook, I think I've reached a point were I have an equal amount of friends from each of the different segments of my life - childhood, college, Pittsburgh, and my different groups here. So on any given day, I am playing Scrabulous (ROCKS) with a friend from middle school, chess with the former IT guy at Pittsburgh Public Theater, Scramble with gal pals from college, and emailing current folks about what to do this weekend.

I do admit, sometimes there's a little cognitive dissonance and I have to remind myself who I knew when, but it's pretty amazing that so many of us are reconnecting after so many years. It's given new resonance to my own solitary trip down memory lane as I sort and purge, and in a way I'm actually finding it kinda grounding as I'm about to start a new chapter of my life, in my most grown-up (read: most expensive) new setting yet.

*(Note: I am so going to get a lot of these great old photos scanned, so perhaps I'll share some time soon...)

Teen Dreams

I was bored on the bus tonight, and suddenly found myself remembering my early celebrity crushes... you know, those gorgeous guys that stared at you longingly from posters on your wall, or pictures taped up on the inside of your locker door. Sigh. That's the stuff preteen dreams were made of!

My earliest crushes make me laugh these days. Remember when Ricky "The Rickster" Schroeder was the coolest thing around? I used to daydream that he was my boyfriend... the raciest those fantasies ever got was that he would come to my school and walk the halls with me holding my hand!

Sixth grade was a big year for me, as that was when we finally had lockers. Oooh, let the magazine clipping begin! I *couldn't wait* for the latest issue of Teen Beat every week, so I could clip out every single picture there was of Mr. Pritikin himself, Kirk Cameron.

My middle school crushes lasted through early high school, and for a while the total love of my life was that quintessential '80's Jersey Boy, Jon Bon Jovi. I felt a real connection to him, you know, cuz he had the same birthday as my brother (March 2). See, we were destined to be soul mates! I swear, at one point I had memorized every bit of trivia ever printed about him, and this was way before the days of Wikipedia.

I had a whole folder of magazine photos of him, and I had this actual Rolling Stone cover hanging on my wall! Look at him, those smoldering eyes, that dreamy crispy crunchy hair! While it still makes me look twice nowadays to recognize him without all that hair, I do have to give JonBon props, as he has aged very well. Still a sexy man!

When I wasn't dreaming of seeing a million faces and rocking them all, I was obsessing over a certain soulful singer who's become a bit of an archetype in my life. Once "Faith" came out in 1987 !!!!, I was a total goner. George Michael, what a heart throb! Ah, my first gay crush. AND my first Greek crush. Mr. "I Want Your Sex" is just a harbinger of things to come, trust me...

For most of high school, I refrained from putting up celeb pics in favor of real-life guys and candid friends shots. Plus, by then I was more into bands like U2 and Depeche Mode, and it just was not cool to put posters of them in your locker. Puh-leeze, how conformist and mainstream. Scoff!

College meant more posters on the wall, and I'm proud to say I was not one of those "Waterlilies" or "Precious Moments" or "French bistro" girls. I can't remember all the posters I had up, but I know U2, Depeche Mode, and Madonna were in the mix. (Posters in your dorm room were infinitely cooler than clippings in your locker, so I was proud to display the bands by then.) Still, these weren't exactly celebrity crushes, it was more about putting a little personality up on the walls.

Grad school... I don't think I had any celeb stuff anywhere. I had a real grown-up apartment by this time, and was having fun decorating for real.

But, once I started working.... I learned the joys of doing image searches on the Internet. So as the locker door was to the 1980's, the computer desktop was to the 2000's!

After I saw the original "Wuthering Heights" I just had to put up a pic of the astoundingly gorgeous young Laurence Olivier. Take a look at him... those eyes! Those cheekbones!

After having Sir Larry up on the screen for about a year, I saw "Gosford Park." Oh. My. God. That is when I first discovered Mr. Clive Owen. And onto the screen he goes...


Noticing the trend here? Way back to Mr. George Michael, I'm a sucker for brooding foreigners... Give me a furrowed brow, a tortured soul, and a sexy accent and I'm done. This is not a trend that has served me well, alas, but I'm willing to hang onto it in just the celebrity arena. I do not wanna give up on Clive!

So what of my pinups now? As you know, over the last few years I've taken up photography as a hobby, so now my real walls and my computer desktop have become gallery space for my own images. That means I have to use this here little blog for my pinups these days. So, for good measure, I give you....


SAWYER!!!!! Seriously, it doesn't get any hotter than that. Have I finally broken free of my brooding foreigners and gone back to my good old American shaggy-haired roots? One can only hope.

What about you, trusty readers? Who were your teen pinups??? Come on, dish!

A Morning Spent Well

Indulge me for a moment to be a little geeky and preachy.... :-)

I had a great morning today, because I participated in something that could have a real impact in some kids' lives. I volunteered for an academic achievement program that we coordinate at my workplace. Today was the local finals for the middle and high school kids involved in this program, and I served as a judge evaluating their work.

There were roughly 30 of us judges spending our Saturday morning with these kids, and I think every single one of us walked away feeling something pretty special. We were allowed to have just a glimpse at these young peoples' lives, just as they are beginning to figure out who they are and what they are capable of. We were impressed by their talents, empathized with their nervousness, and struggled to find ways to provide constructive criticism that will encourage them to continue their own educational pursuits.

When I was a kid, I participated in Olympics of the Mind every year. (Due to copyright issues, I think it changed its name at some point to Odyssey of the Mind, and then was known as just OM.) Looking back, I probably didn't realize at the time how important my OM experiences were to me, but now those memories are some of the most vivid I have. I'll never forget spending a Saturday at school with Emily, Rita, Bobbi, and Sara, watching as they built a giant papier mache dinosaur (papier mache kinda made me sick, so I just watched) that I helped paint white with red polka dots and put on wheels. We came up with a crazy skit that involved time travel and a magical fire bird (I remember attaching feathers to a mask - what a mess!), and we loved every minute of it. I don't remember who the judges were that watched our skit or even what scores we got, but I remember how great it felt to be doing something creative with my friends that for which we all won awards.

I hope those kids I saw today will have similar memories years down the road, and will share stories of the performances or projects they created themselves. I hope that what we did today, validating their work and rewarding their achievement, will encourage their continued curiosity and creative expression.

Someone once did it for me.

Cold Snap!

So, the temperatures's gone way down and it's supposed to be cold here in DC today. Like, high in the 50's. Oh no! We might have to wear a jacket! You mean it's actually going to be cool in the fall...???

While a lot of DC natives will be shivering today, I'm just giggling on the inside. Why? Cuz this is the time of year when I'm SO GLAD that I left my hometown for the much warmer Mid-Atlantic.

Did y'all see how Buffalo got SMACKED! last night with a massive dump of lake effect snow? Ah, how those 3 words used to loom over my childhood.... we were always so used to snow that the threat of just a little flurry never got us excited about possible school closings. With only 5 allowed snow days a year, it had to be a freakin' blizzard to cancel classes for the day. So that meant that big snowstorms just meant tense rides into school, school buses fishtailing on country roads, snow boots and scarves and gloves and frost bite, giant snow drifts and white-outs blocking your vision and blinding you with glare, wet clothes and carpets everywhere, and never really being able to warm up.

With that storm last night, Western New York has ALREADY set a new record as the snowiest October ever. And yeah, I remember getting snow on Mother's Day. More than once. That's 8 months of winter.

So, I'll gladly walk around in the "cold weather" here in DC today and be happy that I've left all that so-called winter wonderland behind.

My DC Hub

Over the last 4 years of my singledom here in DC, there's one place that has become the hub of all of my various social activities: 1633 P Street NW, home of both Cafe Luna and Skewers.

I can't even remember all of the great times, great meals, and great conversations I've had in this building...

Two book clubs have met here, discussing English Victorian prostitutes and epic sea voyages with Bengal tigers over pasta and the immigrant experience and creepy doll museums over kabobs.

I've wowed my mom with eclectic, authentic city living over a bowl of mussels and a huge salad.

A coworker and I shared martinis while going through a giant stack of resumes to hire a new position.

I've welcomed alums new to DC here through comfort-food meals, and I've ended up with one really close friend out of those long-ago Evites.

I've taken two men whom I've loved there, and I had a boozy late-night meal with a friend to debrief on a new crush I was enjoying...the memories of the meals lasted longer than the dream of those relationships, but what can you say?

Last winter, I regularly indulged in decadent solo meals and toasty warm drinks before going to National Geographic lectures nearby.

This building was a beacon of hope for me in 2004, when I led a meetup group that worked really hard to try to effect change. That didn't work so well either, but I made some great friends out of it.

Plus I had a really horrible first date in that building, with a guy who started talking about his ideal pet while pushing his nose up into his face and making oinking sounds. Nice!

If you've never sampled the cheap, hearty, delicious food and friendly ambience at these two great restaurants, I recommend you try it soon. You just might run into me there! :-)

Ice Cream & iTunes

Tonight, after a great dinner at Zaytinya, Brunette and I had a great time just hanging out at the local ice cream place. Gifford's, of course! In addition to sampling TWO of their new seasonal flavors - peanut butter cookies & cream and pumpkin pie, yum! - and reveling in our shared hatred of the movie "Cold Mountain," we did the time warp back to the 1980's courtesy of Gifford's XM Radio choice.

In the time that it took to eat our delicious dessert, we got to chair-dance and sing along to such oldies-but-goodies as:

- "Should've Known Better" by Richard Marx - the man with the 2nd biggest hair of the 80's, just behind Adam Curry.
- "Open Your Heart" by Madonna - they could so not make an underage peepshow video these days.
- Amy Grant's "Baby Baby" - remember her terrible shorts-with-suspenders fashion?
- a Peter Cetera solo "hit" that I can't remember at the moment.. but it was NOT the duet with the aforementioned Amy Grant
- "You Make My Dreams" by Hall & Oates - "I'm Oates!"
and the best...
- "Can't We Try" by Dan Hill & Vonda Shepard. Yep, who knew it was the Ally McBeal chick on that song???

Would you believe that we remembered almost ALL the words? Ah, those memory cells could be put to such better use. The Gifford's scoop-ista was singing along with us, too, as she explained that they listen to this XM station all the time. And I had so much fun that now I'm downloading these blasts from the past from iTunes!

PS - "I Marry You! I Marry You! I Marry You!" I'd rather see "Sack Lunch."

Remembering the First Time

I'm starting to make some technological changes in my life, upgrades and all. And this has started me thinking about how much computers have taken over the world. This led to a funny email thread with another blogger about how it makes us feel old to realize that people 10 years younger than us - people graduating from college - have never known life without computers!

Along the same lines, Jon Stewart had a whole bit about how we've become so accustomed to computers in our lives that Y2K had us all freaked out thinking about life returning to the way it was.... in 1982!!!!!!

I remember the first time I saw a computer. I was in 4th grade, way back in 1984. I was a math geek when I was a kid, and I was in a special advanced class with 2 other kids that was taught by the curriculum coordinator, Miss Barone, who later became Mrs. Greer. (Mock me if you must - but trust me I couldn't do calculus now if you paid me a million dollars!)

Mrs. Greer was very excited one day to take the 3 of us on a field trip - yes, a math class field trip! The high school had just gotten its very first computer, and she took the 3 of us up there to see it. There we were in a special classroom that, as I recall, just had that computer in it. It was an Apple (a IIc? is that possible?), with the green monochrome screen. Mrs. Greer hit some keys and some DOS language appeared (very LOST, I know), and all I really remember was it started doing lots of wavy lines on the screen kinda like that Windows screensaver of today. That was it, the amazing technology of the day.

Within a few years, the elementary school had a computer lab filled with Apples that now had color screens. The most popular use of those computers was to play this game called LOGO (I think), where there was a little triangular "turtle" on the screen, and you had to type in commands to get it to move, to draw lines, to change the background color of the screen, etc. You had to type in the command in some code at the C>: prompt, and if it was a proper command it would execute it. If the code was wrong, it would say "I don't know how to" followed by whatever you'd entered.

Well, you can guess what a bunch of adolescents did with this. Nothing brought on fits of hysterical laughter as reliably as:

C>: FUCK
LOGO: I DON'T KNOW HOW TO FUCK.

Oh, hours and hours of fun!

Nothing Makes Me Feel Old

Like learning that next year is the 20th Anniversary of Dirty Dancing! Where in the heck has the time gone??? Conan O'Brien's 10th anniversary celebration even feels like it was just yesterday.

A friend just sent me a link for a special Dirty Dancing weekend deal at Mountain Lake, where much of the movie was filmed. (Brunette, is this where you went?) It sounds like fun...ah, I'd love to recreate all those priceless scenes for myself. Particularly dancing on the log over the creek, and doing lifts in the water. But I'd need a Johnny of my own, of course.

Unfortunately, I don't think I'll have the vacation time or the fundage to dance the last dance of the season with someone really special. No charades in the west lobby for me, even though I am such a joiner. Alas, instead I'll be stuck reading all alone in my room at night (and I really do have a lot of books in my room.) But no matter what happens, you can bet that I will never, ever, ever carry a watermelon.

Saturday Morning Nostalgia

The NYTimes Travel Section has a great article online showcasing the historic sites and beautiful scenery along Route 20 in Upstate New York.

Route 20 was the Main Street of my youth - it was called Genessee Street running through both the town where my Dad worked and the village where I went to school. We lived on a farm about midway in between both. I learned how to drive on this road, we walked countless miles up and down it as adolescents and teenagers roaming from the pizza place to the ice cream shop to the library to the park where you can swim in the lake. We graduated from high school in that park, where the article shows the boat docking, and later we'd all meet up in informal reunions at any one of the three bars in town, which are all in one block on that same street.

If you want to understand a little bit more about where I come from, check out the article and consider the slow, beautiful, wholesome, but a little bit boring life among the Finger Lakes.