As I mentioned in my last post, I spent...okay, wasted, a bunch of time entering into a contest for a Wii Fit that I had so little chance of winning, I might as well of just put my name on the November presidential ballot. But there are two upsides to all this wasted time. As I was leaving my certain number of comments, which I'm not telling, I stumbled upon another Wii-wanting-to-win-ista who has a blog for mothers and left a comment like, "I'm having the same contest and I've only had 200 entries." So I clicked on the blog and found out it was a parent blog. All you had to do was leave motherly advice about how you, personally, are saving the environment. Not being a mother, but a committed dog owner, I figured this qualified me and so, I entered this contest a few times, with such gems as "Turn off the lights" and "Recycling is really great." Then, as I was leaving more comments on the original site and dreaming of being told I was overweight by the judgmental Wii Fit voice, I came across another contest from another blog that was for some CDs and some homemade peanut brittle. And I was like, what the hey? So I entered that contest, too.
This is yet another reason why online is often better than real life -- you have contests giving away actual desirable prizes, like potentially delicious baked goods, vs. the ten letters I get in the mail everyday that promise "$80 for two hours of your time giving your ideas about how to improve the Los Angeles Times." Not that I ever turn down $80. Like a good whore, I will go anywhere air conditioned in the summer and sit there for as long as I possibly can. Font size, you ask? I've got a treatise on it.
As one of eight contestants, I'm holding out hope that I'll receive the "you've won peanut brittle and CDs!" email someday soon.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Thursday, July 03, 2008
Home
It's been a while, I know. I meant to write this post a little sooner, but I've been busy with this slightly-smaller-than-large obsession for the last two days. Once I entered into a sea of 40,000+ others, it was hard to stop raising my odds, no matter how minuscule the chance of success or how many other, much more pressing matters were on the table. Like, say, making money to keep us from crossing over from "cute bohemian artisan poor" to "total Dickens-style destitution." Yes, it is a fine line and Russ and I delight in toeing it all summer.
Another current obsession worth looking into? Wisecrackers and sun-dried tomatoes.
The great part about summer is that it's most convenient to engage in these minor indiscretions from the convenience of my couch. (Confession:) I've also taken to afternoon yoga sessions in my living room (truly bohemian, right?). If not for my love of getting the mail, I would probably never emerge.
This is all more poignant because about a month ago, I learned that my grandma, who is also very partial to her living room - she's slept on her couch ever since my grandpa died about 15 years ago - was going to have to give up her home. She's been there for over 50 years, and through phases of hideous rust-colored shag carpeting and heavily scotch-guarded draperies. The house, as I remember it, was famous for the clusters of carefully collected, dusty pitchers on shelves, an encyclopedia set written so long ago that the car was still depicted as a Model-T, and a downstairs bathroom that smelled so strongly of Lysol that you couldn't walk by it without being completely sterilized. My grandpa would spend hours in the there and when I was younger and a complete doof, I thought it was because he just really liked to read National Geographic. (The yellow tobacco stains didn't even register.) I grew up in that house; my real house was next door, but because both my parents worked so much and separated when I was eight, I found the orange shag a lot more comforting than the awkward silences at my house. Plus, my grandpa let me not only watch Unsolved Mysteries, which helped me develop an ever-present fear of being followed, but Cheers - and only with the promise that I would never engage in promiscuous sex in a classy bar/pub.
Gram was never the vocal one, but she was always in the background, always offering her famous peanut-butter-and-mayonnaise sandwiches, which have scarred me for life, but also, back scratches with those wonderfully long nails of hers. I'd just lean over her lap, even after I weighed more than her as a ten year-old, and she'd just scratch as long as I asked. Even now, when I think of heaven, I'm hopeful that there's back scratching like that involved. She was proud of how long she'd lived in that house, proud that they'd paid only $17,000 for it in the late 1950s, proud that she'd been content with it even after my grandpa made his first million. Her home was just fine, she always said. I have everything I need here -- why do I need a big, new home -- to spend more time cleaning? If there's anything my grandma and I share, it is a straight up abhorrence for keeping linoleum clean.
But now she's moving out, after she couldn't smell a gas leak. Her new digs are quite nice - she's moving in with my mom, who graciously offered her the bottom floor of her tri-level - but I've been in wistful mode every time I think about it. When I mentioned this to one of my aunts, she let me know that the house was most likely going to be bought by a family friend, who would have no problem letting us wander through, if we wanted. But that misses the point of my reverie. Because it isn't about the house at all.
Another current obsession worth looking into? Wisecrackers and sun-dried tomatoes.
The great part about summer is that it's most convenient to engage in these minor indiscretions from the convenience of my couch. (Confession:) I've also taken to afternoon yoga sessions in my living room (truly bohemian, right?). If not for my love of getting the mail, I would probably never emerge.
This is all more poignant because about a month ago, I learned that my grandma, who is also very partial to her living room - she's slept on her couch ever since my grandpa died about 15 years ago - was going to have to give up her home. She's been there for over 50 years, and through phases of hideous rust-colored shag carpeting and heavily scotch-guarded draperies. The house, as I remember it, was famous for the clusters of carefully collected, dusty pitchers on shelves, an encyclopedia set written so long ago that the car was still depicted as a Model-T, and a downstairs bathroom that smelled so strongly of Lysol that you couldn't walk by it without being completely sterilized. My grandpa would spend hours in the there and when I was younger and a complete doof, I thought it was because he just really liked to read National Geographic. (The yellow tobacco stains didn't even register.) I grew up in that house; my real house was next door, but because both my parents worked so much and separated when I was eight, I found the orange shag a lot more comforting than the awkward silences at my house. Plus, my grandpa let me not only watch Unsolved Mysteries, which helped me develop an ever-present fear of being followed, but Cheers - and only with the promise that I would never engage in promiscuous sex in a classy bar/pub.
Gram was never the vocal one, but she was always in the background, always offering her famous peanut-butter-and-mayonnaise sandwiches, which have scarred me for life, but also, back scratches with those wonderfully long nails of hers. I'd just lean over her lap, even after I weighed more than her as a ten year-old, and she'd just scratch as long as I asked. Even now, when I think of heaven, I'm hopeful that there's back scratching like that involved. She was proud of how long she'd lived in that house, proud that they'd paid only $17,000 for it in the late 1950s, proud that she'd been content with it even after my grandpa made his first million. Her home was just fine, she always said. I have everything I need here -- why do I need a big, new home -- to spend more time cleaning? If there's anything my grandma and I share, it is a straight up abhorrence for keeping linoleum clean.
But now she's moving out, after she couldn't smell a gas leak. Her new digs are quite nice - she's moving in with my mom, who graciously offered her the bottom floor of her tri-level - but I've been in wistful mode every time I think about it. When I mentioned this to one of my aunts, she let me know that the house was most likely going to be bought by a family friend, who would have no problem letting us wander through, if we wanted. But that misses the point of my reverie. Because it isn't about the house at all.
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