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This is a really lovely book. Nonfiction. I'd recommend it to any woman. I'm glad I read it now, and I think I'll want to read it again in ten years or so.
Apr. 3rd, 2009
misc awesomeness that happened in March
Apr. 3rd, 2009 12:50 pm1. While in Pittsburgh, F's sister took us to a strip club to see a midget stripper. Yes. A midget stripper. Her name is Little Sassy Cassie, and she's 2'10" (exactly half my height!). She took it all off. She climbed the stripper pole and did handstands. I was pretty shocked by her obvious arm strength (I mean, she's lifting considerably less weight than I would be if I tried that, but she also has proportionally smaller arms than I do). Overall, it was a pretty interesting thing to do, and was worth seeing just for the ability to say that I have seen it. Cassie is on tour, and I totally recommend catching her if she visits your town.
2. F and I caught a fun play last weekend: William Shakespeare's Land of the Dead. The premise: it's 1599, and zombies attack the Globe Playhouse. It was a fun play in a lot of respects: fun if you like zombies, fun if you like getting splattered with fake blood (there were tarps for the first three rows), fun if you like clever writing and Shakespearean humor. Some of the jokes were great--there was a lot of playing with the idea that Shakespeare didn't write the plays and who might've written them instead. For example, Sir Francis Bacon shows up and wants Shakespeare to pass off one of Bacon's plays as his own, and later on, just about every character he runs into (Queen Elizabeth, John Dee, random actors) has a great idea for a play. The writing was just quick and clever and really fun. I also loved the ending, and the choreography was terrific. (And how thrilled the directors must have been when an actor wearing prosthetic legs signed up for auditions! Brilliant!)
2. F and I caught a fun play last weekend: William Shakespeare's Land of the Dead. The premise: it's 1599, and zombies attack the Globe Playhouse. It was a fun play in a lot of respects: fun if you like zombies, fun if you like getting splattered with fake blood (there were tarps for the first three rows), fun if you like clever writing and Shakespearean humor. Some of the jokes were great--there was a lot of playing with the idea that Shakespeare didn't write the plays and who might've written them instead. For example, Sir Francis Bacon shows up and wants Shakespeare to pass off one of Bacon's plays as his own, and later on, just about every character he runs into (Queen Elizabeth, John Dee, random actors) has a great idea for a play. The writing was just quick and clever and really fun. I also loved the ending, and the choreography was terrific. (And how thrilled the directors must have been when an actor wearing prosthetic legs signed up for auditions! Brilliant!)
cohabitation update
Apr. 3rd, 2009 01:58 pmSo, F moved in just over two months ago! Things have really been going well. Not that I'm surprised, but still.
The first week or so was difficult. F was dealing with being in a new place--a place with snow--and being around me all the time, plus not having any of his stuff. I was dealing with a drastic decrease in personal space and alone time plus F's entirely different style of kitchen-using. Most of that, we've gotten past or found a workaround.
It turns out that I seem to be a complete psycho about dishes for some reason--I never would have suspected ten years ago that I'd turn out to be a dish psycho. I mean, F willingly washes dishes, without even being prompted, even making statements like, "Boy, I'd better wash those" and then following up with dish-washing action, yet still, I am psycho about his STYLE of dishwashing. I think this might be related to the fact that all of my apartmental systems of doing things are in complete disarray now that he's here, which is normal and expected, and it's normal too that I be upset about all the upset, but for some reason I'm taking it out on the dishes. So now we have worked out a nice arrangement where F does more of the cooking and I do more of the dishes. I'm totally cool with that. Also, when F does the dishes, I do not watch.
Other difficulties for me have been F totally taking over my stuff that I love, like my car (he needs to drive to work), my computer, and my ipod (he couldn't update his ipod from my computer and anyway it's too small for audiobooks). Now, though, F's computer is all set up and has the internets, so he can download his darn podcasts to his own ipod and he can do his writing on his own computer and I can have mine back. So I am excited.
F has had his own difficulties, obviously, which he can talk about himself, but the commute is a big unlikeable thing. He used to walk 5 minutes to work and now he drives 50 minutes. Hence the gracious lending of my ipod, but it still sucks. The personal space issue and lack of his own stuff issue is also a problem, but we talked it over and had good communication that led to setting up his computer, which is awesome for many reasons. So, yay communication. Also, I keep making him hang out with my parents, who keep bestowing lovely dollar store holiday decorations upon us. They are entertained by how quickly F covers his horror with a smile and also by his sarcasm!
I am also finding out lots of fun new things about F. For example, he listens to NPR constantly. I'm beginning to suspect that he somehow gets NPR secret radio reception in his brain. Most of our conversations involve something F heard on NPR. However, I am discovering that NPR covers a lot of really interesting stories, so it's all good.
Also, F is just as much a list maker as I am! We have hours of fun. On Fridays, we email back and forth at work to compile a list of things to do over the weekend. Then we print it out and spend the weekend crossing things off. During the week we flip the list over (so as not to waste paper) and re-list everything we have to do and add new items. We get so much DONE!
We're also having a great time with cooking. Every week we make our grocery list and plan our meals for the week (see above RE list-making) and go to the store. We've been making really good food. This week we tried basa, which is a kind of fish. We cooked it in a tomato-pepper sauce which we made from scratch in the blender and then ate it with couscous and asparagus. I also made Stew, which involves a bunch of stuff getting thrown in the crockpot, so we're varying things up and doing meals that involve both high and low time investments. F tends to cook more veggies than I do, and more Mexican and spicier food, and I tend to cook more pasta, so we're expanding each other's repertoires. Now I can eat asparagus, zucchini, squash, green beans, AND snap peas. We keep staples in the kitchen, like potatoes and onions and basil, and when we throw together a meal we don't just take a Lean Cuisine out of the freezer, we actually cook something. I'm so happy with these developments in our diet.
Best of all is the part where I get to spend all my time with this awesome person. We take long walks, we cook, we watch TV, we read, we fall asleep together, and it's every single day and I hardly ever get sick of him (except when he talks about NPR too much). It's so nice! Even though there are many things in my life that aren't ideal right now, there is F, and so that stuff doesn't really matter.
The first week or so was difficult. F was dealing with being in a new place--a place with snow--and being around me all the time, plus not having any of his stuff. I was dealing with a drastic decrease in personal space and alone time plus F's entirely different style of kitchen-using. Most of that, we've gotten past or found a workaround.
It turns out that I seem to be a complete psycho about dishes for some reason--I never would have suspected ten years ago that I'd turn out to be a dish psycho. I mean, F willingly washes dishes, without even being prompted, even making statements like, "Boy, I'd better wash those" and then following up with dish-washing action, yet still, I am psycho about his STYLE of dishwashing. I think this might be related to the fact that all of my apartmental systems of doing things are in complete disarray now that he's here, which is normal and expected, and it's normal too that I be upset about all the upset, but for some reason I'm taking it out on the dishes. So now we have worked out a nice arrangement where F does more of the cooking and I do more of the dishes. I'm totally cool with that. Also, when F does the dishes, I do not watch.
Other difficulties for me have been F totally taking over my stuff that I love, like my car (he needs to drive to work), my computer, and my ipod (he couldn't update his ipod from my computer and anyway it's too small for audiobooks). Now, though, F's computer is all set up and has the internets, so he can download his darn podcasts to his own ipod and he can do his writing on his own computer and I can have mine back. So I am excited.
F has had his own difficulties, obviously, which he can talk about himself, but the commute is a big unlikeable thing. He used to walk 5 minutes to work and now he drives 50 minutes. Hence the gracious lending of my ipod, but it still sucks. The personal space issue and lack of his own stuff issue is also a problem, but we talked it over and had good communication that led to setting up his computer, which is awesome for many reasons. So, yay communication. Also, I keep making him hang out with my parents, who keep bestowing lovely dollar store holiday decorations upon us. They are entertained by how quickly F covers his horror with a smile and also by his sarcasm!
I am also finding out lots of fun new things about F. For example, he listens to NPR constantly. I'm beginning to suspect that he somehow gets NPR secret radio reception in his brain. Most of our conversations involve something F heard on NPR. However, I am discovering that NPR covers a lot of really interesting stories, so it's all good.
Also, F is just as much a list maker as I am! We have hours of fun. On Fridays, we email back and forth at work to compile a list of things to do over the weekend. Then we print it out and spend the weekend crossing things off. During the week we flip the list over (so as not to waste paper) and re-list everything we have to do and add new items. We get so much DONE!
We're also having a great time with cooking. Every week we make our grocery list and plan our meals for the week (see above RE list-making) and go to the store. We've been making really good food. This week we tried basa, which is a kind of fish. We cooked it in a tomato-pepper sauce which we made from scratch in the blender and then ate it with couscous and asparagus. I also made Stew, which involves a bunch of stuff getting thrown in the crockpot, so we're varying things up and doing meals that involve both high and low time investments. F tends to cook more veggies than I do, and more Mexican and spicier food, and I tend to cook more pasta, so we're expanding each other's repertoires. Now I can eat asparagus, zucchini, squash, green beans, AND snap peas. We keep staples in the kitchen, like potatoes and onions and basil, and when we throw together a meal we don't just take a Lean Cuisine out of the freezer, we actually cook something. I'm so happy with these developments in our diet.
Best of all is the part where I get to spend all my time with this awesome person. We take long walks, we cook, we watch TV, we read, we fall asleep together, and it's every single day and I hardly ever get sick of him (except when he talks about NPR too much). It's so nice! Even though there are many things in my life that aren't ideal right now, there is F, and so that stuff doesn't really matter.