Decor

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Scattershot Saturday Thoughts

Will I ever write a single topic post again?

Some might say that I should make several small posts instead of grouping a bunch of small topics together in one post. I say, the heart wants what it wants and today it wants to jibber jabber about a bunch of random shit.

I am obsessed with my cat.

This is likely not a surprise to you. Lenny is The Best, and since I am at home a lot of the day, every day, he is my constant companion. I cannot tell you how much of my one wild and precious life I have devoted to looking up things to enhance his quality of life. Catios, toys, communication systems. One thing I read frequently about cats is that they love to be UP HIGH, and my cat has a cat tower in the kitchen and a window perch in my office and, of course, a balcony (surely the people who built this house had Lenny in mind). But I’m always wondering if we could do more. Maybe I need a floor-to-ceiling cat tower for my office or my bedroom or my kid’s room or the basement?

I mentioned recently that my cat has become obsessed with a grasshopper that attaches to his wand toy. Well, my daughter handed him the grasshopper and he absconded with it and now I have no idea where it is; either it’s gone forever, or it will show up someday under the oven or in my bed at three in the morning. Fortunately, I can buy grasshopper replacements! Which led me to these rabbit fur toys. How many toys does one cat need, Suzanne?!

Instagram is well aware of how much I adore my cat, and feeds me all the cat content. Lately, it seems like everyone is getting another cat, and oh how I would LOVE to have a friend for Lenny. My husband, who did not particularly want a cat in the first place and agreed to get Lenny purely out of love for me and our kid, is not on board. And I respect that. But also: I want a second cat. Much as many non-parents believe with their whole hearts that they will NEVER be the kind of parent to have toys lying around their living rooms, I was firm in my conviction that I would never have cat towers or cat toys cluttering up my space. And, just like those non-parents who do a complete 180 when they have a kid, I now spend long minutes staring at my walls, wondering how best I could incorporate a wall climbing system into our overall home design and daydreaming about teaming up with my dad to create a custom set of cat slash Other Things shelves – maybe this combined with this (or this or this)? – that would look elegant and natural on our walls but would also provide our cat with a new way to see the world.

“How can anyone NOT be obsessed with me?”

Longterm projects to complete with a partner

Okay, moving on from my cat! My mom told me about a local challenge – sort of like a pub crawl, but without the pubs. We went to our first non-pub yesterday and plan to visit another one next week. I love that she suggested this joint activity: it gives us an “excuse” to get together, it encourages us to visit different parts of our community, and it supports local businesses. This is exactly the kind of thing I’ve been wanting to do with her, but a) I haven’t really known how or where to look for this kind of thing and b) nothing has jumped out to bite me.

I have to believe that there are other, similar types of activities that we can do together once we’ve completed this one. BUT WHAT??? Everything I come up with almost immediately hits a non-negotiable.

Visiting local museums seems like an obvious idea. Although I tire of museums quickly. Plus, they often cost money and it would be ideal if this joint activity were free. Birchie has taken on a hiking challenge several years running, which sounds appealing. Unfortunately, my mom lives nearby primarily in the winter months, and hiking in the snow and ice isn’t at the top of her list of fun things to do. (Don’t you love how the prior sentence cleverly implies hiking in snow and ice IS on MY list of fun things to do?) Elisabeth visits lighthouses, but the closest lighthouses to me aren’t reasonably close to my mom’s house. A coffee shop or restaurant or ice cream shop crawl would be fun, but again with the spending money, not to mention that those types of places tend to be crowded and noisy, which cross them pretty firmly off the list. A dear friend of mine would be all about finding local haunted places, but I don’t think that’s my mom’s jam. Stephany recently did a reading crawl, which I find deeply appealing… maybe my mom and I could visit one bookstore or library at a time and spend an hour or so reading together? My mom doesn’t really enjoy shopping or live music, neither of us are that into group exercise classes.

Are there any options I’m not thinking of? Have you ever done a “challenge” or a multi-part activity, either on your own or with a friend or family member?

Favorite podcasts

Based on Engie’s enthusiastic recommendation, I binged the entire second season of “Adults in the Room.” It was compelling and thought-provoking, and I found myself staring into space after every episode, wondering about things like the knife’s edge balance between “protecting a victim and future potential victims from abuse” and “protecting people from false accusations”… the many, many ways people can inflict themselves and their desires on others non-consensually and whether “abuse/abuser” are the most accurate terms for every act/person on that spectrum… and how big systems, like school districts, can feasibly and reliably balance the need to employ staff against their responsibility to protect the people they serve. It was a heavy topic, for sure, and the podcast of course had limitations in its scope and viewpoint and ability to address the bigger questions, but I found it completely engrossing.

Last fall, I think, Nicole recommended that I listen to a podcast called “Beth’s Dead,” and hoo boy, THAT was a fantastic listen. It also touched on heavy topics, but it was mostly about the intensity of parasocial relationships and I loooooved it.

I am not typically a podcast listener, although I can’t articulate why I gravitate toward other types of media first. But I enjoyed “Adults in the Room” and “Beth Is Dead” so much that I would love something exactly like either of them. I just started “Scamanda” which might do the trick, but would love more ideas if you have them.

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Initial thoughts on physical therapy

The other day marked my first physical therapy appointment to treat a case of tennis elbow. Reminder: I do not play tennis. My best guess is that I injured my forearm while lifting weights.

This was my second time patronizing a physical therapist; the last time, some seven or so years ago, was also in response to a workout-related injury. That time, I’d squinched my lower back doing ab exercises during a barre class. I don’t remember much about that PT experience, except that it was helpful. So I am going to try to write about this experience in more detail, for the benefit of Future Me.

When I arrived at the PT office, I had to fill out a series of long questionnaires – the kind that ask the wrong questions. (For instance, it asked “Does your pain interfere with your social life?” instead of “Does your pain interfere with your ability to work out the way you want to, which affects your mental and physical health on a daily basis?”)

After I’d filled out all the forms and handed over my insurance card for photocopying, my physio (Allison calls her PT a physio, so I am going to do that as well) called me back to a little office that looked like a doctor’s exam room: exam table, couple of chairs, cabinet with sink. The physio asked me a bunch of questions about my pain level and when/how I thought I’d injured the area. (He also noted that he had no part in designing the questions, nor has he ever, in twenty years as a PT, looked at any of the completed questionnaires.) (ARRRGGGHHHHHH, amirite.) Then he pressed on various parts of my arm and moved my arm around in a variety of ways and asked if anything caused pain. Then he agreed with the diagnosis of tennis elbow and said I would need to come to PT twice a week for six weeks. Ugh.

Then he showed me a couple of stretches to do, advised me to ice my elbow twice a day, and took me into the main space of the PT room, where there were exercise benches, weight machines, yoga mats, treadmill, and massage tables. I sat on a chair with my arm resting on a massage table and the physio ran an ultrasound machine over my forearm for what seemed like a long time. Then he massaged my forearm using a metal tool that looked kind of like this. He asked me if I could tell how tight my muscles were (or maybe he said “tendons”?), and when I said no, he showed me how the metal tool was unable to slide smoothly over my arm, but instead looked as though it were gliding over a bumpy road. Then he showed me how to massage my own forearm, using the elbow of my opposite arm (not easy or fun), and that was it.

I wasn’t really prepared for anything about the experience, because I had no idea what to expect.

Two things I wish I had known in advance:

1. That I would be a lot of pain after the appointment. My arm is sore, and in a new way than it has been; I would compare it to the same soreness I’ve had after getting a vigorous back massage, or even similar to the soreness of doing a rigorous exercise routine. Allison suggested that I take Advil before PT, and I will do that next time for sure.

2. That I would be expected to CHAT. My physio was lovely and friendly and talkative, and it turned out we had a lot in common to discuss. But chatting for A Whole Hour with someone I don’t know well is exhausting. There was one other patient in the office while I was there, and he looked at his phone the whole time his physio was massaging him… but he was on his stomach and she was working on his legs/feet, and I think it would be a lot more difficult/rude to stare at my phone while my physio massages my arm right there next to my face. I already dread going to the dental hygienist because of the chatting, and I only have to do that twice a year. HOW am I going to survive eleven more hours of conversation with this guy? (Who, again, seems lovely and friendly and kind!)

Wall art

My primary resting spot in this house is in the cozy armchair in the corner of my office. My view from the chair is of my bookshelves, but I am increasingly aware of how bare the walls are on either side of the shelves. Wouldn’t that be a nice way to display some family photos? We have TONS of artwork around our house, but very few family photos.

I have gone so far as to select a variety of photos that I’d like to display, but that’s where I get stuck.

What is the best way to display them? Gallery-wall style or on a series of floating shelves? Is there a way I could incorporate my decorative skiing tile, which I bought from Lauren years ago and LOVE and have never figured out how to properly display? (If you look closely, it’s sitting there on top of the Sue Grafton mysteries, but I would like it to be more visible.) If I have one non-photo, should/could I also add a small painting or a poem or something? How do I figure out how many [items] would look good and what sizes they should be?

I realize my success with gallery walls is zero, but this is MY office so I have more control over it than over shared spaces.

Ergonomic laptop holders

Speaking of my office sitting habits, I forgot to tell you about the part of my physical therapy appointment during which the physio scolded me about my computer usage habits. (He wasn’t mean about it or anything, more aghast that I was doing such constant harm to myself.) He suggested that I immediately stop using my laptop while sitting in an armchair (don’t let him know where I am writing this post) and sit instead at my desk, and invest in an ergonomic laptop holder so that I stop doing intense and ongoing damage to my neck and posture. He also recommended that I immediately cease using the track pad and keyboard on my laptop and get a separate mouse and keyboard.

What I want to know is, are there ergonomic laptop holders I can use on my lap? I really don’t like sitting at my desk.

How long is too long to sleep in?

Between the cat and perimenopause, I am no longer a sleeper-inner. My husband, who is chronically underslept, can sleep in until ten o’clock on the rare occasion the stars align for him to do so. My kid, who is almost-but-not-quite a teenager, has begun to sleep in more luxuriously than she used to; for years and years, she was an up-with-the-sun kind of kid.

My question is, how long do I let her sleep? I know she doesn’t get enough sleep these days, so I’m inclined to let her sleep until she wakes up naturally. But I also don’t want to start a Bad Pattern, and sleeping late often leads directly to staying up late. Ten o’clock feels decently decadent to me, but my husband says he remembers sleeping in until one or so when he was a teen.

When you can sleep in, how late do you sleep? If you have kids, how late do you let them lounge in bed?

Also me.

That’s all I’ve got today, Internet. I hope it is not snowing where you are. You know I love snow, but not in May.

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Turns Out I Have a Few More Random Topics in My System

One of my worst habits is picking up my phone when I wake up in the wee hours of the morning. Last night, I opened up my email to see a 30% off offer from Athleta, which is irresistible because I love their athleisure. (I still don’t know if it’s pronounced Ath-leh-tuh, like “lettuce” or Ath-LEE-tuh, like “athlete.” I want very badly for it to be the latter, but I don’t know.) I already have so many pairs of high-rise leggings, but they are so comfy… and maybe one more pair would ease the emptiness in my soul, especially in the dark green, and especially if I also get this matching sweatshirt.

Okay, I’m just kidding. My soul is full of (mainly) love and light. But I do sometimes get into that mindset of This One Specific Thing Will Fix Me.

Speaking of which, I cannot stop thinking about this sweatshirt.

image from evereve.com

I saw it in person when I was doing a little light shopping with a friend while our kids were at an event. A person in my circle happened to be in the same store and was chatting with us while I perused the clothing. When I held up this sweatshirt and said, mostly joking, “I think I need an après ski sweatshirt,” she said, “No, no one needs that.” in what I can only call a Tone of Intense Derision. DO I need this sweatshirt? No, I most certainly do not. And yet my reaction to her comment was one of visceral opposition and defiance. I managed to tamp it down in the moment – again, I do not need this sweatshirt – but I still want the sweatshirt, and more so after I was scolded about it. It’s probably not financially wise to buy things out of spite, though.

You know what is the opposite of spiteful? Holiday cards. How about that masterful segue, huh??? I have said it many times but holiday cards are my favorite thing about the season. I would forego all gifts in a hot second, but I would never want to give up exchanging holiday cards.

It is quite difficult to get a photo of my cards while still keeping everyone’s faces anonymous. So you get to look at this adorable Christmas dogs card while kind of getting a *feel* for the cards on my wall.

This year, there seem to be far fewer cards on my wall than in years past, when they have wrapped around the entire perimeter of the kitchen. This is slightly concerning. Obviously my main worry is that I have been blacklisted from people’s holiday card lists, for reasons unbeknownst to me. When the more likely scenario is that a) cards are expensive and b) stamps are HELLA expensive and c) Thanksgiving was late this year, so I think some people are late in sending out their cards. I only just got my last few cards into the mail yesterday, so I clearly don’t have a leg to stand on. More cards will arrive, and I will leave them up until my husband gets annoyed enough by their presence to badger me into taking them down.

His big concern with my tendency to stick cards on the walls is that the sticky tack I use won’t come off. I have always pooh poohed that fear because it always comes off. But… last year I may have left the cards up a wee bit too long… and some of the sticky tack may have pulled off a wee bit of paint. Whoopsie. This year I am using a different brand, one that is also nearer the grey of our paint.

If you were concerned that my husband’s stocking was going to be woefully empty compared to everyone else’s, allow me to lay your fears to rest. Last night, we went to Barnes & Noble on our date night, as we do, and he spent a long time examining this book. He doesn’t usually read books in print, because of limited time, but he was seriously considering this one. It has an intriguing premise, and it’s smallish (just over 200 pages) and it has a visual element that is unusual and appealing. He looked it up on Goodreads and told me that the author’s previous book was more highly rated, but, alas, not available in the store. So during my middle-of-the-night non-sleeping, I ordered the previous book for him, along with a book of dad jokes (he’d also spent quite a lot of time lingering over a dad jokes calendar, and he loves telling dad jokes, and this book can be delivered before Christmas so it was an easy add-on). Now I am REALLY DONE BUYING THINGS.

image from amazon.com
image from amazon.com

While a lot of people, I expect, will spend this weekend baking wonderful treats and going to holiday parties, I am planning to spend my weekend TIDYING. The Christmas decor, which I love, is already beginning to close in on me. There’s the tree, which takes up space, and the necessity of moving one of the armchairs into the piano room, which makes that room crowded (there’s STILL an old couch in there as well) (also we got a concrete coffee table for the sunroom and that’s in the piano room too). Plus there is detritus on every surface – like a tin of peppermints from someone at my husband’s office, and the replacement Hanukkah pajamas I mentioned in my last post, still in their bag, and a plate of Christmas cookies, and some gift receipts, and a winter-themed tie someone gave my husband, and the two holiday letters I received from friends that I have read but am not ready to discard yet – in addition to the normal random assortment of glasses and water bottles and cat fur and tweenager flotsam and mail. Of course, there are also BOXES EVERYWHERE (the instant I break down a box and put it into the recycling bin, another box appears) because the cat loves boxes, and he also loves the brown packing paper that comes in the boxes (his version of “These Are a Few of My Favorite Things” would just be “brown paper packages, brown paper packages, brown paper packages” on repeat), and he loves to leap on the packing paper and tear it with his teeth and leave little crumbs of paper everywhere.

The Instagram algorithm, intuiting my Christmas claustrophobia, served me a video of an advice vlogger answering someone’s question about Christmas with her mother-in-law. The gist was that the writer-inner’s mother-in-law had decreed that Christmas was over at noon on Christmas Day, and so promptly at noon she started putting away all the Christmas décor, and insisted the writer-inner help. It took them five hours to put away all the ornaments and lights and the tree, and the writer-inner was upset that THAT was how she’d spent her first Christmas with her new husband and his family. She was anticipating the same thing this year, and wanted help from the advice giver.

Oh, how deeply do I empathize with the mother-in-law! I, too, reach a point at which I am simply Done with Christmas, and when I get there, I want it all to be whisked away immediately. This is one of the reasons that I refuse to decorate for Christmas before December 1. I want to enjoy the decorations, not feel stifled by them. I do typically leave them up until at least New Year’s Day, though. Even if I’m gritting my teeth by the end.

By the way, the advice given was a) see if you can change the holiday arrangement so that you spend Christmas Eve with the in-laws and Christmas Day with your family, rather than swapping every-other-Christmas Day with each family and, if that’s a no-go, b) simply agree that Christmas ends at noon on Christmas Day, and depart the in-laws’ house at that time. I don’t know about how this would go over with your family, but I just cannot imagine doing either of these things with my family of origin or my in-laws. Our families don’t even swap Christmases that often! But if we did, the swap would need to be Exactly Even. And I also cannot imagine simply opting out of what sounds like a family tradition of putting Christmas away, even if it SUCKED. But then again, I am not always the greatest at setting boundaries so maybe the advice giver has it right.

Anyway, I am going to spend this weekend tidying as much as I possibly can (GOODBYE, latest crop of boxes!), and doing laundry, and giving myself a clean-if-cluttered slate from which to begin two weeks of family togetherness.

I am also going to try out a new hair crème, which I discovered after Instagram presumed (rightly!) that I would be interested in something called “glass hair.” None of my efforts at improving my skin with expensive products have worked, but surely I can have the hair of my dreams if I just buy This One Specific Hair Crème. (I had a gift card.)

image from amazon.com
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Five for Friday

Happy Halloween! I know it’s not for everyone, but I adore Halloween. The costumes, the candy, the decorations. It’s all fun. 

Oddly (for me), I haven’t done much more than decorate. Okay, I haven’t done anything more than decorate. And even then, Carla did most of the decorating herself. I haven’t bought any candy, I haven’t made any Halloween treats (although there’s still time for baking!), and we didn’t even buy a pumpkin! The only jack-o-lantern around here is my ceramic one.

Why must you insist on photographing me with these strange objects, woman?!
  • Carla has been really into Halloween this year, and has been leaning into the scary side of it.We’ve been listening to some “scary” audiobooks in the car, which is so fun. Pleasingly, some of my favorite books from when I was a kid hold up pretty well. We’ve listened to as many Zilpha Keatley Snyder books as are available at my library: The Egypt Game, The Witches of Worm, and The Headless Cupid. I love how these books have a slightly supernatural element to them without being overly frightening. As a parent, I also appreciate how insightful they are about kid psychology. Carla loved them. We own the other Stanley mysteries, so hopefully we’ll get to those once we’ve finished reading The Witch of Blackbird Pond, which is not particularly scary at all and might even be kind of boring. We’ve been reading it for a long time and it’s kind of a slog. But in my memory it was so good! After we exhausted the Snyder audiobooks, we turned to The Dollhouse Murders, which remains an excellent novel and is, unfortunately, the only Betty Ren Wright audiobook my library carries. I see that Audible has Christina’s Ghost in its catalog, but none of Wright’s other wonderfully creepy novels. I get it, they’re old. But they are SO GOOD.  Right now, we’re listening to Doll Bones by Holly Black, another Newbury Honor Winner. It’s pretty good so far.
  • Our seasonal media hasn’t stopped at books; we’ve been watching some scary movies, too. My husband and I watched the first Scream movie with Carla. I think it holds up okay, for a 90s film. It wasn’t as scary as I remember, and Carla was unfazed. Then we watched The Sixth Sense, which I hadn’t seen since I first watched in back in the early aughts. It was much slower than I remember, and Carla didn’t seem quite as shocked by the big twist as I remember being. I suppose movies have gotten a lot twistier in the intervening decades. We tried to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which I remember was a lot of fun. But wow. It is SO BAD. My husband and I have also been watching some scary movies instead of our normal nightly TV show. We’ve seen Weapons, which was excellent, and The VVitch, which was also good but in a much less horror-movie kind of way. I liked Weapons because it was kind of a mystery story disguised as a horror movie. It did have some truly graphic violence though, the kind where I had to look at my husband watching the movie instead of looking at it myself. This weekend, we plan to watch Bring Her Back. 
  • Lenny / Leo finds Halloween to be quite perplexing. But he’s rolling with it. There are a lot of fun new things to sniff and bite and knock over.
Despite appearances, no pumpkins were harmed in the taking of this photo.
  • Will this be the last year of trick-or-treating? According to Carla, she is going to be dressing up and trick-or-treating for many years to come. But some of her friends have already indicated that they aren’t dressing up next year.  I don’t mind either way. If she decides not to trick-or-treat next year, we could invite a couple of friends over to watch scary movies and hand out candy. Of course, I’m happy for my kiddo to be a kid as long as she wants to, so dressing up and trick-or-treating sounds fine to me. I have no memory of when I stopped trick-or-treating. Maybe it was in middle school? I do remember that in middle school, I started to have friends over to watch scary movies. Perhaps this wasn’t just around Halloween, though; it seems like every sleepover I went to involved some sort of horror flick. I was big into witchy stuff – I had a Ouija board that I loved and pulled out at sleepovers as often as possible. We played games like Bloody Mary and Light As a Feather, Stiff As a Board and told each other scary stories. Being scared – while knowing you were ultimately safe and secure – was such a delicious feeling. 
  • If you dressed up for Halloween, what was your favorite costume? My mom handmade me a Halloween costume every year – how she managed that, between working full time and raising two kids, is beyond me; I am a strictly Store Bought Costume kind of mom – and my all-time favorite was a fortune teller costume. My mom found this gorgeous crimson paisley material and made me a long, full skirt. I think she made me a sleeveless top out of some sort of gold gauzy material, and a belt out of some sort of gold fringe. I felt mysterious and beautiful in that outfit and I think I had her repurpose it a few years in a row. Carla has been a ton of fun things for Halloween over the years, but I think my favorite was when she was two. She loved the Super Grover segments on Sesame Street, and she specifically requested to be Super Grover for Halloween. She was adorable. 

    As I mentioned, I have not bought a single piece of Halloween candy this year. I did ask that Carla try to snag me a Snickers or a bag of Sour Patch Kids while she’s out trick-or-treating. (I would also love a Milky Way Midnight or a Skor / Heath bar, but those are few and far between.) What kind of candy will you be hoping for tonight?

    That’s right pumpkin heads. BEWARE OF CAT.