Holidays

Five for Friday on a Saturday
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Five for Friday on a Saturday

Did you know that it is nearly November?! Which means that I am going to be (supposedly) posting every day, for NaBloPoMo. (Considering I wrote part of this post on Tuesday, tried to post it Wednesday and Friday and got interrupted, NaBloPoMo may be a big fat pipe dream.) But what, pray tell, shall I write about during the course of that long and dreary month? If you have any burning questions for me, or ideas for posts you want to see, now’s your chance! My old Ask Me Anything form stopped working, so I have set up a new one right here. Please check it out and ask away!

I hope you have questions for me, because I have some questions for you.

When you make leftovers, how long do you expect those leftovers to stretch?


I used to actively dislike leftovers, but I have come around. Now, as long as it’s something I really like – fire fry! chipotle chicken tortilla soup! chipotle chicken tacos! I like-ah the spice! – I am happy to eat it day after day. Maybe not indefinitely, but I’d be happy eating any of those things I just mentioned for a whole week.

However. I just learned that my husband is happy eating a thing, and then eating it as leftovers, and that’s it. I should not find this as surprising as I do, based on his “we eat tacos too often” stance.

This is good for me, of course, because I wind up getting most of the yummy yummy fire fry/soup/tacos to myself. But it’s not so good when I am counting on not cooking for the number of days a food lasts.

Listen, there are most definitely things I don’t want to eat even a second time. For most things, though, I feel like the ideal amount of leftovers is enough for two meals AFTER the initial meal. But maybe I’m wrong?

What is the correct your preferred way to pack a grocery bag?

The other day at the grocery store, for the first time ever in my history of patronizing grocery stores, the checker requested that I put all my produce together to make it easier on the bagger.

I am just now realizing that usually, my produce goes on the belt last. So it’s probably always together already. But this time, I think I may have put some of the heavier produce (onions, sweet potatoes) on the belt first, and then withheld lighter non-produce items (tortilla shells, a quarter pound of deli ham) along with my tomato, bananas, and precious bell peppers (I cannot stand a bruised bell pepper, and I want them to go ON TOP). Perhaps the “all produce together” rule has always been in place, and I’ve only just now run afoul of it.

The checker seemed to feel weird about her request. (Maybe I caused her to feel weird, by remarking – in what I thought was a cheery, non-argumentative way – that no one had ever asked me to do that before.) She kept thanking me for rearranging my items on the belt. And then she gave me a semi-long explanation for why she’d asked me to put the produce together in the first place, which boils down to: the checkers like to bag like items together.

Lenny has Thoughts about how the baggers acked these bags.

Well. I found that FASCINATING. Since the pandemic, I have had quite a lot of experience bagging my groceries myself, and here is how I prefer to do it:

  • Between 2 and 4 heavy-ish things on the bottom of each bag (milk cartons, large yogurt containers, flour, sugar, large cans of tomato puree, cartons of ice cream)
  • A nice base of less heavy but sturdy/boxed items (boxed rice, mixed lettuce in a plastic clamshell, frozen pancakes, containers of salsa or guacamole, boxed pasta, crackers, butter, cream cheese)
  • Or, a nice base of less heavy/smaller cans (beans or tomato sauce or coconut milk)
  • Or, a nice base of heavy, sturdy produce (onions, potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, citrus fruits, iceberg lettuce)
  • The middle section is for meats, awkward and semi-sturdy vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, celery), and bagged items (shredded cheese, cookie mix, frozen peas or mango, chocolate chips, bagged rice/beans/lentils)
  • The top section is for light and/or delicate things (cilantro, green beans, bell peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, bananas, berries, bagged pasta, bread, chips)
  • Eggs and flowers go in a separate bag

I have most definitely run into grocery store baggers who, like, put all the canned goods in one bag. Or who put three items into each of ten separate bags. But I’ve dismissed those occasions as errors on the part of people who either don’t do the shopping and therefore don’t have to carry bags into their house, or are body builders, or, conversely, have no upper body strength whatsoever. I had no idea that, it seems, they have all been TAUGHT to do things this way.

The baggers at Trader Joe’s have been taught a different and far superior way. Without exception, they seem to possess clear understanding about which items should accompany one another, what should go on top vs on the bottom and – crucially important – how to pack a shit ton of groceries into the one solitary reusable bag you brought in from the car, so sure were you that you were only going to buy the three things on your list.

Tell me all your grocery bagging ways.

What Halloween candy have you bought this year?

Carla has persuaded me to buy two bags each of Brach’s candy corn and candy pumpkins. That is, so far, the ONLY Halloween candy I’ve purchased. I have no idea if my husband and I will even give out candy tomorrow. We haven’t decorated our yard, so it’s kind of unclear whether we even celebrate Halloween. But, more pertinent, I have not purchased any Halloween candy to hand out!

I’ve tried. I’ve been in Target a couple of times recently and looked at the Halloween selection with the express purpose of getting some to hand out. IT’S SO EXPENSIVE. A bag of, I think, 75 pieces of candy is TWENTY AMERICAN DOLLARS. That is ridiculous!

Well, I am apparently not the only one complaining about candy costs.

We get a good number of trick-or-treaters, so it’s not like we could buy one bag and call it a day. We usually buy two or three of the giant bags from Costco (I haven’t been to Costco recently, so I have no idea how much they cost). But the bags from Target are NOT BIG ENOUGH. They seem very eeny compared to years past. So it feels like we are getting much less candy for much more money. UGH.

(Edit: After I wrote, tried to, and failed to publish this post, I went to Costco. The bags there had 92 pieces of candy and cost about $21.99. More reasonable but still. My husband voted for turning off the porch lights and watching a scary movie instead of welcoming trick-or-treaters. This feels a little mean and a lot sad, but I left without buying anything.)

I didn’t think to order candy from Amazon, but it looks like that would have been the better option. Oh well, too late now. What are you doing?

Is this anxiety, or Something Real?

Necessary context: with the complete support of my doctor, I stopped taking anxiety medication a couple of months ago. So far, I have noticed that a) I am sleeping much better and feeling much less sleepy during the day and b) my anxiety has ticked up a bit.

I am currently in a spiral about a friendship, and I can’t tell if it’s justified or if it’s just anxiety. Probably I should just TALK TO MY FRIEND, right? But… what if there’s absolutely nothing wrong on my friend’s end, and I am being an overanalytic psycho? I don’t want to come off as clingy or desperate or obsessed or or or. But also… what if I don’t ask and our friendship just dissolves? I can FEEL that this is anxiety; my whole body is tense. My brain keeps coming up with all these very defensible ways that it Knows Something, and I’ve done Something Horribly Wrong, even though the plausible Wrongs are very vague and amorphous. (But plausible!) Also, this is the type of friend who – I think – would come to me if there were Something Horribly Wrong. I don’t see this friend feeling hurt or wronged or whatever and just… pretending things are okay. But then again: THINGS FEEL OFF. Anyway. Ugh. Perhaps the clearest path to take is to restart my anxiety medication.

In the meantime: based on your assessment of my very non-specific and brief explanation of this worry, is this anxiety, or is it Something Real? And whether it is or isn’t, what should I DO about it? If your advice is to reach out to my friend, I am going to need a script please.

Would you like to see a picture of my cat?

This is, of course, a rhetorical question because I am pretty sure the answer is yes. But I have locked myself into this Question Format and I can’t think of anything else (see previous bullet).

If, however, you are on the fence about whether you want to see the cat or not – I mean, there’s ALREADY a picture of him in the post – let me tell you this: Carla and I took him into our yard for an impromptu fall photo shoot yesterday.

He LOVED IT. He loves Outdoors, plus, he finds leaves fascinating. Once in awhile, a stiff breeze will send leaves showering from the trees in our yard, and he has to leap up to whatever window-adjacent surface he can reach so he can watch them fall and try to bap-bap them through the glass. Are they toys? Are they prey? Nobody knows.

That’s all I have for you today, Internet. Hope you have a pleasantly spooky Halloween, full of treats.

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Wordy Wednesday Wandering

June was a whirlwind, wasn’t it? I am still trying to wrap my mind around how it can possibly be July already. The past few days alone included: picking up my child from sleepaway camp, observing a belated Father’s Day with my husband, buying a new car, getting a new air conditioner installed, and celebrating my daughter’s birthday. For those of you who have been around since I was on the fence about having kids: THE KID IS NOW THIRTEEN.

I could only find the “birthday” portion of the “happy birthday” banner, which I think it more of an indication of my current level of discombobulation than lack of delight at my kiddo becoming a teenager.

I have been doing SO MUCH laundry, and there is stuff (camp stuff, gift detritus, air conditioner replacement debris) everywhere, and I cannot stay on top of the mess.

This looks much neater and tidier than it FEELS. It FEELS like being slowly suffocated on all sides by Stuff.

(Alert, alert: Lisa and Nicole, you may want to skip the next two paragraphs and the photo between them.)

The air conditioner replacement was a fun surprise. I scheduled a simple clean-and-check with my HVAC company, and the technician discovered that all the wiring had been devastated by mice. In fact, the only thing that was preventing the wires from being exposed completely was a giant mouse nest. I think you know how I feel about this, which is burn it all down.

How can something so small and kind of cute be so destructive?!?!

We’d already spent a pretty penny to deal with previous mouse-related air conditioning carnage, back in April of 2024, and it was one of those deals where we could shell out a bunch of money to repair the old unit, which could of course die at any moment and has already proved much too welcoming to rodents… or shell out more money for a new, slightly-more-mouse-resistant unit. Considering this week is in the 90s (30s C), we went with the latter option.

The air conditioner is not doing a whole lot for the top floor yet. Carla slept with her camp fan clipped to her bedframe last night. It really does a great job of cooling. (We got it for camp because it is one of the few options that requires only batteries, and not some sort of USB charger to keep it powered on.) Several of the stores we’ve been to recently have been selling fans, which makes me feel like I need more fans. But Carla and I plan to spend as much time in or near the pool as possible, as a heat-beating measure. She has a new turtle pool float and I have pool hammocks to lounge in and copious amounts of sunscreen.

REAL FEEL ONE-OH-FIVE. No thank you.

I have been exploring all the delicious options for hot-weather meals that involve no cooking whatsoever; we had chickpea salad sandwiches last night, on homemade sourdough bread that my husband’s colleague sent home with him. I am planning on making a cold noodle salad later this week, or a Mediterranean platter, or possibly another round of sandwiches, this time with this version of chickpea salad.

Interrupting my husband’s day seeing patients with really crucial discussions.

Carla and I spent the afternoon of her birthday shopping, which was delightful and exhausting. She wanted to go into every tchotchke / novelty items boutique within a ten mile radius. Our adventure included Five Below, Home Goods, Michaels, Hobby Lobby, Target, and the Dollar Store. We also went to Pet Smart, to look at the kitties.

During our expedition, we passed a new international foods store and had to check it out. They had a variety of snacks and treats from different countries. I snagged a bag of coriander flavored Doritos which are my new favorite thing. They taste just like cilantro and are SO GOOD.

Yummmmmm.

Carla was more interested to learn that this store sold squishies and fidgets that are currently all the rage. She persuaded her father to buy her a NeeDoh Fuzz Ball, but then when we got home, she noticed that it doesn’t have the NeeDoh logo on it. We got squishy scammed, y’all. My thought is that this store had no idea they were selling counterfeit NeeDohs, and so I am hoping we can go back and inform them about the problem, maybe get our money back, and definitely get some more coriander chips.  

If you live in the U.S., are you celebrating Independence Day? I dislike this holiday because of the fireworks. They are loud and dangerous and it seems like a lot of people take the expansive view that the entire month of July is for setting off firecrackers in their yards at all hours of the day and night. I get very Grumpy Old Lady about the whole thing, and my husband and I typically prefer to spend the holiday holed up in our basement, grumbling about our neighbors (him) and fretting that a rogue firework will set our home ablaze (me). (Last year, we woke up on July 5 to find our driveway littered with spent firework shells.)

Art by Sina Simburger, @sin.xline

My in laws sent my whole family holiday apparel. This was a very kind gesture, and 250 years is a momentous anniversary. For all its flaws, I love my country. We have freedoms and opportunities here that I try not to take for granted. It is exciting and remarkable that we have reached this semiquincentennial milestone. And… I kind of feel that expressing any kind of patriotism gives an inaccurate impression of my beliefs and politics. I’ve driven past a lot of houses over the past month or so that have cheerful American flag bunting on their fences, or little American flags planted in their yards, or patriotic signs trumpeting their enthusiasm for the anniversary, and part of me feels a little lift of festive joy… and another part of me feels like I have an immediate – and quite possibly biased and wrong! – insight into what kind of people they might be and what kind of beliefs they may hold. UGH. By the way: I am not saying that people more conservative than I am are “bad;” I know many people across the political spectrum who are good, kind, loving people… who simply have different views on some topics than I do. I don’t know. It’s kind of unfair, is what I’m saying, that a symbol of unity should instead carry with it the weight of judgment. As usual, I am not the first or the most articulate person to note this; but it’s particularly noteworthy to me as we inch closer to the Fourth of July.

Let’s turn to a less controversial topic, which is my cat. Poor Lenny was shut away in my room for SIX HOURS while the new air conditioner was being installed, because the HVAC people kept going in and out of the house. He bore the injustice of his imprisonment with dignity. But he did develop a winky eye, which of course made me worry that he had something seriously wrong with him. Carla and I took multiple videos and photos of him, and examined his winky eye in various lights from various angles. I envisioned eye drop prescriptions and Rachel Green-style interactions and surgical intervention and loss of the eye. I called the vet and asked their opinion; their opinion is always “bring him in.” I scheduled the first available appointment, forgetting that there were five (5) strangers meandering in and out of my house for the foreseeable future. I called the vet back and got a later appointment. I fretted as the appointment approached because the HVAC people were STILL THERE. Finally, with about forty minutes to spare, the HVAC people left. I released the cat from my room so he could use the litter box. When he reappeared, his winky eye had resolved completely.

I had texted my husband earlier in the day to alert him to the cat’s almost certain blindness. His response was “Maybe an eggshell.” This requires some backstory, which is that my husband’s colleague sent him home with some fresh eggs the other day, from her chickens. She’d packaged the eggs in a little clear egg carton and had included some instructions with them that said they should be stored on the counter. Well. Lenny was obsessed with the eggs. He must have been able to smell chicken on them? He didn’t bother them until there were only two left. At which point, I came home from Carla’s birthday shopping extravaganza to find the carton overturned on the floor, one egg completely unharmed, and the other broken. I cleaned everything up, returned the surviving egg to the carton, and put a package of insect repellent refills on top of it to make it more difficult to bat off the counter. Not difficult enough, it turns out. The next morning, we came into the kitchen to find the eggshell I’d rinsed and left on the counter to dry once again on the floor, the makeshift carton weight on the counter, and the egg carton on the floor. The remaining egg was still intact. Hence my husband’s assumption that eggshell was the source of Lenny’s winky eye.

Screenshot

I made crème brûlée for Carla’s birthday dessert, per her request. The recipe called for five egg yolks, and I saved the shells because I read that they can deter slugs. Which I think are destroying both my coleus plants and one of my hydrangea trees. I love how pretty the eggshells are, or were before I baked them and crushed them. I hope they help my coleus plants! This is the third year I’ve planted coleus in the same location, and the first time that I’ve had an issue.

What’s up with you this Wednesday? How hot is it where you are? What are you making to eat when you don’t want to turn on the oven?

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Plunging Into Spring Slash Summer Shemozzle; Dinners This Week; Are We Still Doing Easter Baskets

Yesterday, I forced my cranky self to go for a walk in the spring air with my husband. As we were chatting, I mentioned that I felt like my head was SWIRLING with all the to-dos I have ahead of me, and he sagely suggested that I write them down. Well. Writing them down helps, but it does not STOP the swirling.

What also helps is to squawk and flap at you. I know you are either going through something similar, or you know exactly what it feels like, or you have kind and/or wise and/or distracting words.

Because I have a fondness for alliteration, especially in post titles, I was looking for a synonym for “chaos / pandemonium / overwhelm” that began with an S, and I came across the word “shemozzle.” The word itself is a little sillier than how I feel; there’s something about the “ozzle” that makes me want to giggle. Say “shemozzle” out loud, it’s delightful. That very silliness is what makes it perfect. I may feel on the knife’s edge of a panic attack, but I’m panicking about silly inconsequential stuff when the world at large is full of so many massive, significant events, and “shemozzle” helps me remember that.

The first and most uncomfortable shemozzle / source of shemozzle / I have no real idea how to use this word: SUMMER.

I have finally gotten my ass into gear and started thinking about summer camp, and summer feels really, really close, and I have next to zero things planned, and the whole thing stresses me right out. Also, I spent – no exaggeration – SIX HOURS this weekend trying to research camps and fit them into the calendar and talk through them with Carla. Which is all to say that I acknowledge the many privileges and a blessings of a life in which a) I have six hours to devote to summer camp research and b) the wealth of options available to me is so extensive and c) summer camp is neither a necessity nor a hardship.

Summer camp, of course, is all tangled up in summer travel plans. (Shemozzle Two.) My husband and I are apparently inhabiting one of those logic puzzles: Suzanne wants to be in X place for Y days, her husband wants to be in X place for Z days, their daughter needs to be picked up from camp on Day Z, and they have to cross a river in a leaky boat with a hungry shark. How can Suzanne be two places at once without losing a limb?

Plus, summer has a bunch of Unknown Factors that could influence things like Which Camp Is Best and Will Our Travel Plans Work for People Besides Us, and I don’t know when the Factors will become Known and airline tickets continue to climb and also Carla’s birthday is in there somewhere and she’s been through nearly a school year’s worth of bar and bat mitzvahs that have conveyed the idea that Thirteen Is a Seriously Important Birthday but I’m not sure what besides “getting a phone” (no) or “elaborate party and religious ceremony” (also no) meets her expectations of what a Seriously Important Birthday might involve. [Edited to add: NOTE OF CLARITY – I am not opposed to phones for people’s children. A phone is not right for my particular child at this particular time, but there are many excellent and valid reasons for kids to have phones at age thirteen or even younger.]

Listen, I am well accustomed to the turmoil of Pell-Mell May, but it is still March, if only for another day, and I AM NOT READY FOR THIS LEVEL OF SHEMOZZLE.

Shall we turn to another, more pressing issue? Which is that this is a holiday week, and I am hosting one of the week’s holidays and yet I somehow still have to also feed my family on the non-holiday days.

Dinners for the Week of March 30-April 5

  • Fire Fry: My husband requested this, and if someone else is going to suggest a meal, I’m going to make it. Doesn’t hurt that fire fry is delicious.
  • Ground Beef Tacos: It’s been a minute since we’ve had tacos around here, and I’m in the mood for a Taco Tuesday.
  • Sesame Ginger Stir Fry: I think I’m feeling brave enough to try making tofu again, and this recipe sounds like the perfect incentive to attempt it.

We’ve been invited to join family friends for a Passover Seder, so that’s another night I don’t have to think about. And then I’m hosting Easter dinner. I think I’ll make a pork loin with a warm farro and veggie salad on the side. My husband has requested a cake for dessert, and has narrowed down his cake desires to a coconut cake or a carrot cake. I have never made either, and I’m always up for a cake challenge. Do you have a preference? And, if so, do you have a favorite recipe for either?

Speaking of Easter… my kid is twelve… do I still need to do the whole Easter bunny/Easter basket thing? Just the idea of thinking about it is making me weary. Are we still hiding plastic eggs all over the house? Do we need to dye eggs? Surely we should have at least a small Easter basket, right? My husband has always insisted that Easter is not a gift-giving holiday, and yet… I’ve always striven to fill my kid’s Easter basket with as many non-candy items as I can, while still trying to make it fun and exciting.

I wonder if I could get away with filling up an Easter basket with practical things, like these cute jeans Carla wants, or a new skort, or a duffel bag. I bet she would love a variety pack of spring-ish earrings. She’s been more interested in cooking for herself lately, and I’ve been stressing about SPORTS SNACKS, so perhaps a cookbook would be both fun and useful? Books are always a good gift compromise – if only Rosanne Perry’s newest novel had already come out! Carla loved attending Jeopardy! as an audience member over spring break; maybe she would enjoy a book of Jeopardy! games, or a book of trivia, or maybe even this inside peek at the show? Of course, I am also eyeing fun and silly things for Carla’s Easter basket, like these hand-holding socks or these fingernail markers or a stuffed ostrich. My child does NOT need any more stuffed animals, but the ostrich is adorable… and you know what is MORE ADORABLE is this stuffed Pallas cat OMG I want it so much. Carla also loves the latest fidget toys – she was eyeballing this squishy stick of butter at a friend’s house. Oh my goodness, she would get such a kick out of this tic-tac-toe wall hanging. Okay, now I am getting carried away. Let’s save it for her birthday, Suzanne.

I suppose I can at the very least buy some candy the next time I go to the grocery store. And maybe I will consider buying a bag of bunny farts. Carla does love both cotton candy and fart jokes, so it seems like a guaranteed win.