So That Happened

In keeping with the tradition I started...whatever week I started it, each item on this week's list will be accompanied by a random picture that has nothing to do with anything.

I call him Pilgrim 'Bama.  He lives on our microwave.

This weekend is my mom's annual holiday pottery sale. Today my friend Ellen graciously donated her time to keeping me entertained. El helped wrap pots for a while, and then joined me for an afternoon dedicated to baking cookies and listening to CDs we used to listen to in high school, back when we would unwittingly change the lyrics to all the songs. (I can say definitively that it is freedom, not Jesus, that U2 describes as having "a scent like the top of a newborn baby's head.") At the end of the day we went into the studio so Ellen could say goodbye to my mom. I slid the door open, saw someone inside who looked vaguely familiar and who seemed to know exactly who I was (story of my life) and I promptly ran into the wall. Because my embarrassing moments always come in pairs, I followed my collision with: "Well that's a wall." Really? Really? I am most definitely going to die alone.

You may recall that last week I reached the pinnacle of excitement in my life with the arrival of my NPR sticker in the mail, followed shortly by the discovery of the diffuser attachment on my mom's hairdryer. I proceeded to devise a spectrum of my excitement levels--you know, for posterity. Here was my list as of a few nights ago, from most to least exciting (note some missing items):

Amazing dog at Myrtle Edwards Park.

Moving back to Australia--->the Amos Lee concert next month--->NPR sticker--->thinking about how cool it would be to own the rhino from the zoo that can paint with its mouth--->diffuser------------------->having to throw away my favorite pair of socks because they have holes in them. 
So that was my list before my brother came over one night for dinner. We were chatting while eating and he said, "I'm really excited for tomorrow because I get to finish my avocado!" I was so thrilled that my brother is, after all, as freakish as me that I decided to create a whole new level of excitement. Sandwiched between the painting rhino and my mom's diffuser is now "Michael and his avocado."

My baby hates me so much.

I'm currently eavesdropping on a Comedy Central joke my dad is attempting to relay to my mom downstairs. In it, the comedians were making fun of Sarah Palin tweeting. Evidently they said that she was not the first political figure to make use of Twitter. This is a direct quote from my dad: "So they brought up a screen with tweets from Abraham Lincoln. 'Four score and seven....' Oh man. I can't remember the rest, but it was really funny." Impeccable delivery, Pops.

I made spinach gnocchi for Thanksgiving.

I'm very pleased to announce that I have decoded my cat's behavior. More specifically, I have identified the impulse in her little feline brain that causes her to swat at her benevolent human overlords every time we pass her. It's not malicious--she just doesn't want us to leave. I stumbled upon this yesterday evening when she was sitting in a kitchen chair and I was kneeling on the floor next to her, kissing her head (as I can't help doing) and scratching her ears. When I stood up and started to walk away, I immediately felt her paw whack my leg. Her tail was not twitching as it does when she's brainstorming the most sanitary ways to dispose of our bodies, nor were her ears angled back like she was trying to make herself more aerodynamic for lunging or pouncing purposes. She was calm, eyes half-closed (or half-open if you're an optimist, which I'm not), purring. She just wanted a little more love. And really, who doesn't?