The Glowing Edge

  • fan enough for both of us


    The Husband loves Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. Everyone who knows him is aware of this. So whenever Reese’s comes out with yet a new form of this candy – say, “inside out” (peanut butter on the outside, chocolate on the inside) Peanut Butter Cups, or Valentine’s day PBC’s in the shape of little hearts, or white/dark/crunchy chocolate PBC’s, or a candy bar based on PBC’s, — the Husband often receives a little gift of the new item from someone he knows. He’s pretty “eh” about it; the originals suit him perfectly, and if it ain’t broke why fix it?

    Me, I find all the shapes and sizes and varieties and packages infinitely compelling. I’m a sucker for innovative package design and marketing, regardless of the product. I recently wasted 20 minutes of a (patient) co-worker’s time raving about the clever “true” hinge and lid design on the new Eclipse sugar-free mints tin. I bought Shrek M&M’s, marketed as “Ogre-sized” and “Swamp Colored.” I obsessively watch for the holiday Peeps even though I would never actually eat Peeps. If they had Martin Luther King, Jr. gum I would buy it, if it was marketed creatively (think about it, it could be cool: black and white and brown all in the same package!).

    So, all of you who give the Husband cool new candies, please disregard his subdued reaction. I love them. Keep ’em coming.

  • Needed: More Hungry Boys

    The Ice loves to cook. This weekend he wanted to make biscuits, a favorite for us. I requested a double batch, since the single barely makes it around the table in our family. The Ice has never made a double batch of anything before, so we talked about careful measurements and keeping track. He waved me out of the kitchen, preheated the oven, and happily began.

    Ten minutes later I heard a plaintive “Mom, this isn’t right.” Oh boy.

    “Did you put in each ingredient twice?” I asked.

    “Yeeee-ah,” he responded slowly, “but something’s wrong with it. It isn’t supposed to look like this.”

    I peered in to see a soupy mess in the bowl. A whole lot of soupy mess. Yikes.

    We ran the check together. “Did you measure the Bisquick in twice?”

    He had.

    “Did you measure the milk in twice? Two-thirds of a cup, two times?”

    He nodded, pointing to the measuring cup as proof. Ahh.

    We have a four-cup measuring cup. Since the first measurement on the cup is a giant “1” I knew exactly what had happened. He had measured one and two thirds of a cup in. Twice. Which equals soup.

    I shook the Bisquick box — still heavy. “I just loooove biscuits,” I told him jauntily, and dumped in the rest of the box. Well, I do.

    We had five batches of biscuits for dinner. They were very good, they were. If you were here, we would share them with you. And send some home with you, too. Some for your neighbors as well.

  • How True Love Works


    When I was in elementary school I walked to the nearby library every day after school, where I waited until one of my parents could pick me up. As a result, I was conscripted as a library volunteer, shelving books. While I loved to read, I hated to shelve. The fact that every book had a precise spot to belong annoyed me no end. Why not just put the children’s books in the same general area? Why not arrange by book size — or better yet — by color? Dealing with the whole Dewey Decimal system was like being handcuffed in a phone booth with a thousand hungry mosquitoes. Many years later, I went to art school and became a designer, eschewing all things highly ordered.

    When the Husband was elementary age, his mother took him to Hancock Fabrics whenever she went to purchase sewing supplies. Like a worshiper entering the sanctuary, he went with deep reverence and anticipation straight to the zippers.

    The zippers were always a mess. People were constantly picking up a 4″ burgundy and putting it back with the 6″ burgundies. Or mixing the oranges with the reds, or the synthetics with the cottons. Very disorderly. The Husband, age seven, was there to make it right, and he would not leave until the job was done. Many years later, he went to college in engineering and became a mathematician, statistician, and computer geek.

    And that’s why I had to marry him.

    He knows where every receipt, warranty, account number, birth certificate, registration, and instruction booklet is filed because he’s the one who filed it. Our checkbook is always balanced and our bank accounts have the best rates. We were the first in our neighborhood to be wireless, and his passwords have good strength. Our taxes are often finished by February, and there is oil in my car, gas in the tank, and air in the tires.

    Whenever I go to a fabric store, I always spend a few moments of grateful silence in front of the zippers.

  • Sweet Boy

    Last night I found a darling boy-crafted flower on my pillow when I went to bed. Had to be the Maker. This morning I took his picture with it. Don’t you think his girlfriend will go all “awwww!” over this some day?

  • but they were old enough to know better

    The Husband’s grandparents had a cat. It was one of those light orange stripey cats. They called it Orangey. When it died they had another light orange stripey cat. They called it Orangey. (Did you think you lost your place there for a minute?)

    When I was 3 I had two baby yellow-belly slider turtles. I called them Hobo and Bobo. When they died, my parents got me two more baby yellow-belly sliders. I called them Hobo and Bobo. Don’t say anything bad about Hobo and Bobo.

  • Does This Count as a Sick Day or Vacation?


    The Husband, who usually works from home, left early for an all-day work conference, so I’m on task getting the boys through their morning chores, and I’m looking immaculate in my freshly dry-cleaned suit and heels, holding my morning dose of commuter coffee in a go-cup, and waiting to get the little angels to school.

    The house is tidy, the boys are relatively clean, and I’m feeling pret-ty smug. I even made the orange juice. Minute Maid, with Calcium. All those happy vitamins.

    When school is cancelled, darkness descends. The soundtrack of my life goes from a perky happy morning tune — I’m pretty sure it was The Jetsons theme song — to a groaning, distorted goth track. Type O Negative, perhaps. This is not my iMix.

    The call coincides with the beginning of the boys’ breakfast time (chores before eating). The instant school is cancelled (the very instant, I tell you) I get a boy-report from the First and the Maker: Mom, there’s no milk for our cereal. The Ice looks cool; he was up first, finished with his chores first, used the last of the milk for his cereal thirty seconds ago.

    I can handle this one with my eyes shut.

    “Eat something different,” I say blithely. “Eat a banana.”

    “No bananas,” they report. Like this is important to me.

    “What ever,” I reply. “Make toast!”

    “No bread.” I belatedly recall that I ate the last hot dog bun for my own breakfast before they finished their chores.

    Annoyed, I retort, “Listen, you get the entire day off. I still have to work. I know there’s Bisquick, make pancakes or biscuits, for heaven’s sake.” I quickly open my computer in the kitchen to download emails. I will have to lay down the law about not bothering Mom while she works from home today. I prepare my speech in my head.

    “There’s no milk; we have to have milk to make pancakes or biscuits.”

    I breathe deeply in, then exhale fully. I yank open the refrigerator. I can see how dirty the glass shelving is, wow. Someone needs to clean that. I also note the plethora of condiments. This is like, condiment heaven or something. There’s Worcestershire sauce, two containers of parmesan cheese, seven jars of jelly (seven!), two ketchups, three mustards, two relishes, jars of garlic, horseradish, and green olives (who in our house eats green olives?), bar-b-que sauce, balsamic vinegar, pancake syrup, three kinds of salad dressing, a jar of Fluker’s Orange Cube Complete Cricket Diet (forgot that was in there – not exactly a condiment, though, is it?), steak sauce, two different kinds of lime juice, tamari soy sauce, Pick-A-Peppa sauce, a two-years-old prescription for rectal suppositories that stopped the Maker from vomiting once (again, not a condiment, I know), hot pepper rings, two open jars of salsa, mayo, and a jar of hot and spicy pickles that no one likes.

    And applesauce! I rise triumphantly. See, there is food for the children to eat for breakfast.

    At least, there is enough in the bottom for one small bowl. The First appropriates it. The Maker remembers that there’s a spare in the pantry. I walk back to my computer. Look at that pile of email.

    The Maker can’t reach the applesauce; I finish one email, fire it off, and go help him get the applesauce jar down. I open the next email. The Maker can’t get the top off the applesauce. I walk over to the table, open the applesauce, and go back to read the second email. The Maker can’t pour the applesauce direct from the jar; it’s too heavy for him. The Ice offers to spoon it out for him; what a helpful child. I sprint through three emails. Once the Maker realizes he doesn’t have to pour it out, he wants to spoon it himself. Ice digs in his heels; he’s helping and he will continue to help. The Maker makes a grab for the spoon and I hear him shout at Ice: “You got applesauce on my finger!”

    I am not fast enough.

    A blood-curdling shriek rends the air. I turn around and the Maker has pelted Ice with applesauce. It’s an actual food fight in its genesis moments. Everything’s in slow motion; voices take on that odd moo-ing quality. I am slow as frozen molasses. I am wearing a freshly dry-cleaned suit. And heels. I have made serious errors in judgment this morning, starting about four minutes ago.

    When I finish screaming, my three boys regard me with newfound respect. I gotta set of pipes. I order them up to their rooms, not to speak to, breathe on, look at, poke, consider, or send telepathic messages to one another until I have been able to rewind and start this day over again. “Find a library book and sit quietly and read it!” I shout. “Get comfortable, because you’re going to be reading all day long.” There. That should do it.

    I hear the quietest reply from upstairs, “We just returned all our library books.”

    I look over at the library bookshelf, typically loaded (in our tv-free house) with upward of 50 books at all times. Vacant.

    I resist the urge to tear my clothes.

    I could place a web survey here, so that you could vote on the likelihood of me getting any work (as in career, not hearth and home) done, but I think it’s really unnecessary, don’t you?

    So. A small daily summation, for your amusement:

    • Number of food fights: one
    • One jammed finger (swelling, turning purple), the First: splint purchased at drug store and applied
    • One sliced thumb, the Maker: band aid applied
    • One skateboard incident; no injuries
    • The Maker accidentally dropped a bike from the ceiling hanger in the garage, no injuries and my car is fine.
    • Groceries purchased, $245
    • 34 library books acquired
    • One lunch for four, prepared, served, cleaned up
    • Cat vomits cleaned up: one
    • One small incident involving the materials for an upcoming science project, no injuries
    • 17 emails handled, not counting junk mails
    • One blog post, completed

    It’s 5 pm. Quitting time, right?

  • Whatever Happened to Macaroni?

    Pasta is sooo ten minutes ago.

    Tonight the Maker gave me this special necklace to wear. It features (you guessed it) six (his age) shiny tabs pried from coke cans (Or as they say up north: soda cans. Down here, all fizzy drinks are cokes. If you want to specify which kind of coke, you can say “Diet Dr. Pepper,” and so on.) and strung together with an arm’s length of fuscia cord.

    I personally love it, and plan to wear it to work tomorrow. I may ask him to paint it white so I can call it my iNecklace.

  • what they’re listening to

    The Maker: “Turn, Turn, Turn” by the Byrds

    The Ice: “Fergalicious” by Fergie
    The First: “The Black Parade” by My Chemical Romance

    Since they listen to my iPod, they are also getting a healthy dose of 80’s metal. Lately, the tune of choice (put to the First’s recent iPhoto skateboard slideshow) is Breadfan by Metallica.

    Rock on, dudes.

  • Ancient; Yea, Crumbling Into Dust


    Tonight the Maker got his new basketball team jersey. He bounced out of the gym and into the car and announced: “My number is 12! One-two!” And he proudly showed off his shiny new shirt, it’s slippery netted surface glinting in the moonlight.

    On the ride home, he expounded on the great good fortune of having received such a perfect number on his jersey. “It’s my age plus my age,” he explained.

    We sighed, reveling in perfection. Then a new thought struck him. “Can I be twelve now, instead of six?” he asked.

    It seemed like a reasonable request, but I prodded for the possible drawbacks. “Sure,” I replied amicably, “but what do you want, now that you’re twelve?”

    He was ready for me. “Six more birthday cakes!” he cried.

    You gotta watch six year olds. They’re tricky.

    As we pulled into the garage, the Maker murmured wistfully, “I wish I had a birthday every single day. I’d have a lot of cakes by now. A thousand! A hundred million!”

    But then he explored the possible drawbacks. “But that’s so many birthdays I’d be dead,” he reasoned, then added solemnly, “or as old as you.”

  • golden hour playlist

    So Are You to Me, Eastmountainsouth
    Orange Sky, Alexi Murdoch
    Because You Are a Woman, Brett Dennen
    World Spins Madly On, The Weepies
    The Littlest Birds, The Be Good Tanyas
    Butterfly, Mason Jennings
    Let Me Go, Sonya Kitchell
    I Just Love You, Five for Fighting
    Be Here Now, Mason Jennings

    …and if I had more time, I’d link them all appropriately. Too bad.

    Favorite album art from the above selection: definitely The Weepies. Clean, evocative, tonal. Nifty font treatment. And since I like them so much, a link! Go there and drink your fill of these melodic, folky tunes from the fresh singing and songwriting team of Deb Talan and Steve Tannen.

    Just right for a back porch afternoon and a glass of wine.