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Posts Tagged ‘Peeves’

“She hates time, make it stop”

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on August 22, 2010| Leave a Comment »

For reasons that should be obvious from some of my earlier posts, my anthem for this summer is Bowling For Soup’s 1999 song “1985.”


These lyrics in particular really resonate with me lately:

She’s seen all the classics, she knows every line
Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, even St. Elmo’s Fire
She rocked out to Wham!, not a big Limp Bizkit fan
Thought she’d get a hand on a member of Duran Duran

Where’s the mini-skirt made of snake skin?
And who’s the other guy that’s singing in Van Halen?
When did reality become TV?
Whatever happened to sitcoms, game shows, on the radio was

Springsteen, Madonna, way before Nirvana
There was U2 and Blondie and music still on MTV
Her two kids in high school they tell her that she’s uncool
‘Cause she’s still preoccupied with 19-19-1985
(Woo hoo hoo)

She hates time, make it stop
When did Motley Crue become classic rock?
And when did Ozzy become an actor?
Please make this stop, stop, stop!

I can’t stop time, and I can’t go back to my 20s, so I must find joy in the present. And in the present, I find joy in little things.

Here’s a non-comprehensive list in no particular order of 50 things of things that make me happy.

  1. Doing impressions with Eddie of Tim Gunn.
  2. When Gideon yells “I love you, Mama” in crowded places.
  3. A hot, hilarious, handy husband
  4. Deciding to give up hoping that certain people will stop saying mean, untrue things about Eddie and me.
  5. Realizing that my best will never be good enough for some people, and coming to terms with that (a corollary to the above).
  6. Greek yogurt
  7. Greek yogurt with pomegranate
  8. Montessori school
  9. An iTunes playlist on which artists such as Lady Gaga, Will Smith, Amy Winehouse, OK Go and the Dixie Chicks live together harmoniously.
  10. Kenny Chesney’s “She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy“
  11. When my mother-in-law isn’t speaking to us
  12. “Everything” bagels
  13. That my father found a woman who makes him happy in his post-Mom life.
  14. Shopping for groceries
  15. Trying new recipes
  16. Having friends over
  17. Close female friends I’ve had for years who “get” me (Trish, Linda, Julia, Tina, Khaki, Heidi, Sophia and Terri come to mind)
  18. Funny male friends (Royce, Billy, Edgar, Alex, James, Ed, Michael — I’m talking about you)
  19. Facebook and Twitter
  20. Certain past and present students
  21. My Beer of the Month Club membership
  22. Grammar, punctuation and spelling errors in the wild because it means fodder for this blog
  23. Hearing the kids sing along to Owl City’s “Fireflies“
  24. Primary colors, especially blue
  25. Coffee, specifically in a Starbucks frappuccino
  26. That I killed a venomous snake by myself
  27. Entertainment Weekly and People magazines
  28. AP Style
  29. “Amazing Race,” “Survivor,” “Project Runway,” “Top Chef”
  30. Knowing how to make certain meals, such as empanadas with Spanish rice, without a recipe
  31. Dominic’s interest in science
  32. That Eddie and I know what each other is thinking with one look (a code look)
  33. Cheese
  34. Cranium
  35. Flamin’ Hot Cheetos Puffs (of course)
  36. Chickens
  37. That I can figure out a way to get to New York roughly twice a year
  38. Week 10 of the quarter
  39. Apple products
  40. Leaves changing in the fall
  41. Christmas Eve
  42. A quiet house
  43. Candles
  44. Living near lakes, the ocean, and people with pools
  45. Petra’s strawberry cake
  46. Ida’s Iranian cutlets
  47. Dragonflies
  48. Zunzi’s
  49. “Walter the Farting Dog“
  50. Bedtime

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Publication envy

Posted in Grammar, etc., tagged , , , , , , , , on August 16, 2010| 1 Comment »

I must confess that I am jealous of Jeff Deck and Benjamin Herson. “Who are they?” you might ask. If you did, then you are not one of the dozen or so people who have sent me the link to all the coverage of their amazing book, “The Great Typo Hunt.”

I used to read their blog, but now the blog seems more focused on their amazing book tour. A book tour. For writing a book about noticing and fixing typos. SIGH.

Maybe someday “Eats, Shoots and Lays” will be a book. But until then, I must be satisfied with noting errors on a small scale.

Lucky me, there is no shortage of errors.

In today’s mail, there was a doozy:

AFLAC is a fairly big company, no? So they must have some senior folks in charge of their unsolicited mailings. Well, whoever these folks are, they need to revisit the rules for apostrophes.

I’ll go a little easier on the produce manager at Piggly Wiggly because the mistake is not quite as public. (It didn’t go through the U.S. mail on the cover of an envelope.)

Hmm … “Beefstake” tomatoes. Like really chunky, flavorful tomatoes grown on a piece of wood stuck in the ground? Or like “beefcake” — muscular, handsome tomatoes? Oh it’s a darn heterograph tripping up our friend in produce. “Beefsteak” is the word he/she needs.

Speaking of public, this is about as public as it gets:

Stay classy, North Carolina!

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Avatar: The Last Sharpie

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , on August 12, 2010| 6 Comments »

Dominic and Gideon wake up before Eddie and I do. We’ve been strongly encouraging them to stay in their rooms and play quietly.

This morning, Eddie left very early to open the gym. Usually, the kids are up when he leaves at 6:30. Not this morning. I was pleased, thinking they were playing quietly or still sleeping.

I should have been worried.

About an hour later, I woke up again — this time to Dominic yelling, “Mama! I made Gideon look like Aang!”

Aang is the main character in “Avatar: The Last Airbender.”

And here is Gideon as Aang.

Yes, that is Sharpie permanent marker all over him (it was in Gideon’s room to mark his height chart). Here is the back view for your enjoyment:

(I promise we feed him. He’s going through a massive growth spurt.)

So cute. So awful.

The "artiste," "Aang" and Mona (who doesn't care what kind of crap anyone has on his face)

Dominic realized he had made a mistake when he saw the look on my face. He started saying he was sorry, but what could I do? I laughed. I laughed to keep from crying.

I guess I should be happy he has artistic talent.

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Mile-high ditty

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , , , on August 8, 2010| 1 Comment »

Sing the following to the tune of John Cougar Mellencamp’s “Jack and Diane.”

Little ditty about Beth and Sophia
Two American chicks livin’ it up for just a week.
Beth is gonna be a new media star.
Sophia had plenty of fun without a car.

Right. So I’m not a songwriter. What I am, apparently, is an academic who finds enjoyment in conferences where people present research that might be boring to 95 percent of the population.

I was in Denver this week for the annual Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communications conference. I was just here in April for the AWP conference. This time, though, I didn’t have access to a car, so I walked or took the fantastic Denver public transportation, which allowed me to really get to know the city. It is, for the most part, clean and beautiful, with street performers on every corner. (Although, Eddie would point out that there is plenty of “bummery.”)

"Mile-high City" as seen from Room 2122 of the Sheraton.

What made this trip even better was the presence of my friend Sophia. While I was enjoying an endless parade of panel discussions and presentations about new media, old media, social media, technology and pedagogy, Sophia was taking bike rides around the city, visiting museums, and browsing boutiques in Boulder.

One thing we decided to do together was the Denver Microbrew Tour. We were running late and were starving, so we grabbed sandwiches to go from The Lobby, the restaurant across the street from the tour’s first stop, Great Divide. At strategic pauses during the tour portion at the Great Divide, Sophia and I took gobble breaks. Not pretty, but we didn’t want to get hammered on the tour.

Sophia is holding the bag of to-go containers in her right hand.

We finally finished our meal at the next stop on the tour: Breckenridge Brewery, across, ironically, from Coors Field (home of the Colorado Rockies).

Up next: Wynkoop Brewing Company, home of a beer brewed with Anaheim chiles and smoked Ancho peppers. The beer is called Patty’s Chile Beer.

Or is it?

They should change that sign. The beer is made with “chile” peppers.

The last stop on the tour was Rock Bottom Restaurant and Brewery, which put us back on 16th Street where we caught the free MallRide back to base camp.

After a short nap, we headed out again. This time, our destination was Mizuna, the restaurant that Anthony Bourdain said was the only reason to go to Colorado. I practically had to take out a second mortgage, but it was worth it: Best. Meal. Ever. Fat and happy, we headed “home” in a cab.

The next day, Sophia headed home and I headed downstairs for another day of conferencing.

Oh yeah, life goes on
Long after the thrill of Mizuna is gone.
Oh yeah, life goes on
Long after the thrill of the conference is gone. Now rock on.

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Cruel intentions

Posted in Grammar, etc., tagged , , , on August 3, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Let’s talk about intent. SCAD graduate student Charlotte (fiancée of my friend Nate) provided a visual aid for this topic exploration.

I’m sure the writer wanted to get people excited about UGA football. But what he/she has really done is offer tickets to specific dogs. What do they want with those? And how much is $10,0000? Is it really $100,000? Or $10,000? I’ll take either.

My friend Heidi provided another good example.

The writer probably does not want people to sit in that cushy-looking chair. But instead, the sign warns against a sit-in. What about picketing or rioting? Are those OK instead?

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Around Atlanta in 60 hours

Posted in Grammar, etc., Random, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 29, 2010| 6 Comments »

Some friends of ours returned from Abu Dhabi for the summer, and wanted to take a family trip to Atlanta.

It was an opportunity we could not refuse.

We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn because of its proximity to the places we wanted to visit, and because Hilton was offering a package called “The Great Getaway” that offered free breakfast. Sign us up!

Here are the places we visited:

In addition to all the wonderful beasts of the waterways, the aquarium also has a whale slide. Billy, who is not a small man, decided he would try it out. Dominic said, “The whale’s gonna choke!”

Gideon and Mana enjoy some alone time.

It’s less a museum and more an educational Monkey Joe’s. Lots of screaming, running, banging, etc. And the kids made noise too (ba-dum-dum). Let’s just call it “collaborative learning.”

Gideon plays with the moon sand.

That place seemed so much bigger (and cooler) when I was an elementary school kid on a field trip. We saw the Galaxy Gameshow at the planetarium. I think the kids enjoyed it, but I don’t really know. I was asleep. And so were the other three adults. In fact, Eddie said as we left, “So we paid $12 for a nap?” Yes, yes we did.

Fernbank is to the American Museum of Natural History as CitiTrends is to Henri Bendel.

It’s my favorite mall in Atlanta, and I used to work in one of the clothing stores when I was in college. (I won’t say which store because it is just too embarrassing, even for me). We weren’t really there to shop, though. I had to get the hinge on my MacBook Air fixed. While I was doing that, everyone else ate ice cream.

The screaming stopped when they got ice cream.

This is my favorite hotel in the world, and I love this restaurant. It’s a little pricey, but it is worth it for the view.

Lunch over Atlanta

On the way there, I noticed this sign.

Only in the South, y’all.

No visit to Atlanta is complete without a naked dog with cheese, fries and an FO (Frosted Orange). Of course, then I slip into a grease-induced coma, but I don’t care.

The plan was to go to The Old Spaghetti Factory (cheesy but yummy and cheap) but it was closed. (For those of you keeping count, that’s the fourth of my favorite restaurants that has closed in the past year. Am I bad luck?) So we went across the street to Mary Mac’s. Despite it being an Atlanta landmark, I had never eaten there. It is Mrs. Wilkes’ Dining Room and The Lady & Sons restaurant in a larger environment. A butter-induced coma ensued.

  • The hotel pools

There were two pools — one outdoor, one indoor — and a jacuzzi. With five kids in the party, though, there are bound to be time-outs, even at the pool. The award for Best Actor in a Dramatic Role goes to my son Gideon for his role in “Pool Party, Pity Party.”

Time-out, party of four

I found another lovely sign here also.

Does the “mangement” handle identifying the “persons with communicable diseases” using the pool?

Overall, it was a fun trip, but also very exhausting. I think Dominic would agree.

All tuckered out

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Sans pride

Posted in Grammar, etc., tagged , on July 17, 2010| Leave a Comment »

For those of you who think people are too hard on Comic Sans, you can show your support for the font by wearing this:

(Thanks, Morgan!)

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A mother’s confessional

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , on July 14, 2010| 16 Comments »

Is it wrong that I am counting down the days until school starts again? I am teaching three online classes so I can be home with the kids every day during the summer.

And that was a mistake.

I am not cut out to be a stay-at-home mom. I admire women who are. And those women who homeschool have my ultimate respect.

Let me assure you that I love my children with all my heart. I think they are funny, interesting little people. I would take a bullet for them. I adore them. However, my amount of patience is inversely proportional to the amount of time spent alone with the boys during the summer when they have extra energy and less self-control. And the days are longer.

Women don’t like to admit stuff like this. They pretend they are always so Zen with their kids. And maybe some are. But I’m not, and I want to talk about it because I know I’m not alone. This sounds like some kind of addiction meeting: “Hello. My name is Beth, and my kids drive me crazy.”

Every day, I say one of the following sentences. (See this related post for sentences I never thought I’d say.)

1. Leave the dog alone.

2. Stop standing on the furniture.

3. Please stop yelling.

4. Keep your hands to yourself (and its corollary: Leave your brother alone).

5. If you don’t put those toys away, I’m getting a trash bag and I’ll put them away for you.

This week, I’ve also been saying this every day: “No, we can’t watch ‘Land of the Lost.'”

Loss of patience can lead to mother rage. That concept is addressed in a hilarious manner by Anne Lamott in this post that is rather old, but still apropos.

Can I get a “Holla” here? Anyone?

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Redneck missionary work

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , , on July 13, 2010| Leave a Comment »

When Trish and I were getting in my car after the Redneck Games, I noticed something stuck under my windshield. I just grabbed it and threw it in the car without looking at it. Much later, when I was about to throw it away, I actually looked at it.

The headline: “Rednecks can be Christians too!”

Oh boy.

Let me share with you some “wisdom” from the pamphlet.

If I had to stand before a dozen terrorists who threaten my life, I’d choose a half dozen or so rednecks to back me up. Tire irons, squirrel guns and grit — that’s what rednecks are made of.

Wow. Somehow I don’t think a tire iron is a match for an AK47. But maybe a squirrel gun is equal to an IED made by a weak terrorist in training. Grit, as in gumption, might be equal, although grit, as in particles, probably is not: Sand tends to get in crannies a little more obnoxiously than Georgia red clay does.

I’ve scanned the brochure for your enjoyment.

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Dan Gilbert needs help

Posted in Grammar, etc., tagged , , , , on July 9, 2010| 4 Comments »

Despite the fact that I don’t give a rat’s ass where LeBron James ends up, I have not been able to escape the news (Miami). Apparently, there are some folks in the Buckeye State who are pretty pissed off — folks like Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert, who wrote an open letter to fans of the Cavs.

I don’t really care about the letter, except to point out that someone should have proofread it with an eye toward unnecessary quotation marks. Take a look at this excerpt:

To make matters worse, that font is Comic Sans.

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